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THE TUNNEL
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PILGRIMAGE
THE TUNNEL
BY
DOROTHY M. RICHARDSON
new YORK ALFRED ? A * KNOPF mcmxix
COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY
ALFRED A. KNOPF, Inc.
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I
THE TUNNEL
CHAPTER I
MIRIAM paused with her heavy bag dragging at her
arm. It was a disaster. But it was the last of
Mornington Road. To explain about it would be to bring
Mornington Road here.
" It doesn't matter now " said Mrs. Bailey as she dropped
her bag and fumbled for her purse.
" Oh, I'd better settle it at once or I shall forget about
it. I'm so glad the things have come so soon."
When Mrs. Bailey had taken the half-crown they stood
smiling at each other. Mrs. Bailey looked exactly as she had
done the first time. It was exactly the same ; there was
no disappointment. The light coming through the glass
above the front door made her look more shabby and worn.
Her hair was more metallic. But it was the same girlish
figure and the same smile triumphing over the badly fitting
teeth. Miriam felt like an inmate returning after an
absence. The smeariness of the marble-topped hall table
did not offend her. She held herself in. It was better to
begin as she meant to go on. Behind Mrs. Bailey the stair-
case was beckoning. There was something waiting up-
stairs that would be gone if she stayed talking to Mrs.
Bailey.
Assuring Mrs. Bailey that she remembered the way to the
room she started at last on the journey up the many flights
of stairs. The feeling of confidence that had come the
first time she mounted them with Mrs. Bailey returned now.
ii
12 THE TUNNEL
She could not remember noticing anything then but a large
brown dinginess, one rich warm even tone everywhere in the
house; a sharp contrast to the cold harshly lit little bed-
room in Mornington Road. The day was cold. But this
house did not seem cold and when she rounded the first
flight and Mrs. Bailey was out of sight the welcome of the
place fell upon her. She knew it well, better than any place
she had known in all her wanderings — the faded umbers
and browns of the stair carpet, the gloomy heights of wall, a
patternless sheen where the staircase lights fell upon it and
in the shadowed parts a blurred scrolling pattern in dull
madder on a brown background ; the dark landings with
lofty ceilings and high dark polished doors surmounted
by classical reliefs in grimed plaster, the high staircase
windows screened by long smoke grimed lace curtains. On
the top landing the ceiling came down nearly level with the
tops of the doors. The light from above made the little
grained doors stare brightly. Patches of fresh brown and
buff shone here and there in the threadbare linoleum. The
cracks of the flooring were filled with dust and dust lay
along the rim of the skirting. Two large tin trunks stand-
ing one upon the other almost barred the passage way. It
was like a landing in a small suburban lodging-house, a small
silent afternoon brightness, shut in and smelling of dust.
Silence flooded up from the lower darkness. The hall
where she had stood with Mrs. Bailey was far away below
and below that were basements deep in the earth. The
outside of the house with its first-floor balcony, the broad
shallow flight of steps leading to the dark green front door,
the little steep flight running sharply down into the railed
area seemed as far away as yesterday.
The little landing was a bright plateau, under the sky-
light, shut off by its brightness from the rest of the house,
the rooms leading from it would be bright and flat and
THE TUNNEL 13
noisy with light compared with the rest of the house.
From above came the tap-tap of a door swinging gently
in a breeze and behind the sound was a soft faint continuous
murmur. She ran up the short twisting flight of bare stairs
into a blaze of light. Would her room be a bright suburban
bedroom? Had it been a dull day when she first called?
The skylight was blue and gold with light, its cracks
threads of bright gold. Three little glaring yellow grained
doors opened on to the small strip of uncovered dusty
flooring; to the left the little box-loft, to the right the
empty garret behind her own and in front of her her own
door ajar; tapping in the breeze. The little brass knob
rattled loosely in her hand and the hinge ran up the scale
to a high squeak as she pushed open the door and down
again as it closed behind her neatly with a light wooden
sound. The room was half dark shadow and half brilliant
light.
She closed the door and stood just inside it looking at
the room. It was smaller than her memory of it. When
she had stood in the middle of the floor with Mrs. Bailey
she had looked at nothing but Mrs. Bailey, waiting for
the moment to ask about the rent. Coming upstairs she
had felt the room was hers and barely glanced at it when
Mrs. Bailey opened the door. From the moment of waiting
on the stone steps outside the front door everything had
opened to the movement of her impulse. She was surprised
now at her familiarity with the detail of the room . . .
that idea of visiting places in dreams. It was something
more than that ... all the real part of your life has a real
dream in it ; some of the real dream part of you coming
true. You know in advance when you are really following
your life. These things are familiar because reality is here.
i 4 THE TUNNEL
Coming events cast light. It is like dropping everything
and walking backwards to something you know is there.
However far you go out you come back. ... I am back
now where I was before I began trying to do things like
other people. I left home to get here. None of those
things can touch me here. They are mine. . . .
. . . The room asserted its chilliness. But the dark
yellow graining of the wall-paper was warm. It shone
warmly in the stream of light pouring through the barred
lattice window. In the further part of the room darkened
by the steep slope of the roof it gleamed like stained wood.
The window space was a little square wooden room, the long
low double lattice breaking the roof, the ceiling and walls
warmly reflecting its oblong of bright light. Close against
the window was a firm little deal table covered with a thin
brightly coloured printed cotton tablecloth. When Miriam
drew her eyes from its confusion of rich fresh tones the
bedroom seemed very dark. The bed drawn in under
the slope showed an expanse of greyish white counterpane,
the carpet was colourless in the gloom. She opened the
door. Silence came in from the landing. The blue and
gold had gone from the skylight. Its sharp grey light shone
in over the dim colours of the threadbare carpet and on
to the black bars of the little grate and the little strip of
tarnished yellow grained mantelpiece, running along to
the bedhead where a small globeless gas bracket stuck out
at an angle over the head of the bed. The sight of her
luggage piled up on the other side of the fireplace drew
her forward into the dimness. There was a small chest
of drawers battered and almost paintless but with two
long drawers and two small ones and a white cover on which
stood a little looking glass framed in polished pine . . .
and a small yellow wardrobe with a deep drawer under the
hanging part and a little drawer in the rickety little wash-
THE TUNNEL 15
stand and another above the dusty cupboard of the little
mahogany sideboard. I'll paint the bright part of the
ceiling; scrolls of leaves. . . . Shutting the quiet door she
went into the brilliance of the window space. The out-
side world appeared; a long row of dormer windows and
the square tops of the larger windows below them, the
windows black or sheeny grey in the light, cut out against
the dinginess of smoke grimed walls. The long strip of
roof sloping back from the dormers was a pure even dark
grey. She bent to see the sky, clear soft heavy grey, striped
by the bars of her window. Behind the top rim of the iron
framework of the bars was a discoloured roll of window
blind. Then the bars must move. . . . Shifting the table
she pressed close to the barred window. It smelt strongly
of rust and dust. Outside she saw grey tiles sloping steeply
from the window to a cemented gutter beyond which was a
little stone parapet about two feet high. A soft wash of
madder lay along the grey tiles. There must be an after-
glow somewhere, just out of sight. Her hands went
through the bars and lifted the little rod which held the lat-
tice half open. The little square four paned frame swung
free and flattened itself back against the fixed panes, out of
reach, its bar sticking out over the leads. Drawing back
grimed fingers and wrists striped with grime she grasped
the iron bars and pulled. The heavy framework left the
window frame with a rusty creak and the sound of paint
peeling and cracking. It was very heavy but it came up
and up until her arms were straight above her head and
looking up she saw a stout iron ring in a little trap door
in the wooden ceiling and a hook in the centre of the end-
most bar in the iron framework.
Kneeling on the table to raise the frame once more and
fix it to the ceiling she saw the whole length of the top
row of windows across the way and wide strips of grimy
16 Til E TUNNEL
stucco placed across the house fronts between the windows.
The framework of the freed window was cracked and
blistered but the little square panes were clean. There
were four little windows in the row, each with four square
panes. The outmost windows were immovable. The one
next to the open one had lost its bar, but a push set it free
and it swung wide. She leaned out holding back from the
dusty sill and met a soft fresh breeze streaming straight in
from the west. The distant murmur of traffic changed
into the clear plonk plonk and rumble of swift vehicles.
Right and left at the far end of the vista were glimpses of
bare trees. The cheeping of birds came faintly from the
distant squares and clear and sharp from neighbouring
roofs. To the left the trees were black against pure grey,
to the right they stood spread and bunched in front of the
distant buildings blocking the vista. Running across the
rose-washed facade of the central mass she could just make
out " Edward's Family Hotel " in large black letters.
That was the distant view of the courtyard of Euston
Station. ... In between that and the square of trees ran
the Euston Road, by day and by night, her unsleeping
guardian, the rim of the world beyond which lay the
northern suburbs, banished.
From a window somewhere down the street out of sight
came the sound of an unaccompanied violin, clearly attack-
ing and dropping and attacking a passage of half a dozen
bars. The music stood serene and undisturbed in the air
of the quiet street. The man was following the phrase,
listening; strengthening and clearing it, completely undis-
turbed and unconscious of his surroundings. ' Good
heavens ' she breathed quietly, feeling the extremity of
relief, passing some boundary, emerging strong and equipped
in a clear medium. . . . She turned back into the twilight
of the room. Twenty-one and only one room to hold the
THE TUNNEL 17
richly renewed consciousness, and a living to earn, but the
self that was with her in the room was the untouched
tireless self of her seventeenth year and all the earlier
time. The familiar light moved within the twilight, the
old light. . . . She might as well wash the grime from
her wrists and hands. There was a scrap of soap in the
soap dish, dry and cracked and seamed with dirt. The
washstand rocked as she washed her hands; the toilet
things did not match, the towel-horse held one small thin
face towel and fell sideways against the wardrobe as she
drew off the towel. When the gas was on she would be visi-
ble from the opposite dormer window. Short skimpy faded
Madras muslin curtains screened a few inches of the end-
most windows and were caught back and tied up with tape.
She untied the tape and disengaged with the curtains a
strong smell of dust. The curtains would cut off some of
the light. She tied them firmly back and pulled at the edge
of the rolled up blind. The blind streaked and mottled
with ironmould came down in a stifling cloud of dust. She
rolled it up again and washed once more. She must ask
for a bath towel and do something about the blind, sponge
it or something; that was all.
3
A light had come in the dormer on the other side of the
street. It remained unscreened. Watching carefully she
could see only a dim figure moving amongst motionless
shapes. No need to trouble about the blind. London could
come freely in day and night through the unscreened happy
little panes; light and darkness and darkness and light.
London, just outside all the time, coming in with the
light, coming in with the darkness, always present in the
depths of the air in the room.
18 THE TUNNEL
4
The gas flared out into a wide bright flame. The dingy
ceiling and counterpane turned white. The room was a
square of bright light and had a rich brown glow, shut
brightly in by the straight square of level white ceiling
and thrown up by the oblong that sloped down, white,
at the side of the big bed almost to the floor. She left
her things half unpacked about the floor and settled her-
self on the bed under the gas jet with the Voyage of the
Beagle. Unpacking had been a distraction from the glory,
very nice, getting things straight. But there was no need
to do anything or think about anything . . . ever, here.
No interruption, no one watching or speculating or treating
one in some particular way that had to be met. Mrs.
Bailey did not speculate. She knew, everything. Every
evening here would have a glory, but not the same kind of
glory. Reading would be more of a distraction than un-
packing. She read a few lines. They had a fresh attractive
meaning. Reading would be real. The dull adventures
of the Beagle looked real, coming along through reality.
She put the book on her knee and once more met the clear
brown shock of her room.
5
The carpet is awful, faded and worn almost to bits.
But it is right, in this room. . . . This is the furnished
room ; one room. I have come to it. " You could get a
furnished room at about seven shillings rental." The awful
feeling, no tennis, no dancing, no house to move in, no
society. The relief at first when Bennett found those
people . . . maddening endless roads of little houses in
the east wind . . . their kind way of giving more than
they had undertaken, and smiling and waiting for smiles
THE TUNNEL 19
and dying all the time in some dark way without knowing
it. Filling the rooms and the piano and the fern on the
serge table cloth and the broken soap dish in the bath
room until it was impossible to read or think or play because
of them, the feeling of them stronger and stronger till
there was nothing but crying over the trays of meals and
wanting to scream. The thought of the five turnings
to the station, all into long little roads looking alike and
making you forget which was which and lose your way,
was still full of pain . . . the relief of moving to Granville
Place still a relief, though it felt a mistake from the first.
Mrs. Corrie's old teacher liking only certain sorts of people
knew it was a mistake, with her peevish silky old face and
her antique brooch. But it had been the beginning of Lon-
don. . . . Bond Street that Sunday morning in the thick
fog ; these sudden pictures gleaming in a window, filmy . . .
von Hier. Adelina Compayne, hanging out silk stockings
on the top balustrade. " I love cawfy "... that was the
only real thing that had been said downstairs. There was
no need to have been frightened of these two women in
black silk evening dresses. None of these clever things
were real. They said young Asquith is a really able man
to hide their thoughts. The American Academy pupils
talked together to keep everybody off, except when they
made their clever jokes ..." if anyone takes that top bit
there'll be murder Miss Spink." When they went out of
the room they looked silly. The young man was real some-
where else.
The little man talking about the wonders of the linotype
in the smoking room. . . . How did I get into the smoking
room? Someone probably told Miss Spink I talked to him
in the smoking room and smoked a cigarette. Perhaps his
wife. If they could have seen. It was so surprising to hear
ao THETUNNEL
anybody suddenly talking. Perhaps he began in the hall
and ushered me into the smoking room. There was no one
there and I can't remember anything about the linotype,
only the quiet and the talking face and suddenly feeling
in the heart of London. But it was soon after that they
all began being stand-offish ; before Mr. Chamberlayne
came ; before Adela began playing Esther Summerson at
the Kennington. They approved of my going down to
fetch her until he began coming too. The shock of seeing
her clumsy heavy movements on the stage and her face
looking as though it were covered with starch. ... I can
think about it all, here, and not mind.
She was beautiful. It was happiness to sit and watch
her smoking so badly, in bed, in the strip of room, her
cloud of hair against the wall in the candlelight, two o'clock
. . . the Jesuit who had taught her chess . . . and Michael
Somebody, the little book " The Purple Pillar." He was an
author and he wanted to marry her and take her back to
Ireland. Perhaps by now she was back from America and
had gone, just out of kindness. She was strong and beau-
tiful and good, sitting up in her chemise, smoking. . . . I've
got that photograph of her as Marcia somewhere. I must
put it up. Miss Spink was surprised that last week, the stu-
dents getting me into their room . . . the dark clean shining
piano, the azaleas and the muslin shaded lamp, the way they
all sat in their evening dresses, lounging and stiff with stiff
clean polished hair. ..." Miss Dust's here's going to be
the highest soprano in the States." ..." None of that Miss
Thicker." ..." When she caught that top note and the
gold medal she went right up top, to stay there, that minute."
She was surprised when Mrs. Potter took me to hear
Melba. I heard Melba. I don't remember hearing her.
THE TUNNEL 21
English opera houses are small ; there are fine things all over
the world. If you see them all you can compare one with
the other; but then you don't see or hear anything at all.
It seems strange to be American and at the same time stout
and middle-aged. It would have got more and more difficult
with all those people. The dreadful way the Americans got
intimate and then talked or hinted openly everywhere about
intimate things. No one knew how intimate Miss O'Veagh
was. I shall remember. There is something about being
Irish Roman Catholic that makes happiness. She did not
seem to think the George Street room awful. She was sur-
prised when I talked about the hole in the wall and the cold
and the imbecile servant and the smell of ether. " We are
brought up from the first to understand that we must never
believe anything a man says." She came and sat and talked
and wrote after she had gone ..." goodbye — sweet
blessed little rose of Mary "... she tried to make me think
I was young and pretty. She was sorry for me without
saying so.
I should never have gone to Mornington Road unless I
had been nearly mad with sorrow ... if Miss Thomas
disapproved of germs and persons who let apartments why
did she come and take a room at George Street ? She must
have seen she drove me nearly mad with sorrow. The
thought of Wales full of Welsh people like her, makes one
mad with sorrow. . . . Did she think I could get to know
her by hearing all her complaints? She's somewhere now,
sending someone mad.
I was mad already when I went to Mornington Road.
"You'll be all right with Mrs. Swanson " ... the awful
fringes, the horror of the ugly clean little room, the horror
of Mrs. Swanson's heavy old body moving slowly about the
house, a heavy dark mountain, fringes, bugles, slow dead
eyes, slow dead voice, slow grimacing evil smile . . . house-
22 THK TUNNEL
keeper to the Duke of Something and now moving slowly
about heavy with disapproval. She thought of me as a busi-
ness young lady.
7
Following advice is certain to be wrong. When you don't
follow advice there may be awful things. But they are not
arranged beforehand. And when they come you do not
know that they are awful until you have half got hold of
something else. Then they change into something that has
not been awful. Things that remain awful are in some way
not finished. . . . Those women are awful. They will get
more and more awful, still disliking and disapproving till
they die. I shall not see them again. ... I will never again
be at the mercy of such women or at all in the places where
they are. That means keeping free of all groups. In
groups sooner or later one of them appears, dead and sight-
less and bringing blindness and death . . . although they
seem to like brightness and children and the young people
they approve of. I run away from them because I must.
They kill me. The thought of their death is awful. Even
in heaven no one could explain anything to them if they
remain as they are. Wherever people advise you to go
there is in the end one of those women. . . .
8
When she turned out the gas the window spaces remained
faintly alight with a soft light like moonlight. At the win-
dow she found a soft bluish radiance cast up from below
upon the opposite walls and windows. It went up into
the clear blue darkness of the sky.
When she lay down the bed smelt faintly of dust. The
air about her head under the sharply sloping ceiling was still
a little warm with the gas. It was full of her untrammelled
THE TUNNEL 23
thoughts. Her luggage was lying about, quite near. She
thought of washing in the morning in the bright light on the
other side of the room . . . leaves crowding all round the lat-
tice and here and there a pink rose . . . several pink roses
. . . the lovely air chilling the water . . . the basin quite up
against the lattice . . . dew splashing off the rose bushes in
the little garden almost dark with trellises and trees, crowd-
ing with Harriett through the little damp stiff gate, the sud-
den lineny smell of Harriett's pinafore and the thought of
Harriett in it, feeling the same, sudden bright sunshine, two
shouts, great cornfields going up and up with a little track
between them ... up over Blewburton . . . Whittenham
Clumps. Before I saw Whittenham Clumps I had always
known them. But we saw them before we knew they were
called Whittenham Clumps. It was a surprise to know any-
body who had seen them and that they had a name.
9
St. Pancras bells were clamouring in the room; rapid
scales, beginning at the top, coming with a loud full thump
on to the fourth note and finishing with a rush to the lowest
which was hardly touched before the top note hung again
in the air, sounding outdoors clean and clear while all the
other notes still jangled together in her room. Nothing had
changed. The night was like a moment added to the day ;
like years going backwards to the beginning ; and in the
brilliant sunshine the unchanging things began again, per-
fectly new. She leaped out of bed into the clamorous still-
ness and stood in the window rolling up the warm hair that
fell like a shawl round her shoulders. A cup of tea and
then the 'bus to Harriett's. A 'bus somewhere just out there
beyond the morning stillness of the street. What an adven-
ture to go out and take a 'bus without having to face any-
body. They were all out there, away somewhere, the very
24 THE TUNNEL
thought and sight of them, disapproving and deploring her
surroundings. She listened. There they were. There
were their very voices, coming plaintive and reproachful
with a held-in indignation, intonations that she knew inside
and out, coming on bells from somewhere beyond the
squares — another church. She withdrew the coloured
cover and set her spirit lamp on the inkstained table. Strong
bright light was standing outside the window. The clamour
of the bells had ceased. From far away down in the street
a loud hoarse voice came thinly up. Referee — Lloyd's —
Sunday Times — People — pypa. ... A front door opened
with a loud crackle of paint. The voice dropped to speaking
tones that echoed clearly down the street and came up clear
and soft and confidential. Referee? Lloyd's? The door
closed with a large firm wooden sound and the harsh voice
went on down the street.
St. Pancras bells burst forth again. Faintly interwoven
with their bright headlong scale were the clear sweet deli-
cate contralto of the more distant bells playing very swiftly
and reproachfully a five finger exercise in a minor key. That
must be a very high-Anglican church; with light coming
through painted windows on to carvings and decorations.
10
As she began on her solid slice of bread and butter St.
Pancras bells stopped again. In the stillness she could hear
the sound of her own munching. She stared at the surface
of the table that held her plate and cup. It was like sitting
up to the nursery table. " How frightfully happy I am,"
she thought with bent head. Happiness streamed along
her arms and from her head. St. Pancras bells began
playing a hymn tune in single firm beats with intervals
between that left each note standing for a moment gently
in the air. The first two lines were playing carefully
THE TUNNEL 25
through to the distant accompaniment of the rapid weaving
and interweaving in a regular unbroken pattern of the five
soft low contralto bells. The third line of the hymn ran
through Miriam's head a ding-dong to and fro from tone to
semitone. The bells played it out, without the semitone,
with a perfectly satisfying falsity. Miriam sat hunched
against the table listening for the ascending stages of the last
line. The bells climbed gently up, made a faint flat dab at
the last top note, left it in the air askew above the decorous
little tune and rushed away down their scale as if to cover
the impropriety. The clamoured recklessly mingling with
Miriam's shout of joy as they banged against the wooden
walls of the window space.
