Coquette, Page 3

danger, of starvation orslavery, all old discomforts were shown to have been trivial, becausethey had been accidents in a life which, however rough and ugly had beenat least absorbed in plans for enjoyment. Now plans for enjoyment gaveplace to expedients for protection. Sally was indeed fierce andresentful. It was with animosity that she put together the few sticks ofrubbish which remained to them and helped her mother to rearrange thesethings in a single room which they had taken on the other side ofHolloway Road. No more for them the delights of Hornsey Road and threerooms; but the confined space surrounded by these four dingy walls. Whatwonder that Sally was desperate for fresh air, for escape, and ran outof doors as soon as she could wriggle free! What wonder that she walkedquickly about the dark streets! Tears came to her eyes, and withclenched fists she secretly whimpered in this new angry despair. Of whatavail? She was alone, and the streets were dark; and behind her lay thatone room, gloomy and wretched, with a speechless ruminating mother forsolitary welcome; and no hope ... no hope.

  The roads she now so wildly trod were familiar ground to Sally. Theywere all gravelled roads, upon which in the evenings boys and girlscycled and flirted, and in which on Saturdays and after school hourschildren bowled their hoops and played together. As the darkness grew,the roads were more deserted, for the children were in bed, and the boysand girls were not allowed out. Then appeared young men and girls ofslightly greater age and of a different class, the girls walking two bytwo, the young men likewise. The young men cleared their throats, thegirls peeped and a little raised their voices, a relation wasestablished, and still the pairs continued to promenade, safe incouples, and relishing the thought that they were enjoying stolenacquaintance. Sally knew the whole thing through and through. She hadwalked so with May. She had tried to talk to the boys and found themsoppy, and herself soppy, and everything soppy. She had wanted more andmore excitement, and all this strolling and holding hands in the dark,and snatching them away, and running, and being caught, was tame to hereager longing for greater adventure. And now she walked rapidly aboutthe roads, her eyes full of despair, her heart heavy, her brain activeand contemptuous. She knew her own cleverness. She knew it too well. Andit was smarting now at being proved such an ignominiously valuelesspossession. She might be clever, she might have brains enough to despiseMay Pearcey; but she had not the power to make a living. She must stillpinch and starve beside her mother. Trapped! Trapped!

  It was a matter of weeks, this mood of indignant despair, of baffledpowerlessness in face of reality. And each night, after such a lonelywalk, in such a vehement mood, Sally would return to the miserable roomin which for the present she was to spend her life. It was at the backof the house, on the second floor, and there was another floor above.The room had a stained ceiling and a wallpaper that had discoloured instreaks. The original pattern had been of small flowers on apseudo-primrose background. Now all was merged in a general stagnationof Cambridge blue and coffee colour. Mrs. Minto had carefully put thewashstand beneath a patch that had been washed nearly white by splashes;and Sally had insisted that it should stand in another part of the room."But that's where a washstand's stood before," wailed Mrs. Minto."That's _why_," explained Sally, brutally. "Put the chest-of-drawersthere. _I_ don't want to splash exactly where other people havesplashed. Not likely! The place ought to have been papered new."

  When their bed and the washstand and a table and the chairs andchest-of-drawers were in there was not much to arrange. Nor was thereroom for very much, because the bed took up about a quarter of thespace. The Mintos had no pictures. They thus anticipated the best moderntaste. But the consequence was that if Sally happened to be irritableshe saw the wallpaper, and the wallpaper drove her crazy. It was aconstant exasperation to her. Her extremely good taste was beginning tobud, and wallpaper is as vital an aesthetic test as any other. She hadnot yet the power or the knowledge to dress effectively, but she wasalready learning intuitively such things as harmony and colour-values.She gave an eye to neatness and cleanliness, and knew how to riddle thecostumes of girls of her own class, beginning with May Pearcey. She alsowas becoming aware of all Miss Jubb's deficiencies. Higher than her ownclass she could not well go, because she never had opportunities forseeing well-dressed women. It was so much the Minto habit to rise lateon Sundays, to sit about during the afternoon, and to go out only whenother people were generally indoors, that Sundays were wasted days.Moreover, Sally had not in the past thought much of other girls. She hadthought only of boys. Even her new spruceness was a comparatively recentmanifestation. She was growing.

