"I am afraid what your unpleasant acquaintance of this morning told you is probably true," she said. "After all, if you went and handed out four guineas it was a direct temptation to the poor old woman to get away on."
"I don't believe she would take it just for that," Joan tried to argue. "I know she wanted it awfully badly, but it was to help her pull through and things were going to run better afterwards. I don't believe she would just take it and slip away without saying a word to me."
"Faith in human nature is all very well," the other answered, "but it is awfully apt to let you down, especially in the working world."
"I shall go on believing for a bit," Joan said; "she was looking so awfully ill yesterday, it may just be that she could not come up to office to-day."
"May be," Rose agreed. "When you are tired of waiting for the return of the prodigal let me know and I will see if I cannot get you in somewhere. I ought to be able to help. And look here, my child, never you pay another penny for tuition on those lines; you could get all the learning you need at the County Council Night Schools, and it is a good deal cheaper."
Joan put in two days at No. 2, Baker Street, waiting for the return of Miss Bacon or for some message which might explain her absence, but nothing and no one came. On the morning of the third day she found that the stout and bad-tempered man had carried out his vague threats. The place had been taken possession of, already they were removing the typewriters and tables under the direction of a bailiff. Even the plate bearing Miss Bacon's name had vanished, and boards announcing the top flat to let flaunted themselves from the area railings.
After that Joan gave up the hope. Sometimes she wondered if after all Miss Bacon had found the necessary courage to be done with it all, and if her silence betokened death. It was more likely though that the poor old lady had merely sunk one rung lower on the ladder of self-esteem and was dragging out a miserable existence somewhere in the outside purlieus of London.
CHAPTER XIII
| "Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, Or what's a heaven for?" |