“I’m coming in again in a minute or two. I’ve just got to go across the Steps on an errand,” she said, and kissed him. Both of them had also the belief that her kisses did him good; and this conviction was better founded than the other one. She had said nothing to him about Mrs. Earlforward’s operation. He had learnt only that Elsie was mistress because Mrs. Earlforward was in hospital; the full story might have aggravated his mental distress.
“Elsie!” It was Mr. Earlforward’s summons as she crossed the landing on her way down.
She put no more than her face—a rather mettlesome face—into the room.
“What do you keep on going upstairs for?”
Yes. He suspected. With strange presence of mind she replied promptly:
“I’ve just been up for the key of the shop, sir. I left it up in my room. I can’t go out and leave the shop door on the latch, can I?”
“Well, bring me all the letters.”
“Oh, very well. Very well!” She was hostile again.
This time she shut the bedroom door, ignoring his protest. Then she went upstairs once more and locked her own door on the outside and carried off the key. At any rate, if in some impossible caprice he should take it into his head to prowl about the house in her absence, he should not pry into her room. He had no right to do so. And she was absolutely determined to defend her possession of Joe. A moment later she bounced into Mr. Earlforward’s bedroom, and carelessly dropped all the letters on to the bed—a regular shower of envelopes and packets.
“There!” she exclaimed, on a hard and inimical note, as if saying: “You asked for them. You’ve got them. And I wash my hands of it all.”
Mr. Earlforward saw that he must walk warily. She was a changing Elsie, a disagreeably astonishing Elsie. He did not quite know where he was with her.
As she emerged from the shop into the Steps a young woman with a young dog, stopping suddenly, addressed her in soft, apprehensive, commiserating accents:
“How is Mr. Earlforward this evening?”
“He seems to think as he’s a bit better, ’m, thank you, in himself,” Elsie answered brightly. She was uplifted by the mere concern in the voice, and at once felt more kindly towards her master, was indeed rather ashamed of her recent harshness to him.
Dusk had now fallen, and she could not see very clearly, but the next instant she had recognized both the woman and the dog. Quite a lady! A sort of a sealskin coat! Gloves! Utterly different from the savage creature of the previous night. The dog, too, was different. A dog lacking yet in experience of the world, and apt to forget that a dog’s business is to keep an eye on its guardian if it sets any store on a quiet and safe existence; but still well disposed towards its guardian, and apparently in no fear of her. More remorse for Elsie.
“Oh! I’m so glad! … And Mrs. Earlforward?”
“Oh, ’m! We haven’t heard. We’re expecting news.”
“I do hope everything’ll be all right. Operation—internal trouble, isn’t it?”
“Yes, ’m.”
“Yes. So I heard. Well, thank you. Good night. Skip—Skip!”
Skip was the disturber of repose, and he responded, leaping. The two disappeared round the corner.
It was wonderful to Elsie how everybody knew, and how kind everybody was. She was touched. The woman had given her the illusion that the whole of Clerkenwell was filled with anxiety for the welfare of her master and her mistress. Her sense of responsibility was intensified. If the whole of Clerkenwell knew that she was secretly harbouring her young man in her bedroom! … She went hot. The complexity of her situation frightened her afresh.
Belrose’s was at its old royal game of expending vast quantities of electric current. The place had just been lighted up, and had the air of a popular resort; it warmed and vitalized all the Steps by its radiance, which seemed to increase from month to month. What neither Mr. Earlforward nor anybody else of the old Clerkenwell tradition had ever been able to understand or approve was the continual illumination of the upper storeys. And yet the solution of the mystery was simple, and lay in a fact with which most of the district was familiar. Belrose had “gone in for wholesale.” Elsie entered the shop very timidly, for she regarded her errand as “presuming,” and in the midst of all her anxieties she had diffidence enough to be a little ashamed of it.
The shop was most pleasantly warm; its warmth was a greeting which would have overpowered some folk; and there was a fine rich odour of cheese and humanity. Also the shop was full. You could scarcely move in it. The stock was plenteous, and the character of the stock had changed. Advertised brands of comestibles of universal consumption were far less prominent than under previous regimes, and there was a great deal more individuality. The travellers and the collectors of advertised brands now called at the establishment with a demeanour different from of old; they had to leave their hard-faced, bullying manner on the doorstep. Two enormous and smiling young, mature women stood behind the counter. Their magnificently rounded façades were covered with something that was only white on Saturdays and Wednesdays, and certainly was not white tonight. Like the shop itself the servers were neither tidy nor clean; but they were hearty, gay and active, and they had authority, for one of them was Mr. Belrose’s sister, and the other Mrs. Belrose’s sister; nevertheless, they looked like sisters; they both had golden, rough hair and ruddy complexions, and the same experienced, comprehending, jolly expression, and fat, greasy hands.
There were four customers in the shop, of course all women, and the six
