The Crowded Street

by Winifred Holtby

XXXI

Connie did not come downstairs at tea-time.

"She'll be tidying herself after lying down," said Muriel.

"She'll be crying over a letter from an old sweetheart," laughed Dolly.

Matthew winked at his brother. "There, Ben, lad, off ye go and see what's up wi' your wife. You'll have t'keep an eye on her letters now. Connie always was one for the lads. No followers!"

"Shame on you, Mat. Give over now," soothed Mrs. Meggie, pouring out the tea from a great brown pot. "You'll be bringing home a wife yourself one of these days, and then you'll laugh with the other side of your face. Well, Muriel, since you're the greatest stranger, bacon, cake or ham?"

Muriel gazed at the characteristic profusion. She was thinking of William Todd and the terrifying strangeness of the front parlour.

"Ham, please—a very little," she said.

"Muriel's lost her appetite because she hasn't had a letter too," jeered Dolly.

Alice said nothing. She lifted her heavy-lidded eyes to Ben's red face and sat watching him. Ben bent his head above his cup, drinking great gulps of tea.

"I found an old ewe on her back i' forty acre," he remarked to change the subject.

"Not one o' the cross-breds?" asked Mat with interest.

"Or was it our old friend Agatha?" interposed Gertie.

"Agatha? Who was Agatha?" asked Muriel. Her head ached and she wondered why Connie did not come downstairs, but she knew that tea-time at Thraile was a convivial meal and that "moping" was against the rules.

Dolly explained to her with avidity. "Last spring at Follerwick Camp an old bird called Agatha Anderson brought a concert affair down to give improving music to the fellows. You never saw such an old geezer! She had sort of woolly white curls round a long solemn face, just like a sheep. Well, one night Connie was coming back from Follerwick and right halfway across the moors she heard a sheep bleating, for all the world just like old Agatha. It had got strayed and hurt its leg, and was sort of huddled on a bank like the old platform. So she got up and brought it along with her and we called it Agatha."

"Brought it home? All by herself? Wasn't it heavy?" asked Muriel without interest. Surely Connie had had time now to do her hair. Wasn't she feeling well? Muriel knew how much she hated those Thraile meals. Perhaps at the last moment she had taken fright.

Polly was giggling. "By herself? I ask you? Our Con walk home from Follerwick by herself? Not 'arf! Ben, you were with her, weren't you, when she found Agatha?"

"No, I wasn't," said Ben stiffly.

"Oh, well then—it was one of the other fellows. Bill or Tubby or——"

"Wasn't it Eric Fennington?" asked Alice very quietly. She picked up her cup and drank, her light eyes never leaving Ben's flushed face.

Eric Fennington? To Muriel the name was not quite unfamiliar. "Who was Eric Fennington?" she asked, but without much interest, because she felt as though the powers of darkness were behind her locked away in the front parlour, and she was afraid.

"Eric Fennington," explained Dolly volubly, "was one of the lads all right. You bet he was! He was one of the officers at Follerwick Camp, two pips up, and a great flame of Connie's. I thought you'd know him. She said she met him at Kingsport, knew him well at home. My word, he was a knut! D'you remember when he hired a car and took us to the Movies at Scarshaven, Alice? And that time he put the alarm clock in the Major's box and it went off during the third act of 'Romance' with an awful row—just when that curate was beginning to carry on!"

"Old Eric's married, isn't he?" asked Matthew heavily.

"Married or engaged or something. It was you who saw that bit in the paper, wasn't it, Alice? Anyway he's in Mespot."

"Just as well, Ben, eh?" laughed Matthew. Ben rose, his mouth still full of pie. "Where you going, lad?"

"Up t'see why Connie don't come down," interposed Mrs. Meggie. "That's a good fellow."

