“I have learnt not to expect a nice sense of honour from superior persons with unimpeachable sentiments,” said Hadria.
“You are certainly a good hater!” cried Valeria, with a laugh.
“Oh, I don’t hate Henriette; I only hate unimpeachable sentiments.”
The sentiments that Henriette represented had become, to Hadria, as the walls of a prison from which she could see no means of escape.
She had found that life took no heed either of her ambitions or of her revolts. “And so I growl,” she said. She might hate and chafe in secret to her heart’s content; external conformity was the one thing needful.
“Hadria will be so different when she has children,” everyone had said. And so she was; but the difference was alarmingly in the wrong direction. Throughout history, she reflected, children had been the unfailing means of bringing women into line with tradition. Who could stand against them? They had been able to force the most rebellious to their knees. An appeal to the maternal instinct had quenched the hardiest spirit of revolt. No wonder the instinct had been so trumpeted and exalted! Women might harbour dreams and plan insurrections; but their children—little ambassadors of the established and expected—were argument enough to convince the most hardened sceptics. Their helplessness was more powerful to suppress revolt than regiments of armed soldiers.
Such were the thoughts that wandered through Hadria’s mind as she bent her steps towards the cottage near Craddock Church, where, according to the gravedigger’s account, the baby of the unhappy schoolmistress was being looked after by Mrs. Gullick.
It would have puzzled the keenest observer to detect the unorthodox nature of Mrs. Temperley’s reflections, as she leant over the child, and made enquiries as to its health and temperament.
Mrs. Gullick seemed more disposed to indulge in remarks on its mother’s conduct than to give the desired information; but she finally admitted that Ellen Jervis had an aunt at Southampton who was sending a little money for the support of the child. Ellen Jervis had stayed with the aunt during the summer holidays. Mrs. Gullick did not know what was to be done. She had a large family of her own, and the cottage was small.
Mrs. Temperley asked for the address of the aunt.