'My strength won't give way,' said Nelly, with quiet conviction. Then, after pausing a moment, she said with a strange ardour—'I once heard a story—a true story—of a man, who burnt his own hand off, because it had struck his friend. He held it in a flame till there was only the burnt stump, and after that he forgave himself and could bear to live again.'
'But whom have you struck, you poor child!' cried Hester.
'George!' said Nelly, looking at her with bitterly shining eyes.
Hester's arms enfolded her, and they talked far into the night. Before they separated, Hester had agreed that the date of Nelly's departure should be not postponed, but quickened.
And during the few remaining days they were together, Hester could only notice with growing amazement the change in all the small ways and habits that had once characterised Nelly Sarratt—especially since her Torquay illness; the small invalidisms and self-indulgences, the dependence on a servant or on Bridget. Now the ascetic, penitential passion had come upon her; as it comes in different forms, upon many a man or woman in the sélva oscúra of their life; and Hester knew that there was no resisting it.
Hester went back to her 'Welfare' work. Cicely travelled between Carton and London, collecting her trousseau and declaring that she would be married in Lent, whatever people might say. Farrell was deeply engaged in introducing a new antiseptic treatment of an extremely costly kind throughout his hospital, in watching the results of it, and in giving facilities for the study of it, to the authorities and officials of all kinds who applied to him. A sorrowful man—but a very busy one. Marsworth was making his mark in the Intelligence Department of the War Office, and was being freely named as the head of an important Military Mission to one of the Allied Headquarters. What would become of Cicely and the wedding, if the post were given him, and—as was probable—at a day's warning—was not quite clear. Cicely, however, took it calmly. 'They can't give us less than three hours' notice—and if it's after two o'clock, we can always get married somehow by five. You scurry round, pay fifty pounds, and somebody at Lambeth does it. Then—I should see him safely off in the evening!'
Meanwhile Bridget Cookson was living in her usual Bloomsbury boarding-house, holding herself quite aloof from the idle ways of its inmates, who, in the midst of the world-war, were still shopping as usual in the mornings and spending the afternoons in tea and gossip. Bridget, however, was scarcely employing her own time to any greater profit for a burdened country. She was learning various languages, and attending a number of miscellaneous lectures. Her time was fairly full, and she lived in an illusion of multifarious knowledge which flattered her vanity. She was certainly far cleverer; and better-educated than the other women of her boarding-house; and she was one of those persons who throughout life prefer to live with their inferiors. 'The only remedy against a superiority,'—says some French writer—'is to love it.' But Bridget was so made that she could not love it; she could only pull it down and belittle it.
But all the same, Bridget Cookson was no monster, though she was probably without feelings and instincts that most people possess. She missed Nelly a good deal, more than Nelly herself would have believed. And she thought now, that she had behaved like a fool in not recognising Sarratt at once, and so preserving her influence with her sister. Morally, however, she saw no great harm in what she had done. It was arguable, at any rate. Everything was arguable. As to the effect on Nelly of the outward and visible facts of Sarratt's death, it seemed to have been exactly what she, Bridget, had foreseen. Through some Manchester acquaintance she succeeded in getting occasional news of Nelly, who was, it appeared, killing herself with hard and disagreeable work. She heard also from the woman left in charge of the Loughrigg farm that all Mrs. Sarratt's personal possessions had been sent to the care of Miss Martin, and that Sir William had shut up the cottage and never came there. Sometimes Bridget would grimly contrast this state of things with what might have happened, had her stroke succeeded, and had George died unrecognised. In that event how many people would have been made happy, who were now made miserable!
The winter passed away, the long and bitter winter which seemed to sharpen for English hearts and nerves all the suffering of the war. On the Somme the Germans were secretly preparing the retreat which began with the spring, while the British armies were growing to their full stature, month by month, and England was becoming slowly accustomed to the new and amazing consciousness of herself as a great military power. And meanwhile death in the trenches still took its steady toll of our best and dearest; and at sea, while British sea-power pressed home its stifling grasp on the life of Germany, the submarine made England anxious, but not afraid.
March shewed some pale gleams of spring, but April was one of the coldest and dreariest in the memory of living man. The old earth in sympathy with the great struggle that was devastating and searing her, seemed to be withholding leaf and flower, and forbidding the sun to woo her.