In London once more! It was Fan's birth-place, the home she had known continuously up till one short year ago; yet now on her return how strange, how foreign to her soul, how even repelling it seemed! The change had come so unexpectedly and in such unhappy circumstances, and the contrast was so great to that peaceful country life and all its surroundings, which had corresponded so perfectly with her nature. To Constance, who knew little of London except from reading, the contrast seemed equally great, but it affected her in a different and much pleasanter way. To Fan town and town-life could be repelling because, owing to her past experiences, and to something in her mental character, she was able vividly to realise her present position. Even when the brilliant May sun shone on her, and the streets and parks were thronged with fashionable pleasure-seekers, and London looked not unbeautiful, she realised it. For all that made town-life pleasant and desirable was now beyond her reach. It was sweet when Mary loved her and gave her a home; but in all this vast world of London there was no second Mary who would find her and take her to her heart. Now she might sink into a state of utter destitution, and she would be powerless to win help or sympathy, or even a hearing, from any one of the countless thousands of fellow-creatures that would pass her in the streets, all engrossed with their own affairs, so accustomed to the sight of want and suffering that it affected them not at all. To find some work which she might be able to do, and for which the payment would be sufficient to provide her with food, clothing, and shelter, was the most she could hope. She could dream of no wonderful second deliverance in the long years of humble patient drudgery that awaited her—no impossible good fortune passing over the heads of thousands as deserving as herself to light on hers and give a new joy and glory to her life.
To Constance, with her more vigorous intellect and ardent imagination, no such dreary prospect could present itself. The thunderous noise and shifting panorama of the streets, the interminable desert of brick houses, and even the smoke-laden atmosphere only served to exhilarate her mind. These things continually reminded her that she was now where she had long wished to be, in the great intellectual laboratory, where thousands of men and women once as unknown and poor as herself had made a reputation. Not without great labour and pains certainly; but what others had done she could do; and with health and energy, and a bundle of carefully-prepared manuscripts in her box to begin with, she could feel no serious anxiety about the future.
During their second day in town they managed after much searching to find cheap furnished apartments—a bed and small sitting-room—on the second floor of a house in a monotonous street of yellow brick houses in the monotonous yellow brick wilderness of West Kensington. Their search for rooms would not have occupied them very long if Constance had been as easily satisfied as her companion; but although in most of the places they visited she found the bedrooms “good enough,” wretched as they were compared with her own fragrant and spotless bower at Wood End House, she was not so readily pleased with the sitting-room. That, at all events, must not wear so mean and dingy a look as one usually has to put up with when the rent is only ten shillings a week; and beyond that sum they were determined not to go. The reason of this fastidiousness about a sitting-room presently appeared. Fan was told the secret of the engagement with Merton Chance; also that Merton was now for the first time about to be informed of the step Constance had taken without first consulting him, and asked to visit her at her lodgings. Constance felt just a little hurt at the way her news was received, for Fan said little and seemed unsympathetic, almost as if her friend's happiness had been a matter of indifference to her.
Next day, after moving into their new quarters, Constance wrote her letter, addressing it to the Foreign Office, posting it herself in the nearest pillar-box, and then settled herself down to wait the result. It was weary waiting, she found, when the next morning's post brought her no answer, and when the whole day passed and no Merton came, and no message. She was restless and anxious, and in a feverish state of anxiety, fearing she knew not what; but outwardly she bore herself calmly; and remembering with some resentment still how little her engagement had seemed to rejoice her friend, she proudly held her peace. But she would not leave the house, for the lover might come at any moment, and it would not do to be out of the way when he arrived. She remained indoors, pretending to be much occupied with her writing, while Fan went out for long walks alone. The next day passed in like manner, the two friends less in harmony and less together than ever; and when still another morning came and brought no letter, Fan began to feel extremely unhappy in her mind, for now the long-continued strain was beginning to tell on her friend, robbing her cheeks of their rich colour, and filling her hazel eyes with a great unexpressed trouble. But on that day about three o'clock, while Constance sat at her window, which commanded a view of the street, she saw a hansom-cab arrive at the door, and the welcome form of her lover spring rapidly out and run up the steps. He had come to her at last! But why had he left her so long to suffer? She heard his steps bounding up the stairs, and stood trembling with excitement, her hand pressed to her wildly-beating heart. One glance at his face was enough to show her that her fears had been idle, that her lover's heart had not changed towards her; the next moment she was in his arms, feeling for the first time his kisses on her lips. After the excitement of meeting was over, explanations followed, and Merton informed her that he had only just received her letter, and greatly blamed himself for not having sent her his new address immediately after having left the Foreign Office.
“Left the Foreign Office! Do you mean for good?” asked Constance in a kind of dismay.
“I hope for good,” he replied, smiling at her serious face. “The uncongenial work I had to do there has chafed me for a long time. It interfered with the real and serious business of my life, and I threw it up with a light heart. I must be absolutely free and master of my own time before I can do, and do well, the work for which I am fitted.”
“But, dear Merton, you told me that your work was so light there, and that the salary you had relieved you from all anxiety, and left you free to follow the bent of your own mind in literary work.”
“Did I? That was one of my foolish speeches then. However light any work may be, if it occupies you during the best hours of the day, it must to some extent take the freshness out of you. And to look at the matter in a practical way, I consider that I am a great gainer, since by resigning a salary of £250 a year I put myself in a position to make five hundred. I hope before very long to make a thousand.”
His news had given a considerable shock to Constance, but he seemed so confident of success, laughing gaily at her doubts, that in a little while he succeeded in raising her spirits, and she began to believe that this exceedingly clever young man had really done a wise thing in throwing up an appointment which would have secured him against actual want for the whole term of his life.
After a while she ventured to speak of her own plans and hopes. He listened with a slight smile.