AND AFTERWARDS
BEE went quietly through the rest of the day, saying little, doing all that was needful. She looked white, Amy thought. But any attempt at confidential talk, any reference to the past scene, on the part of the elder, was decisively checked by the younger girl. For once, Amy found herself powerless.
Mrs. Major did not seem to remark anything unusual; and the hours wore away tardily. How tardily, how drearily, with Bee, Amy might have seen. She was no longer a young girl herself; but she had known something of life. She had had her own love-affair, many years back, caring too much for one who did not care for her; and this ought to have given her power, to read and sympathise. But she had found consolation in that past trouble, by pouring her rejected devotion upon Bee; and somehow, though she did see something, she failed to estimate fully.
Bedtime came; and Bee was alone. At last!
She had longed for this moment, through those leaden hours of the interminable evening. Till now she had not dared to let herself think. A heavy weight pressed upon her; but she might not analyse it. She could only struggle on, minute by minute, holding herself in with a firm hand.
The others had gone to bed; and her door was locked; and she no longer feared interruption. She stood in the middle of her pretty room, dazed and motionless; her hands clasped, her eyes fixed on a far distance.
She was seeing again, hearing again, all that had gone on that afternoon; feeling again her own coldness to him; enduring again that terrible strain, and the sense that she might not, could not, let herself go—that she might not, could not, let him see what his coming was to her.
And she had driven him away; had rebuffed and repelled him; had made him think that she did not care, that he was nothing to her. She had read in his face, that he understood it so. He would never get over it. He would never again come forward. She had ruined her happiness, once and for all!
It had been unavoidable. Not knowing what he felt, and recalling what he might have overheard, how could she take any forward step? Things might have been so different—but for Amy! Magda mattered less. Magda saw little below the surface. She could have managed Magda. But Amy—her life-long friend and devotee, Amy who professed to love her more than any other—Amy had done this. Amy had worked the mischief. Amy had laughed at her; had twice said the wrong thing at the critical moment; had upset her self-control; had interfered unkindly, when she might have helped; had driven her into doing that which had destroyed her hope, that which had spoilt her life. If Amy had not been there, or if Amy had acted otherwise, when he came in, she might have met him so differently!
Bee was startled at the force of her own passionate resentment, under this consciousness. Hers was not a resentful nature. That, is to say, it was not one of those natures which are for ever taking offence at nothings, being annoyed at little things. But if resentment were once aroused in her, it was no light matter—just because such arousing was so rare, and would never be without some real cause. To-day it had been aroused, intensely, deeply. Her whole being as she stood in the centre of her room, seemed to swell and surge in vehement bitter wrath. How could she ever forgive this—this which meant the wrecking of her life's happiness?