The Privet Hedge

by J. E. Buckrose

"Oh! I do wish you could come to-night," she said. "I particularly want it to go back to-night."

The carrier laughed good-naturedly, looking down at her. "Oh, that's it, is it?" he said. "Well, you're in the right on it. One lass is enough for any man. Gee-up." And he shouted back as he went: "I'll call round in an hour or so."

Caroline stood still in the road as he jolted round out of sight, forgetting to move, her bodily sensations all swamped by the tumult of her mind. How dare he say such a thing! she said to herself; then she burst forth, aloud: "I aren't going to have it. I aren't going to have it!"

But behind all that, she felt the iron touch of reality. Life was not to be as she wanted it, just because she was herself—as she had felt in the past. No matter how she might rebel, she'd got to "have it." The people in Thorhaven must pity her or laugh at her as they liked: she could not prevent them from destroying the steps she had hewn with such careful pains on the side of that steep hill which led to everything she desired. With all her fun and easy friendliness she had always kept herself a little "nice"—a little carefully unsmirched—holding her head up among the other girls—— And now they had the laugh of her. Now, she thought—standing there, digging her finger-nails into her palms—now they'd giggle and talk about her as they did about all those others who had been made fools of and left in the lurch. And she could not get away from it all. Despite her fine talk about never entering Uncle Creddle's house again, she had found that it would be literally impossible to live in Flodmouth on what she earned at first, and she would be obliged to lodge with Aunt Creddle, going in and out by train every day.

Suddenly, the thought swept over her of how she had gloried in the idea of travelling with the other girls who were off to places of business in Flodmouth—all so neat, and nicely dressed, and so independent. Now that was spoilt, like everything else.

Then the sudden hooting of a motor-bicycle caused her to start aside, and Wilf careered past—cap correctly poised, slim young body bent forward. The next moment, he swerved round with a dash and swirl, shouting out:

"Hello! hello! You'll be getting run down one of these days!" But it was to show his new motor-bicycle, and what he had gained by her "turning him down," as well as what she had lost.

Caroline was conscious of his triumphant attitude, though she only felt a sort of incredulous wonder that she could ever have thought of him as a lover. It seemed, somehow, to have happened in another life, so far off it appeared from her present experiences.

After that two girls whom she knew passed, laughing and talking together on the other side of the road, and she immediately felt sure that they were making fun of her. No doubt it was all over the town that she had been "carrying on" with Wilson—a man just about to be married to Miss Temple, whom everybody respected and liked. There would be no pity there—only contempt. So she called out "good night" and went on as fast as she could, fancying what the girls were saying to each other. "Well, I wouldn't have done such a thing! And I never reckoned to be as particular as Carrie Raby. But pride will have a fall——"

She could almost hear them say it as she hurried on, her ambition as well as her love so deeply wounded that she could scarcely bear herself. Revolting, fighting—having to find out with exasperated agony like every one else that those who fight against destiny only hurt themselves. But as she passed the short street leading to the promenade a strong current of sea-air blew down it and she turned her hot face towards the breeze, looking up towards the pay-box which stood silent and deserted in the fading light. It took on for her now that strange quality which belongs to places where we have felt a great deal—as if the walls had absorbed some of the currents of emotion which had been given out there. She both loved the little wooden erection, and longed never to see it again. Beyond it, the Flamborough lights swung out across the sea: white—white—red. How unhappy life was! And contempt did not kill love, as she had always understood from the novels in the pretty paper covers which she liked to read so much. It had killed trust; but the ache in her went on just the same, even though Godfrey had been threatened by Uncle Creddle with a big stick, and had shown such a cowardly anxiety to escape a row.