“All the horses you back finish sixth and all the girls you like best come croppers. Poor little Phyllis! weren’t you sorry for her?”
“But her husband, surely, is most devoted?”
“Yes, but she’s frightfully hard up, and you remember how opulent she used to be at school. Of course, it must sound funny hearing me pitying people for having no money. But somehow other people’s hard-upness always seems so much worse than mine. Especially poor old Phyl’s, because she really isn’t fit to stand it. I’ve been used to being absolutely broke all my life. Poor dear father always seemed to be writing an article against time, with creditors scratching earnestly at the door.” Eve laughed, but her eyes were misty. “He was a brick, wasn’t he? I mean, sending me to a first-class school like Wayland House when he often hadn’t enough money to buy tobacco, poor angel. I expect he wasn’t always up to time with fees, was he?”
“Well, my dear, of course I was only an assistant mistress at Wayland House and had nothing to do with the financial side, but I did hear sometimes. . .”
“Poor darling father! Do you know, one of my earliest recollections—I couldn’t have been more than ten—is of a ring at the front-door bell and father diving like a seal under the sofa and poking his head out and imploring me in a hoarse voice to hold the fort. I went to the door and found an indignant man with a blue paper. I prattled so prettily and innocently that he not only went away quite contentedly but actually patted me on the head and gave me a penny. And when the door had shut father crawled out from under the sofa and gave me twopence, making threepence in all—a good morning’s work. I bought father a diamond ring with it at a shop down the street, I remember. At least I thought it was a diamond. They may have swindled me, for I was very young.”
“You have had a hard life, dear.”
“Yes, but hasn’t it been a lark! I’ve loved every minute of it. Besides, you can’t call me really one of the submerged tenth. Uncle Thomas left me a hundred and fifty pounds a year, and mercifully I’m not allowed to touch the capital. If only there were no hats or safety bets in the world, I should be smugly opulent. . . . But I mustn’t keep you any longer, Clarkie dear. I expect the waiting-room is full of dukes who want cooks and cooks who want dukes, all fidgeting and wondering how much longer you’re going to keep them. Good-bye, darling.”
And, having kissed Miss Clarkson fondly and straightened her hat, which the other’s motherly embrace had disarranged, Eve left the room.