CHAPTER II
ur\ EEN to church?" said Gerald digging his shoulders
J into his chair.
"No. Have you?"
" We've not been for weeks. . . . Everybody thinks us
awful heathens."
" P'raps you are."
" It's Curls. She says she's hanged if she's going any
more."
" I can't stand the vicar," said Harriett. " He doesn't
believe a word he says."
Fancy Harriett ! . . .
" Besides, what's the good? "
" Oh, there you are."
" There's nothing the matter with church once in a way
to my way of thinking if it's a decent high musical service."
" Even Eve hardly ever goes now — and nobody could
possibly be more goody than she is."
This was disquieting. It was one thing to be the agnostic
of the family — but Eve and Harriett. Miriam pondered
resentfully while Gerald smoked and flicked his clothing and
Harriett sat upright and pursed and untroubled in her great
chair. She wondered whether she ought to say something
about Unitarianism. But after all there might not be any-
thing in it and they might not feel the relief of the way it
cleared up the trouble about Christ. Besides there was no
worry here in the room. A discussion would lead nowhere.
26
THE TUNNEL 27
They could all three look at each other if they wanted to and
laugh everything off. In the middle of a sleepy Sunday
afternoon with nothing to do sitting in three huge chairs and
looking at each other they were all right. Harriett's
strength and scorn were directed against everything in the
world but not against herself . . . never against herself.
Harriett often thought her grumpy and ill-tempered, but she
approved of her. She was approving now.
" After all Frills it's good form to go " Gerald said idly.
" Go on. Smart people go to show their clothes."
" Well, we've shown ours."
Harriett flew out of her chair and daintily kicked him.
He grabbed and missed and sank back wailing, his face
hidden in a cushion. Her dainty foot flew out once more
and he smothered a shriek.
" Shut up " said Harriett curling herself up in her chair.
Gerald wailed on.
" Do we smoke in here? " said Miriam, wanting the scene
to drop or change while it was perfect. She would tell them
now about her change of lodgings.
" Yes " said Harriett absently with an eye on Gerald.
" I've changed my diggings " began Miriam formally,
fumbling for her packet of cigarettes. Harriett was hurl-
ing a cushion. Gerald crumpled into the depths of his chair
and sobbed aloud, beating with his arms.
" Stop it silly " piped Harriett blushing.
" I've changed my diggings " repeated Miriam uncomfort-
ably. Harriett's face flashed a response. Gerald's loud
wailings were broken by beseeching cries. Real, absolutely
real and satisfying. Miriam answered them from some far
deep in herself as if they were her own cries. Harry was
embarrassed. Her bright strength was answering. She
was ashamed at being seen answering.
Miriam got up conversationally and began looking about
28 THETUNNEL
for matches in the soft curtained drawing-room light.
There were swift movements and Harriett's voice busily
chiding. When she turned Gerald was sitting on the floor
at Harriett's knee beating it gently with his head.
"Got a match, G?" she said seeing in imagination the
flare of the match in the soft greenish glare of the room.
There was bright light all round the house and a glare of
brightness in the garden, beyond the curtains. " Rather,"
said Gerald, " dozens." He sat up and handed out a box.
Leaning back against Harriett's knee he began intoning a
little poem of appeal. There was a ring at the front door
bell. Miriam got herself to the piano putting cigarettes and
matches behind a vase on the mantelshelf. " That's old Tre-
mayne " said Gerald cheerfully, shooting his linen and
glancing in the strip of mirror in the overmantel. The door
opened admitting the light from the hall. The curtains at
the open French windows swayed forward flooding the room
with the bright garden light. Into the brightness stepped
Mr. Tremayne, grey-clad and with a pink rose in his button-
hole.
Over tea they heard the story of his morning and how it
had been interrupted by the man on the floor above who had
come down in his dressing gown to tell him about a birthday
party . . . the two men sitting telling each other stories
about drinks and people seeing each other home. After tea
he settled back easily in his chair and went on with his
stories. Miriam found it almost impossible to follow him.
She grew weary of his bantering tone. It smeared over
everything he touched and made him appear to be saying
one thing over and over again in innuendo. Something he
could not say out and would never get away from. He
made little pauses and then it gleamed horribly about all his
refinement of dress and bearing and Gerald laughed encour-
agingly and he went on, making a story that was like a
THE TUNNEL 29
play, that looked like life did when you looked at it, a mad-
dening fussiness about nothing and people getting into states
of mind. He went on into a story about business life . . .
people getting the better of each other. It made her feel
sick with apprehension. Anybody in business might be
ruined any minute unless he could be sure of getting the
better of someone else. She had never realised that before.
... It pressed on her breathing and made her feel that she
had had too much tea. . . . She hated the exponent sitting
there so coolly. It made the cool green-lit afternoon room
an island amongst horrors. But it was that to him too . . .
he felt the need of something beyond the everlasting innu-
endo of social life and the everlasting smartness of business
life. She felt it was true that he spent Sunday mornings
picking out hymn tunes with one finger and liked " Sabbath
music " and remembered the things his mother used to play
to him. He wanted a home, something away from business
life and away from social life. He saw her as a woman in a
home, nicely dressed in a quiet drawing room, lit by softly
screened clear fresh garden daylight. ..." Business is busi-
ness." ..." Man's love is of man's life a thing apart — 'tis
woman's whole existence." Byron did not know what
he was saying when he wrote it in his calm patronising way.
Mr. Tremayne would admire it as a " great truth " — think-
ing it like a man in the way Byron thought it. What a
hopeless thing a man's consciousness- was. How awful to
have nothing but a man's consciousness. One could test it
so easily if one were a little careful, and know exactly how
it would behave. . . .
Opening a volume of Mendelssohn she played from his
point of view one of the Songs without Words quietly into
the conversation. The room grew still. She felt herself
and Mr. Tremayne as duplicates of Harriett and Gerald only
that she was a very religious very womanly woman, the ideal
30 THE TUNNEL
wife and mother and he was a bad fast man who wanted to
be saved. It was such an easy part to play. She could go
on playing it to the end of her life, if he went on in business
and made enough money, being a "gracious silence," taking
an interest in his affairs, ordering all things well, quietly
training the servants, never losing her temper or raising her
voice, making the home a sanctuary of rest and refreshment
and religious aspiration, going to church. . . . She felt all
these things expressing themselves in her bearing. At the
end of her piece she was touched to the heart by the look of
adoration in his eyes, the innocent youthfulness shining
through his face. There was something in him she could
have and guard and keep if she chose. Something that
would die if there were no woman to keep it there. There
was nothing in his life of business and music halls to keep it
there, nothing but the memory of his mother and he joined
her on to that memory. His mother and his wife were
sacred . . . apart from life. But he could not be really
happy with a woman unless he could also despise her. Any
interest in generalities, any argument or criticism or opposi-
tion would turn him into a towering bully. All men were
like that in some way. They each had a set of notions and
fought with each other about them whenever they were to-
gether and not eating or drinking. If a woman opposed
them they went mad. He would like one or two more Men-
delssohns and then supper. And if she kept out of the con-
versation and listened and smiled a little he would go away
adoring. She played the Duetto; the chords made her think
of Beethoven and play the last page carelessly and glance at
Harriett. Harriett had felt her response to the chords and
knew she was getting away from Mendelssohn. Mr. Tre-
mayne had moved to a chair quite close to the piano, just
behind her. She found the Beethoven and played the first
movement of a sonata. It leapt about the piano breaking
THE TUNNEL 31
up her pose, using her body as the instrument of its gay
wild shapeliness, spreading her arms inelegantly, swaying
her, lifting her from the stool with the crash and vibration
of its chords. ..." Go on " said Harriett when it came to
an end. The Largo came with a single voice deep and
broad and quiet; the great truth behind the fuss of things.
She felt her hearers grow weary of its reiterations and
dashed on alone recklessly into the storm of the last move-
ment. Through its tuneless raging she could hear the steady
voice and see the steady shining of the broad clear light.
Daylight and gaiety and night and storm and a great song
and truth, the great truth that was bigger than anything.
Beethoven. She got up, charged to the fingertips with a
glow that transfigured all the inanimate things in the room.
The party was wrecked ... a young lady who banged the
piano till her hair nearly came down. ... Mr. Tremayne
had heard nothing but noise. . . . His eyes smiled and his
uneasy mouth felt for compliments.
" Why didn't you ask him to supper La Fee? "
" The Bollingdons are coming round, silly."
" Well ? "
" With one small chicken and a blancmange."
" Heaven help us."
When they sat down to play halfpenny nap after supper
Miriam recovered her cigarette from its hiding place. She
did not know the game. She sat at Harriett's new card-
table wrapped in the unbroken jesting of the Bollingdons
and the Ducaynes, happily learning and smoking and feeling
happily wicked. The Bollingdons taught her simply with
a complete trustful friendliness, Mrs. Bollingdon leaning
across in her pink satin blouse, her clear clean bulging
cheeks and dark velvet hair like a full blown dark rose.
32 THE TUNNEL
Between the rounds they poured out anecdotes of earlier
nap parties, all talking at once. The pauses at the fresh
beginnings were full of the echoes of their laughter. Miriam
in the character of the Honourahle Miss Henderson had
just accepted Lord Bollingdon's invitation to join the Duke
and Duchess of Ducayne and himself and Lady Bollingdon
in an all-day party to Wembley Park in a break and four on
Easter Monday and had lit a second cigarette and accepted
a small whisky and soda when Mr. Grove was announced.
Harriett's face flushed jocular consternation.
When the party subsided after Mr. Grove's spasmodic
handshakings Miriam got herself into a chair in a far corner,
smoking her cigarette with burning cheeks. Sitting isolated
with her cigarette and her whisky while he twice sent his
low harsh clearly murmuring voice into the suddenly empty
air to say that he had been to evensong at the Carmelites
and was on his way home, she examined the relief of his
presence and the nature of her farewell. Mr. Bollingdon
responded to him remarking each time on the splendour of
the evening.
3
Strolling home towards midnight along the narrow pave-
ment of Endsleigh Gardens Miriam felt as fresh and un-
troubled as if it were early morning. When she had got
out of her Hammersmith omnibus into the Tottenham Court
Road she had found that the street had lost its first terrify-
ing impression and had become part of her home. It was
the borderland of the part of London she had found for
herself; the part where she was going to live, in freedom,
hidden, on her pound a week. It was all she wanted. That
was why she was young and glad ; that was why fatigue had
gone out of her life. There was nothing in the world that
could come nearer to her than the curious half twilight half
THE TUNNEL 33
moonlight effect of lamplit Endsleigh Gardens opening out
of Gower Place ; its huge high trees, their sharp shadows
on the little pavement running by the side of the railings,
the neighbouring gloom of the Euston Road dimly lit by
lamps standing high in the middle of the roadway at long
intervals, the great high quiet porched houses, black and
still, the shadow mass of St. Pancras church, the great dark
open space in front of the church, a shadowy figure-haunted
darkness with the vague stream of the Euston Road running
to one side of it and the corridor of Woburn Place opening
on the other. The harsh voice of an invisible woman
sounded out from it as she turned off into her own street.
..." Dressed up — he was — to the bloody death." . . .
The words echoed about her as she strolled down the street
controlling her impulse to flinch and hurry. The woman
was there, there and real and that was what she had said.
Resentment was lurking about the street. The woman's
harsh voice seemed close. Miriam pictured her glaring
eyes. There was no pretence about her. She felt what she
said. She belonged to the darkness about St. Pancras
church . . . people had been garrotted in that part of the
Euston Road not so very long ago. . . . Tansley Street was
a soft grey gloaming after the darkness. When she rattled
her key into the keyhole of number seven she felt that her
day was beginning. It would be perpetually beginning now.
Nights and days were all one day; all hers, unlimited.
Her life and work at Wimpole Street were something extra,
thrown in with her own life of endless day. Sarah and
Harriett, their lives and friends, her own friends, the
Brooms, the girls in Kennett Street, all thrown in. She lit
her table lamp and the gas and two candles, making her
little brown room brilliant under a brilliant white ceiling and
sat down eager to tell someone of her wealth and freedom.
34 THETUNNEL
4
Someone must know she was in London, free, earning her
own living. Lilla? She would not see the extraordinary
freedom: earning would seem strange and dreadful to her
. . . someone who would understand the extraordinary free-
dom Alma. Alma! Setting forth the London ad-
dress in a heavy careless hand at the head of a postcard
slu- wrote from the midst of her seventeenth year, " Dear
A. Where are you? "
Walking home along the Upper Richmond Road ; not
liking to buy sweets ; not enjoying anything to the full —
always afraid of her refinements ; always in a way wanting
to be like her; wanting to share her mysterious knowledge
of how things were done in the world and the things one
had to do to get on in some clever world where people
were doing things. Never really wanting it because the
mere thought of that would take the beauty of the syringa
and make it look sad. Never being able to explain why one
did not want to do reasonable clever things in a clever brisk
reasonable way ; why one disliked the way she went behav-
ing up and down the Upper Richmond Road with her pretty
neat brisk bustling sidling walk, keeping her secret with a
sort of prickly brightness. The Upper Richmond Road was
heaven, pure heaven ; smelling of syringa. She liked flowers
but she did not seem to know. . . . Syringa. I had forgot-
ten. That is one of the things I have always wanted to
stop and remember. . . . What was it all about? What
was she doing now? Anyhow the London post-card would
be an answer. A letter, making her see Germany and bits
of Newlands and what life was now would answer every-
thing, all her snubs and cleverness and bring back the Upper
THE TUNNEL 35
Richmond Road and make it beautiful. She will know
something of what it was to me then. Perhaps that was why
she liked me even though she thought me vulgar and very
lazy and stupid.
CHAPTER III
THERE was a carriage at the door. West-end people,
after late nights, managing to keep nine o'clock ap-
pointments — in a north wind. Miriam pressed the bell
urgently. The scrubbed chalky mosaic and the busy bright
brass plate reproached her for her lateness during the long
moment before the door was opened. ... It must be some-
one for Mr. Orly; an appointment made since last night;
that was the worst of his living in the house. He was in
his surgery now, with the patient. The nine-fifteen patient
would come almost at once. He would discover that his
charts were not out before there was any chance of getting
at his appointment book. ... As the great door swung open
she saw Mr. Hancock turn the corner of the street walking
very rapidly before the north wind. . . . Mr. Orly's voice
was sounding impatiently from the back of the hall. . . .
" Where's Miss Hends. . . . Oh — here y'are Miss Hends,
I say call up Chalk for me will ya, get him to come at once,
I've got the patient waiting." His huge frock-coated form
swung round into his surgery without waiting for an answer.
Miriam scurried through the hall past Mr. Leyton's open
surgery door and into her room. Mr. Leyton plunged out
of his room as she was flinging down her things and came in
briskly. " Morning, Pater got a gas case ? "
" Mm " ; said Miriam. " I've got to call up Chalk and I
haven't a second to do it."
" Why Chalk ? "
26
THE TUNNEL 37
" Oh I don't know. He said Chalk " said Miriam angrily,
seizing the directory.
" I'll call him up if you like."
" You are a saint. Tell him to come at once — sooner,"
said Miriam dabbing at her hair as she ran back through
the hall and upstairs. As she passed the turn of the stair-
case Mr. Hancock was let in at the front door. She found
his kettle furiously boiling on its wrought-iron stand near
the chair. The stained glass window just behind it was dim
with steam. She lowered the gas, put a tumbler in the
socket of the spittoon, lit the gas burner on the bracket
table and swiftly pulled open its drawers one by one. The
instruments were all right . . . the bottles — no chloro-
form, the carbolic bottle nearly empty and its label soaked
and defaced. Gathering the two bottles in her hand she
turned to the instrument cabinet, no serviettes, no rubber
dam, clamps not up from the workshop. The top of the
cabinet still to be dusted. Dust and scraps of amalgam
were visible about the surfaces of the paper lining the instru-
ment drawers. No saliva tubes in the basin. She swung
round to the bureau and hurriedly read through the names of
the morning's patients. Mr. Hancock came quietly in as
she was dusting the top of the instrument cabinet by pushing
the boxes and bottles of materials that littered its surface to
the backmost edge. They were all lightly coated with dust.
It was everlasting and the long tubes and metal body of the
little furnace were dull again. " Good morning," they said
simultaneously, in even tones. There were sounds of letters
being opened and the turning of the pages of the appoint-
ment book. The chain of Mr. Hancock's gold pencil case
rattled softly as he made notes on the corners of the letters.
" Did you have a pleasant week-end ? "
" Very " said Miriam emphatically.
There was a squeak at the side of the cabinet. " Yes "
118574
38 THE TUNNEL
said Miriam down the speaking tube. ..." Thank you.
Will you please bring up some tubes and serviettes."
" Mr. Wontner."
" Thank you." ..." Mrs. Hermann is ' frightfully
shocked ' at the amount of her account. What did we send
it in for? 1 "
" Seventy guineas. It's a reduction, and it's two years'
work for the whole family." The bell sounded again. . . .
" Lady Cazalet has bad toothache and can you see her at
once."
" Confound. . . . Will you go down and talk to her and
see if you can get one of the others to see her."
" She won't."
" Well then she must wait. I'll have Mr. Wontner up."
Miriam rang. Mr. Hancock began busily washing his
hands. The patient came in. He greeted him over his
shoulder. Miriam gathered up the sheaf of annotated
letters and the appointment book and ran down-stairs.
"Has Mr. Leyton a patient Emma?" "Miss Jones just
gone in, Miss." " Oh, Emma, will you ask the workshop
for Mr. Hancock's rubber and clamps? " She rang through
to Mr. Leyton's room. " There's a patient of Mr. Han-
cock's in pain, can you see them if I can persuade them?"
she murmured. " Right, in ten minutes " came the answer-
ing murmur. Mr. Hancock's bell sounded from her room.
She went to his tube in the hall. " Can I have my charts? "
Running into her room she hunted out the first chart from
a case full and ran upstairs with it. Mr. Hancock's patient
was sitting forward in the chair urging the adoption of the
decimal system. Running down again she went into the
waiting room. The dark Turkey carpeted oak furnished
length seemed full of seated forms. Miriam peered and
Lady Cazalet, with her hat already off rose from the deep
arm-chair at her side. "Can he see me?" she said in a
THE TUNNEL 39
clear trembling undertone, her dark eyes wide upon
Miriam's. Miriam gazed deep into the limpid fear. What
a privilege. How often Captain Cazalet must be beside
himself with unworthiness. " Yes, if you can wait a little "
she said dropping her eyes and standing with arms re-
strained. " I think it won't be very long " she added lin-
gering a moment as the little form relapsed into the chair.
" Lady Cazalet will wait until you can see her " she tubed
up to Mr. Hancock.
" Can't you make her see one of the others ? "
" I'm afraid it's impossible ; I'll tell you later."
" Well I'll see her as soon as I can. I'm afraid she'll
have to wait."
Miriam went back to her room to sort out the remaining
charts. On her table lay a broken denture in a faded mo-
rocco case ; a strip of paper directed " five-thirty sharp " in
Mr. Orly's handwriting. Mr. Leyton's door burst open.
He came with flying coat-tails.
" Vi got to see that patient of Mr. Hancock's " he asked
breathlessly.
" No " said Miriam " she won't."
" Right " he said swinging back. " I'll keep Miss Jones
on."
Mr. Hancock's bell sounded again. Miriam flew to the
tube.
" My clamps please."
" Oh yes " she answered shocked, and hurried back to
her room.
Gathering up the broken denture she ran down the stone
steps leading to the basement. Her cheap unyielding shoes
clattered on the unyielding stones. The gas was on in the
lunch room, Mrs. Willis scrubbing the floor. The voices of
the servants came from the kitchens in the unknown back-
ground. She passed the lunch room and the cellar and
4 o T II E TUNNEL
clamped on across the stone hall to the open door of the
workshop.
\\ inthrop was standing at the small furnace in the box-
lined passage way. It was roaring its loudest. Through its
open door the red light fell sharply on his pink-Mushed
face and drooping fair moustache and poured down over
his white apron. " Good ph-morning " he said pleasantly,
his eye on the heart of the furnace, his foot briskly pump-
ing the blower. From the body of the room came sounds
of tapping and whistling . . . the noise of the furnace pre-
vented their knowing that anyone had come in. . . . Miriam
drew near to the furnace, relieved at the shortness of her
excursion. She stared at the tiny shape blazing red-gold
at the heart of the glare. Winthrop gathered up a pair of
tongs and drew the mould from the little square of light.
The air hissed from the bellows and the roaring of the flames
died down. In a moment he was standing free with hot
face and hot patient ironic eyes, gently taking the denture
from her hands. " Good morning " said Miriam, " Oh, Mr.
Winthrop, it's a repair for Mr. Orly. It's urgent. Can
you manage it ? " " It's ph — ph — sure to be urgent " said
Winthrop examining the denture with a short-sighted frown.