Muriel watched him shamble from the room, an uncouth figure, part boy, part man. This overgrown weakling whom Connie had married, how had he done it? What had induced Connie to—to—Muriel wondered for the hundredth time how it had come about. Had she been sorry for him? Surely he cared for her. There was in his manner a hint of wistfulness, of manhood undeveloped. Had the craving for self-assertion forced him to madness, aping the passion of a man without a man's self-mastery? Connie had said that he had over-mastered her. It was difficult, watching him now retreat before his family's rough humour, to imagine him mastering anyone, even himself.

He did not return soon. Muriel sat through the long meal uneasily. What was happening upstairs? Had William Todd, as a result of her interview, sent for Connie, and was he convicting her again of sin? Poor Connie! Finally, when tea was cleared, Muriel climbed to Connie's room. The staircase was dark. Only a glimmer of starlight from the narrow window guided her. She paused outside her sister's door and called. No answer came. She opened the door. No light came from the room. She was about to go downstairs again, when the shadow by the bedside quivered suddenly. She stared into the darkness.

"Connie!" she said softly. "Connie, what are you doing there? Where's Ben?"

"Is that you, Muriel?" The voice made her start violently. "It's not Connie. It's me—Ben. Come in and shut t'door."

"Ben! What's the matter? Where's Connie?" A shrill little quiver of fear crept to her voice. "Why are you sitting in the dark?"

"Aw—come in and shut the door," he repeated. His voice terrified her. It was as though a dead man spoke. "Connie isn't here. She's gone."

"Gone? Gone where? I don't understand."

"She's gone to do herself in."

"Ben, what do you mean?" Oh, if only there was a light! The darkness pressed in suddenly upon her face and choked her.

"She's gone to do 'erself in. And I don't care. I wouldn't ha' stopped her anyway. She'd gone before I came upstairs. I expect she's gone down to the Fallow. She once said she would."

"Do you mean," said Muriel quietly, "that you think she's gone to—to kill herself? Oh, but what nonsense, Ben. Why should she? What nonsense! How dare you talk such wicked nonsense!" She stretched out her hand for the brass bed-post and stood there clinging to its solid comfort. "It's nonsense, nonsense. Connie—kill herself? Now—when I've just made things——"

"It's not nonsense," Ben said heavily. "I'll show you a letter."

"Letter? Letter? Did Connie write a—— Oh, for goodness' sake get a light and don't talk in riddles."

The bed creaked. Somewhere from the darkness moved a blacker darkness yet. She heard Ben's laboured breathing.

"Oh, be quick! Be quick!"

If they stood in the dark another minute she would scream.

Ben stumbled across the room. She heard him fumbling on the mantelpiece. Something fell against the fender with a light, splintering crash.

"I can't find matches," growled Ben.

"Oh, you idiot!" It was incredible that two people in such dire consternation should be tortured because they couldn't find the matches. It made her terribly angry, with a cold fury that she had not known before.

Ben was cursing softly in the darkness.

"I'll go and get some——" said Muriel.

She stumbled frantically along the passage. From the room shared by the land-girls came a flood of light, flowing out across the passage. Alice was sitting beside the lamp, darning a stocking.

Muriel looked at her with wonder. People were still darning stockings then? What a funny way Alice's hair grew back from her ears, with little silvery tufts along her neck. You could see them in the lamplight quite distinctly. What had she come for? Oh, the matches.

"Please, Alice, have you any matches?"

Alice looked up. "My! What a start you gave me! Matches? No. I had to borrow Mrs. Todd's! Why don't you get Connie's? She bags all my matches."

On then to her own room she must go. Hours, interminable hours stretched between her and the horrible nightmare of Ben's voice. Her own matches lay on the candlestick by her bed where she had left them. She lit the candle with shaking fingers, then ran again down the long corridor. The draught plucked at her candle flame; it fluttered ruddily within the pink screen of her hand.

She came back to Connie's room.

"Ben! Ben! Where are you?"

She set the candle down by the disordered bed. The little flame shook itself, quivered and then stood gallantly upright, showing the flower-decked walls, the coarse white counterpane, all heaped and crumpled, and Ben's white face—blank and passive, staring at her from beside the mantelpiece.