  She was growing so fast that her old knowledges had been undermined. Shefelt raw. She felt merely exasperated with the past, so that she desiredonly to forget it. All she had seemed to know and to relish had becomeinsipid to Sally. She was chafing at her new position, and wasunconsciously looking round and round her, bewildered, for a new path tofollow. She could no longer take the old silly pleasure in hearing ofMay's fresh conquests, which gave May such monotonous delight. Sheabandoned "boys," and was rewarded for her emancipation by May'sindignant sniffs at her loss of spirit. May was driven to take a newcomrade, a girl prettier than Sally, and therefore more of a rival. SoMay was equally dissatisfied with the present position. She had lostground, and some of her victories were invented. Nellie Cavendish had asharp tongue, and that helped May; but Nellie was less coarselyconfident than May, and annexed the boys by means of her demureness inface of double meanings. May could not refrain from turning away to hidea burst of laughter. That gave Nellie an advantage, and May secretlylonged to hunt once more with Sally. When the old times could not berecaptured, May sneered in self-defence. The two girls did not chatterover their work now when they were left alone. They became hostile, eachaggrieved, and both mutually contemptuous. Sally kept to her stitching,and glowered. May thought to herself. Sally abruptly announced thesoppiness of May's continued exploits. When asked by her mother if shewere not going out with May, Sally returned the cold answer that May wassoft, and continued to walk alone, much disturbed, and privatelyindignant that her mother should be so blind as to ignore the alterationthat had come about. She was lonely and wretched, spoiling for anymischief that might offer.

  Material for the use of such desperation never lacks. It arosenaturally. Toby came into her life.

  Toby was a young man of about twenty years of age, who lived in thehouse. She caught sight of him one night as she returned home, for hewas running down the stairs as she went up them. He was of middleheight, very dark and rather stoutly built; and he wore a cap. That wasall she noticed at their first encounter, since the stairs were dark:that, and the fact that he did not draw to one side as they met. Thecontact filled her mind with sudden interest. She thought about him asshe munched her supper, and wondered what he was really like. Shewreathed around Toby quite a host of guesses--not very deep or vivid,but sufficiently so to make her think of him still as she undressed andslipped into bed beside her mother. Her last thought before sleep camewas a faint enjoyment of the knowledge that a young man lived in thesame house. It was the faintest of thoughts, due solely to herrestlessness; but in the gloom she was conscious of him and of theconviction that they would meet again upon the stairs. For that timethis was as far as speculation could carry her. Sally did not think ofherself at all--only that there was a young man, and that she should seehim again. The rest of her attention was absorbed in the endeavour toremember all she had noticed of his appearance in that hasty meeting.She had seen enough to be sure of recognising him again with the houseas associative background. That was all. Knowing it, she feel asleep,and dreamed of a sudden gift of beauty and attractiveness.

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  For several days Sally did not see the young man, and so she half forgothim, lost him in the mixture of her more pressing preoccupations. Everymorning she rose at eight o'clock, after her mother had left the housefor her first situation, and then, breakfasting slowly, she had justtime to reach Miss Jubb's by nine. She did not like Miss Jubb, who was athin-faced and fussy person who alwa
ys wore a grey pinafore and feltthat her untidy grey hair looked as though it might hint a sorrow ratherthan betray advancing years. Miss Jubb was full of the futile vanity ofthe elderly spinster, her mouth full of pins, and her head full of paperpatterns. She lived with her mother on two floors of an old house, andone of the downstairs rooms was used on Sundays for sitting in andduring the week for trying on. The work she did never suggestedanything of the enormous pains Miss Jubb took in fitting, in fasteningpins and cutting out. She was incurably a bad dressmaker; but she gaveher clients the impression that she knew her business. This was becauseshe was so careful, and because they knew no better than she did whatwomen may and may not wear with propriety. The backs of all skirtscoming from Miss Jubb drooped lower than the fronts. Her bodices alwayswent wrong upon the shoulders. She was great on tucks. But she wascheap, and she was Sybil-like