Miriam waited anxiously. The hammering and whistling
had ceased. " It'll be all right, Miss Ph-Henderson " said
Winthrop encouragingly. She turned to the door. The
clamps. . . . Gathering herself together she went down the
passage and stood at the head of the two stone steps leading
down into the body of the room. A swift scrubbing of
emery paper on metal was going on at the end of the long
bench, lit by a long sky-light, from which the four faces
looked up at her with a chorus of good mornings in response
to her greeting. " Are Mr. Hancock's clamps ready?" she
THE TUNNEL 41
asked diffidently. "Jimmy . . ." The figure nearest to
her glanced down the row of seated forms. The small
bullet-headed boy at the end of the bench scrubbed vigor-
ously and ironically with his emery stick. " He won't be a
minute, Miss Henderson " said the near pupil comfortingly.
Miriam observed his spruce grey suit curiously masked
by the mechanic's apron, the quiet controlled amused face,
and felt the burden of her little attack as part of the patient
prolonged boredom of his pupillage. The second pupil,
sitting next to him kept dog-like sympathetic eyes on her
face, waiting for a glance. She passed him by, smiling
gently in response without looking at him while her eyes
rested upon the form of the junior mechanic whose head
was turned in the direction of the scrubbing boy. The head
was refined, thin and clear cut, thatched with glossy curls.
Its expression was servile — the brain eagerly seeking some
flowery phrase — something to decorate at once the occasion
and the speaker, and to give relief to the mouth strained in
an arrested obsequious smile. Nothing came and the clever
meticulous hands were idle on the board. It seemed absurd
to say that Mr. Hancock was waiting for the clamps while
Jimmy was scrubbing so busily. But they had obviously
been forgotten. She fidgeted.
" Will somebody send them up when they're done? "
" Jimmy, you're a miserable sinner, hurry up " said the
senior pupil.
" They're done " said Jimmy in a cracked bass voice.
" Thank goodness " breathed Miriam, dimpling. Jimmy
came round and scattered the clamps carefully into her
outstretched hand, with down-cast eyes and a crisp dimpling
smile.
" Rule Britannia," remarked the junior pupil, resuming
his work as Miriam turned away and hurried along the
passage and through the door held open for her by Win-
42 THE TUNNEL
throp. She flew up to Mr. Hancock's room three steps at a
time, tapped gently at the door and went in. He came for-
ward across the soft grey green carpet to take the clamps
and murmured gently " Have you got my carbolic? "
3
Miriam looked out the remainder of the charts and went
anxiously through the little pile of letters she had brought
down from Mr. Hancock's room. All but three were
straight-forward appointments to be sent. One bore besides
the pencilled day and date the word " Tape "... she
glanced through it — it was from a University settlement
worker, asking for an appointment for the filling of two
front teeth. . . . She would understand increasing by one
thickness per day until there were five, to be completed two
days before the appointment falls due so that any tenderness
may have passed off. Mrs. Herman's letter bore
no mark. She could make a rough summary in
Mr. Hancock's phraseology. The third letter enclosed a
printed card of appointment with Mr. Hancock which she
had sent without filling in the day and hour. She flushed.
Mr. Hancock had pencilled in the missing words. Gather-
ing the letters together she put them as far away as her hand
would reach, leaving a space of shabby ink-stained morocco
clear under her hands. She looked blindly out of the win-
dow ; hand-painted, they are hand-painted, forget-me-nots
and gold tendrils softly painted, not shining, on an unusual
shape, a merry Christmas. Melly Klismas. In this coun-
tree heapee lain, chiney man lun home again, under a red
and green paper umbrella in the pouring rain, that was not
a hand-painted one, but better, in some strange way, close
bright colours drawing everything in; a shock. I stayed in
there. There was something. Chinee man lun home again.
Her eye roamed over the table; everything but the newly-
THE TUNNEL 43
arrived letters shabby under the high wide uncurtained win-
dow. The table fitted the width of the window. There was
something to be done before anything could be done. Every-
thing would look different if something were done. The
fresh letters could lie neatly on the centre of the table in the
midst of something. They were on the address books,
spoiled by them. It would take years to check the addresses
one by one till the old books could be put away. If the day
books were entered up to date, there would still be those,
disfiguring everything. If everything were absolutely up to
date, and all the cupboards in perfect order and the discounts
and decimals always done in the depot-books to time there
would be time to do something. She replaced the letters in
the centre of the table and put them back again on the ad-
dress books. His nine- forty-five patient was being let in at
the front door. In a moment his bell would ring and some-
thing must be said about the appointment card. " Mr.
Orly ? " A big booming elderly voice, going on heavily mur-
muring into the waiting-room. She listened tensely to the
movements of the servant. Was Mr. Orly in " the den " or
in his surgery ? She heard the maid ring through to the sur-
gery and wait. No sound. The maid came through her
room and tapped at the door leading from it. Come in sang a
voice from within and Miriam heard the sound of a hammer
on metal as the maid opened the door. She flew to the
surgery. Amidst the stillness of heavy oak furniture and
dark Turkey carpet floated the confirming smell. There
it was all about the spittoon and the red velvet covered
chair and the bracket table, a horrible confusion — and blood
stains, blood blotted serviettes, forceps that made her feel
sick and faint. Summoning up her strength she gathered
up the serviettes and flung them into a basket behind the
instrument cabinet. She was dabbing at .the stains on the
American cloth cover of the bracket when Mr. Orly came
44 THE TUNNEL
swinging in, putting on his grey frock-coat and humming
( kffiga Din as he came. " Regular field day " he said cheer-
fully. " I shan't want those things — just pop 'em out of
sight." He turned up the cupboard gas and in a moment
a stream of boiling water hissed down into the basin filling
the room with steam. " I say, has this man got a chart?
Don't throw away those teeth. Just look at this — how's
that for twisted? Just look here." He took up an object
to which Miriam forced reluctant eyes, grotesquely formed
fangs protruding from the enclosing blades of a huge for-
ceps. "How's that eh?" Miriam made a sympathetic
sound. Gathering the many forceps he detached their con-
tents putting the relic into a bottle of spirit and the rest into
the hidden basket. The forceps went head first into a jar
of carbolic and Miriam breathed more freely. " I'll see to
those. I say has this man got a chart?" "I'll see" said
Miriam eagerly making off with the appointment book. She
returned with the chart. Mr. Orly hummed and looked.
" Right. Tell 'em to send him in. I say, vi got any gold
and tin?" Miriam consulted the box in a drawer in the
cabinet. It was empty. " I'm afraid you haven't " she said
guiltily. " All right, I'll let y'know. Send 'im in," and
he resumed Gunga Din over the washhand basin. Mr. Han-
cock's bell was ringing in her room and she hurried off with
a sign to the little maid waiting with raised eyebrows in the
hall. Darting into her room she took the foils from the safe,
laid them on a clean serviette amongst the litter on her table
and ran upstairs. Mr. Leyton opened his door as she passed
" I say, can you feed for me " he asked breathlessly, putting
out an anxious head. " I'll come down in a minute," prom-
ised Miriam from the stairs. Mr. Hancock was drying his
hands. He sounded his bell as she came in. The maid an-
swered. " I'm so sorry " began Miriam. " Show up Mr.
Green " said Mr. Hancock down the speaking tube. " You
THE TUNNEL 45
remember there's Lady Cazalet ? " said Miriam relieved and
feeling she was making good her carelessness in the matter
of the appointment card.
" Oh confound." He rang again hurriedly. " Show up
Lady Cazalet." Miriam swept from the bracket table the
litter of used instruments and materials, disposing them
rapidly on the cabinet, into the sterilising tray, the waste
basket and the wash-hand basin, tore the uppermost leaf
from the headrest pad, and detached the handpiece from the
arm of the motor drill while the patient was being shown
upstairs. Mr. Hancock had cleared the spittoon, set a fresh
tumbler, filled the kettle and whisked the debris of amalgam
and cement from the bracket table before he began the
scrubbing and cleansing of his hands, and when the patient
came in Miriam was in her corner reluctantly handling the
instruments, wet with the solution that crinkled her finger-
tips and made her skin brittle and dry. Everything was in
its worst state. The business of drying and cleansing, free-
ing fine points from minute closely adhering fragments,
polishing instruments on the leather pad, repolishing them
with the leather, scraping the many little burs with the fine
wire brush, scraping the clamps, clearing the obstinate
amalgam from slab and spatula, brought across her the ever-
recurring circle. The things were begun, they were getting
on, she had half-done . . . the exasperating tediousness of
holding herself to the long series of tiny careful attention-
demanding movements . . . the punctual emergence when
the end was in sight of the hovering reflection, nagging and
questioning, that another set of things was already getting
ready for another cleansing process ; the endless series to
last as long as she stayed at Wimpole Street . . . were
there any sort of people who could do this kind of thing
patiently, without minding? . . . the evolution of dentistry
was wonderful, but the more perfect it became the more
46 THETUNNEL
and more of this sort of thing there would be . . . the more
drudgery workers, at fixed salaries ... it was only possible
for people who were fine and nice . . . there must be, every-
where, women doing this work for people who were not nice.
They could not do it for the work's sake. Did some of them
do it cheerfully, as unto God. It was wrong to work unto
man. But could God approve of this kind of thing . . .
was it right to spend life cleaning instruments . . . the blank
moment again of gazing about in vain for an alternative . . .
all work has drudgery. That is not the answer. . . .
Blessed be Drudgery, but that was housekeeping, not some-
one else's drudgery. ... As she put the things back in the
drawers, every drawer offered tasks of tidying, replenishing,
and repapering of small boxes and grooves and sections.
She had remembered to bring up Lady Cazalet's chart. It
looked at her propped against the small furnace. Behind
it were the other charts for the day complete. The drug
bottles were full, there was plenty of amadou pulled soft
and cut ready for use, a fair supply of both kinds of Japanese
paper. None of the bottles and boxes of stopping materials
were anywhere near running short and the gold drawer was
filled. She examined the drawers that held the less fre-
quently used fittings and materials, conducting her operations
noiselessly without impeding Mr. Hancock's perpetual move-
ments to and fro between the chair and the instrument
cabinet. Meanwhile the dressing of Lady Cazalet's painful
tooth went quietly on and Mr. Leyton was waiting, hoping
for her assistance downstairs. There was no excuse for
waiting upstairs any longer. She went to the writing table
and hung over the appointment book.
4
It was a busy day. He would hardly have half an hour
for lunch. . . . She examined the names carefully, one by
THE TUNNEL 47
one, and wrote against one " ask address," underlined and
against another " enquire for brother — ill." Lady Cazalet
drew a deep sigh ... she had been to other dentists. But
perhaps they were good ones. Perhaps she was about
thirty . . . had she ever gone through a green baize door
and seen a fat common little man with smooth sly eyes stand-
ing waiting for her in a dark stuffy room smelling of creo-
sote? Even if she had always been to good ones they were
not Mr. Hancock. They were dentists. Cheerful ordinary
men with ordinary voices and laughs, thinking about all
manner of things. Or apparently bland, with ingratiating
manners. Perhaps a few of them, some of his friends and
some of the young men he had trained were something like
him. Interested in dentistry and the way it was all develop-
ing, some of them more enthusiastic and interested in cer-
tain special things than he was. But no one could be quite
like him. No other patients had the lot of his patients. No
other dentist was so completely conscious of the patient all
the time, as if he were in the chair himself. No other dentist
went on year after year remaining sensitive to everything
the patient had to endure. No one else was so unsparing
of himself . . . children coming eagerly in for their dentis-
try, sitting in the chair with slack limbs and wide open
mouths and tranquil eyes . . . small bodies braced and tense,
fat hands splayed out tightly on the too-big arms of the chair
in determination to bear the moment of pain bravely for
him. . . . She wandered to the corner cupboard and opened
it and gazed idly in. But none of them knew what it cost.
..." I think you won't have any more pain with that ; I'll
just put in a dressing for the present " — she was Lady
Cazalet again, without tooth-ache, and that awful feeling
that you know your body won't last . . . they did not know
what it cost. What always doing the best for the patient
meant. Perhaps they knew in a zvay; or knew something
48 THE TUNNEL
and did not know what it was . . . there would be some-
thing different in Mr. Hancock's expression, especially in
the throe quarters view when his face was turned away to-
wards the instrument cabinet, if he saved his nerves and
energy and money by doing things less considerately, not
perpetually having the instruments sharpened and perpet-
ually buying fresh outfits of sharp burs. The patient would
suffer more pain ... a dentist at his best ought to be more
delicately strong and fine than a doctor . . . like a fine en-
graving ... a surgeon working amongst live nerves . . .
and he would look different himself. It was in him. It
was keeping to that, all day, and every day, choosing the
best difficult tiresome way in everything that kept that rad-
iance about him when he was quietly at work ... I mustn't
stay here thinking these thoughts . . . it's that evil thing in
me, keeping on and on, always thinking thoughts, nothing
getting done . . . going through life like — a stuck pig. If
I went straight on things would come like that just the same
in flashes — bang, bang, in your heart, everything breaking
into light just in front of you, making you almost fall off the
edge into the expanse coming up before you, flowers and
light stretching out. Then you shut it down, letting it go
through you with a leap that carries you to the moon — the
sun, and makes you bump with life like the little boy burst-
in out of his too small clothes and go on choking with song
to do the next thing deftly. That's right. Perhaps that is
what they all do? Perhaps that's why they won't stop to
remember. Do you realise ? Do you realise you're in Brus-
sels? Just look at the white houses there with the bright
green trees against them in the light. It's the air, the clear-
ness. Sh — If they hear you, they'll put up the rent. They
were just Portsmouth and Gosport people, staying in Brus-
sels and fussing about Portsmouth and Gosport and Aunt
this and Mr. that. ... I shan't realise Brussels and Bel-
THE TUNNEL 49
gium for years because of that. They hated and killed me
because I was like that. ... I must be like that . . . some-
thing comes along, golden, and presently there is a thought.
I can't be easy till I've said it in my mind, and I'm sad till
I have said it somehow . . . and sadder when I have said it.
But nothing gets done. I must stop thinking, from now,
and be fearfully efficient. Then people will understand and
like me. They will hate me too, because I shall be absurd,
I shan't be really in it. Perhaps I shall. Perhaps I shall
get in. The wonder is they don't hate me more. There was
a stirring in the chair and a gushing of fresh water into the
tumbler. Why do I meet such nice people ? One after an-
other. " There " said Mr. Hancock, " I don't think that will
trouble you any more. We will make another appointment."
Miriam took the appointment book and a card to the chair-
side and stayed upstairs to clear up.
5
When she reached the hall Mr. Orly's door was standing
wide. Going in to the surgery she found the head parlour
maid rapidly wiping instruments with a soiled serviette. " Is
it all right, James ? " she said vaguely, glancing around the
room.
" Yes miss," answered James briskly emptying the half-
filled tumbler and going on to dry and polish it with the
soiled serviette ... the housemaid spirit ... the dry cor-
ner of a used serviette probably appeared to James much
too good to wipe anything with. Telling her would not be
any good. She would think it waste of time. . . . Besides,
Mr. Orly himself would not really mind ; and the things were
" mechanikly clean "... that was a good phrase of Mr.
Leyton's . . . with his own things always soaking even his
mallets, until there was no polish left on the handles ; and
his nailbrust in a bath of alcohol. . . . Mr. Orly came in,
5 o THE TUNNEL
large and spruce. He looked at his hands and began comb-
ing his beard, standing before the overmantel. " Hancock
busy?"
" Frightfully busy."
Miriam looked judicially round the room. James hovered.
The north wind howled. The little strip of sky above the
outside wall that obscured the heavily stained glass of the
window seemed hardly to light the room and the little light
there was was absorbed by the heavy dull oak furniture and
the dark heavy Turkey carpet and dado of dull red and tar-
nished gold.
" It is dark for April " murmured Miriam. " I'll take
away your gold and tin box if I may."
" Thank ye " said Mr. Orly nervously, wheeling about
with a harsh sigh to scan the chair and bracket-table;
straightening his waistcoat and settling his tie. " I got
through without it — used some of that new patent silicate
stuff of Leyton's. All right — show in the Countess."
James disappeared. Miriam secured the little box and
made off. On her table was a fresh pile of letters annotated
in Mr. Orly's clear stiff upright rounded characters. She
went hurriedly through them. Extricating her blotter she
sat down and examined the inkstand. Of course one of her
pens had been used and flung down still wet with its nib
resting against the handle of the other pens. . . . Mr. Ley-
ton ... his gold filling ; she ought to go in and see if she
could help . . . perhaps he had finished by now. She
wiped away the ink from the nib and the pen-handles.
Tapping at Mr. Leyton's door she entered. He quickly
turned a flushed face his feet scrabbling noisily against the
bevelled base of the chair with the movement of his head.
" Sawl right Miss Henderson. I've finished. 'V'you got
any emery strips — mine are all worn out."
THE TUNNEL 51
Back once more in her room she heard two voices talking
both at once excitedly in the den. Mrs. Orly had a morning
visitor. She would probably stay to lunch. She peered
into the little folding mirror hanging by the side of the
small mantelpiece and saw a face flushed and animated so
far. Her hair was as unsatisfactory as usual. As she
looked she became conscious of its uncomfortable weight
pinned to the back of her head and the unpleasant warm feel-
ing of her thick fringe. By lunch-time her face would be
strained and yellow with sitting at work in the cold room
with her feet on the oil-cloth under the window. She
glanced at the oil lamp standing in the little fireplace, its
single flame glaring nakedly against the red-painted radia-
tor. The telephone bell rang. Through the uproar of me-
chanical sounds that came to her ear from the receiver she
heard a far off faint angry voice in incoherent reiteration.
" Hullo, hullo " she answered encouringly. The voice faded
but the sounds went on punctuated by a sharp angry pop-
ping. Mr. Orly's door opened and his swift heavy tread
came through the hall. Miriam looked up apprehensively,
saying " Hullo " at intervals into the angry din of the tele-
phone. He came swiftly on humming in a soft light bari-
tone, his broad forehead, bald rounded crown and bright
fair beard shining in the gloom of the hall. A crumpled
serviette swung with his right hand. Perhaps he was going
to the workshop. The door of the den opened. Mrs. Orly
appeared and made an inarticulate remark abstractedly and
disappeared. " Hullo, hullo " repeated Miriam busily into
the telephone. There was a loud report and the thin angry
voice came clear from a surrounding silence. Mr. Orly
came in on tiptoe, sighed impatiently and stood near her
5 2 T H E TUNNEL
drumming noiselessly on the table at her side. " Wrong
number " said Miriam, " will you please ring off? "
" What a lot of trouble they givya " said Mr. Orly. " I
say, what's the name of the American chap Hancock was
talking about at lunch yesterday? "
Miriam frowned.
" Can y'remember? About sea-power."
" Oh " said Miriam relieved. " Mahan."
"Eh?"
" Mahan. May-ann."
" That's it. You've got it. Wonderful. Don't forget to
send off Major Moke's case sharp will ye? "
Miriam's eyes scanned the table and caught sight of a
half hidden tin-box.
" No. I'll get it off."
" Right. It's in a filthy state, but there's no time to clean
it."
He strode back through the hall murmuring Mahan.
Miriam drew the tin from its place of concealment. It
contained a mass of dirty cotton-wool upon which lay a
double denture coated with tartar and joined by tarnished
gold springs. " Eleven thirty sharp " ran the instruction
on an accompanying scrap of paper. No address. The
name of the patient was unfamiliar. Mrs. Orly put her
head through the door of the den.
"What did Ro want?"
Miriam turned towards the small sallow eager face and
met the kind sweet intent blue glint of the eyes. She ex-
plained and Mrs. Orly's anxious little face brdke into a
smile that dispelled the lines on the broad strip of low fore-
head leaving it smooth and sallow under the smoothly
brushed brown hair.
" How funny " said Mrs. Orly hurriedly. " I was just
THE TUNNEL 53
comin' out to ask you the name of that singer. You know.
Mark something. Marsky. . . ."
" Mar-kaysie " said Miriam.
" That's it. I can't think how you remember." Mrs.
Orly disappeared and the two voices broke out again in
eager chorus. Miriam returned to her tin. Mastering her
disgust she removed the plate from the box, shook the cot-
ton-wool out into the paper-basket collected fresh wool,
packing paper, sealing wax, candle and matches and set to
work to make up the parcel. She would have to attack the
workshop again and get them to take it out. Perhaps they
would know the address. When the case was half packed
she looked up the patient's name in the ledger. Five en-
tries in about as many years — either repairs or springs —
how simple dentistry became when people had lost all their
teeth. There were two addresses, a town and a country one
written in a long time ago in ink ; above them were two in
pencil, one crossed out. The newest of the address books
showed these two addresses, one in ink, neither crossed out.
What had become of the card and letter that came with the
case ? In the den with Mrs. Orly and her guest. . . .
Footsteps were coming neatly and heavily up the base-
ment stairs. Winthrop. He came in smiling, still holding
his long apron gathered up to free his knees. " Ph — Ph —
Major Moke's case ready?" he whispered cheerfully.
" Almost — but I don't know the address."
" It's the ph — ph — Buck'mam Palace Otel. It's to go
by hand."
" Oh, thank goodness " laughed Miriam sweeping the
scissors round the uneven edge of the wrapping paper.
" My word " said Winthrop, " What an eye you've got
I couldn't do that to ph-save melife and I'm supposed to be
a ph-mechanic."
" Have I," said Miriam surprised, " I shan't be two
54 THE TUNNEL
minutes ; it'll be ready by the time anybody's ready to go.
I'.ut the letters aren't"
" All right. I'll send up for them when we go out to
lunch," said Winthrop consolingly, disappearing.