"Where's that letter?" asked Muriel.

As though in a trance he came forward and handed her a sheet of flimsy paper, pencil written. She glanced at it.

"This isn't from Connie! What do you mean? Where's Connie? What have you done with her?"

"Read yon," said Ben.

After one glance at his set face, she read:

Dear old girl,

There ain't no flies round Christmas time in Blighty, but there's jolly well nothing else in this old hole. It's as hot as—well any place we specially used to think of as being hot. I say, Kiddo, who's been having you on that I'm engaged? Your stately letter—written by the way some time in August—has been chasing me across the desert sands and under the deodar and all the rest of it until it knocked the portals of my heart (Good that? What?) about—well may be—two months ago. Who sprung that yarn on to you about Cissie Bradfield? It's old Ernest, my brother, she collared. They were married last July. I can't think how you made the mistake because Alice knows Cissie and knew all about it. If you'd asked her she could have told you. We have the same initials of course. Honest, Kiddo, I'm no hand at letter writing and time dashes by here, but you're barking up the wrong tree this time. You must know that you are the only girl in the world as far as I am concerned. Rumour hath it that in another two months we may get leave and then what about another room at Scarshaven Hotel and you "on a visit to your friends at Buxton," eh? I'm not the marrying sort you know, but sometimes I think that when this war's over, I'd like to settle down. How would the idea of being Mrs. E. F. seem to you, old girl? Not much in your line, what?

Anyway don't forget me,

Yours to a cinder,

Eric.

She read twice through this strange production, straining her eyes to decipher the crude, boyish writing. Then she looked at Ben. "I don't understand, what does it mean?" she said.

"Don't you? Don't you? Ay, but you do. You Hammonds, you're all alike, you, you——"

She gazed at him with open-eyed amazement. The boy whom she had thought of as a poor thing became instead a sneering raging fury. Completely beyond self-control, he turned upon her.

"You and your snivelling mother, coming down and weeping piety and her daughter's honour; and your bullying rip of a father, damn him! I bet you're all the same. You know jolly well what this all means. 'What about another room at the Scarshaven Hotel,' eh? And then she comes whining and sobbing to me and saying I must marry her because I've ruined her life! She and her honour. How do I know how many more Erics she's fooled on with? Blast her! Curse her!"

His weak face was distorted by rage. The candlelight danced on the red rims of his swollen eyes and on his trembling hand upraised as if he would strike Muriel.

She still sat on the edge of the bed, quite quietly. Her mind refused to register any thought but the name of her sister, Connie, Connie, repeated again and again without significance.

Ben dropped his hand. "She taunted me. She said I was no man. She pretended that she knew nowt o' this sort o' thing. She told me that she'd carried on with other fellows, just a bit, just playing like. And there was I, cursing myself because I'd done it. Calling myself a black sinner when I had no call to marry her, not even a farm o' my own yet, and all the time she was just laughing at me, fooling me. And I've been feeling myself under a heavy burden o' sin, with my guilt an' hers upon me, an' not daring to go round to chapel, and feeling the hand o' the Lord upraised against me. She led me on. She led me on. Let her drown now. Let her drown. I reckon she'll not swim long i' Fallow, and her burden o' guilt will weigh her down."

Muriel stared at him. "Ben. You've lost your head. It mayn't mean all that. She's your wife."

"She betrayed me. She betrayed me." He dropped his face into his hands and sat with quivering shoulders on the bed by Muriel's side. "She's shamed me. And I meant to prove myself a man." He began to sob, bitter grinding sobs that tore him with grief for his shamed manhood. "Ah never had a wife. Ah never had one. She fooled me. Ah've been fooled all my life. Ah've been fooled by God an' fooled by her. There's no faith left."

"Ben. Pull yourself together. You've got no right to accuse her till you know. When did she go? Are you sure she left the house? Which way would she take?"

