that she did not yet feel in a fit state to meet Pa's scrutiny. He might be the old fool he sometimes appeared to be, and, inconveniently, he might not. Just because she did not want him to be particularly bright it was quite probable that he would have a flourish of brilliance. That is as it occasionally h

onversation which might engage the ancient mind in ruminant pasti

gone out? Is it Emmy that's gone out? What did that

t have listened," rebuked

that it had been refilled by his benevolent genius. It was not until the

e quavered. "I didn't h

out wi

ckets! Tickets for seats.... Oh, dear! Why can't

enly un

. "That's like Alf Rylett," presently added Pa. Jenny sat lo

"I never knew you were

ing rattle from the inner recesses of his person. He was getting brigh

certainty. Furtively he looked at her, suspecting all the time that memo

. But I'll tell you a bit of news, Pa. And that is, that

hives for confirmation of Jenny's sweeping statement. The Blanchards of several generations might have been imagined as flitting across a fantastic horizon, keening for their withered laurels, thrown into the shades by these more brighter eccentrics. It was, o

h as nothing else could have done-not even the profoundest yawn

you sitting there saying it! And I reckon they've go

le, which suggested a derangement of his internal parts, or the ru

th some unpardonable

to the conversation thereafter. Was it real? Or had her too excited brain played her a trick? Jenny pinched herself. It was like a fairy tale, in which cats talk and little birds humanly sing, or the tiniest of fairies appear from behind clocks or from within flower-pots. She looke

fact-the dreamer is in retrospect always victor, in the heroic limelight. With Jenny this was a mood, not a preoccupation; but when she had been moved or excited beyond the ordinary she often did tend to put matters in a fresh aspect, more palatable to her self-love, and more picturesque in detail than the actual happening. That is one of the advantages of the rapidly-working brain, that its power of improvisation is, in solitude, very constant and reassuring. It is as though such a grain, upon this more strictly personal side, were a commonwealth of little cell-building microbes. The chief microbe comes, like the engineer, to

n argument. How were they shattered! How inept were their feebleness! Ho

estioned the heroic vein as natural to her own actions. More justly, she resumed her consideration of the scenes, pondering over them in their nakedness and their meanings, trying

lone, but a single small thing caught in the general mix-up of actions and inter-actions. She had just to go on as she was doing, waking up each morning after the events and taking her old place in the world; and in this instance she would have, somehow, to smooth matters over when the excitements and agitations of the evening were past. It would be terribly difficult. She could not yet see a clear course. If only Emmy didn't live in the same house! If only, by throwing Alf over as far as concerned herself, she could at the same time throw him into Emmy's waiting arms. Why couldn't everybody be sensible? If only they could all be sensible for half-an-hour everything could be arranged and happiness could be made r

old Em along to the theatre-and afterwards, when the evening was over and he had gone off in a cloud of glory. He would think it all over and come solemnly to the conclusion that the reason for his mumbling stupidity, his toeing and heeling, and all that idiotic speechlessness that set Emmy on her hind legs, was sheer love of the truth. He couldn't tell a lie-to a woman. That would be it. He would pretend that Jenny h

ed Jenny. "To a woman. Georg

ny did not like scones. She thought them stodgy. She had also that astounding feminine love of cream buns which no true man could ever acknowledge or understand. So Emmy became a scone, with not too many currents in it. Jenny's fluent fancy was inclined to dwell upon this notion. She a little lost sight of Alf's grievance in her pleasure at the figures she had drawn. Her mind was recalled with a jerk. Now: what was it? Alf had wanted to take her-Jenny. Right! He had taken Emmy. Because he had taken Emmy, he had a grievance

