"The economic, materialistic, worldly point of view—that money problems can be solved by a thing that is sacred, sacred!" Imogen passionately declared, her face still hidden.
Her mother now guessed that the self-abandonment was over and that, with recovered control, she found it difficult to pick up her usual dignity. The insight added to her tenderness. She touched the girl's hair softly, said, in a soothing voice, that she had meant nothing, nothing gross or unfeeling, and, seeing that her nearness was not, at the moment, welcome, returned to her own place at the other end of the table.
Imogen now dried her eyes. In the consternation that her mother's statements had caused her there had, indeed, almost at once, arisen the consoling figure of Jack Pennington, and she did not know whether she were the more humiliated by her own grief, for such a mercenary cause, or by this stilling of it, this swift realization that the cramped life need last no longer, for herself, than she chose. To feel so keenly the need of escape was to feel herself imprisoned by the new conditions; for never, never for one moment, must the need of escape weigh with her in her decision as to Jack's place in her life. She must accept the burden, not knowing that it would ever be lifted, and with this acceptance the sense of humiliation left her, so that she could more clearly see that she had had a right to her dismay. Her crippled life would hurt not only herself, but all that she meant to others—her beneficence, her radiance, her loving power; so hurt it, that, for one dark moment, had come just a dart of severity toward her father. The memory of her mother's implied criticism had repulsed it; dear, wonderful, transcendentalist, she must be worthy of him and not allow her thoughts, in their coward panic, to sink to the mother's level. This was the deepest call upon her courage that had ever come to her. Calls to courage were the very breath of the spiritual life. Imogen lifted her heart to the realm of spirit, where strength was to be found, and, though her mother, with those implied criticisms, had pierced her, she could now, with her recovered tranquility of soul, be very patient with her. In a voice slightly muffled and uncertain, but very gentle, she said that she thought it best to live on in the dear home. "We must retrench in other places, mama. I would rather give up almost anything than this. He is here to me." Her tears rose again, but they were no longer tears of bitterness. "It would be like leaving him."
"Yes, dear, yes; that shall be as you wish," said Valerie, who was deeply considering what these retrenchments should be. She, too, was knowing a qualm of humiliation over self-revelations. She had not expected that it would be really so painful, in such trivial matters, to adjust herself to the most ordinary maternal sacrifices. It only showed her the more plainly how fatal, how almost fatal, it was to the right impulses, to live away from family ties; so that at their first pressure upon her, in a place that sharply pinched, she found herself rueful.
For the first retrenchment, of course, must be the sending back to England of her dear, staunch Felkin, who had taken such care of her for so many years. Her heart was heavy with the thought. She was very fond of Felkin, and to part with her would be, in a chill, almost an ominous way, like parting with the last link that bound her to "over there." Besides,—Valerie was a luxurious woman,—unpleasant visions went through her mind of mud to be brushed off and braid to be put on the bottoms of skirts; stockings to darn-she was sure that it was loathsome to darn stockings; buttons to keep in their places; all the thousand and one little rudiments of life, to which one had never had to give a thought, looming, suddenly, in the foreground of one's consciousness. And how very tiresome to do one's own hair. Well, it couldn't be helped. She accepted the accompanying humiliation, finding no refuge in Imogen's spiritual consolations.
"Eddy leaves Harvard this spring and goes into Mr. Haliwell's office. He will live with us here, then. And we can be very economical about food and clothes; I can help little dressmakers with yours, you know," she said, smiling at her child.
"Everything, mama, everything must be done, rather than leave this house."
"We mustn't let the girls' clubs suffer, either," Valerie attempted further to lighten the other's gloomy resolution. "That's one of the first claims."
"I must balance all claims, with justice. I have many other calls upon me, dear, and it will need earnest thought to know which to eliminate."
"Well, the ones you care about most are the ones we'll try to fit in."