He raised his haggard face and jeered at her. "Go an' find her. You're scared o' the dark, aren't you? Go an' find her corpse knocking about i' Fallow like an old sow drowned last Martinmas. Go on. Get out o' way." His voice rose to the shrill note of hysteria. "Get out o' here! This is my room. What are you doing in my room—you——"

He called her a name that she had never heard before. She turned to run, and saw him towering above her, fantastic in the candlelight. As she ran, she heard his voice behind her, calling, "Run, Muriel! Run! It's nice and cold in t'river."

The echo of his laughter drove her down the passage.

Outside the kitchen door she paused. The firelight, the call of cheerful voices beckoned her. From the back room came the shouted chorus of a song.

"If you were the only girl in the world

And I were the only boy."

The desire to tell some one, to find a sane and comforting adviser in this world gone mad, urged her almost irresistibly. She would go and tell Mrs. Todd. She would tell Mat. They would help her to look for Connie.

"Nothing else would matter in this world to-day,

We would go on loving in the same old way."

She laid her hand upon the latch of the door.

If she told, they would all follow her. They would all know what had happened to Connie. They would all know what Connie had done.

She had to tell. She could not bear alone this dreadful burden of responsibility.

If she went now either she would find Connie, reason with her and bring her back, or else it would be too late for any one to help Connie, too late for any army of lanterns, swinging down the hill, to pierce those dark waters of the Fallow.

"There would be such wonderful things to do

I would say such wonderful things to you!"

A chair shrieked against the paved floor. Somebody was going to leave the room. If she told now, it would be a betrayal. She must go alone.

With a little choking cry she turned and fled.

The bolts were stiff and heavy, but when she had dragged them aside the wind tore at the door and hurled it open. The frail strength of her shoulder could not push it back. She let it swing.

Along the flagged yard, down the two steps and into the strip of narrow garden Muriel ran. Oh, but she must hurry, hurry, hurry, or it would be too late. The garden path was steep and slippery. A thaw had set in, and the ground under her thin shoes was wet and yielding. Once she leapt aside as a white cat darted out at her from the potatoes. Once her serge skirt caught on a stunted gooseberry bush.

Out through the wicket gate and on to the field road ran Muriel. The first field was a grass pasture; she remembered that. It led straight down, with the bottom gate a little to the right. If only she had stopped to find a lantern! It was quite dark now. The stars were veiled by tattered shreds of cloud. She could not see the road before her feet, but only feel the short, uneven turf, and the steady sloping of the long hill. If she faced down hill she would find the way.

The high heel of her shoe caught in a rut, and she fell headlong, her cheek against the chill, wet turf. Even as she lay there for a second, dazed and breathless, something moved from the shadows at her side, and with a little shriek of horror she remembered that in this field wandered the cows and horses.

She sprang up, never heeding the pain of her wrenched ankle or the mud clinging to her skirt. Every breeze that touched her hot cheeks was now the fiery breath of bulls; every clump of furze the dark form of a furious stallion. Blindly sobbing she ran, while the strong wind seized her and blew her kindly down the shadowed hill.

Almost before she hoped for it she found the wall. But the gate? The gate. Standing to regain her bearings, she heard the dull thud of feet tramping behind her down the hill.

The wind whistling on her neck came like the breath from a bull's nostrils. Clutching at the rough stones, bruising her knees and her thin elbows, she scrambled up the wall.

By this time she did not know whether she was running to save her own life or her sister's. The black arms of the trees swept over her, their wild heads tossing, tangling the vagrant stars. Their branches creaked; their twisted fingers snatched at her, caught at her hair and scratched her face, only to swing back again with mocking lightness. The trees terrified her. At any minute they must come down upon her. She heard the sharp splintering of the wood; the rush of branches like a mighty sea; the vast arms that embraced her, dragging her down, down as they fell faster, faster and the great weight overwhelmed her.

