Then as once she danced under the tall plane tree of Hagworth Street to a sugared melody of "Cavalleria," so now she danced in an apple orchard, keeping time to the wind and the waving boughs. Young Frank quivered and kicked with joy to see the twirling of his mother's skirts. May cried, "You great tomboy!" but with robin's eyes and slanting head watched her sister.
Had she been a poet, Jenny would have sung of London, of the thunder and grayness, of the lamps and rain, of long irresistible rides on the top of swaying tramcars, of wild roars through the depth of the earth past the green lamps flashing to red. She danced instead about the sea-girt orchard-close all that once her heart had found in London. She danced the hopes of many children of Apollo, who work so long for so little. She danced their disillusions, their dreams of immortality, their lives, their marriages, their little houses. She danced their fears of poverty and starvation, their work and effort and strife, their hurrying home in the darkness. She danced their middle age of growing families and all their renewed hopes and disappointments and contentments. She danced a little of the sorrow and all the joy of life. She danced old age and the breathing night of London and the sparrow-haunted dawn. She danced the silly little shillings which the children of Apollo earn. Fifteen pirouettes for fifteen shillings, fifteen pirouettes for long rehearsals and long performances, fifteen pirouettes for a week, fifteen pirouettes for no fame, fifteen pirouettes for fifteen shillings, and one high beat for the funeral of a marionette.
And all the time the gay October leaves danced with her in the grass.
"Well, I hope you've enjoyed yourself," said May. Jenny threw herself breathless on the outspread rug and kissed young Frank.
"I don't suppose I shall ever dance again."
"What about the other letter?" asked May.
"There, if I didn't forget all about it," cried Jenny. "But who's it from? What unnatural writing! Like music."
She broke the seal.
Pump Court, Temple.
My dear Jenny,