"All right," said Marsden. "So be it. I dare say they'll fetch a tidy sum—and it's share and share alike, of course, for the two of us."
Two days after this the house was stripped of nearly all that had given it an air of opulent comfort and decorative luxury. Mrs. Marsden went to the department of the firm, and bought the cheapest bedroom things she could find to fill the blank spaces and ugly gaps upstairs, and paid for everything with her private purse.
In a fortnight the furniture auctioneers wrote to inform Mr. Marsden that the goods under the hammer had brought the respectable sum of one hundred and thirty pounds. Account for commission, etc., with cheque to balance, should follow shortly. And before long he duly received the balancing cheque.
But the loss of the cabinets and sofas made the living rooms seem bare and forlorn. The house and the shop had become alike: in each one could now see the empty, cheerless aspect of impending ruin.
Enid, when next she brought her child to call on granny, uttered an exclamation of surprise and distress.
"Mother! What has happened? Where has everything gone?"
"To London—to be sold."
"Oh, mother. Has he obliged you to do this?"
"Yes."
The barrier of reserve so long maintained by Mrs. Marsden had worn very thin. It gave small shelter now; and the brave defender seemed to be growing careless of exposure. And Enid too was losing the power to protect herself from pity and commiseration. The misery caused by both husbands could not much longer be concealed. Yet Enid's state was surely a happy one, when compared with the prevailing gloom in which her mother vainly laboured. Enid had a child to console her.