There she would lie crushed and bleeding on the hill-side, and Connie would lie deep below the swirling waters of the Fallow.

She dared not risk the trees. She scurried towards the centre of the field, stumbling blindly among the turnips. Twice she struck her foot against them, falling and recovering herself.

Her breath came now in painful sobs. Across her chest lay a sharp bar of iron that hurt her as she breathed. The wind through her silk blouse whipped her shoulders.

Oh, she would never find her way. Why hadn't she brought a lantern? Why hadn't she told the others? What madness sent her alone, running wildly down these dreadful fields? And when she reached the river, if Connie were not there, what could she do!

A rope, stretched straight across her way, nearly flung her down again. Panting, she felt along it. A rough net—a net. Her mind, unaccustomed to the ways of farming, refused to register its use. She forced it down with both her hands and stepped across it.

As she paused, it seemed as though again she heard those footsteps following; but perhaps they only were the beats of her own heart. She started forward.

A worse nightmare than ever laid hold upon her. She was surrounded by a moving horror. Soft formless things pushed up against her knees, her waist. Each way she stumbled, they bore down upon her. The starlight showed her just a dim, pale sea heaving waist-high all round her, before the wild clouds swept across the one patch of clear sky and left her blind with panic and the dark.

She could bear no more. Perils of darkness, perils of tempest, perils of bulls and wild living things she had withstood. Even the peril of Ben's frenzied face and uplifted hand had not appalled her. But this heaving horror engulfed her. She must fall.

She put out one hand and touched rough, soft wool; a familiar cry rang out beside her, "Baa-a-ah!" another followed. Echo followed echo across the sheepfold. She turned and pushed her way out from among the clustering flock, regaining the assurance of the road. The trees might swoop above her. Her feet might slip beneath her, but the road was sure. On and on she ran, though now she knew no longer the object of her running. Through one gate, then another, then another, and the woods closed down upon her. The path grew steeper. A light rain blew in her face like wave-flung spray. She did not notice it. The bushes caught at her. The branches tore her hair. Then, suddenly, quite close beside her, she heard the rushing of the river.

She remembered why she had come, and stood quite still to listen.

"Connie!" she shouted. "Connie! Connie! Connie!"

Parallel with the river ran a narrow path. It wound up Fallowdale for several miles until it crossed the Pilgrim's Bridge at Barwood. Up this path Muriel ran, the tangled woods on her left hand, the river on her right. Without a gleam the water swirled beside her, now dashing angrily against the stones, now sliding deep and dark between the banks.

"Connie! Connie! Connie!" called Muriel. The wind snatched at her futile little voice. The river drowned it. The high trees mocked her, clashing their long arms together.

"Connie! Connie!" she sobbed. The pain in her bruised ankle throbbed unceasingly. Her hands were torn. Her knees hurt. She felt forlorn and utterly defeated.

"Connie! Connie!"

Along the path before her, something moved.

"Connie!"

The figure stopped. It hesitated, then started forward. A twig snapped in the darkness. Then, though the river ran silently here the noise of it rose like a flood, thundering in her ears.

"Connie, darling! Stop! I want to tell you something."

She dared not run too quickly. A false step, and she might feel those ice-cold waters close above her head. If she delayed, though, she might hear the splash of Connie's final plunge.

"Oh, Connie, please don't go so fast. I can't keep up. Please stop."

In the dark, Connie turned to face her.

"Muriel—what do you want? Why have you come?" With a sudden sharp anguish, "Have you got my letter?"

"Your letter? Your letter? No. Ben's got your letter."

"Ben? Of course he has! Of course. Oh, isn't that like you, Muriel! You come down here to me, but you let Ben have the letter! I might have known. Here I've been telling myself that perhaps you'd find it and not say anything and just come down here, and now—I might have known!"

"But Ben found it first. What could I do?"

"Of course he did. He would. Oh, now for Heaven's sake go home. I'm sick of you. Can't you leave me alone just for a minute? What do you want? Why did you follow me? Go back. Go back, I tell you."