Miriam found a piece of fine glazed green twine in her
string box and tied up the neat packet — sealing the ends
of the string with a neat blob on the upper side of the packet
and the folded paper at each end. She admired the two
firmly flattened ends of string close together. Their free
ends united by the firm red blob were a decorative substitute
for a stamp on the white surface of the paper. She wrote
in the address in an upright rounded hand with firm rotund
little embellishments. Poring over the result she examined
it at various distances. It was delightful. She wanted to
show it to someone. It would be lost on Major Moke.
He would tear open the paper to get at his dreadful teeth.
Putting the stamps on the label, she regretfully resigned the
packet and took up Mr. Orly's day-book. It was in arrears
— three, four days not entered in the ledger. Major Moke
repair — one guinea, she wrote. Mr. Hancock's showing
out bell rang. She took up her packet and surveyed it up-
side down. The address looked like Chinese. It was really
beautiful . . . but handwriting was doomed . . . short-
hand and typewriting . . . she ought to know them if she
were ever to make more than a pound a week as secretary
. . . awful. What a good thing Mr. Hancock thought them
unprofessional . . . yet there were already men in Wimpole
Street who had their correspondence typed. What did he
mean by saying that the art of conversation was doomed?
He did not like conversation. Jimmie came in for the parcel
and scuttled downstairs with it. Mr. Hancock's patient was
going out through the hall. He had not rung for her to go
up. Perhaps there was very little to clear and he was doing
it himself.
THE TUNNEL 55
7
He was coming downstairs. Her hands went to the pile
of letters and busily sorted them. Through the hall. In
here. Leisurely. How are you getting on ? Half amused.
Half solicitous. The first weeks. The first day. She had
only just come. Perhaps there would be the hand on the
back of the chair again as before he discovered the stiffness
like his own stiffness. He was coming right round to the
side of the chair into the light, waiting, without having
said anything. She seemed to sit through a long space
waiting for him to speak, in a radiance that shaped and
smoothed her face as she turned slowly and considered the
blunted grave features, their curious light, and met the smil-
ing grey eyes. They were not observing the confusion on
the table. He had something to say that had nothing to do
with the work. She waited startled into an overflowing of
the curious radiance, deepening the light in which they were
grouped. "Are you busy?" "No," said Miriam in quiet
abandonment. " I want your advice on a question of decor-
ation " he pursued smiling down at her with the expression
of a truant schoolboy and standing aside as she rose. " My
patient's put off " he added confidentially, holding the door
wide for her. Miriam trotted incredulously upstairs in front
of him and in at the open surgery door and stood contemplat-
ing the room from the middle of the great square of soft
thick grey green carpet with her back to the great triple
window and the littered remains of a long sitting.
Perhaps a question of decoration meant altering the posi-
tions of some of the pictures. She glanced about at them,
enclosed in her daily unchanging unsatisfying impressions —
the green landscape plumy with meadow-sweet, but not let-
ting you through to wander in fields, the little soft bright
coloury painting of the doorway of St. Mark's — San Marco,
56 THE TUNNEL
painted by an Englishman, with a procession going in at the
door and beggars round the doorway, blobby and shapeless
like English peasants in Italian clothes . . . bad . . . and
the man had worked and studied and gone to Italy and had
a name and still worked and people bought his things . . .
an engraving very fine and small of a low bridge in a little
town, quiet sharp cheering lines ; and above it another en-
graving, a tiresome troubled girl, all a sharp film of fine
woven lines and lights and shadows in a rich dark liny filmy
interior, neither letting you through nor holding you up, the
girl worrying there in the middle of the picture, not moving,
an obstruction. . . . Maris ... the two little water colours
of Devonshire, a boat with a brown sail and a small narrow
piece of a street zig-zagging sharply up between crooked
houses, by a Londoner — just to say how crooked everything
was . . . that thing in this month's Studio was better than
any of these . . . her heart throbbed suddenly as she
thought of it ... a narrow sandy pathway going off, frilled
with sharp greenery, far into a green wood. . . . Had he
seen it? The studios lay safely there on the polished table
in the corner, the disturbing bowl of flowers from the coun-
try, the great pieces of pottery, friends, warm and sympa-
thetic to touch, never letting you grow tired of their colour
and design . . . standing out against the soft dull gold of
the dado and the bold soft green and buff of the wall paper.
The oil painting of the cousin was looking on a little super-
ciliously . . . centuries of " fastidious refinement " looking
forth from her child's face. If she were here it would be
she would be consulted about the decoration; but she was
away somewhere in some house, moving about in a dignified
way under her mass of gold hair, saying things when speech
became a necessity in the refined fastidious half-contempt-
uous tone, hiding her sensitive desire for companionship,
contemptuous of most things and most people. To-day she
THE TUNNEL 57
had an interested look, she was half jealously setting stand-
ards for him all the time. . . . Miriam set her aside. The
Chinese figures staring down ferociously from the narrow
shelf running along the base of the high white frieze were
more real to her. They belonged to the daily life here,
secure from censure.
8
From the brown paper wrappings emerged a large plaque
of Oriental pottery. Mr. Hancock manoeuvred it upright,
holding it opposite to her on the floor, supported against his
knees. "There — what do you think of that?" he mur-
mured bending over it. Miriam's eyes went from the vein-
ings on his flushed forehead to the violent soft rich red and
blue and dull green covering the huge concave disc from
side to side. It appeared to represent a close thicket of
palm fronds, thin flat fingers, superimposed and splaying
out in all directions over the deep blue background. In
the centre appeared the head and shoulders of an enormous
tiger, coming sinuously forward, one great paw planted on
the greenery near the foremost middle edge of the plaque.
" M'm," said Miriam staring.
Mr. Hancock rubbed the surface of the plaque with his
forefinger. Miriam came near and ran her finger down
across the rich smooth reliefs.
" Where shall I put it? " said Mr. Hancock.
" I should have it somewhere on that side of the room,
where the light falls on it."
Mr. Hancock raised the plaque in his arms and walked
with it to the wall raising it just above his head and holding
it in place between the two pictures of Devonshire. They
faded to a small muddled dinginess, and the buff and green
patterning of the wall-paper showed shabby and dim.
" It looks somehow too big or too small or something.
58 THETUNNEL
... I should have it down level with the eyes, so that you
can look straight into it."
Mr. Hancock carefully lowered it.
" Let me come and hold it so that you can look " said
Miriam advancing.
" It's too heavy for you " said Mr. Hancock straining his
head back and moving it from side to side.
" I believe it would look best " said Miriam " across the
corner of the room as you come in — where the corner cup-
board is — I'm sure it would " she said eagerly and went
back to the centre of the carpet.
Mr. Hancock smiled towards the small oak cupboard
fixed low in the angle of the wall.
" We should have to move the cupboard," he said
dubiously and carried the heavy plate to the indicated
place.
" That's simply lovely " said Miriam in delight as he held
the plaque in front of the long narrow fagade of black oak.
Mr. Hancock lowered the plaque to the floor and propped
it crosswise against the angle.
" It would be no end of a business fixing it up " he mur-
mured crossing to her side. They stood looking at the beau-
tiful surface blurred a little in the light by its backward
tilt. They gazed fascinated as the plaque slid gently for-
ward and fell heavily breaking into two pieces.
They regarded one another quietly and went forward to
gather up the fragments. The broken sides gritted together
as Miriam held hers steady for the other to be fitted to it.
When they were joined the crack was hardly visible.
" That'll be a nice piece of work for Messrs. Xikko "
said Mr. Hancock with a little laugh, "we'd better get it
in back behind the sofa for the present." They spread the
brown paper over the brilliant surfaces and stood up.
Miriam's perceptions raced happily along. How had he
THE TUNNEL 59
known that she cared for things ? She was not sure that she
did . . . not in the way that he did . . . How did he know
that she had noticed any of his things? Because she had
blurted out " Oh what a perfectly lovely picture " when he
showed her the painting of his cousin ? But that was because
he admired his cousin and her brother had painted the pic-
ture and he admired them both and she had not known about
this when she spoke.
" Did you see this month's Studio ? " she asked shyly.
He turned to the table and took up the uppermost of the
pile.
" There's a lovely green picture " said Miriam, " at least
I like it."
Mr. Hancock turned pages ruminatively.
" Those are good things " he said flattening the open page.
" Japanese flower Decorations " read Miriam looking at
the reproduced squares of flowering branches arranged with
a curious naturalness in strange flat dishes. They fascinated
her at once — stiff and real, shooting straight up from the
earth and branching out. They seemed coloured. She
turned pages and gazed.
" How nice and queer."
Mr. Hancock bent smiling. " They've got a whole science
of this you know " he said ; " it takes them years to learn
it ; they apprentice themselves and study for years. . . ."
Miriam looked incredulously at the simple effects — just
branches placed " artistically " in flat dishes and fixed some-
how at the base amongst little heaps of stones.
" It looks easy enough."
Mr. Hancock laughed. " Well — you try. We'll get
some broom or something, and you shall try your hand.
You'd better read the article. Look here — they've got
names for all the angles. . . . ' Shin ' — he read with amused
admiring delight, ' sho-shin ' . . . there's no end of it."
60 THE TUNNEL
Miriam fired and hesitated. " It's like a sort of mathe-
matics. . . . I'm no good at mathematics."
" I expect you could get very good results . . . we'll try.
They carry it to such extraordinary lengths because there's
all sorts of social etiquette mixed up with it — you can't
have a branch pointing at a guest for instance — it would
be rude."
" No wonder it takes them years " said Miriam.
They laughed together, moving vaguely about the room.
Mr. Hancock looked thoughtfully at the celluloid tray of
hairpins on the mantelshelf, and blew the dust from it . . .
there was something she remembered in some paper, very
forcibly written, about the falsity of introducing single
specimens of Japanese art, the last results of centuries of an
artistic discipline, that was it, that had grown from the life
of a secluded people living isolated in a particular spot under
certain social and natural conditions, into English house-
hold decoration. ..." Gleanings in Buddha Fields " the
sun on rice fields . . . and Fujiama — Fuji-no-San in the
distance . . . but he did not like Hearn — " there's some-
thing in the chap that puts me off " . . . puts off — what a
good phrase ..." something sensuous in him "... but
you could never forget Buddha Fields. It made you know
you were in Japan, in the picture of Japan . . . and some-
body had said that all good art, all great art, had a sensuous
element ... it was dreadful, but probably true . . . be-
cause the man had observed it and was not an artist, but
somebody looking carefully on. Mr. Hancock, Englishman,
was " put off " by sensuousness, by anybody taking a delight
in the sun on rice fields and the gay colours of Japan . . .
perhaps one ought to be " put off " by Hearn . . . but Mr.
Hancock liked Japanese things and bought them and put
them in with his English things, that looked funny and tame
THE TUNNEL 61
beside them. What he did not like was the expression of
delight. It was queer and annoying somehow . . . espe-
cially as he said that the way English women were trained
to suppress their feelings was bad. He had theories and
fixed preferences and yet always seemed to be puzzled about
so many things.
" D'you think it right to try to introduce single pieces of
Japanese art into English surroundings?" she said tartly,
beginning on the instruments.
" East is East and West is West and never the twain can
meet ? "
" That's a dreadful idea — I don't believe it a bit."
Mr. Hancock laughed. He believed in those awful final
dreary-weary things . . . some species are so widely dif-
ferentiated that they cannot amalgamate — awful . . . but
if one said that he would laugh and say it was beyond him
. . . and he liked and disliked without understanding the
curious differences between people — did not know why they
were different — they put him off or did not put him off
and he was just. He liked and reverenced Japanese art and
there was an artist in his family. That was strange and fine.
" I suppose we ought to have some face-powder here,"
mused Mr. Hancock.
" They'll take longer than ever if we do."
r< I know — that's the worst of it ; but I commit such
fearful depredations ... we want a dressing room ... if
I had my way we'd have a proper dressing room downstairs.
But I think we must get some powder and a puff. . . . Do
you think you could get some ... ? " Miriam shrank.
Once in a chemist's shop, in a strong Burlington Arcade
west-end mood buying some scent, she had seized and bought
a little box. ... La Dorine de Poche . . . Dorin, Paris
. . . but that was different to asking openly for powder and
62 THE TUNNEL
a puff ... la Dorine de Dorin Paris was secret and wonder-
ful. ..." I'll try " she said bravely and heard the familiar
little sympathetic laugh.
9
Lunch would be ready in a few minutes and none of the
letters were done. She glanced distastefully at the bold
handwritings scrawling, under impressive stamped addresses
with telephone numbers, and names of stations and tele-
graphic addresses, across the well-shaped sheets of expensive
note-paper, to ask in long, fussy, badly-put sentences for ex-
pensive appointments. Several of the signatures were un-
familiar to her and must be looked up in the ledger in case
titles might be attached. She glanced at the dates of the ap-
pointments — they could all go by the evening post. What
a good thing Mr. Hancock had given up overlooking the
correspondence. Mrs. Hermann's letter he should see
. . . but that could not anyhow have been answered by re-
turn. The lunch-bell rang. . . . Mr. Orly's letters! There
was probably a telegram or some dreadful urgent thing
about one or other of them that ought to have been dealt
with. With beating heart she fumbled them through — each
one bore the word answered in Mr. Orly's fine pointed hand.
Thank goodness. Opening a drawer she crammed them
into a crowded clip ... at least a week's addresses to be
checked or entered. . . . Mr. Hancock's unanswered letters
went into the same drawer, leaving her table fairly clear.
Mr. Leyton's door burst open, he clattered down the base-
ment stairs. Miriam went into his room and washed her
hands in the corner basin under the patent unleaking taps.
Everything was splashed over with permanganate of potash.
The smell of the room combined all the dental drugs with
the odour of leather — a volunteer officer's accoutrements
lay in confusion all over on the secretaire. Beside them
THE TUNNEL 63
stood an open pot of leather polish. Mr. and Mrs. Orly
passed the open door and went downstairs. They were
alone. The guest had gone.
10
" Come and share the remains of the banquet Miss
Hens'n."
" Do have just a bit of somethin', Ro darling, a bit of
chicking or somethin'."
" Feeling the effects ? " remarked Mr. Leyton cheerfully
munching, " I've got a patient at half past " he added ner-
vously glancing up as if to justify his existence as well as
his remark. Miriam hoped he would go on ; perhaps it
would occur to Mrs. Orly to ask him about the patient.
" You'd feel the effects my boy if you hadn't had a wink
the whole blessed night."
" Hancock busy Miss Hens' ? " Miriam glanced at the
flushed forehead and hoped that Mr. Orly would remain
with his elbows on the table and his face hidden in his hands.
She was hungry and there would be no peace for anybody
if he were roused.
"Too many whiskies?" enquired Mr. Leyton cheerfully,
shovelling salad on to his plate.
" To much whisking and frisking altogether sergeant,"
said Mr. Orly incisively, raising his head.
Mrs. Orly flushed and frowned at Mr. Orly.
" Don't be silly Ley — you know how father hates dinner
parties."
Mr. Orly sighed harshly, pulling himself up as Miriam
began a dissertation on Mr. Hancock's crowded day.
" Ze got someone with him now? " put in Mrs. Orly per-
functorily.
" Wonderful man " sighed Mr. Orly harshly, glancing at
his son.
64 THE TUNNEL
" Have a bit of chicking Ro."
" No my love no not all the perfumes of Araby — not all
the chickens of Cheshire. Have some pate Miss Hens' —
No? You despise pate? "
A maid came briskly in and looked helpfully round.
"Who's your half past one patient Ley?" asked Mrs.
Orly nervously.
" Buck " rapped Mr. Leyton. " We going to wait for
Mr. Hancock, Mater?"
" No, of course not. Keep some things hot Emma and
bring in the sweets."
" I lave some more chicken Miss Hens' — Emma ! " he
indicated his son with a flourish of his serviette. " Wait
upon Mr. Leyton, serve him speedily."
Emma arrested looked hopefully about, smiled in brisk
amusement, seized some dishes and went out.
Mrs. Orly's pinched face expanded. " Silly you are,
Ro." Miriam grinned, watching dreamily. Mr. Leyton's
flushed face rose and dipped spasmodically over the remains
of his salad.
"Bucking for Buck" — laughed Mr. Orly in a soft
falsetto.
" Ro, you are silly, who's Buck, Ley? "
" Don't question the officer Nelly."
" Ro, you are absurd," laughed Mrs. Orly.
" Help the jellies dearest " shouted Mr. Orly in a frown-
ing whisper. " Have some jelly, Miss Hens'. It's all right
Ley . . . glad you so busy, my son. How many did you
have this morning?" Mopping his brow and whisking his
person with his serviette he glanced sidelong.
" Two " said Mr. Leyton, noisily spooning up jelly, " any
more of that stuff mater, how about Hancock?"
" There's plenty here " said Mrs. Orly helping him.
Miriam laboured with her jelly and glanced at the dish.
THE TUNNEL 65
People wolfed their food. It would seem so conspicuous
to begin again when the fuss had died down ; with Mr. Orly
watching as if feeding were a contemptible self-indulgence.
" Had a beastly gold case half the morning " rapped Mr.
Leyton and drank, with a gulp.
" Get any help ? " said Mr. Orly glancing at Miriam.
" No " said Mr. Leyton in a non-committal tone, reach-
ing across the table for the cheese.
"Hancock too busy?" asked Mr. Orly. "Have some
more jelly, Miss Hens'n."
" No thank you " said Miriam.
" A bit of cheese ; a fragment of giddy Gorgonzola."
" No thanks."
Mrs. Orly brushed busily at her bodice, peering down
with indrawn chin. The room was close with gas. If Mr.
Hancock would only come down and give her the excuse
of attending to his room.
"What you doing s'aafnoon?" asked Mr. Leyton.
" I, my boy, I don't know," said Mr. Orly with a heavy
sigh, " string myself up, I think."
" You'd much better string yourself round the Outer
Circle and take Lennard's advice."
" Good advice my boy — if we all took good advice . . .
eh Miss Hens'n? I've taken twenty grains of phenacetin
this morning."
" Well, you go and get a good walk," said Mr. Leyton
clattering to his feet. " S'cuse me, Mater."
" Right my boy ! Excellent ! A Daniel come to judg-
ment ! All right Ley — get on with you. Buck up and see
Buck. Oh-h-h my blooming head. Excuse my language
Miss Hens'n. Ah ! Here's the great man. Good morning
Hancock. How are you ? D'they know you're down ? "
Mr. Hancock murmured his greetings and sat down op-
posite Miriam with a grave preoccupied air.
66 THE TUNNEL
" Busy? " asked Mr. ( >rly turning to face his partner.
•• Yes— fairly " said Mr. Hancock pleasantly.
" Wonderful man. . . . Ley's gone off like a bee in a
gale. D'they know Hancock's down Nelly?"
Miriam glanced at Mr. Hancock wishing he could lunch
in peace, lit' was tired. Did he too feel oppressed with
the gas and the pale madder store cupboards? . . . glaring
muddy hot pink?
" I've got a blasted head on . . . excuse my language.
Twenty of 'em, twenty to dinner."
"Oh yes?" said Mr. Hancock shifting in his chair and
glancing about.
* Nelly / D'they know he's down? Start on a pate,
Hancock. The remains of the banquet."
" ( >h . . . well, thanks."
" You never get heads do ye? "
Mr. Hancock smiled and began a murmuring response as
he busied himself with his pate.
" Poor Ro he's got a most awful head. . . . How's your
uncle Mr. Hancock? "
" Oh — thank you. . . . I'm afraid he's not very flourish-
ing."
" He's better than he used to be, isn't he?"
" Well — yes, I think perhaps on the whole he is."
" You ought to have been there. Hancock. Cleave came.
He was in no end of form. Told us some fine ones. Have
a biscuit and butter Miss Hens'n."
Miriam refused and excused herself.
On her way upstairs she strolled into Mr. Leyton's room.
He greeted her with a smile — polishing instruments busily.
" Mr. Hancock busy? " he asked brisklv.
" M'm."
" You busy? I say if I have Buck in will you finish up
these things? "
THE TUNNEL 67
" All right, if you like " said Miriam, regretting her so-
ciable impulse. " Is Mr. Buck here ? " She glanced at the
appointment book.
" Yes, he's waiting."
" You haven't got anybody else this afternoon " ob-
served Miriam.
" I know. But I want to be down at Headquarters by
five in full kit if I possibly can. Has the Pater got any
body?"
" No. The afternoon's marked off — he's going out, I
think. Look here, I'll clear up your things afterwards if
you want to go out. Will you want all these for Mr.
Buck?"
" Oh — all right, thanks ; I dunno. I've got to finish
him off this afternoon and make him pay up."
" Why pay up? Isn't he trustworthy? "
"Trustworthy? A man who's just won three hundred
pounds on a horse and chucked his job on the strength
of it."
" What a fearfully insane thing to do."
" Lost his head." '
" Is he very young? "
" Oo —'bout twenty-five."
" H'm. I spose he'll begin the rake's progress."
" That's about it. You've just about hit it." said Mr.
Leyton with heavy significance.
Miriam lingered.
" I boil every blessed thing after he's been ... if that's
any indication to you."
" Boil them ! " said Miriam vaguely distressed and ponder-
ing over Mr. Leyton standing active and aseptic between
her and some horror . . . something infectious ... it must
be that awful mysterious thing . . . how awful for Mr.
Leyton to have to stop his teeth.
i in: ti; N n EL
- Boil Yin " he chuckled knowingly.
