‘It was inevitable,’ said Mrs. Luke, turning to Jocelyn. ‘Absolutely inevitable.’
He caught hold of his mother’s hands. That she should see that, that she should instantly understand....
‘And I congratulate you with all my heart, my dear son, and my dear daughter,’ Mrs. Luke went on, continuing to be wonderful. ‘You are both my dear, my very dear, children.’
And Jocelyn bent his head over her hand, and kissed it in a fervour of gratitude and relief.
And Sally, looking on at Usband in this new light, thought, ‘Well, I’m blest.’
IX
§
Restored by the shock both of Sally’s loveliness and language to her normal self, Mrs. Luke’s tears dried up and her emotions calmed down, and she began to think rapidly and clearly.
This situation had to be dealt with. The only person who could deal with it with any hope at all of success was herself. She would, then, grasp it firmly, as if it were a nettle, and wear it proudly, as if it were a rose. Yes, that was the line to take: wear it proudly, as if it were a rose.
More clearly than if Jocelyn had explained for an hour she saw what had happened, what couldn’t have helped happening, once chance had shown him Salvatia. From those few words of Sally’s she reconstructed the Pinner family and its conditions, and as she stood gazing at her, with one hand still in Jocelyn’s, she grouped the whole Pinner lot into the single word Gutter. Jocelyn had found and picked up beauty in a gutter. The gutter was as evident as the beauty, and as impossible to hide. Accept it, then; accept it, and make South Winch accept it. Treat it as quaint, as amusing, as completely excused by the beauty. She had made South Winch accept Tiepolo, when it didn’t in the least want to, and now see into what an enthusiasm it had lashed itself! Even so would she make it accept Salvatia; and ceaselessly every hour, every minute, she herself would educate the girl, and train her patiently, and force her gently into proper ways of speech and behaviour. Seventeen, was she? Mrs. Luke felt that with seventeen all things were possible. A child. Wax. And she was so really exquisite, so really perfect of form and colour and movement, that it would be wonderful to watch her development, her unfolding into at least the semblance of a lady.