"No, no. I can't leave you here. You mustn't—you—you'll make yourself ill."

"Ill? Shall I?"

Muriel dared not move. If she advanced one step she feared lest Connie, mad with recklessness, should plunge into that dreadful river. And if Connie did jump in, what could she do? Connie was heavy. The river was so deep, and Muriel could not swim. She became dazed with panic.

"Connie, dear. Connie, come home. It's terrible for you out here in the dark. Come back with me. It's all right. I won't leave you."

"If you come a step nearer," cried Connie's furious voice, "I shall jump straight into the river. So there!"

Suddenly the absurdity of the situation struck Muriel. Here she was. Here was Connie. If Connie chose to drown herself, Muriel was completely powerless to stop her, because she was so small and Connie so much stronger.

At the realization of her impotence, Muriel's self-control gave way. She flung up her head and laughed, peal after peal of helpless laughter.

It was the last sound that Connie had expected.

"What's the matter? Are you mad? That's right then, laugh away! I suppose that you think it's funny that I should have made a mess of my whole life. I can be in hell if I like, and all that you can do is to stand there and laugh. I suppose that you read Eric's letter and saw that he—that he would have married me—Eric. Eric."

Muriel stopped laughing and came forward, laying her small hand on her sister's arm. Connie seemed to be unaware that anyone was touching her.

"Oh, it's damned funny, isn't it? I wonder that I don't laugh myself. You never thought at Marshington that your respected sister was anyone's mistress, did you? Only once, I tell you. I thought that he would marry me. I'd heard they would. I was fed up, and at least it was worth trying. It was that little fiend Alice who ruined me. Of course she liked him, but she kidded us that it was Ben she cared about. Ben. Ben! Come to think about it, we might ha' known that she was fooling us. Who'd care for Ben, with his great gawky body, Ben the big soft idiot! I ask you! That's my husband, Muriel. Good joke, isn't it? I swore to love, honour and obey that thing, because Alice told me Eric had married Cissie Bradfield and showed me a newspaper cutting, and I was green enough to believe her. Oh, she was clever. My God, she was clever. I'd just been home on leave, you know, that time we met Delia on Kingsport Station. I was happy then. I thought he cared. Then I came back here and Alice told me—showed me the cutting. He was just going to Mespot too. I wrote. He never answered." She stopped, choking.

"Never mind that now, Connie, dear," Muriel said timidly. "Come back with me. You'll get so wet."

Connie shook off her hand and went on speaking. It was as though, having decided to tell the truth at last, she could not stop.

"If I'd been cheap with one, I'd be cheap with all. There'd be no end to my cheapness. If Eric had had me and didn't want me, then Ben, who wanted me, should have me. Oh, I was wild, I didn't care. I didn't care what happened. Muriel, you don't know. You'd never been like that, stuck there in Marshington, longing to get away, every one round you getting married. It wasn't as if I hadn't tried other things. I wanted to chicken farm; I wanted to go away and do just anything. But Mother wouldn't let me. It was just men, men, men, and make a good match."

She shivered violently. The rain was now sweeping in great gusts along the valley. It splashed from the bare branches on to their heads. Slowly they began to walk along the path.

"Well—I didn't make a good match. Look at Godfrey Neale. When I was a kid I used to think him wonderful. Then Hugh McKissack. Mother made me think I liked him and that he would marry me. Look how he fooled us both. Then Eric came——"

Connie's voice mingled with the rushing of the river and the rustling rain among the trees. She lifted her head and spoke into the darkness, taking no heed of Muriel.