" Why on earth? " she asked.
"Well — there you are" said Mr. Leyton — " that's all
I can tell you. I boil 'em."
•• Crikey " said Miriam half in response and halt in com-
ment <>n his falsetto laugh, as she made for the door. " ( )h (
hut 1 say, 1 don't understand your boiling apparatus, Mr.
Leyton."
''• All right, don't you worry. I'll set it all going and
shove the things in. You've only to turn off the gas and
wipe 'em. I daresay 1 shall have time to do them myself."
ii
When she had prepared for Mr. Hancock's first after-
noon patient Miriam sat down at her crowded table in a
heavy drowse. No sound came from the house or from
the den. The strip of sky above the blank wall opposite
her window was an even cold grey. There was nothing
to mark the movement of the noisy wind. The room was
I and stuffy. Shivering as she moved, she glanced
round at the lamp. It was well trimmed. The yellow flame
was at its broadest. The radiator glared. The warmth did
not reach her. She was cold to the waist, her feet without
feeling on the strip of linoleum; her knees protruding into
the window space felt as if they were in cold water. Un-
arms crept and flushed with cold at every movement, strips
of cold wri^t disgusted her, showing beyond her skimpy
sleeves and leading to the hopelessness of her purplish red
hands swollen and clammy with cold. Tier hot head and
flushed cheeks begged for fresh air. Warm rooms, with
carpd- and tire-; an even, airy warmth. . . . There were
pie who could he in this ^ort of cold and be active,
with cool faces and warm hands, even just after lunch.
I: Mi Leyton were here he would be briskly entering up
THE TUNNEL 69
the books — perhaps with a red nose ; but very brisk. He
was finishing Buck off ; briskly, not even talking. Mr.
Hancock would be working swiftly at well up-to-date ac-
counts, without making a single mistake. Where had he
sat doing all those pages of beautiful spidery book-keeping?
Mr. Orly would be rushing things through. What a drama.
He knew it. He knew he had earned his rest by the fire
. . . doing everything, making and building the practice
. . . people waiting outside the surgery with basins for him
to rush out and be sick. Her sweet inaccurate help in the
fine pointed writing on cheap paper . . . the two cheap
rooms they started in. . . . The Wreck of the Mary Glou-
cester ..." and never a doctor's brougham to help the
missis unload." They had been through everything to-
gether ... it was all there with them now . . . rushing
down the street in the snow without an overcoat to get
her the doctor. They were wise and sweet; in life and
wise and sweet. They had gone out and would be back
for tea. Perhaps they had gone out. Everything was so
quiet. Two hours of cold before tea. Putting in order
the materials for the gold and tin she propped her elbows
on the table and rested her head against her hands and
closed her eyes. There was a delicious drowsiness in her
head but her back was tired. She rose and wandered
through the deserted hall into the empty waiting room. The
clear blaze of a coal fire greeted her at the doorway and her
cold feet hurried in on to the warm Turkey carpet. The
dark oak furniture and the copper bowls and jugs stood in a
glow of comfort. From the center of the great littered
table a bowl of daffodils asserted the movement of the
winter and pointed forward and away from the winter
stillness of the old room. The long faded rich crimson
rep curtains obscured half the width of each high window
and the London light screened by the high opposing houses
7 o THE TUNNEL
fill dimly on the dingy books and periodicals scattered
about the table. Miriam stood by the mantelpiece her feet
deep in the black sheepskin rug and held out her hands
towards the fire. They felt cold again the instant she with-
drew thorn from the blaze. The hall clock gonged softly
twice. The legal afternoon had begun. Anyone finding
her in here now would think she was idling. She glanced
at the deep dark shabby leather armchair near by and
imagined the relief that would come to her whole frame,
if she could relax into it foi five undisturbed minutes.
The ringing of the front door bell sent her hurrying back
to her room.
The sound of reading came from the den — a word-
mouthing word-slurring monotonous drawl — thurrah-
thurrah-thurrah ; thurrah thurrah ... a single beat, on and
on, the words looped and forced into it without any dis-
crimination, the voice dropping uniformly at the end of each
sentence . . . thrah. . . . An Early Victorian voice giving
reproachful instruction to a child ... a class of board
school children reciting. . . . Perhaps they had changed
their minds about going out. . . . Miriam sat with her
hands tucked between her knees musing with her eyes fixed
on the thin sheets of tin and gold . . . extraordinary to
read any sort of text like that . . . but there was some-
thing in it, something nice and good . . . listening care-
fully you would get most of the words. It would be bet-
ter to listen to than a person who read with intelligent
modulations, as if they had written the thing themselves;
like some men read . . . and irritatingly intelligent women
. . . who knew they were intelligent. But there ought to
be clear . . . enunciation. Not expression — that was like
commenting as you read ; getting at the person you were
reading to . . . who might not want to comment in the
same way. Reading, with expression, really hadn't any ex-
THE TUNNEL 71
pression. How wonderful — of course. Mrs. Orly's read-
ing had an expression; a shape. It was exactly like the
way they looked at things; exactly; everything was there;
all the things they agreed about, and the things he admired
in her . . . things that by this time she knew he admired.
. . . She was conscious of these things . . . that was the
difference between her and her sister, who had exactly the
same things but had never been admired . . . standing side
by side exactly alike, the sister like a child — clear with a
sharp fresh edge; Mrs. Orly with a different wisdom . . .
softened and warm and blurred . . . conscious, and always
busy distracting your attention, but with clear eyes like a
child, too.
12
Presently the door opened quietly and Mrs. Orly appeared
in the doorway. " Miss Hens'n " she whispered urgently.
Miriam turned to meet her flushed face. " Oh Miss
Hens'n " she pursued absently, " if Mudie's send d'you mind
lookin' and choosin' us something nice ? "
" Oh " said Miriam provisionally with a smile.
Mrs. Orly closed the door quietly and advanced con-
fidently with deprecating bright wheedling eyes. " Isn't it
tahsome " she said conversationally. " Ro's asleep and the
carriage is comin' round at half past. Isn't it tahsome? "
" Can't you send it back? "
" I want him to go out ; I think the drive will do him
good. I say, d'you mind just lookin' — at the books? "
" No, I will ; but how shall I know what to keep ? Is
there a list?"
Mrs. Orly looked embarrassed. " I've got a list some-
where " she said hurriedly, " but I can't find it."
" I'll do my best " said Miriam.
" You know — anythin' historical . . . there's one I put
:2 - TH E TUNN EL
down 'The Sorrow- of a Young Queen.' Keep that if
they send it and anything else you think."
" Is there anything to go hack?"
'• Yes, I'll bring them out. We've been reading an awful
one — awful."
Miriam began fingering her gold foil. Mrs. Orly was
going to expect her to he shocked. . . .
" By that awful man Zola. . . ."
"< ih yes" said Miriam, dryly.
" I lave you read any of his? "
" Yes " said Miriam carefully.
" Have you? Aren't they shockin'? "
" Well I don't know. I thought ' Lourdes ' was simply
wonderful."
" Is that a nice one — what's it ahout? "
"Oh you know — it's about the Madonna of Lourdes,
the miracles, in the south of France. It begins with a
crowded trainload of sick people going down through France
on a very hot day . . . it's simply stupendous . . . you
feel you're in the train, you go through it all " — she turned
away and looked through the window overcome ..." and
there's a thing called ' La Reve ' " she went on incoherently
with a break in her voice " about an embroideress and a man
called IVIicien — it's simply the most lovely thing."
Mr>. ( )rly came near to the table.
" You understand about books don't you," she said wist-
fully.
>h no " said Miriam. " I've hardly read anything."
" I wish you'd put those two down."
I don't know the names of the translations," announced
Miriam with conceited solicitude.
A long loud yawn resounded through the door.
" Better, boysie?" asked Mrs. Orly turning anxiously to-
ward- the open door.
THE TUNNEL 73
" Yes, my love," said Mr. Orly cheerfully.
" I am glad, boy — I'll get my things on — the carriage '11
be here in a minute."
She departed at a run and Mr. Orly came in and sat
heavily down in a chair set against the slope of the wall
close by and facing Miriam.
" Phoo " he puffed, " I've been taking phenacetin all day ;
you don't get heads do you? "
Miriam smiled and began preparing a reply.
" How's it coming in? Totting up, eh? "
" I think so " said Miriam uneasily.
"What's it totting up to this month? Any idea?"
" No ; I can see if you like."
" Never mind, never mind. . . . Mrs. O's been reading
. . . phew ! You're a lit'ry young lady — d'you know that
French chap — Zola — Emmil Zola " Mr. Orly
glanced suspiciously.
" Yes " said Miriam.
"Like 'im?"
" Yes " said Miriam firmly.
" Well — it's a matter of taste and fancy " sighed Mr.
Orly heavily. " Chacun a son gout — shake an ass and go,
as they say. One's enough for me. I can't think why they
do it myself — sheer well to call a spade a spade sheer
bestiality those French writers — don't ye think so, eh? "
" Well no. I don't think I can accept that as a summary
of French literature."
" Eh well, it's beyond me. I suppose I'm not up to it.
Behind the times. Not cultured enough. Not cultured
enough I guess. Ready dearest ? " he said addressing his
wife and getting to his feet with a groan. " Miss Hens'n's
a great admirer of Emmil Zola."
" She says some of his books are pretty, didn't you, Miss
Hens'n. It isn't fair to judge from one book, Ro."
74 THE TUNNEL
' No my love no. Quite right. Quite right. I'm wrong
— no doubt. Getting old and soft. Things go on too fast
for me
" Don't be so silly, Ro."
Drowsily and automatically Miriam went on rolling tin
and gold — sliding a crisp thick foil of tin from the pink
tissue paper leaved book on to the serviette ... a firm
metallic crackle . . . then a silent layer of thin gold . . .
then more tin . . . adjusting the three slippery leaves in
perfect superposition without touching them with her
hands, cutting the final square into three strips, with the
long sharp straight bladed scissors — the edges of the metal
adhering to each other as the scissors went along — thinking
again with vague distant dreamy amusement of the boy
who cut the rubber tyre to mend it — rolling the flat strips
with a fold of the serviette, deftly until they turned into
neat little twisted crinkled rolls — wondering how she had
acquired the knack. She went on and on lazily, unable to
stop, sitting hack in her chair and working with outstretched
arms, until a small fancy soap box was filled with the twists
— enough to last the practice for a month or two. The
sight filled her with a sense of achievement and zeal. Put-
ting on its lid she placed the soap box on the second chair.
Lazily, stupidly, longing for tea — all the important clerical
work left undone, Mr. Orly's surgery to clear up for the day
— still she was working in the practice. She glanced ap-
provingly at the soap box . . . but there were ages to pass
before tea. She did not dare to look at her clock. Had the
hall clock struck three? Bending to a drawer she drew out
a strip of amadou — offended at the sight of her red wrist
coming out of the harsh cheap black sleeve and the fingers
bloated by cold. They looked lifeless; no one else's hands
THE TUNNEL 75
looked so lifeless. Part of the amadou was soft and warm
to her touch, part hard and stringy. Cutting out a soft
square she cut it rapidly into tiny cubes collecting them
in a pleasant flummery heap on the blotting paper — Mr.
Hancock should have those; they belonged to his perfect
treatment of his patients ; it was quite just. Cutting a
strip of the harsher part, she pulled and teased it into com-
parative softness and cut it up into a second pile of frag-
ments. Amadou, gold and tin . . . Japanese paper? A
horrible torpor possessed her. Why did one's head get into
such a hot fearful state before tea? . . . grey stone wall
and the side of the projecting glass roofed peak of Mr.
Leyton's surgery . . . grey stone wall . . . wall . . . rail-
ings at the top of it . . . cold — a cold sky ... it was their
time — nine to six — no doubt those people did best who
thought of nothing during hours but the work — cheerfully
— but they were always pretending — in and out of work
hours they pretended. There was something wrong in them
and something wrong in the people who shirked. La — te
— ta — te — te — ta, she hummed searching her table for
relief. Mr. Hancock's bell sounded and she fled up to the
warmth of his room. In a moment Mudie's cart came and
the maid summoned her. There was a pile of books in the
hall. . . . She glanced curiously at the titles worried with
the responsibility — ' The Sorrows ' — that was all right.
' Secrets of a Stormy Court ' . . . that was the sort of thing
..." you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear "...
one day she must explain to Mr. Orly that that was really
" sousiere " a thing to hold halfpence. ' My Reminis-
cences ' by Count de Something. Perhaps that was one they
had put down. The maid presented the volumes to be re-
turned. Taking them Miriam asked her to ask Mr. Han-
cock if he had anything to change. ' Cock Lane and Com-
mon Sense ' she read . . . there was some sort of argu-
7 6 Til 1 T UNN1 I.
nu'iit in that . . . the ' facts' of some case ... it would
sneer al something, some popular idea ... it was probably
by some doctor or scientific man . . . but that was not the
book. . . . "The Earth' . . . Emile Zola. She flapped the
book op< i and hurriedly read a few phrases. The hall
pulsated triously. She Hushed all over her body.
"There's othing for Mr. Hancock, miss." "All right;
these can g » and these arc to he kept," die -aid indistinctly.
Wandering hack to her room she repeated the phrases in
her mind in French. They seemed to clear up and take
shelter — somehow they were terse and acceptable and they
were secret and secure — but English people ought not to
read them; in English. It was — outrageous. English
men. The French man had written them simply . . .
French logic . . . English men were shy and suggestive
about these tilings — either that or breezy . . . "filth"
which was almost worse. The Orlys ought not to read them
at all ... it was a good thing the book was out of the house
. . . they would forget. But she would not forget. Her
empty room glanced with a strange confused sadness; the
clearing up upstairs was not quite done ; but she could not
go upstairs again yet. Three-fifteen ; the afternoon had
turned : her clock was a little slow too. The warm quiet
empty den was waiting for the tea-tray. Clearing the rem-
nants from her table she sat down again. The heavy still-
- of the house closed in. . . . She opened the drawer of
stationery. Various kinds of notepaper lay slid together
in confusion; someone had been fumbling there. The cor-
ondence cards propped against the side of the drawer
would never stay in their proper places. With comatose
meticulousness she put the whole drawer in order, replenish-
ing it from a drawer of reserve packets, until it was so full
that nothing could slide. She surveyed the result with
isf action; and shut the drawer. She would tidy one
THE TUNNEL 77
drawer every afternoon. . . . She opened the drawer once
more and looked again. To keep it like that would mean
never using the undermost cards and notepaper. That
would not do . . . change them all around sometimes. She
sat for a while inertly and presently lazily roused herself
with the idea of going upstairs. Pausing in front of a long
three-shelved what-not filling the space between the door
and the narrow many drawered specimen case that stood
next her table she idly surveyed its contents. Nothing
but piles of British Dental Journals, Proceedings of the
Odontological Society, circulars from the Dental Manu-
facturing Companies. Propping her elbows on the upper
shelf of the what-not she stood turning leaves.
14
"Tea up?"
" Don't know " said Miriam irritably, passing the open
door. He could see she had only just come down and could
not possibly know. The soft jingling of the cups shaken
together on a tray by labouring footsteps came from the
basement stairs. Mr. Leyton's hurried clattering increased.
Miriam waited impatiently by her table. The maid padded
heavily through swinging the door of the den wide with
her elbow. When she had retired, Miriam sauntered warm
and happy almost before she was inside the door into the
den. With her eyes on the tea-tray she felt the afternoon
expand. ..." There's a Burma girl a settin' and I know
she thinks of me." ..." Come you back you British sol-
dier, come you back to Mandalay." Godfrey's tune was
much the best ; stiff, like the words, the other was only sing-
song. Pushing off the distraction she sat down near the
gently roaring blaze of the gas fire in a low little chair,
upholstered in cretonne almost patternless with age. The
glow of the fire went through and through her. If she
7 8 Til E TUNNEL
had tea at once, everything would be richer and richer,
but things would move on, and if they came back she
would have finished and would have to go. The face of
the railway clock fixed against the frontage of the gallery
at the far end of the room said four-fifteen. They had
evidently ordered tea to be a quarter of an hour late and
might be in any minute . . . this curious feeling that the
room belonged to her more than to the people who owned
it, so that they were always intruders. . . . Leaving with
difficulty the little feast untouched ... a Dundee cake
from Buszards ... she browsed rapidly, her eyes roam-
ing from thing to thing ... the shields and assegais
grouped upon the raised dull gold papering of the high op-
posite wall, the bright beautiful coloured bead skirts spread
out amongst curious carved tusks and weapons, the large
cool placid gold Buddha reclining below them with his chin
on his hand and his elbow on a red velvet cushion, on the
Japanese cabinet; the Japanese cupboard fixed above Mrs.
Orly's writing table, the fine firm carved ivory on its panels ;
the tall vase of Cape gooseberries flaring on the top of the
cottage piano under the shadow of the gallery; the gallery
with its upper mystery, the happy clock fastened against
its lower edge, always at something after four, the door
set back in the wall, leading into her far-away midday room,
the light falling from the long high frosted window along
the confusion of Mr. Orly's bench, noisy as she looked at it
with the sound of metal tools falling with a rattle, the
drone and rattle of the motor lathe, Mr. Orly's cheerful
hummings and whistlings, the bench swept down the length
of the room to her side ... the movable shaded electric
lamp; Mr. Orly's African tobacco pouch bunched under-
neath it on the edge of the bench near the old leather arm-
chair near to the fire, facing the assegais ; the glass-doored
bookcase on either side of the fireplace, the strange smooth
THE TUNNEL 79
gold on the strips of Burmese wood fastened along the
shelves, the clear brown light of the room on the gold, the
curious lettering sweeping across the gold.
"Tea? Good."
Mr. Leyton pulled up a chair and plumped into it digging
at his person and dragging out the tails of his coat with one
hand, holding a rumpled newspaper at reading length.
When his coat-tails were free he scratched his head and
scrubbed vigorously at his short brown beard.
' You had tea ? " he said to Miriam's motionlessness, with-
out looking up.
" No — let's have tea," said Miriam. Why should he as-
sume that she should pour out the tea. . . .
" I say that's a nasty one " said Mr. Leyton hysterically
and began reading in a high hysterical falsetto.
Miriam began pouring out. Mr. Leyton finished his pas-
sage with a little giggling shriek of laughter and fumbled for
bread and butter with his eyes still on the newspaper.
Miriam sipped her hot tea. The room darkled in the silence.
Everything intensified. She glanced impatiently at Mr. Ley-
ton's bent unconscious form. His shirt and the long straight
narrow ends of his tie made a bulging curve above his
low-cut waistcoat. The collar of his coat stood away from
his bent neck and its tails were bunched up round his hips.
His trousers were so hitched up that his bent knees strained
against the harsh crude Rope Brothers cloth. The ends of
his trousers peaked up in front, displaying loose rolls of
black sock and the whole of his anatomical walking-shoes.
Miriam heard his busily masticating jaws and dreaded his
operations with his tea-cup. A wavering hand came out
and found the cup and clasped it by the rim, holding it at
the edge of the lifted newspaper. She busied herself with
cutting stout little wedges of cake. Mr. Leyton sipped,
gasping after each loud quilting gulp ; a gasp, and the sound
8o T H E TU N N ! L
of a moustache being sucked Mr. Hancock's showing out
bell rang. Mr. Leyton plunged busily round, finishing his
cup in a series of rapid gulps. " Kike?" he said.
"M" said Miriam, "jolly kike — did you finish Mr.
Buck?"
" More or less "
" 1 >id you boil the remains? "
" Boiled every blessed thing — and put the serviette in
k'l...lir •
Miriam hid her relief and poured him out another cup.
Mr. Hancock came in through the open door and quickly
up to the tea-tray. Pouring out a cup he held the teapot
suspended, " another cup? "
" No thanks, not just at present" said Miriam getting to
her feet with a morsel of cake in her fingers.
" Plenty of time for my things " said Mr. Hancock sitting
down in Mr. Orly's chair with his tea, his flat compact
slightly wrinkled and square-toed patent leather shoes
gleamed from under the rims of his soft dark grey beauti-
fullv cut trousers with a pleasant shine as he sat back com-
fortable and unlounging. with crossed knees in the deep
chair.
Mr. Leyton had got to his feet.
"Busy?" he said rapidly munching. "I say I've had
that man Ruck this afternoon."
"Oh yes" said Mr. Hancock brushing a crumb from
his kn
" You know — the case I told you about."
'• ( >h " said Mr. Hancock with a clear glance and a
slight tightening of the face.
Miriam made for the door. Mr. Hancock was not en-
couraging the topic. Mr. Leyton's cup came down with a
clatter. " I'm fearfully rushed " he said. " I must be off,"
THE TUNNEL 81
He caught Miriam up in the hall. " I say tea must have
been fearfully late. I've got to get down to headquarters
by five sharp."
" You go on first " said Miriam standing aside.
Mr. Leyton fled up through the house three steps at a
time.
15
When she came down again intent on her second cup of
tea in the empty brown den a light had been switched on,
driving the dark afternoon away. The crayon drawings
behind the piano shone out on the walls of the dark square
space under the gallery as she hesitated in the doorway.
There was someone in the dim brightness of the room.
She turned noiselessly towards her table.
" Come and have some more tea Miss Hens'n."
Miriam went in with alacrity. The light was on in the
octagonal brass framed lantern that hung from the sky-
light and shed a soft dim radiance through its old glass.
