“We can only do what we think right,” she said, as she passed in through the passage upstairs.
She felt sure from what had passed that he had not sent the money to Sophy. But why not? Sophy had said that he was bashful. Was he so far bashful that he did not dare himself to send the money to the girl he loved, though he had no scruple as to giving it to her through another person? And, as for bashfulness, it seemed to her that the man spoke out his mind clearly enough. He could scold her, she thought, without any difficulty, for it still seemed that his voice and manner were rough to her. He was never rough to Sophy; but then she had heard so often that love will alter a man amazingly!
Then she wrote her letter to Sophy, and explained as well as she could the whole affair. She was quite sure that Sophy would regret the loss of the money. Sophy, she knew, would have accepted it without scruple. People, she said to herself, will be different. But she endeavoured to make her friend understand that she, with her feelings, could not be the medium of sending on presents of which she disapproved. “I have given him your address,” she said, “and he can suit himself as to writing to you.” In this letter she enclosed a money order for the contribution made to Sophy’s comfort out of her own wages.
Sophy’s answer, which came in a day or two, surprised her very much. “As to Mr. Hall’s money,” she began, “as things stand at present perhaps it is as well that you didn’t take it.” As Lucy had expected that grievous fault would be found with her, this was comfortable. But it was after that, that the real news came. Sophy was a great deal better; that was also good tidings;—but she did not want to leave Hastings just at present. Indeed she thought that she did not want to leave it at all. A very gentlemanlike young man, who was just going to be taken into partnership in a hairdressing establishment, had proposed to her;—and she had accepted him. Then there were two wishes expressed;—the first was that Lucy would go on a little longer with her kind generosity, and the second—that Mr. Hall would not feel it very much.
As regarded the first wish, Lucy resolved that she would go on at least for the present. Sophy was still on sick leave from the office, and, even though she might be engaged to a hairdresser, was still to be regarded as an invalid. But as to Mr. Hall, she thought that she could do nothing. She could not even tell him—at any rate till that marriage at Hastings was quite a settled thing. But she thought that Mr. Hall’s future happiness would not be lessened by the event. Though she had taught herself to love Sophy, she had been unable not to think that her friend was not a fitting wife for such a man. But in telling herself that he would have an escape, she put it to herself as though the fault lay chiefly in him. “He is so stern and so hard that he would have crushed her, and she never would have understood his justness and honesty.” In her letter of congratulation, which was very kind, she said not a word of Abraham Hall, but she promised to go on with her own contribution till things were a little more settled.
In the meantime she was very poor. Even brown dresses won’t wear forever, let them be ever so brown, and in the first flurry of sending Sophy off to Hastings—with that decent apparel which had perhaps been the means of winning the hairdresser’s heart—she had got somewhat into debt with her landlady. This she was gradually paying off, even on her reduced wages, but the effort pinched her closely. Day by day, in spite of all her efforts with her needle, she became sensible of a deterioration in her outward appearance which was painful to her at the office, and which made her most careful to avoid any meeting with Abraham Hall. Her boots were very bad, and she had now for some time given up even the pretence of gloves as she went backwards and forwards to the office. But perhaps it was her hat that was most vexatious. The brown straw hat which had lasted her all the summer and autumn could hardly be induced to keep its shape now when November was come.
One day, about three o’clock in the afternoon, Abraham Hall went to the Post Office, and, having inquired among the messengers, made his way up to the telegraph department at the top of the building. There he asked for Miss Graham, and was told by the doorkeeper that the young ladies were not allowed to receive visitors during office hours. He persisted, however, explaining that he had no wish to go into the room, but that it was a matter of importance, and that he was very anxious that Miss Graham should be asked to come out to him. Now it is a rule that the staff of the department who are engaged in sending and receiving messages, the privacy of which may be of vital importance, should be kept during the hours of work as free as possible from communication with the public. It is not that either the girls or the young men would be prone to tell the words which they had been the means of passing on to their destination, but that it might be worth the while of some sinner to offer great temptation, and that the power of offering it should be lessened as much as possible. Therefore, when Abraham Hall pressed his request the doorkeeper told him that
