PAMELA ran up to her room with the long, low lattice window and the somber furniture. She threw herself full length on the old sofa which she had rescued from one of the attics and covered in the most approved be-frilled style with cretonne. Her head was back on the cushions, her sparkling eyes were on a level with the garden. She looked at the Brussels sprouts with satisfaction, imagining shaven emerald turf and lozenge-shaped beds of standard roses and geraniums in their place.
She was going to marry Jethro. Their eyes and lips had met—the thing was settled. Men did not propose in set words and the conventional attitude nowadays. She would marry Jethro. Her future life stretched out before her—smooth, level, pleasant—like the big tennis lawn at Turle. She thought of all the country houses round where she was sure of a hearty welcome because she was a cousin. They were comfortable, easy people, these Turles and Crisps and Jaynes and Furlongers. She had grown really fond of Nancy, with her simper, her pretty pink face, and her glorious red hair. Annie Jayne, in her spick and span nursery with her beaming face bent over her baby boy and her lips flowing forth pious reminiscences of her mother, had her own particular charm. To be simple, to be sterling, that was all one wanted; everything else was garish, meretricious. Hearts were better than the flimsy things called brains.
She saw her life roll away year after year, so placid, so uneventful, so comfortable and prosperous. She loved money for her pleasure, not her pocket. She always felt her greatest admiration for Jethro when he hauled out a canvas bag of sovereigns.
She began to form social plans. She would be exclusive, yet catholic, like Aunt Sophy. Jethro must let her have another servant—that would be three. The wagonette must be done up, and she’d try for a Battlesden car like Furlonger’s. She’d aim at culture, too—a Browning class, in opposition to Mrs. McAlpine’s Shakspere. There wouldn’t be so many expurgations necessary. The members of the Shakspere class had neatly written slips sent them with a list of passages to be slurred. She would like to take a rise out of Mrs. McAlpine, who lived in a cottage, but gave herself tremendous airs because she was a J. P.’s daughter, and had instituted afternoon tea with cucumber or cress sandwiches.
In the afternoon she slipped on her things and went to the Buttery, the ancient cottage where the absentee journalist’s wife lived with a small maid. Mrs. Clutton had become her most confidential friend. She didn’t mean to mention her engagement, but she was twitching with excitement, dragged here and there with emotions of very different sorts.
She went across the common in the March sun and wind. Her heart and feet danced, but her face was like the changing sky. Forget! She must forget. She was to marry Jethro. It was so easy to say forget, so difficult to do it. Once she stopped, her eyes strained in the direction of London—far away over moor and hill and sleek pasture. She groaned aloud. She knew that she would give it all—greenhouse, Battlesden, big, fond man with the bulging bag of sovereigns—for one touch on the mouth from one other man. He was still in prison, still only a number behind the high wall. When he came out? Emigration or the army. But that was not her affair.
When she reached the Buttery she went through the high green trellis door into the garden, sure of finding her hostess there on such a day, at such a season. It was a fair-sized garden in apple-pie order. The long borders were gay. At one end were substantial pig-sties. In them Mrs. Clutton kept fowls. She was leaning over the wall, her elbows spread out on the wire netting which was nailed across to keep the birds from flying over.
She came running excitedly along the neat asphalt path. In one hand she held an egg. It was evidently only just laid. It hardened as the air touched it.
“Look!” she said with a laugh, “I’m going to give this to the cock. What would your thrifty Gainah say? They are all going—my pet hens—Flirt and Prim and Sheila. My cock, too—Tatters. Isn’t he a fine fellow? But morals! None. They are neurotic. Old Chalcraft says they eat their eggs because the floor of the run is brick and they can’t scratch. I hate a person who snouts round for a practical solution. It’s just environment—because I am their mistress. Tatters has been more trouble to me than able-bodied twins. I fed him from the very shell with hard-boiled egg and bread-crumb, thereby sowing the seed of future vice, no doubt. I’ve scrubbed his legs with carbolic and anointed him with vaseline for scaly-leg. I read about it in a paper. I came and stood out here, paper in hand, comparing his leg with the symptoms. And then, after all, I found that humpy-bumpy legs were natural to that particular breed. I was overjoyed at his first baby-crow—such a throaty, silly sound.
“To be practical—the eggs went. Every time Flirt or Prim or Sheila cackled I rushed out, only to find them stalking gravely up and down with an unconscious expression faintly tinged with injury. And then one day I saw that villain Tatters gulping down the last bit of shell. I’ve sold them at a sacrifice, on condition that they are sent to market and not allowed to demoralize another run. Hone will be here directly; he’s taking them to Liddleshorn. But—Tatters—here!”