She turned to the veiled window and idly pulled the blind and looked out. Huge red and yellow cars were swimming in thunder along Deansgate; lorries jolted and rattled; the people of Manchester hurried along the pavements, apparently unconscious that all their doings were vain. Yesterday he too had been in Deansgate, hungry for life, hating the idea of death! What a figure he must have made! Her heart dissolved in pity for him. She dropped the blind.
“My life has been too terrible!” she thought. “I wish I was dead. I have been through too much. It is monstrous, and I cannot stand it. I do not want to die, but I wish I was dead.”
There was a discreet knock on the door.
“Come in,” she said, in a calm, resigned, cheerful voice. The sound had recalled her with the swiftness of a miracle to the unconquerable dignity of human pride.
Mr. Till Boldero entered.
“I should like you to come downstairs and drink a cup of tea,” he said. He was a marvel of tact and good nature. “My wife is unfortunately not here, and the house is rather at sixes and sevens; but I have sent out for some tea.”
She followed him downstairs into the parlour. He poured out a cup of tea.
“I was forgetting,” she said. “I am forbidden tea. I mustn’t drink it.”
She looked at the cup, tremendously tempted. She longed for tea. An occasional transgression could not harm her. But no! She would not drink it.
“Then what can I get you?”