Mrs. Orly still in her bonnet and fur-lined cape was sitting
drinking tea in the little old cretonne chair. She raised a
tired flushed face and smiled brightly at Miriam as she came
down the room.
" I'm dying for another cup ; I had to fly off and clear
up Mr. Hancock's things."
" Mr. Hancock busy ? Have some cake, it's rather a
nice one." Mrs. Orly cut a stout little wedge.
Clearing away the newspaper Miriam took possession of
Mr. Leyton's chair.
Mr. Orly swung in shutting the door behind him and
down the room peeling off his frock coat as he came.
"Tea darling?"
" Well m'love, since you're so pressing."
82 THE TUNNEL
Mr. Orly switched on the lamp on the corner of the
bench and subsided into his chair his huge bulk poised
lightly and alertly, one vast leg across the other knee.
" 'Scuse my shirt-sleeves Miss Hens'n. I say I've got a
new song — like to try it presently or are ye too busy? "
Poised between the competing interests of many worlds
Miriam basked in the friendly tones.
" Well I have got rather a fearful lot of things to do."
" Come and try it now, d'ye mind? "
" Have your tea Ro, darling."
" Right my love, right, right, always right — Hancock
busy?"
" Yes ; he has two more patients after this one."
" Marvellous man."
" Mr. Hancock never gets rushed or flurried does he ?
He's always been the same ever since we've known him."
" He's very even and steady outwardly " said Miriam
indifferently.
" You think it's only outward? "
" Well I mean he's really frightfully sensitive."
"Just so; it's his coolness carries him through, self-com-
mand, I wish I'd got it."
" You'd miss other things boysie ; you can't have it both
ways."
" Right m'love — right. I don't understand him. D'you
think anyone does, Miss Hens'n — really — I mean. D'you
understand him? "
" Well you see I haven't known him very long "
" Xo — but you come from the same district and know
his relatives."
" The same Berkshire valley and his cousins happened to
be my people's oldest friends."
" Well don't ye see, that makes all the difference — I say
I heard a splendid one this afternoon. D'you think I could
THE TUNNEL 83
tell Miss Hens'n that one Nelly ? — you're not easily shocked,
are you ? "
" I've never been shocked in my life " said Miriam get-
ting to her feet.
" Must ye go ? Shall we just try this over ? "
" Well if it isn't too long."
" Stop and have a bit of dinner with us can ye? "
Miriam made her excuse, pleading an engagement and sat
down to the piano. The song was a modern ballad with an
easy impressive accompaniment, following the air. The
performance went off easily and well, Mr. Orly's clear
trained baritone ringing out persuasively into the large
room. Weathering a second invitation to spend the even-
ing she got away to her room.
16
Her mind was alight with the sense of her many beckon-
ing interests, aglow with fulness of life. The thin piercing
light cast upon her table by the single five candle power
bulb, drawn low and screened by a green glass shade was
warm and friendly. She attacked her letters, despatching
the appointments swiftly and easily in a bold convincing
hand and drafted a letter to Mrs. Hermann that she carried
with a glow of satisfaction to Mr. Hancock's room. When
his room was cleared in preparation for his last patient it
was nearly six o'clock. She began entering his day-book in
the ledger. The boy coming up for the letters brought two
dentures to be packed and despatched by registered post
from Vere Street before six o'clock. " They'll be ready
by the time you've got your boots on " said Miriam and
packed her cases brilliantly in a mood of deft-handed con-
centration. Jimmy clattered up the stairs as she was stamp-
ing the labels. When he fled with them she gave a general
sigh and surveyed the balance of her day with a responsible
84 THE TUNNEL
cheerful wicked desperation; her mind leaping forward to
her evening. The day books would not be done, even Mr.
Hancock's would have to go up unentered; she had not the
courage to investigate the state of the cash book ; Mr. Ley-
ton's room was ready for the morning; she. ran through
to Mr. Orly's room and performed a rapid perfunctory
tidying up; many little things were left; his depleted stores
must be refilled in the morning; she glanced at his appoint-
ment book, no patient so far until ten. She left the room
with her everyday guilty consciousness that hardly anything
in it was up to the level of Mr. Hancock's room . . . look
after Hancock, I'm used to fending for myself . . . but
he knew she did not do her utmost to keep the room going.
There were times when he ran short of stores in the midst
of a sitting. That could be avoided.
17
When Miriam entered his room at half past six Mr.
Hancock was switching off the lights about the chair. A
single light shone over his desk. The fire was nearly out.
"Still here?"
" Yes " said Miriam switching on a light over the instru-
ment cabinet.
" I should leave those things to-night if I were you."
" It isn't very late."
She could go on, indefinitely, in this confident silence,
preparing for the next day. He sat making up his day-
book and would presently come upon Mrs. Hermann's let-
ter. As long as he was there the day lingered. Its light
had left the room. The room was colourless and dark
except where the two little brilliant circles of light made
bright patches of winter evening. Their two figures quietly
at work meant the quiet and peace of the practice ; the
full, ended day, to begin again to-morrow in broad daylight
THE TUNNEL 85
in this same room. The room was full of their quiet con-
tinuous companionship. It was getting very cold. He
would be going soon.
He stood up, switching off his light. " That will do ex-
cellently " he said with an amused smile, placing Mrs. Her-
mann's letter on the flap of the instrument cabinet and wan-
dering into the gloomy spaces.
" Well. I'll say good night."
" Good night " murmured Miriam.
Leaving the dried instruments in a heap with a wash
leather flung over them she gathered up the books switched
the room into darkness, felt its promise of welcome and
trotted downstairs through the quiet house. The front
door shut quietly on Mr. Hancock as she reached the hall.
She flew to get away. In five minutes the books were in
the safe and everything locked up. The little mirror on
the wall, scarcely lit by the single globe over the desk just
directed the angle of her hat and showed the dim strange
eager outline of her unknown face. She fled down the hall
past Mr. Leyton's room and the opening to the forgotten
basement, between the heavy closed door of Mr. Orly's
room and the quiet scrolled end of the balustrade and past
the angle of the high dark clock staring with its unlit face
down the length of the hall, between the high oak chest
and the flat oak coffer confronting each other in the glooms
thrown by Mrs. Orly's tall narrow striped Oriental curtains ;
she saw them standing in straight folds, the beautiful
height and straightness of their many coloured stripes, as
they must have been before the outside stripe of each had
been cut and used as a tie-up; and was out beyond the
curtains in the brightly lit square facing the door. The
light fell on the rich edge of the Turkey carpet and the
groove of the bicycle stand. In the corner stood the blue
and white pipe, empty of umbrellas. Her hand grasped the
86 THE TUNNEL
machine-turned edge of the small flat circular knoh that
released the door . . . hrahma ; that was the word, at last.
. . . The door opened and closed with its familiar heavy
wooden firmness, neatly, with a little rattle of its chain.
Her day scrolled up behind her. She halted, trusted and
responsible, for a long second in the light flooding the steps
from behind the door.
The pavement was under her feet and the sparsely lamp-
lit night all round her. She restrained her eager steps to a
walk. The dark houses and the blackness between the
lamps were elastic about her.
CHAPTER IV
WHEN she came to herself she was in the Strand.
She walked on a little and turned aside to look at
a jeweller's window and consider being in the Strand at
night. Most of the shops were still open. The traffic was
still in full tide. The jeweller's window repelled her. It
was very yellow with gold, all the objects close together
and each one bearing a tiny label with the price. There
was a sort of commonness about the Strand, not like the
cheerful commonness of Oxford Street, more like the City
with its many sudden restaurants. She walked on. But
there were theatres also, linking it up with the west-end
and streets leading off it where people like Bob Greville
had chambers. It was the tailing off of the west-end and
the beginning of a deep dark richness that began about Holy-
well. Mysterious important churches crowded in amongst
little brown lanes . . . the little dark brown lane. . . . She
wondered what she had been thinking since she left Wim-
pole Street and whether she had come across Trafalgar
Square without seeing it or round by some other way. They
were fighting; sending out suffocation and misery into the
surrounding air . . . she stopped close to the two upright
balanced threatening bodies, almost touching them. The
men looked at her. " Don't " she said imploringly and
hurried on trembling. ... It occurred to her that she
had not seen fighting since a day in her childhood when
87
88 Til E TUNNEL
she had wondered at the swaying bodies and sickened at
the thud of a fist against a check. The feeling was the same
to-day, the longing to explain somehow to the men that
they could not tight. . . . Half-past seven. Perhaps there
would not he an A. B.C. so far down. It would he impossi-
ble to get a meal. Perhaps the girls would have some coffee.
An A..B.C. appeared suddenly at her side, its panes misty
in the cold air. She went confidently in. It seemed nearly
full of men. Never mind, city men; with a wisdom of
their own which kept them going and did not afreet any-
thing, all alike and thinking the same thoughts; far away
from anything she thought or knew. She walked con-
fidently down the centre, her plaid-lined golf-cape thrown
back her small brown boat-shaped felt hat suddenly hot
on her head in the warmth. The shop turned at a right
angle showing a large open fire with a fireguard, and a cat
sitting on the hearthrug in front of it. She chose a chair
at a small table in front of the fire. The velvet settees
at the sides of the room were more comfortable. But it
was for such a little while to-night and it was not one of
her own A.B.C.s. She felt as she sat down as if she were
the guest of the city men and ate her boiled egg and roll
and butter and drank her small coffee in that spirit-gazing
into the fire and thinking her own thoughts unresentful
of the uncongenial scraps of talk that now and again pene-
trated her thoughts ; the complacent laughter of the men
amazed her; their amazing unconsciousness of the things
that were written all over them.
The fire blazed into her face. She dropped her cape
over the back of her chair and sat in the glow ; the small
pat of butter was not enough for the large roll. Pictures
came out of the fire, the strange moment in her room,
the smashing of the plaque, the lamplit den; Mr. Orly's
song, the strange rich difficult day and now her untouched
THE TUNNEL 89
self here, free, unseen and strong, the strong world of
London all round her, strong free untouched people, in
a dark lit wilderness happy and miserable in their own way,
going about the streets looking at nothing, thinking about
no special person or thing, as long as they were there, being
in London.
Even the business people who went about intent, going
to definite places were in the secret of London and looked
free. The expression of the collar and hair of many of
them said they had homes. But they got away from them.
No one who had never been alone in London was quite
alive. . . . I'm free — I've got free — nothing can ever alter
that she thought, gazing wide-eyed into the fire, between
fear and joy. A strange familiar pang gave the place a
sort of consecration. A strength was piling up within her.
She would go out unregretfully at closing time and up
through wonderful unknown streets, not her own streets
till she found Holborn and then up and round through the
Squares.
2
On the hall table lay a letter . . . from Alma; under
the shadow of the bronze soldier leaning on his gun.
Miriam gathered it up swiftly. No one knew her here . . .
no past and no future . . . coming in and out unknown, in
the present secret wonder. Pausing for a moment near the
smeary dimly-lit marble slab the letter out of sight she
held this consciousness. There was no sound in the house
... its huge high thick walls held all the lodgers secure
and apart, fixed in richly enclosed rooms in the heart of
London ; secure from all the world that was not London,
flying through space, swinging along on a planet spread
with continents — Londoners. Alma's handwriting, the
same as it had been at school only a little larger and firmer,
9o THE TUNNEL
broke into that. Of course Alma had answered the post-
card ... it had been an impulse, a cry of triumph after
years of groping- about. But it was like pulling a string.
Silly. And now this had happened. But it was only a
touch, only a finger laid on the secret hall table that no
one had seen. The letter need not be answered. Out of
sight is seemed to have gone away . . . destroyed unopened
it would be as if it had never come and everything would
be as before. . . . Enough, more than enough without writ-
ing to Alma. An evening paper boy was shouting rau-
cously in the distance. The letter-box brought his voice into
the hall as he passed the door. Miriam moved on up the
many flights.
3
Upstairs she found herself eagerly tearing open the letter.
..." I've just heard from an old schoolfellow she heard
herself saying to the girls in Kennett Street. There was
something exciting in the letter ... at the end Alma Wil-
son (officially Mrs. G. Wilson) . . . strange people in the
room . . . Alma amongst them ; looking out from amongst
dread fulness. Married. She had gone in amongst the
crowd already — forever. How clever of her . . . de-
ceitful . . . that little spark of Alma in her must have been
deceitful . . . sly, at some moment. Alma's eyes glanced
at her with a new more preoccupied and covered look . . .
she used to go sometimes to theatres with large parties
of people with money and the usual dresses who never
thought anything about anything . . . perhaps that was part
of the reason, perhaps Alma was more that than she had
thought . . . marrying in the sort of way she went to
theatre-parties — clever. The letter was full of excitement
. . . Alma leaping up from her marriage and clutching at
her . . . not really married ; dancing to some tune in some
THE TUNNEL 91
usual way like all those women and jumping up in a way
that fizzled and could not be kept up. . . .
" You dear old thing ! . . . fell out of the sky this morn-
ing .. . to fill pages with ' you dear old thing !'"... see
you at once ! Immediately ! . . . come up to town and meet
you . . . some sequestered tea shop . . . our ancient heads
together . . . tell you all that has happened to me since
those days . . . next Thursday ... let you know how
really really rejoiced I am . . . break the very elderly fact
that I am married . . . but that makes no difference. . . ."
That would not be so bad — seeing Alma alone in a tea
shop in the west end; in a part of the new life, that would
be all right ; nothing need happen, nothing would be touched,
" all I have had the temerity to do . . ." what did that
mean?
4
Unpinning the buckram-stiffened black velvet band from
her neck, she felt again with a rush of joy that her day was
beginning and moved eagerly about amongst the strange
angles and shadows of her room, the rich day all about her.
Somebody had put up her little varnished oak bookshelf
just in the right place, the lower shelf in a line with the
little mantelpiece. When the gas bracket was swung
out from the wall the naked flame shone on the backs
of the indiscriminately arranged books . . . the calf-bound
Shakespeare could be read now comfortably in the im-
mense fresh dark night under the gas flame ; the Perne's
memorial edition of Tennyson. . . . She washed her face
and hands in hard cold water at the little rickety washstand,
yellow-grained rich beloved, drying them on the thin holey
face towel hurriedly. Lying neatly folded amongst the con-
fusion of oddments in a top drawer was her lace tie. Hold-
ing it out to its full length she spread it against her neck,
92 T H E T U N N E L
crossed the ends at the back bringing them back round her
neck to spread in a narrow flat plastron to her waist, kept in
place by a brooch at the top and a pin fastened invisibly
half way down. Her face shone fresh and young; above
the creamy lace . . . the tie was still fairly new and crisp
. . . when it had to be washed it would be limp . . . but it
would go on some time just for evenings transforming her
harsh black John Doble half guinea costume into evening
dress. For some moments she contemplated its pleasant
continuous pattern and the way the rounded patterned ends
fell just below the belt. . . .
'•I
5
The top-floor bell would not ring. After some hesitation
Miriam rang the house bell. The door was opened by a
woman in a silk petticoat and a dressing jacket. Miriam
gazed dumbly into large clear blue eyes gazing at her from
a large clean clear fresh face feathered with little soft nat-
ural curls, cut out sharply against the dark passage.
" Are you for the top? " enquired the woman in a smooth
serene sleepy voice.
" Yes " announced Miriam eagerly coming in and closing
the door, her ears straining to catch the placid words spoken
by the woman as she disappeared softly into a softly-lit
room. She went tremulously up the dark stairs into a thick
stale odour of rancid fried grease and on towards a light
that glimmered from the topmost short flight of steep un-
carpeted winding stairs. " They're in " said her thoughts
with a quick warm leap. " Hullo " she asserted, ascending
the stairs.
" Hullo " came in response a quick challenging voice . . .
a soft clear reed-like happy ring that Miriam felt to her
knees while her happy feet stumbled on.
" Is that the Henderson?"
THE TUNNEL 93
" It's me " said Miriam emerging on a tiny landing and
going through the open door of a low-ceiled lamplit room.
" It's me it's me " she repeated from the middle of the floor.
An eager face was turned towards her from a thicket of
soft dull wavy hair. She gazed vaguely. The small slip-
pered feet planted firmly high up against the lintel the sweep
of the red dressing-gown, the black patch of the Mudie book
with its yellow label, the small ringed hand upon it, the
outflung arm and hand the little wreath of smoke about
the end of the freshly lit cigarette, the cup of coffee on the
little table under the lamp, the dim shapes about the room
lit by the flickering blaze. . . .
Miriam smiled into the smiling steel blue of the eyes
turned towards her and waited smiling for the silver reed
of tone to break again. " I'm so glad you've come. I
wanted you. Sit down and shut the door my child. . . .
I don't mind which you do first, but — do — them — both,"
she tinkled, stretching luxuriously and bringing her feet
to the ground with a swing. Miriam closed the door.
" Can I take off my things ? "
" Of course child . . . take them all off ; you know I
admire you most draped in a towel."
" I've got such awful feet " said Miriam hugging the
compliment as she dropped her things in a distant arm-chair.
" It's not your feet, it's your extraordinary shoes."
" M."
" How beautiful you look. You put on ties better than
anyone I know. I wish I could wear things draped round
my neck."
Miriam sat down in the opposite wicker chair.
" Isn't it cold — my feet are freezing ; it's raining."
" Take off your shoes."
Miriam got off her shoes and propped them in the fender
to dry.
94 TUK TUNNEL
" What is that book?"
"Eden Philpotfs 'Children of the Mist'" fluted the
voice reverently. " Read it?"
" No" said Miriam expectantly.
The eager face turned to an eager profile with eyes
brooding into the fire. " He's so wonderful " mused the
voice and Miriam watched eagerly. Mag read books — for
their own sake; and could judge them and compare them
with other books by the same author . . . but all this
wonderful knowledge made her seem wistful ; knowing all
about books and plays and strangely wistful and regretful ;
the things that made her eyes blaze and made her talk
reverently or in indignant defence always seemed sad in
the end . . . wistful hero worship . . . raving about certain
writers and actors as if she did not know they were people.
" He's so wonderful" went on the voice with its per-
petual modulations " he gets all the atmosphere of the west
country — perfectly. You live there while you're reading
him."
With a little chill sense of Mag in this wonderful room
alone, living in the west country and herself coming in as
an interruption, Miriam noted the name of the novelist
in her mind . . . there was something about it, she knew
she would not forget it ; soft and numb with a slight clatter
and hiss at the end, a rain-storm, the atmosphere of Devon-
shire and the mill-wheel.
" Devonshire people are all consumptive," she said de-
cisively.
"Are they?"
" Yes, it's the mild damp air. They have lovely complex-
ions ; like the Irish. There must be any amount of con-
sumption in Ireland."
" I suppose there is."
Miriam sat silent and still watching Mag's movements
THE TUNNEL 95
as she sipped and puffed, so strangely easy and so strangely
wistful in her wonderful rich Bloomsbury life — and waiting
for her next remark.
" You look very happy tonight child ; what have you
been doing? "
" Nothing."
" You look as happy as a bird."
" Are birds happy ? "
" Of course birds are happy."
" Well — they prey on each other — and they're often
frightened."
" How wise we are."
Brisk steps sounded on the little stairs.
" Tell me what you have been doing."
" Oh. I don't know. Weird things have been happen-
ing. . . . Oh, weird things."
" Tell your aunt at once." Mag gathered herself together
as the brisk footsteps came into the room. " Hoh " said a
strong resonant voice " it's the Henderson. I thought as
much."
"Yes. Doesn't she look pretty?"
" Yes — she has a beautiful lace tie."
" I wish I could wear things like that round my neck,
don't you von Bohlen?"
" I do. She can stick anything round her neck — and
look nice."
" Anything ; a garter or a — a kipper. . . ."
" Don't be so cracked."
" She says weird things have been happening to her. I
say I didn't make any coffee for you and the spirit lamp
wants filling."
" Damn you — Schweinhund — verfluchte Schweinhund."
Miriam had been gazing at the strong square figure in the
short round fur-lined cloak and sweeping velvet hat, the
96 Til E TUNNEL
firm decisive movements and imagining the delicate pointed
high-heeled shoes. Presently those things would be off and
the door closed on the three of them.
" There's some Bass."
" I'm going to have some suppe. Have some suppe, Hen-
derson."
" Xon, merci."
" She's proud. Bring her some. What did you have for
supper, child? "
" Oh, we had an enormous lunch. They'd had a dinner-
party."
" What did you have for supper?"
" Oh lots of things."
" Bring her some suppe. I'm not sure I won't have a
basin myself."
" All right. I'll put some on." The brisk steps went off
and a voice hummed in and out of the other rooms.
Watching Mag stirring the fire, giving a last pull at her
cigarette end and pushing back the hair from her face . . .
silent and old and ravaged, and young and animated and
powerful, Miriam blushed and beamed silently at her reit-
erated demands for an account of herself.
" I say I saw an extraordinary woman downstairs."
Mag turned sharply and put down the poker.
"Yes?"
" In a petticoat."
