It would have been simple in the old Vicarage; in Beresford Road it was impossible. She kept her two lives apart, despising herself for snobbishness and lack of courage, but keeping the place she had made for herself and living almost freely for half her time. No one there would have suspected her of the fears that assailed her at night or of yearnings for beauty within and without. She was a hard worker and though this keenness and an odd sense of fair play constrained her from being tiresome in class, these virtues were forgiven for the sake of her readiness to see and mimic the peculiarities of her superiors; the Ruth who strolled homewards with her friends was gay and impudent, or downright and cynical according to her mood and the impression she wished to make, and very different from the one who, later on, brooded over the supper-table, and to a Ruth who, one day, was showing off more successfully than usual, it was terrible to turn and see the approaching figure of Miss Mole, clad in a very old-fashioned ulster. It might have been a handsome, and it must have been a sturdy garment when it was bought: it had a character which the oncoming of dusk and the drizzling rain could not disguise: it gave Miss Mole a waist where waists no longer existed and a breadth of shoulder out of all proportion to her thin frame; it was impossible not to notice it and it was all Ruth could do to sustain her mirth under the sound of those rapidly-approaching footsteps.
The figure passed; Ruth felt a nudge at each side of her; someone giggled and Ruth continued her chatter, but when she parted from her companions, she began to run, drawing sharp breaths through her piteously-parted lips. She was like Peter: she had denied her friend, and if those girls ever saw the ulster again and recognised Miss Mole as the wearer, what would they think of Ruth? They had nudged and giggled and she had not said a word. She ought to have called out to Miss Mole and stopped her, but she had been afraid of ridicule. She had not only committed a disloyal act, but one which might be discovered, and in that bitter moment she learnt that secret sin could be forgotten, while sin revealed to the world could be remembered forever. All she could do now was to hurry and wipe away some of the stain.
Going home was not quite as bad as it had been for the last two years, she was not so anxious to linger in the streets, her habit of running past the next-door house and entering her own with a rush, was an old one, and Miss Mole, lighting the hall gas, showed no surprise at Ruth’s breathless entrance, though her sharply benevolent eyes may have seen more than the dampness of Ruth’s clothes as she said briskly, “Don’t stand about in your coat. And you’ll change your stockings, won’t you?”
“What about you, Miss Mole?” Ruth said faintly. “You’re wet, too.”
Miss Mole patted the abominable ulster. “It can’t get through this. Do go and change or you’ll have a cold and it seems a pity to waste one when there isn’t a party to dodge.”
Ruth’s smile was wan. Miss Mole, revealing herself as a person of humour and understanding, was simply making things worse for her. She went towards the stairs where there was more shadow. “Did you come across Regent Square?”
“Yes. I’d been for a walk round the hill to look at the river. Lovely it was, too, in the rain. The mist was thick on the water and there was a tree on the other side like a torch blazing through a fog. But the leaves will be dropping under this rain.”
For a moment, Ruth was held from her purpose. She wished Miss Mole would go on talking like that. She said things differently, in Ruth’s experience, from other people and in a different voice. She had spoken of a moony night, and beauty and peace had stolen over her listener, and now Ruth felt the chill danger of thick mist and the joy of seeing light ahead. The necessity for confession seemed less pressing, the world of vision became of more importance than the one of facts, and while she was persuading herself that it would be easy and kinder to be silent, she began to speak.
“Miss Mole,” she said, “I think I saw you. I mean—I saw you. But you went past so quickly and I was too late. You know how things happen. I ought to have shouted to you at once, but it would have looked so funny to the other girls if I’d recognised you when you were nearly out of sight, so I didn’t—but I feel so mean.”
“Mean?” said Hannah. “I’m grateful. When I’m in this ulster, I’m supposed to be invisible. I know what it’s like. I ought not to wear it at all, but it’s thick and it’s an old friend. If you’d stopped me I should have died of shame. Thank goodness you didn’t. I won’t run the risk again, except in the dark. Now will you kindly go and change those clothes? You ought to have worn your mackintosh. It’s high-tea night and when I was up on the hill I suddenly thought of mushrooms and I bought some on the way home. We’ll have them with scrambled eggs and you can come and help me if you like.”
Ruth was childish in some ways, but she was not stupid. She could see that Miss