"He wasn't much of a fellow perhaps, in lots of ways, but he was a jolly sight better than lots of the men we used to meet. And I wanted so much to be married. He said his father wouldn't let him marry till he'd become a proper chartered accountant. He was still articled or something when I met him that night at the Kingsport dance. Hugh McKissack had just turned me down. Oh, I was desperate. I flirted with him. He said I was a sport. We—we got on. Oh, you won't understand. When I went to stay with Betty Taylor at York, I met him again. I went there so that I could meet him. Chase him? Who'd taught me to chase men? Of course I did. Don't all women? Hadn't mother? Then he said I didn't care for him. I wasn't going to show him at first, so he said 'Prove it.' I—you don't know. I thought he'd slip away just like the rest of them. I said I'd prove it. We went away to Scarshaven together for three days, before I went to Buxton to the Marshalls. You thought I was there, and nobody found out. I thought he'd marry me. If anything went wrong, he said he'd see me through. There was a time, just once, on Scarshaven station when he came to meet me, I thought I couldn't do it. Then he smiled. Oh, you—you—you don't know what it's like to love a man! I couldn't turn him down."

She stopped and clung to Muriel, who could only hold her tightly, murmuring silly words of comfort, neither shocked nor grieved, but gently pitiful. "Poor Connie. Oh, poor Connie!"

"Then the war came. He was sent up to Follerwick. I stuck it at home for a bit. I tried once to get through to see him, but I couldn't arrange it easily. I saw that if I stayed at home I never should get away without being found out. Then he told me about Thraile. The Todds were advertising for land-girls. I'd always liked outdoor things, and I was mad to come. You know the row we had at home. Then Mother heard that the Setons were doing land-work. How I blessed those girls. So she gave me her blessing too and off I went. Oh, but I was happy. You don't know. I'd never been happy like that before. He was at Follerwick and I at Thraile. We used to go for concerts and things, and I'd meet him and go off for long walks on the moors. We didn't do anything that you'd call bad. Somehow when it was so easy, we did not want to in the same way. We were like kids. We'd race up and down hill hand in hand. He'd come and sit sometimes on the old sheep trough when I was cleaning turnips and we'd talk. It was all as easy as the beasts and flowers and things. I dun'no. We were just great pals. We didn't talk of marriage or anything. That didn't matter. Then I came on leave." Her voice hardened. "When I got back that Alice told me he'd had to go off suddenly to Aldershot. He didn't write—or, if he did, she got hold of the letters. Possibly he didn't write. He wasn't the pen-scratching kind. Then the news of his wedding came, and the newspaper cutting.

"Oh, I think I went mad. I do really. You see—I'd been fooled so often. I wanted to hurt every one, myself most of all. And Ben was always hanging round. I hadn't noticed him while Eric was there. But after—after I heard about Cissie I used to tease Ben, just to spite him and myself. I said he wasn't a man. I—Oh, I led him on. He was such a great, green, religious baby, terrified of his father. Then I made him—do it."

Her hands clutched at her sister's arm. Her dragging step moved onward, and her toneless voice talked on and on, taking a bitter satisfaction in the telling.

"When I found out that I was going to have a baby, I was scared. I told you that they turned me out. They didn't. I ran away. Father found that out after he came down to Thraile that day. Really, he was awfully decent to me. He seemed to understand. But at first the Todds were awful. That terrible old man. Only Ben was decent. I believe he was fond of me. Funny, wasn't it? He thought he'd sinned black sin for me, and made me sin, and he must make it up to me. And then, while I was waiting for the wedding, that was a queer time. I used to pretend that it was Eric I was going to marry. Honest I did. I quite enjoyed it. Even when we got here, married, it might not have been so bad. Do you know," she said reflectively, "I believe that if I'd never known Eric I'd have been content with Ben. He's a dud of course, but he'd do anything for me. It's nice to have someone who'd sell their souls for you, until they think they've sold it. That was just it. Old William Todd would never let Ben alone. He was always on at him. If we could have gone away together. . . . Well, I used to think we would go and get a farm and settle down. I like children too. Then—to-day." It was Connie's turn to laugh now.