" Frederika Elizabeth ! She's seen the Pierson ! "
" Hoh ! Has she? " The brisk footsteps approached and
the door was closed. The dimly shining mysteries of the
room moved about Miriam, the outside darkness flowing
up to the windows moved away as the tall dressing-gowned
figure lowered the thin drab loosely rattling Venetian blinds ;
the light seemed to go up and distant objects became more
visible; the crowded bookshelf the dark littered table under
THE TUNNEL 97
it, the empty table pushed against the wall near the win-
dow — the bamboo bookshelf between the windows above a
square mystery draped to the ground with a table cover —
the little sofa behind Mag's chair, the little pictures, cattle
gazing out across a bridge of snow, cattish complacent
sweepy women. Albert . . .? Moore? the framed photo-
graphs of Dickens and Irving, the litter on the serge draped
mantelpiece in front of the mirror of the bamboo overman-
tel, silver candlesticks, photographs of German women and
Canon Wilberforce ... all the riches of comfortable life.
" You are late."
" Yes I am fear-fully late."
" Why are you late Frederika Elizabeth von Bohlen ? "
The powerful rounded square figure was in the leather
armchair opposite the blaze, strongly moulded brown knick-
ered black stockinged legs comfortably crossed stuck firmly
out between the heavy soft folds of a grey flannel dressing
gown. The shoes had gone, grey woollen bedroom slippers
blurred all but the shapely small ankles. Mag was lighting
another cigarette, von Bohlen was not doing needlework,
the room settled suddenly to its best rich exciting blur.
" Tonight I must smoke or die."
" Must you, my dear."
" Why."
" To-nate, — a, ay must smoke — a, or daye."
" Es ist bestimmt, in Gottes Rath."
" Tell us what you think of the Pierson, child."
"She was awfully nice. Is it your landlady?"
" Yes — isn't she nice ? We think she's extraordinary —
all things considered. You know we hadn't the least idea
what she was when we came here."
"What is she?"
" Well — er — you embarrass me, child, how shall we put
it to her, Jan?"
98 THE TUNNEL
" D'you mean to say she's improper?"
" Yes — she's improper. We hadn't the faintest notion
of it when we came."
" I low extraordinary."
" It is extraordinary. We're living in an improper house
— the whole street's improper we're discovering."
" I low absolutely awful."
"Now we know why Mother Cosway hinted when we
left her to come here that we wanted to be free for devil's
mirth."
"How did you find out?"
" Henriette told us ; you see she works for the Pierson."
"What did she tell you?"
"Well — she told us."
" Six " — laughed Mag, quoting towards Jan.
" Six," trumpeted Jan " and if not six, seven."
They both laughed.
" In one evei <ing," trumpeted Jan.
"I say are you going to leave?" The thought of the
improper street was terrible and horrible ; but they might
go right away to some other part of London. May an-
swered instantly but the interval had seemed long and
Miriam was cold with anxiety.
" No : we don't see why we should."
Miriam gazed dumbly from one to the other, finding
herself admiring and wondering more than ever at their
independence and strength.
" You see the woman's so absolutely self-respecting."
" Much more so than we are ! "
" Out of doors she's a model of decorum and good style."
" We're ashamed when we meet her."
" We are. We skip into the gutter."
" We babble and slink ! "
THE TUNNEL 99
" Indoors she's a perfect landlady. She's been awfully
good to us."
" A perfect brick ! "
" She doesn't drink ; she's most exquisitely clean. There's
nothing whatever to — to indicate the er — nature of her
profession."
" Except that she sits at the window."
" But she does not tire her hair and look forth."
" Or fifth."
" Fool"
Miriam giggled.
" Really Miriam she is rather wonderful you know. We
like her."
" Henriette is devoted to her."
" And so apparently is her husband."
" Her husband ? " '
" Yes — she has a husband — he appears at rare intervals
— and a little girl at boarding school. She goes to see her
but the child never comes here. She tells us quite frankly
that she wants to keep her out of harm's way."
" How amazing ! "
1 Yes, she's extraordinary. She's Eurasian. She was
born in India."
"That accounts for a good deal. Eurasians are awful;
they've got all the faults of both sides."
" East is East and West is West and never the two shall
meet."
" Well, we like her."
" So we have decided to ignore her little peccadilloes."
" I don't see that it's our business. Frankly I can't see
that it has anything whatever to do with us. Do you ? "
" Well I don't know ; I don't suppose it has really."
" What would you do in our place ? "
ioo THE TUNNEL
" I don't know ... I don't believe I should have found
out."
" 1 don't believe you would; but if you had?"
" I think I should have been awfully scared."
" You would have been afraid that the sixth."
" Or the seventh."
" Might have wandered upstairs."
" No ; I mean the whole idea."
" Oh ; the idea. . . ."
" London, my dear Miriam, is full of ideas."
" I will go and get the suppe."
Jan rose ; her bright head and grey shoulders went up
above the lamplight, darkening to steady massive outlines,
strongly moving as she padded and fluttered briskly out of
the room.
The rich blur of the room free of the troubling talk and
the swift conversational movements of the two, lifted and
was touched with a faint grey, a suggestion of dawn or
twilight, as if coming from the hidden windows. Mag sat
motionless in her chair, gazing into the fire.
". . . Wise and happy infant, I want to ask your
opinion."
Miriam roused herself and glanced steadily across. The
outlines of things grew sharp. She could imagine the room
in daylight and felt a faint sharp sinking; hungry.
" I'm going to state you a case. I think you have an
extraordinarily sharp sense of right and wrong."
" Oh no"
" You have an extraordinarily sharp sense of right and
wrong. Imagine a woman. Can you imagine a woman?"
" Go on."
" Imagine a woman engaged to a man. Imagine her
allowing — another man — to kiss her."
THE TUNNEL 101
Miriam sat thinking. She imagined the two, the snatched
caress, the other man alone and unconscious.
" Would you call that treachery to the other person ? "
" It would depend upon which she liked best."
" That's just the difficulty."
" Oh. That's awful."
" Don't you think a kiss, just a kiss — might be, — well —
neither here nor there."
" Well, if it's nothing, there's nothing in the whole thing.
If there is anything — you can't talk about just kisses."
" Dreadful Miriam."
"Do you believe in blunted sensibilities?" How funny
that Mag should have led up to that new phrase . . . but
this was a case.
" You mean "
" Whether if a sensibility is blunted it can ever grow
sharp again."
" No. I suppose that's it. How can it? "
" I don't know. I'm not sure. It's a perfectly awful
idea, I think."
" It is awful — because we are all blunting our sensibili-
ties all the time — are we not ? "
"That's just it — whether we ought."
" Does one always know ? "
"Don't you think so? There's a feeling. Yes I think
one always knows."
" Suppe, children."
Miriam took her bowl with eager embarrassment . . .
the sugar-basin, the pudding basin and the slop bowl to-
gether on a tray, the quickly produced soup — the wonder-
ful rich life the girls lived in their glowing rooms — each
room with a different glow. . . . Jan's narrow green clean
room with its suite and hair brushes and cosmetics and pic-
102 THE TUNNEL
hires of Christ, Mag's crowded shadowy little square, its
litter and its many photographs, their eiderdowns and baths
and hot water bottles; the kitchen alive with eyes and fore-
heads — musicians, artists philosophers pasted on the walls
. . . why? Why? . . . Jan with wonderful easy knowl-
edge of the world's great people . . . and strange curious
intimate liking for them ... the sad separate effect of all
those engraved faces ... the perfectly beautiful blur they
made all together in patches on the walls ... the sitting
room. Mag, nearly all Mag, except the photographs on
the mantelpiece . . . the whole rooms from the top of the
stairs . . . her thoughts folded down ; they were not going
away ; not ; that was certain.
" I say I can't go on for ever eating your soup."
" Drink it then for a change my child."
" No but really."
" This is special soup ; there is a charge ; one guinea a
basin."
" Use of room two guineas."
" Intellectual conversation "
" One and eleven three."
Miriam flung out delighted admiring glances and laughed
unrestrainedly. Mag's look saying " it does not take much
to keep the child amused " took nothing from her mirthful
joy. Their wit, or was it humour? — always brought the
same happy shock . . . they were so funny ; there was a
secret in it.
" It's awfully good soup."
" Desiccated "
" A penny a packet."
" Thickened with pea flour."
" Twopence a packet."
THE TUNNEL 103
6
"Was she your favourite schoolfellow?"
Miriam's jarred mind worked eagerly. The girls thought
this was a revival of some great school friendship . . .
they would not be in the least jealous; they were curious
and interested, but they must understand . . . they must
realize that Alma was wonderful . . . something to be
proud of ... in the strange difficult scientific way ; some-
thing they knew hardly anything about. Mag almost not at
all and Jan only in a general way in her neat wide education ;
but not in Alma's way of being rigid and reverent and
personally interested about, so that every other way of
looking at things made her angry. But they must under-
stand, they must in some quite certain way be quickly made
to understand at the same time that she was outside . . .
an extra ... a curious bright distant resource, nothing
whatever to do with the wonderful present . . . the London
life was sacred and secret, away from everything else in
the world. It would disappear if one had ties outside . . .
anything besides the things of holidays and week-ends that
they all three had and brought back from outside to talk
about. It would be easy and exciting to meet Alma if
that were clear, and to come back and tell the girls about it.
" I don't think so."
They both looked up, stirring in their quick way, and
waited.
Miriam moved her head uneasily. It was painful. They
were using a sort of language . . . that was the trouble . . .
your favourite flower . . . your favourite colour ... it
was just the sort of pain that came in trying to fill up con-
fession albums. This bit of conversation would be at an
end presently. Her anger would shut it up, and they would
io 4 Till', TUNNEL
put it away without understanding that Mag would go on
to something else.
" \'o — I don't think she was. She was very small and
pretty — petite. She had the most wonderful limpid eyes."
Mag was sitting forward with her elhows on her knees
and her little hands sticking out into the air. A comfort-
able tinkling chuckle shook her shoulders. Miriam tugged
and wrenched.
" I don't think she cared for me, really . . . she was an
only child."
Mag's chuckle pealed up into a little festoon of clear
laughter.
" She doesn't care for you because — she's — an — only
— child " she shook out.
" One of the sheltered ones." Jan returned to her chiffon
pleats. She was making conversation. She did not care
how much or how little Alma mattered.
" She's sheltered now anyhow — she's married."
" Oh — she's married. . . ."
"She's married is she?"
Polite tones . . . they were not a bit surprised . . . both
faces looked calm and abstracted. The room was dark
and clear in the cold entanglement. It must be got over
now, as if she had not mentioned Alma. She felt for her
packet of cigarettes with an uneasy face, watching Mag's
firm movements as she rearranged herself and her dressing
gown in her chair.
"How old is she?"
" About my age."
" Oh — about nine ; that's early to begin the sheltered
life."
"You can't begin the sheltered life too early; if you
are going to begin it at all."
" Why begin it at all, Jan ? "
THE TUNNEL 105
" Well my dear little Miriam I think there is a good deal
to be said for the sheltered life."
« Yes " Mag settled more deeply into her chair,
burrowing with her shoulders and crossing her knees with
a fling — " and if you don't begin it jolly early it's too late
to begin it at all. . . ."
Then Mag meant to stay always as she was ... oh, good,
good . . . with several people interested in her . . . what
a curious worry her engagement must be . . . irrelevant
. . . and with her ideas of loyalty. " Don't you think soh ? "
Irritating — why did she do it — what was it — not a pro-
vincialism — some kind of affectation as if she were on the
stage. It sounded brisk and important — soh — as if her
thoughts had gone on and she was making conversation
with her lips. Why not let them and drop it . . . there
was something waiting, always something waiting just out-
side the nag of conversation.
" I can't imagine anything more awful than what you
call the sheltered life " said Miriam with a little pain in
her forehead. Perhaps they would laugh and that would
finish it and something would begin.
" For us yes. Imagine either of us coming down to it
in the morning; the regular breakfast table, the steaming
coffee, the dashes of rishers . . . dishers of rashes I mean,
the eggs. . . ."
" You are alluding I presume to the beggs and aeon."
" Precisely. We should die."
" Of boredom."
" Imagine not being able to turn up on Sunday morning
in your knickers with your hair down."
" I love Sundays. That first cigarette over the Referee."
" Is like nothing on earth."
" Or in heaven."
" Well, or in heaven."
106 THETUNNEL
" The first cigarette anyhow, with or without the Referee.
It's just pure absolute bliss that first bit of Sunday morn-
ing ; complete well-being and happiness."
" While the sheltered people are flushed with breakfast
table-talk "
" Or awkward silences."
" The deep damned silence of disillusionment."
" And thinking about getting ready for church."
" The men smoke."
" Stealthily and sleepily in armchairs like cats — ever
seen a cat smoke? — like cats — with the wife or somebody
they are tired of talking to on the doormat — as it were —
tentatively, I speak tentatively ... in a dead-alley — De-
dale — Dedalus — coming into the room any minute in
Sunday clothes "
" To stand on the hearthrug."
" No, hanging about the room. If there's any hearthrug
standing it's the men who do it, smoking blissfully alone,
and trying to look weary and wise and important if anyone
comes in."
"Like Cabinet ministers?"
" Yes ; when they are really — er."
" Cabinets."
" Footstools ; office stools ; you never saw a sheltered
woman venture on to the hearthrug except for a second if
she's short-sighted to look at the clock." Miriam sprang
to the hearthrug and waved her cigarette. " Con-fu-sion
to the sheltered life!" The vast open of London swung,
welcoming before her eyes.
" Hoch ! Hoch ! "
" Banzai ! "
" We certainly have our compensations."
" Com-pen-.ra-tions? "
" Well — for all the things we have to give up."
THE TUNNEL 107
"What things?"
" The things that belong to us. To our youth. Tennis,
dancing — er irresponsibility in general. . . ."
" I've never once thought about any of those things ;
never once since I came to town " said Miriam grappling
with little anxious pangs that assailed her suddenly; dimly
seeing the light on garden trees, hearing distant shouts,
the sound of rowlocks, the lapping of water against smooth-
ing swinging culls. But all that life meant people, daily
association with sheltered women and complacent abomin-
able men, there half the time and half the time away on
their own affairs which gave them a sort of mean advantage,
and money. There was nothing really to regret. It was
different for Mag. She did not mind ordinary women.
Did not know the difference ; or men.
" Yes but anyhow. If we were in the sheltered life we
should either have done with that sort of thing and be
married — or still keeping it up and anxious about not being
married. Besides anyhow; think of the awful people."
" Intolerant child."
" Isn't she intolerant. What a good thing you met us."
" Yes of course ; but I'm not intolerant. And look here.
Heaps of those women envy us. They envy us our free-
dom. What we're having is wanderyahre ; the next best
thing to wanderyahre."
" Women don't want wanderyahre."
" I do, Jan."
" So do I. I think the child's quite right there. Free-
dom is life. We may be slaves all day and guttersnipes all
the rest of the time but ach Gott, we are free."
7
" What a perfectly extraordinary idea."
" I know. But I don't see how you can get away from
108 THE TUNNEL
it" mused Miriam, dreamily holding out against Jan's
absorbed sewing and avoiding for a moment Mag's in-
credulously speculative eyes; "if it's true," she went on,
the rich blur of the warm room becoming as she sent out
her voice evenly, thinking eagerly on, a cool clear even day-
light, " that everything that can possibly happen does hap-
pen, then there must be somewhere in the world, every
possible kind of variation of us and this room."
" D'you mean to say " gurgled Mag with a fling of her
knickered leg and an argumentative movement of the hand
that hung loosely dangling a cigarette over the fireside arm
of the chair, " that there are millions of rooms exactly like
this each with one thing different — say the stem of one
narcissus broken instead of whole for instance."
" My dear Miriam, infinitude couldn't hold them."
" Infinitude can hold anything — of course I can see the
impossibility of a single world holding all the possible
variations of everything at once — but what I mean is that
I can think it and there must be something corresponding
to it in life — anything that the mind can conceive is real-
ised, somehow, all possibilities must come about, that's what
I mean I think."
" You mean you can see, as it were in space, millions of
little rooms — a little different " choked Mag.
" Yes I can — quite distinctly — solid — no end to
them."
" I think it's a perfectly horrible idea " stated Jan com-
placently.
"It isn't — I love it and it's true . . . you go on and
on and on, filling space."
" Then space is solid."
" It is solid. People who talk of empty space don't
think . . . space is more solid than a wall . . . yes . . .
more solid than a diamond — girls, I'm sure."
THE TUNNEL 109
" Space is full of glorious stars. . . ."
" Yes ; I know but that's such a tiny bit of it. . . ."
" Millions and trillions of miles."
" Those are only words. Everything is words."
" Well you must use words."
" You ought not to think in words. I mean — you can
think in your brain by imagining yourself going on and on
through it, endless space."
" You can't grasp space with your mind."
" You don't grasp it. You go through it."
" I see what you mean. To me it is a fearful idea. Like
eternal punishment."
" There's no such thing as eternal punishment. The
idea is too silly. It makes God a failure and a fool. It's
a man's idea. The men who take the hearthrug. Sitting
on a throne judging everybody and passing sentence is a
thing a man would do."
" But humanity is wicked."
" Then God is. You can't separate God and humanity
and that includes women who don't really believe any of
those things."
" But. Look at the churches. Look at women and the
parsons."
" Women like ritual and things and they like parsons,
some parsons, because they are like women, penetrable to
light, as Wilberforce said the other day, and understand
women better than most men do."
" Miriam, are you a pantheist? "
" The earth the sea and the sky
" The sun the moon and the stars
" Are not these, oh soul,
" That's the Higher Pantheism."
" Nearer is he than breathing, closer than hands and
feet. It doesn't matter what you call it."
no THE TUNNEL
"If you don't accept eternal punishment there can't be
eternal happiness."
"Oh punishment, happiness; tweedledum, tweedledee."
" Well — look here, there's remorse. That's deathless.
It must be. If you feel remorseful about anything the
feeling must last as long as you remember the thing."
" Remorse is real enough. I know what you mean. But
it may be short-sightedness. Not seeing all round a thing.
Is that Tomlinson? Or it may be cleansing you. If it
were complete Mag it would kill you outright. I can be-
lieve that. I can believe in annihilation. I am prepared
for it. I can't think why it doesn't happen to me. That's
just it."
" I should like to be annihilated."
" Shut up von Bohlen ; you wouldn't. But look here
Miriam child, do you mean to say you think that as long
as there is something that keeps on and on, fighting its way
on in spite of everything one has, well, a right to exist?"
" Well, that may be the survival of the fittest which
doesn't mean the ethically fittest as Huxley had to admit.
We kill the ethically fittest at present. We killed Christ.
They go to Heaven. All of us who survive have things to
learn down here in hell. Perhaps this is hell. There seems
something, ahead."
" Ourselves. Rising on the ashes of our dead selves.
Lord, it's midnight "
The chill of the outside night, solitude and her cold
empty room. . . .
" I'm going to bed."
" So am I. We shall be in bed, Miriam, five minutes after
you have gone."
Jan went off for the hot water bottles.
"All right, I'm going " Miriam bent for her shoes.
The soles were dry, scorching; they scorched her feet as
THE TUNNEL in
she forced on the shoes ; one sole cracked across as she put
her foot to the ground . . . she braced the muscles of her
face and said nothing. It must be forgotten before she left
the room that they were nearly new and her only pair;
two horrid ideas, nagging and keeping things away.
8
Outside in the air daylight grew strong and clear in
Miriam's mind. Patches of day came in a bright sheen
from the moonlit puddles, distributed over the square.
She crossed the road to the narrow pathway shadowed by
the trees that ran round the long oblong enclosure. From
this dark pathway the brightness of the wet moonlit road-
way was brighter and she could see fagades that caught the
moonlight. There was something trying to worry her,
some little thing that did not matter at all, but that some
part of her had put away to worry over and was now want-
ing to consider. Mag's affairs ... no she had decided
about that. It might be true about blunted sensibilities ; but
she had meant for some reason to let that other man kiss
her, and people never ask advice until they have made up
their minds what they are going to do and Mag was Mag
quite apart from anything that might happen. She would
still be Mag if she were old . . . or mad. That was a firm
settled real thing, real and absolute in the daylight of the
moonlit square. She wandered slowly on humming a tune ;
every inch of the way would be lovely. The figure of a
man in an overcoat and a bowler hat loomed towards her
on the narrow pathway and stopped. The man raised his
hat, and his face showed smiling with the moonlight on it.
Miriam had a moment's fear; but the man's attitude was
deprecating and there was her song; it was partly her own
fault. But why why . . . fierce anger at the recurrence
of this kind of occurrence seized her. She wanted him out
ii2 THE TUNNEL
of the way and wanted him to know how angry she was at
the interruption.
" Well." she snapped angrily, coming to a standstill in
the moonlit gap.
" Oh " said the man a little breathlessly in a lame broken
tone, " I thought you were going this way."
" So I am," retorted Miriam in a loud angry shaking
tone, " obviously."
The man stepped quickly into the gutter and walked
quickly away across the road. St. Pancras church chimed
the quarter.
