The church clock began to strike. Could a whole hour have gone by? It seemed more like a quarter of an hour. She had her great sorrow, and superimposed on it a childish regret that the expectant watching was over; she had enjoyed the vigil, and it appeared now that no balm whatever remained to her. Reluctantly she drew in her body and shut the window softly, shutting out the last vestige of hope, and carrying with her, as she padded back to her bedroom, the full sense of her unbelievable silliness. Her mind swerved round to Mrs. Earlforward’s ordeal; her heart overflowed with benevolence towards Mrs. Earlforward, and with a sublime determination to stand by Mrs. Earlforward in any crisis that might arise. She forgot herself for a space, and became tranquil and cheerful and uplifted.
Then she felt hungry. Since midday she had eaten little, having refused offers of meals on her visits, and accepted only snacks, lest she might deplete larders already very inadequate. She took the candle into the kitchen cautiously, but also with a certain domination; for at nights the entire second-floor was her realm. She opened the kitchen window and the cage, and procured for herself more of the diminished cheese and one or two cold potatoes and a piece of bread crust. Then she arranged the side-flap of sacking on the cage to protect it against possible rain. She ate slowly, enjoying with deliberation each morsel. After all, she had one positive pleasure in life. She knew she was wicked; she knew she was a thief; she did not defend herself by subtle arguments. Of late she had been stealing more and more, and had received no reproach. She thought “they” had given up taking stock of the larder. She was becoming a hardened criminal.
VI
Henry’s Plot
When Violet awoke the next morning at the appointed time for waking, and heard the familiar muffled sounds of Elsie’s activity, she was tempted to stay in bed; she had not had a good night, and she felt quite disturbingly unwell; indeed, her physical sensations, although not those of acute pain, alarmed her by a certain fundamental quality involving the very basis of her vitality. But she resisted the temptation, apprehensive of the results, on herself and on the household organism, of any change of habit. The upset would be terrible if she failed in her daily role; Henry would maintain his calm, but beneath the calm “what a state he would be in!” She knew him (she said to herself). “I shall be better on my feet, and I shall worry less.” So she arose to the cold room and to the cold water. Henry was quite bland and cheerful, and said that he had slept well. It was his custom to get up as soon as Violet had washed. He did not get up.
“Aren’t you going to get up? I’ve finished here.” She was folding the towel.
“I think I shall stay where I am for a bit,” he announced with tranquillity.
It was just as if he had given her a dizzying blow. This, then, was the beginning of the end. She crossed the room to the bed, and gazed at him aghast.
“Now, Vi!” he admonished her, pulling at his short beard. “Now, Vi!”
There was so much affection, so much loving banter, in his queer tone, that her glance fell before his, as it had not fallen for months. She covered her exposed throat with her cold, damp hands.
“I shall send for the doctor at once,” she announced with vivacity, all her body tingling in sudden energy.
“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” he said. “I’ve told you I’m all right. But I’ll promise you one thing. Next time the medicine-man comes to see you he shall see me as well, if you like. … Now”—he changed his tone to the practical—“you can attend to everything in the shop. Surely it can manage without me for a day or two.”
“ ‘A day or two’!” she thought. “Is he taking to his bed permanently? Is that it?”
“And I shall save a clean shirt,” he said reflectively.
“But, darling, if you’re all right, why must you stay in bed? Please, please, do be open with me. You never are—if you know what I mean.” She spoke with a plaintive and eager appeal, as it were girlishly. Her face, with an almost forgotten mobility, showed from moment to moment the varying moods of her emotion; tears hung in her eyes; and she was less than half-dressed. She looked as if she might sob, shriek, and drop in a hysterical paroxysm to the floor.
“Something has to be done about that thief of an Elsie,” Henry very calmly explained. “Of course, I could put a lock on the cage, but that might seem stingy, miserly, and I should be sorry if anybody thought we were that. Besides, she’s a good sort in some ways. She’s got to be frightened; she’s got to be impressed. You send her in to me. You can talk to her yourself as much as you like afterwards, but send her in to me first. I’ll teach her a lesson.”
“How? What are you going to say to her?”
“I shall tell her we’ve had the doctor, and make out I’m very ill