kets given to him. It's not as though they co

all spoilt. It was spoilt because of Emmy. Emmy had spoilt it by wanting Alf for herself. Ugh! thought Jenny. Em had always been a jealous cat: if she had just seen Alf somewhere she wouldn't have wanted him. That was it! Em saw that Alf preferred Jenny; she saw that Jenny went out with him. And because she always wanted to do what Jenny did, and always wanted what Jenny had got, Em wanted to be taken out by Alf. Jenny, with the cruel unerringness of an exasperated woman, was piercing to Emmy's heart with fierce lambent flashes of insight. And if Alf had taken Em once or twice, and Jenny once or twice, not wanting either one or the other, or not wanting one of them more than the other, Em would have been satisfied. It would have gone no further. It would still have been sensible, without nonsense. But it wouldn't do for Em. So long as Jenny was going out Emmy stayed at home. She had said to herself: "Why should Jenny go, and not me ... ha

or hating people, or being jealous...." Then a swift feeling of pity darted through her, changing her thoughts, changing every shade of the portrait of Emmy which she had been etching with her quick corrosive strokes of insight. "P

, releasing her arm again and clasping her hands over her knees as she bent lower, staring at the glowing heart of the fire. Her lips were closely, seriously, set now; her eyes sorrowful. Alf and Emmy had receded fro

i

that pressed her each morning into acquiescence. She bent nearer to the fire, smiling to herself. The fire showing under the little door of the kitchener was a bright red glowing ash, the redness that came into her imagination when the words "fire" or "heat"

When Pa was recalcitrant Jenny occasionally shouted very loud, with what might have appeared to some people an undesirable knowledge of customs, "Act of Parliament, gentlemen, please"-which is a phra

nd waistcoat; she took off his boots and his socks; she laid beside him the extraordinary faded scarlet nightgown in which Pa slept away the darkness. Then she left him to struggle out of his clothes as well as he could, which Pa did with a skill worthy of his best days. The cunning which replaces competence had shown him how the braces may be made to do their

g either good or bad but thinking makes it ever so much more important than it really is. Loneliness with happy thoughts is perhaps an ideal state; but no torment could be greater than loneliness with thoughts that wound. Jenny's thoughts wounded her. The mood of complacency was gone: that of shame and discontent was upon her. Distress was uppermost in her mind-not the petulant wrig

she's afraid of getting left on the shelf.... I wonder why it is the marrying men don't get hold of the marrying girls! They do, sometimes, I suppose...." Jenny shrugged restlessly and stood looking at nothing. "Oh, it's sickening! You can't do anything you like in this world. Nothing at all! You've always got to do what you don't like. They say it's good for you. It's your 'duty.' Who to? And who are 'they,' to say such a thing? What are they after? Just to keep people like me in their place-do as you're told. Well, I'm not going to do as I'm told. They can lump it! That's what they can do. What does it matter-what happens to me? I'm me, aren't I? Got a right to live, haven't I? Why should I be somebody's servant all my life? I won't! If Alf doesn't want to marry Emmy, he can go and whistle somewhere else. There's plenty of girls who'd jump at him. But just because I don't, he'll worry me to death. If I was to be all over him-see Alf sheer off! He'd think there was something funny about me. Well, there is! I'm Jenny Blanchard

which she had unconsciously measured herself with others. Because she was a human being, Jenny thought she had a right to govern her own actions. With a whole priesthood against her,

th.... No, I wouldn't.... Fancy being boxed up and pretending I liked it-just because other people say they like it. Do as you're told. Do like other people. All be the same-a sticky mass of silly fools doing as they're told! All for a b

ning intelligence. She felt trapped, impotent, as though her hands were tied; as though only her whirling thoughts were unfettered. Again she took up the hat, but her hands so trembled that she could not hold the needle steady. It made fierce ja

at nobody but Emmy had heard from her since the days of childhood. She gave a long sigh, looking through the blur at that clear glow from beneath the iron door of the kitchen grate. Miserably she refused to think again. She was half sick of thoughts that tore at her nerves and

uld happen. I don't care what! But something ... some

asm of distaste for its steady record of the fleeting seconds. "Wound up to go

knock at the front door of the Blanchard's dwelling, and a sharp whirring ring at the push-bell below the kno

RT

I