When she had done, the chill dawn was stealing up the smoky heavens.
She put out the lamp, and packed.
The memories would come crowding, treading on each other’s heels importunately. Betty remembered only the happinesses; and these, because they made her lip tremble, she put from her with stern and dogged fortitude, bending her wits only on the details of her coming actions, on the things she must do; and it was thus that, when the time came, every move she made fitted into its calculated place with appointed precision, and she was prepared for every event before it nudged at her attention.
The sun was well up, and yawning housemaids clumsily astir, before she had put away her last little belongings in the big black trunk. Even at her tender years she had learnt in the harsh school of experience the value that the world sets upon the having of possessions, and the credit that landlords give to such as show responsible luggage.
Wisdom is thrust upon some at sixteen.
The room looked sadly desolate when she had put away the last of her small belongings; and it was with a strenuous effort that she sat down before the mirror and gathered up and coiled her nut-brown hair about her head for the first time. She stared wide-eyed at the years it added to her age.
She dressed herself in her lengthened gown; put on her hat and jacket. When she was finished she stood before the glass a woman—and a very beautiful woman.
Yet her brows clouded—at the dread that she looked too young!
She wrote a short note to her landlady to say she might be away all day; stole stealthily on to the landing to see that there was no one about; locked her door; put the key in her pocket; ran down the stairs; and let herself out into the street....
All day she spent in the purlieus of Soho, in the search for a room; and it was near upon nightfall when she made a choice.