“I’m going to keep it on,” she said.
“You’ll be awfully hot. You’ll only catch cold when we go out.”
“I don’t care. It’s the first time I’ve worn it. Don’t you think it’s lovely. And look: the muff matches.”
I gave the cape a glance. It was of fur. I did not know it was sable.
“It looks awfully rich. How did you get that?”
“Jack Kuyper gave it to me. We went and bought it yesterday just before he went away.” She stroked the smooth fur; she was as happy with it as a child with a toy. “How much d’you think it cost?”
“I haven’t an idea.”
“Two hundred and sixty pounds. Do you know I’ve never had anything that cost so much in my life? I told him it was far too much, but he wouldn’t listen. He made me have it.”
Rosie chuckled with glee and her eyes shone. But I felt my face go stiff and a shiver run down my spine.
“Won’t Driffield think it’s rather funny, Kuyper giving you a fur cape that costs all that?” said I, trying to make my voice sound natural.
Rosie’s eyes danced mischievously.
“You know what Ted is, he never notices anything; if he says anything about it I shall tell him I gave twenty pounds for it in a pawnshop. He won’t know any better.” She rubbed her face against the collar. “It’s so soft. And everyone can see it cost money.”
I tried to eat and in order not to show the bitterness in my heart I did my best to keep the conversation going on one topic or another. Rosie did not much mind what I said. She could only think of her new cape and every other minute her eyes returned to the muff that she insisted on holding on her lap. She looked at it with an affection in which there was something lazy, sensual, and self-complacent. I was angry with her. I thought her stupid and common.
“You look like a cat that’s swallowed a canary,” I could not help snapping.
She only giggled.
“That’s what I feel like.”
Two hundred and sixty pounds was an enormous sum to me. I did not know one could pay so much for a cape. I lived on fourteen pounds a month and not at all badly either; and in case any reader is not a ready reckoner I will add that this is one hundred and sixty-eight pounds a year. I could not believe that anyone would make as expensive a present as that from pure friendship; what did it mean but that Jack Kuyper had been sleeping with Rosie, night after night, all the time he was in London, and now when he went away was paying her? How could she accept it? Didn’t she see how it degraded her? Didn’t she see how frightfully vulgar it was of him to give her a thing that cost so much? Apparently not, for she said to me:
“It was nice of him, wasn’t it? But then Jews are always generous.”
“I suppose he could afford it,” I said.
“Oh, yes, he’s got lots of money. He said he wanted to give me something before he went away and asked me what I wanted. Well, I said, I could do with a cape and a muff to match, but I never thought he’d buy me anything like this. When we went into the shop I asked them to show me something in astrakhan, but he said: No, sable, and the best money can buy. And when we saw this he absolutely insisted on my having it.”
I thought of her with her white body, her skin so milky, in the arms of that old fat gross man and his thick loose lips kissing hers. And then I knew that the suspicion that I had refused to believe was true; I knew that when she went out to dinner with Quentin Forde and Harry Retford and Lionel Hillier she went to bed with them just as she came to bed with me. I could not speak; I knew that if I did I should insult her. I do not think I was jealous so much as mortified. I felt that she had been making a damned fool of me. I used all my determination to prevent the bitter jibes from passing my lips.
We went on to the theatre. I could not listen to the play. I could only feel against my arm the smoothness of the sable cape; I could only see her fingers forever stroking the muff. I could have borne the thought of the others; it was Jack Kuyper who horrified me. How could she? It was abominable to be poor. I longed to have enough money to tell her that if she would send the fellow back his beastly furs I would give her better ones instead. At last she noticed that I did not speak.
“You’re very silent tonight.”
“Am I?”
“Aren’t you well?”
“Perfectly.”
She gave me a sidelong look. I did not meet her eyes, but I knew they were smiling with that smile at once mischievous and childlike that I knew so well. She said nothing more. At the end of the play, since it was raining, we took a hansom and I gave the driver her address in Limpus Road. She did not speak till we got to Victoria Street, then she said:
“Don’t you want me to come home with you?”
“Just as you like.”
She lifted up the trap and gave the driver my address. She took my hand and held it, but I remained inert. I looked straight out of the window with angry dignity. When we reached Vincent Square I handed her out of the cab and let her into the house without a word. I took off my hat and coat. She threw her cape and her muff on the sofa.
“Why are you so sulky?” she asked, coming up to me.
“I’m