"I say, if there's a God, mustn't he have a jolly time laughing over the things that come too late? Here's a priceless joke now—me married to Ben, and a kid coming, and Eric ready to marry me when he comes home. Ben's child! Ben's child! And it might have been Eric's!" The laughter turned again to choking sobs. Breaking suddenly from Muriel's arms, Connie collapsed on the bank and crouched there, crying softly.

"I meant to kill myself. I knew I might funk it though. I always do. I put that letter where Ben would see it and know what had happened. So I could never go back to him. I thought I'd settle it for good and all. And I'd hurt Ben too. He'd been so stupid. The more beastly I was to him, the more patient he was with me. Rather like you, Muriel. Oh, you patient people! I bet you're responsible for half the suicides that happen. He was so proud to think I'd marry him too! He—me!"

Muriel knelt beside her on the wet stones. "Get up, Connie. You'll be ill. Get up. It's so wet."

That was all she could say, silly futile things.

"Ill? Oh, Muriel, you are a fool. Don't you see, I can't go back? I can't go anywhere. Oh, my God, I haven't got the pluck to kill myself, and there's nowhere in the world for me to live! You're a beauty, you are. You always turn up when it's too late to help. What shall I do? I don't want to die."

"We'll go away together. Listen. Listen. I'll make Father let us have some money. He's fond of you. If Ben turns you out, he'll pay. I can get work now in war-time too. We'll both go away. We'll—Oh, what's that?"

A light, swinging between the trees, gleamed suddenly round the angle of the rocks. A yellow splash of lantern light moved along the path. Through the rain came the sound of running footsteps.

"Who's that? Who's that?"

Her voice was sharp with fear.

"Is that Muriel?"

Connie's hand gripped her like a vice. Connie screamed in sudden terror.

"Muriel, it's Ben. Don't let him hurt me! Don't!"

Muriel stood up. "Ben, what do you want?"

The lantern swayed and stopped. In that moment Muriel thought that Ben had come to kill his wife.

"Is Connie there?"

"Yes." Connie's voice was calm now.

"Ben, you shan't hurt her," cried Muriel.

"I shan't hurt her." She could hear that he too was now calm. The voice that spoke from the darkness was a man's voice. "Connie, I want to ask you something."

"Well?" Still she was defiant. "What do you want?"

"When did you last see—yon—yon fellow?"

"Eric Fennington?"

"Ay."

"In the summer. Before I went on leave, but——"

"I thowt so. You fooled me properly, didn't you?"

"But——" Connie rose slowly to her feet. She stood now facing her husband. He raised the lantern and flashed it full upon her. "Ben," she said.

"Have ye anything to say? Ye laughed an' mocked at me. Ye treated me like a boy without pride, or honour. Then, when yon fellow let ye down, you found that I was man enough to give his child my name." He spoke now without bitterness. His steady, even voice was strange to them. They stood before him, afraid of his new dignity. Then Connie said:

"Ben, that's not true."

"Eh?"

"I—I saw Eric in the summer, but it was—in March when we—when we went together. The only time, I swear."

"And when is the child coming?"

"April."

"Is yon true, Muriel?"

"Yes."

"How many lovers did yer have before this—officer fellow?"

"Eric, only Eric."

"Is yon true, Muriel?"

"Yes, Ben, I am sure of it."

They waited, while in the darkness Ben received back his lost honour. When he spoke again it was with a shy confidence.

"Oh, well, I reckon ye'd better come home out o' t'wet, Connie. I wanted ye to kill yourself at first, and then I thought mebbe I'd better let you speak for yourself first. But if yon's false, what you've told me——"

"It's not."

He sighed wearily. "Oh, well, best come home, Connie."

"Do—do the others know?"

"Nay. An' they won't. This is our affair. T'letter's in my pocket. I'll burn it an' fake some tale. Coom on, Connie. I——" He had forgotten Muriel. They were alone together in a world new made.

"I want my child," said Ben.

They turned; he put his hand on her arm, and they went up the path together.

Muriel stood alone beside the river; then she too moved forward, following the lantern's light.