Miriam marched angrily forward with shaking limbs that
steadied themselves very quickly . . . the night had become
suddenly cold ; bitter and penetrating ; a north-east wind,
of course. It was frightfully cold after the warm room;
the square was bleak and endless ; the many facades were
too far off to keep the wind away ; the pavement was very
cold under her right foot; that was it; the broken sole
was the worry that had been trying to come up ; she could
walk with it; it would not matter if the weather kept dry
... an upright gait, hurrying quickly away across the
moonlit sheen; just the one she had summoned up anger
and courage to challenge was not so bad as the others
. . . they were not bad; that was not it; it was the way
they got in the way . . . figures of men, dark, in dark
clothes, presenting themselves, calling attention to them-
selves and the way they saw things, mean and suggestive,
always just when things were loveliest. Couldn't the man
see the look of the square and the moonlight? . . . that
afternoon at Hyde Park Corner . . . just when even-thing
flashed out after the rain . . . the sudden words close to
her ear ... my beauty ... my sweet . . . you sweet
girl . . . the puffy pale old face, the puffs under the sharp
brown eyes. A strange . . . conviction in the trembling
THE TUNNEL 113
old voice ... it was deliberate; a sort of statement; done
on purpose, something chosen that would please most. It
was like the conviction and statement there had been in
Bob Greville's voice. Old men seemed to have some sort
of understanding of things. If only they would talk with
the same conviction about other things as there was in their
tone when they said those personal things. But the things
they said were worldly — generalisations, like the things
one read in books that tired you out with trying to find the
answer, and made books so awful . . . things that might
look true about everybody at some time or other and were
not really true about anybody — when you knew them.
But people liked those things and thought them clever and
smiled about them. All the things the old men said about
life and themselves and other people, about everything but
oneself, were sad; disappointed and sad with a glint of far
off youth in their faces as they said them . . . something
moving in the distance behind the blue of their eyes. . . .
" Make the best of your youth my dear before it flies." If
it all ended in sadness and envy of youth, life was simply
a silly trick. Life could not be a silly trick. Life cannot
be a silly trick. That is the simple truth ... a certainty.
Whatever happens, whatever things look like, life is not
a trick.
Miriam began singing again when she felt herself in her
own street, clear and empty in the moonlight. The north
wind blew down it unobstructed and she was shivering and
singing . . . spring is co-ming a-and the .swa-llows —
have come back to te-ell me so." Spring could not be far
off. At this moment in the dark twilight behind the thick
north wind the squares were green.
ii 4 THE TUNNEL
9
Her song, restrained on the doorstep and while she felt
her already well-known way in almost insupportable happi-
ness through the unlit hall and through the moonlight up
the seventy-five stairs, broke out again when her room was
reached and her door shut ; the two other doors had stood
open showing empty moonlit spaces. She was still alone
and unheard on the top floor. Her room was almost warm
after the outside cold. The row of attic and fourth floor
windows visible from her open lattice were in darkness, or
burnished blue with moonlight. Warm blue moonlight
gleamed along the leads sloping down to her ink-black
parapet. The room was white and blue lit, with a sweet
morning of moonlight. She had a momentary impulse to-
wards prayer and glanced at the bed. To get so far and
cast herself on her knees and hide her face in her hands
against the counterpane, the bones behind the softness of
her hands meeting the funny familiar round shape of her
face, the dusty smell of the counterpane coming up, her
face praying to her hands, her hands praying to her face,
both throbbing separately with their secret, would drive
something away. Something that was so close in every-
thing in the room, so pouring in at the window that she
could scarcely move from where she stood. She flung
herself more deeply into her song and passed through the
fresh buoyant singing air to light the gas. The room
turned to its bright even brown. Prayer. Being so
weighed down and free with happiness was the time . . .
sacrifice . . . the evening sacrifice of praise and prayer.
That is what that means. To toss all the joys and happi-
ness away and know that you are happy and free without
anything. That you cannot escape being happy and free.
It always comes.
THE TUNNEL 115
Why am I so happy and free she wondered with tears
in her eyes. Why? Why do lovely things and people go
on happening? To own that something in you had no
right. But not crouching on your knees . . . standing and
singing till everything split with your joy and let you
through into the white white brightness.
10
To see the earth whirling slowly round, coloured, its
waters catching the light. She stood in the middle of the
floor hurriedly discarding her clothes. They were old and
worn, friendly and alive with the fresh strength of her
body. Other clothes would be got somehow; just by going
on and working . . . there's so much — eternally. It's
stupendous. I've no right to be in it; but I'm in. Some-
one means me to be in. / can't help it. Fancy people
being alive. You would think everyone would go mad.
She found herself in bed, sitting up in her flannellette
dressing jacket. The stagnant air beneath the sharp down-
ward slope of the ceiling was warmed by the gas. The
gas-light glared beautifully over her shoulder down on to
the page. . . .
11
All that has been said and known in the world is in
language, in words ; all we know of Christ is in Jewish
words ; all the dogmas of religion are words ; the meaning
of words change with people's thoughts. Then no one
knows anything for certain. Everything depends upon
the way a thing is put, and that is a question of some par-
ticular civilisation. Culture comes through literature,
which is a half-truth. People who are not cultured are
isolated in barbaric darkness. The Greeks were cultured ;
but they are barbarians . . . why? Whether you agree
n6 THE TUNNEL
or not, language is the only way of expressing anything and
it dims everything. So the Bible is not true ; it is a culture.
Religion is wrong in making word-dogmas out of it. Christ
was something. But Christianity which calls Him divine
and so on is false. It clings to words which get more and
more wrong . . . then there's nothing to be afraid of and
nothing to be quite sure of rejoicing about. The Chris-
tians are irritating and frightened. The man with side-
whiskers understands something. But.
CHAPTER V
THEN all these years they might have been going
sometimes to those lectures. Peter talking about
them — telling about old Rayleigh and old Kelvin as if
they were his intimates — flinging out remarks as if he
wanted to talk and his audience were incapable of apprecia-
tion . . . light, heat, electricity, sound-waves; and never
saying that members could take friends or that there were
special lectures for children . . . Sir Robert Ball ..." a
fascinating Irish fellow with the gift of the gab who made
a volcano an amusing reality " Krakatoa . . . that year of
wonderful sunsets and afterglows . . . the air half round
the world, full of fine dust ... it seemed cruel . . . de-
privation ... all those years ; all that wonderful know-
ledge just at hand. And now it was coming, the Royal
Institution . . . this evening. She must find out whether
one had to dress and exactly how one got in. Albemarle
Street. ... It all went on in Albemarle Street.
" We might meet " said Mr. Hancock, busily washing
his hands and lifting them in the air to shake back his coat
sleeves. Miriam listened from her corner behind the in-
strument cabinet, stupid with incredulity; he could not be
speaking of the lecture ... he must be ... he had meant
all the time that he was going to be with her at the lec-
ture.
117
u8 THE TUNNEL
"... in the library at half past eight."
" Oh yes " she replied casually.
3
To sit hearing the very best in the intellectual life of
London, the very best science there was ; the inner circle
suddenly open . . . the curious quiet happy laughter that
went through the world with the idea of the breaking up
of the air and water and rays of light; the strange love
that came suddenly to them all in the object lesson classes
at Banbury Park. That was to begin again . . . but now
not only books, not the strange heavenly difficult success
of showing the children the things that had been found
out ; but the latest newest things from the men themselves
— there would be an audience and a happy man with a lit
face talking about things he had just found out. Even if
one did not understand there would be that. Fancy Mr.
Hancock being a member and always going and not talk-
ing about it ... at lunch. He must know an enormous
number of things besides the wonders of dentistry and
pottery and Japanese art.
It was education ... a liberal education. It made up
for only being able to say one was secretary to a dentist
at a pound a week ... it sounded strange at the end of
twelve years of education and five months in Germany
and two teaching poets — to people who could not see how
wonderful it was from the inside ; and the strange mean-
ing and Tightness there was ; there had been a meaning in
Mr. Hancock from the beginning, a sort of meaning in her
privilege of associating with fine rare people, so different
to herself and yet coming one after another, like questions
into her life, and staying until she understood . . . some-
body struggled all night with the angel ... I will not let
thee go until thou bless me . . . and there was some mean-
THE TUNNEL 119
ing — of course, meanings everywhere . . . perhaps a per-
son inside a life could always feel meanings ... or per-
haps only those who had moved from one experience to an-
other could get that curious feeling of a real self that stayed
the same through thing after thing.
4
" This is the library " said Mr. Hancock leading Miriam
along from the landing at the top of the wide red-carpeted
staircase. It seemed a vast room — rooms leading one out
of the other, lit with soft red lights and giving a general
effect of redness, dull crimson velvet in a dull red glow and
people, standing in groups and walking about — a quite
new kind of people. Miriam glanced at her companion.
He looked in place ; he was in his right place ; these were
his people ; people with gentle enlightened faces and keen
enlightened faces. They were all alike in some way. If
the room caught fire there would be no panic. They were
gentle, shyly gentle or pompously gentle, but all the same
and in agreement because they all knew everything, the real
important difficult things. Some of them were discussing
and disagreeing; many of the women's faces had questions
and disagreements on them and they were nearly all worn
with thought ; but they would disagree in a way that was
not quarrelsome, because everyone in the room was sure
of the importance of the things they were discussing . . .
they were all a part of science. ..." Science is always
right and the same, religion cannot touch it or be reconciled
with it, theories may modify or cancel each other but the
methods of science are one and unvarying. To question
that fundamental truth is irreligious" . . . these people
were that in the type of their minds — one and unvarying ;
always looking out at something with gentle intelligence or
keen intelligence . . . this was Alma's world ... it would
120 THE TUNNEL
be something to talk to Alma about. There was something
they were not. They were not . . . jolly. They could
not be. They would never stop " looking." Culture and
refinement ; with something about it that made them quite
different to the worldly people, a touch of rawness, raw
school harshness about them that was unconscious of itself
and could not come to life. Their shoulders and the backs
of their heads could never come to life. It gave them
a kind of deadness that was quite unlike the deadness of the
worldly people, not nearly so dreadful — rather funny and
likable. One could imagine them all washing, very care-
fully, in an abstracted way still looking and thinking and
always with the advancement of science on their minds ;
never really aware of anything behind or around them be-
cause of the wonders of science. Seeing these people
changed science a little. They were almost something tre-
mendous; but not quite.
5
" That's old Huggins " murmured Mr. Hancock, giving
Miriam's arm a gentle nudge as a white-haired old man
passed close by them with an old woman at his side, with
short white hair exactly like him. " The man who invented
spectrum analysis — and that's his wife ; they're both great
fishermen." Marian gazed. There, was the splendid thing.
... In her mind blazed the coloured bars of the spectrum.
In the room was the light of the beauty, the startling life
these two old people shed from every part of their persons.
The room blazed in the light they shed. She stood staring,
moving to w r atch their gentle living movements. They
moved as though the air through which they moved was a
living medium, — as though everything were alive all round
them — in a sort of hushed vitality. They were young.
She felt she had never seen anyone so young. She longed
THE TUNNEL 121
to confront them just once, to stand for a moment the tide
in which they lived.
"Ah Meesturra Hancock — you are a faceful votary."
That's a German, thought Miriam, as the flattering deep
caressing gutturals rebounded dreadfully from her startled
consciousness. What a determined intrusion. How did
he come to know such a person? Glancing she met a pair
of swiftly calculating eyes fixed full on her face. There
was fuzzy black hair lifted back from an anxious, yellowish,
preoccupied little face. Under the face came the high
collar-band of a tightly-fitting dark claret-coloured ribbed
silk bodice, fastened from the neck to the end of the pointed
peak by a row of small round German buttons, closely
decorated with a gilded pattern. Mr. Hancock was smiling
an indulgent, deprecating smile. He made an introduction
and Miriam felt her hand tightly clasped and held by a
small compelling hand, while she sought for an answer to a
challenge as to her interest in science. " I don't really
know anything about it " she said vaguely, strongly urged
to display her knowledge of German. The eyes were re-
moved from her face and the little lady boldly planted
and gazing about her made announcements to Mr. Hancock
— about the fascinating subject of the lecture and her hopes
of a large and appreciative audience.
What did she want? She could not possibly fail to see
that Mr. Hancock was telling her that he could see through
her social insincerities. It was dreadful to find that even
here there were social insincerities. She was like a busy
ambassador for things that belonged somewhere else and
that he was laughing at in an indulgent, deprecating way
that must make her blaze with an anger that she did not
show. Looking at her as her eyes and mouth made and
fired their busy sentences, Miriam suddenly felt that it
would be easy to deal with her, take her into a corner and
122 THE TUNNEL
talk about German things, food and love affairs and poetry
and music. But she would always be breaking away to
make a determined intrusion on somebody she knew. She
could not really know any English person. What was she
doing, bearing herself so easily in the inner circle of English
science? Treating people as if she knew all about them
and they were all alike. How surprised she must often be,
and puzzled.
6
" That was Miss Teresa Szigmondy " said Hancock, re-
producing his amused smile as they took their seats in the
dark theatre.
" Is she German? "
" Well ... I think, as a matter of fact, she's part Aus-
tro-Hungarian and part — well, Hebrew." A Jewess . . .
Miriam left her surroundings, pondering over a sudden
little thread of memory. An eager, very bright-eyed,
curiously dimpling school-girl face peering into hers, and
a whispering voice — " D'you know why we don't go down
to prayers? 'Cos we're Jews" — they had always been
late ; fresh faced and shiny haired and untidy and late and
clever in a strange brisk way and talkative and easy and
popular with the teachers. . . . Their guttural voices ring-
ing out about the stairs and passages, deep and loud and
stronger than any of the voices of the other girls. The
Hyamson girls — they had been foreigners, like the Siggs
and the de Bevers, but different . . . what was the differ-
ence in a Jew? Mr. Hancock seemed to think it was a sort
of disgraceful joke . . . what was it? Max Sonnenheim
had been a Jew, of course, the same voice. Banbury Park
" full of Jews "... the Brooms said that in patient con-
temptuous voices. But what was it? What did every-
body mean about them?
THE TUNNEL 123
" Is she scientific? "
" She seems to be interested in science " smiled Mr.
Hancock.
" How funny of her to ask me to go to tea with her just
because you told her I knew German."
" Well, you go ; if you're interested in seeing notabilities
you'll meet all kinds of wonderful people at her house. She
knows everybody. She's the niece of a great Hungarian
poet. I believe he's to be seen there sometimes. They're
all coming in now." Mr. Hancock named the great names
of science one by one as the shyly gentle and the pompously
gentle little old men ambled and marched into the well
of the theatre and took their seats in a circle round the
central green table.
7
" There's a pretty lady " said Mr. Hancock, conversa-
tionally, just as the light was lowered. Miriam glanced
across the half circle of faintly shining faces and saw an
effect, a smoothly coiffured head and smooth neck and
shoulders draped by a low deep circular flounce of lace ris-
ing from the gloom of a dark dress, sweep in through a side
door bending and swaying — " or a pretty dress at any
rate " — and sat through the first minutes of the lecture,
recalling the bearing and manner of the figure, with sad
fierce bitterness. Mr. Hancock admired " feminine "
women ... or at any rate he was bored by her own heavy
silence and driven into random speech by the sudden dip
and sweep of the lace appearing in the light of the doorway.
He was surprised himself by his sudden speech and half
corrected it ..." or a pretty dress." . . . But anyhow he,
even he, was one of those men who do not know that an
effect like that was just an effect, a deliberate " charming "
feminine effect. But if he did not know that, did not know
i2 4 THE TUNNEL
that it was a trick and the whole advertising manner, the
delicate, plunging fall of the feet down the steps — "I am
late ; look how nicely and quietly I am doing it ; look at me
being late and apologetic and interested" — out of place
in the circumstances, then what was he doing here at all?
Did he want science or would he really rather be in a draw-
ing room with " pretty ladies " advertising effects and being
"arch" in a polite, dignified, lady-like manner? How
dingy and dull and unromantic and unfeminine he must
find her. She sat in a lively misery, following the whirling
circle of thoughts round and round, stabbed by their dull
thorns, and trying to drag her pain-darkened mind to meet
the claim of the platform, where, in a square of clear light,
a little figure stood talking eagerly and quietly in careful
slow English. Presently the voice on the platform won
her — clear and with its curious, even, unaccented rat-tat-
tat flowing and modulated with pure passion, the thrill of
truth and revelation running alive and life-giving through
every word. That, at least, she was sharing with her com-
panion . . . development-in-thee-method-of-intaircepting-
thee-light." " Daguerre "... a little Frenchman stopping
the sunlight, breaking it up, making it paint faces in filmy
black and white on a glass. . . . There would only be a
few women like the one with the frill in an audience like
this ..." women will talk shamelessly at a concert or an
opera, and chatter on a mountain top in the presence of a
magnificent panorama ; their paganism is incurable." Then
men mustn't stare at them and treat them as works of art.
It was entirely the fault of men . . . perfectly reasonable
that the women who got that sort of admiration from men
should assert themselves in the presence of other works of
art. The thing men called the noblest work of God must
be bigger than the work by a man. Men plumed them-
selves and talked in a clever expert way about women
THE TUNNEL 125
and never thought of their own share in the way those
women went on . . . unfair, unfair ; men were stupid com-
placent idiots. But they were wonderful with their brains.
The life and air and fresh breath coming up from the plat-
form amongst the miseries and uncertainties lurking in the
audience was a man . . . waves of light which would rush
through the film at an enormous speed and get away into
space without leaving any impression were stopped by
some special kind of film and went surging up and down
in confinement — making strata . . . supairposeetion of
strata ... no Englishman could move his hands with that
smoothness, making you see " Violet subchloride of
silver." That would interest Mr. Hancock's chemistry.
She glanced at the figure sitting very still, with bent head,
at her side. He was asleep. Her thoughts recoiled from
the platform and bent inwards, circling on their miseries.
That was the end, for him, of coming to a lecture with her.
If she had been the frilled lady, sitting forward with her
forward-falling frill, patronising the lecture and " exhibit-
ing " her interest he would not have gone to sleep.
8
When the colour photographs came, Miriam was too
happy for thought. Pictures of stained glass, hard crude
clear brilliant opaque flat colour, stood in miraculous
squares on the screen and pieces of gardens, grass and
flowers and trees shining with a shadeless blinding brilliance.
She made vague sounds. " It's a wonderful achieve-
ment " said Mr. Hancock, smiling with grave delighted ap-
proval towards the screen. Miriam felt that he under-
stood, as her ignorance could not do, exactly what it all
meant scientifically; but there was something else in the
things as they stood, blinding, there that he did not see.
It was something that she had seen somewhere, often.
126 THE TUNNEL
" They'll never touch pictures."
" Oh no — there's no atmosphere ; but there's something
else ; they're exactly like something else. . . ."
Mr. Hancock laughed, a little final crushing laugh that
turned away sceptical of further enlightenment.
Miriam sat silent, busily searching for something to
express the effect she felt. But she could not tell him what
she felt. There was something in this intense hard rich
colour like something one sometimes saw when it wasn't
there, a sudden brightening and brightening of all colours
till you felt something must break if they grew any brighter
— or in the dark, or in one's mind, suddenly, at any time,
unearthly brilliance. He would laugh and think one a little
insane ; but it was the real certain thing ; the one real cer-
tain happy thing. And he would not have patience to
hear her try to explain; and by that he robbed her of the
power of trying to explain. He was not interested in what
she thought. Not interested. His own thoughts were
statements, things that had been agreed upon and disputed
and that people bandied about, competing with each other
to put them cleverly. They were not things. It was only
by pretending to be interested in these statements and tak-
ing sides about them that she could have conversation with
him. He liked women who thought in these statements.
They always succeeded with men. They had a reputation
for wit. Did they really think and take an interest in the
things they said, or was it a trick, like " clothes " and
" manners " — or was it that women brought up with
brothers or living with husbands got into that way of think-
ing and speaking. Perhaps there was something in it.
Something worth cultivating ; a fine talent. But it would
mean hiding so much, letting so much go ; all the real things.
The things men never seemed to know about at all. Yet
he loved beautiful things; and worried about religion and
THE TUNNEL 127
had found comfort in " Literature and Dogma " and
wanted her to find comfort in it, assuming her difficulties
were the same as his own; and knowing the dreadfulness
of them. The brilliant unearthly pictures remained in her
mind, supporting her through the trial of her consciousness
of the stuffiness of her one long-worn dress. Dresses
should be fragrant in the evening. The Newlands even-
ing dress was too old fashioned. Things had changed so
utterly since last year. There was no money to have it
altered. But this was awful. Never again could she go out
in the evening, unless alone or with the girls. That would
be best, and happiest, really.
CHAPTER VI
MIRIAM sat on a damp wooden seat at the station.
Shivering with exhaustion, she looked across at
tie early morning distance, misty black and faint misty
green. . . . Something had happened to it. It was not
beautiful; or anything. It was not anything. . . . That
was the punishment. . . . The landscape was dead. All
that had come to an end. Her nimble lifeless mind noted
the fact. There was dismay in it. Staring at the land-
scape she felt the lifelessness of her face; as if something
had brushed across it and swept the life away, leaving her
only sight. She could never feel any more.
»
Behind her fixed eyes something new seemed moving
forward with a strange indifference. Suddenly the land-
scape unrolled. The rim of the horizon was no longer
the edge of the world. She lost sight of it in the rolling
out of the landscape in her mind, out and out, in a light
easy stretch, showing towns and open country and towns
again, seas and continents on and on ; empty and still.
A'o thing. Everywhere in the world nothing. She drifted
back to herself and clung, bracing herself. She was some-
body. If she was somebody who was going to do some-
thing ... not roll trolleys along a platform. The train
swept busily into the landscape; the black engine, the
brown, white-panelled carriages, warm and alive in the
empty landscape, Her strained nerves relaxed. In a
128
THE TUNNEL 129
moment she would be inside it, being carried back into her
own world. She felt eagerly forward towards it. Hearts-
ease was there. She would be able to breathe again. But
not in the same way ; unless she could forget. There were
other eyes looking at it. They were inside her; not caring
for the things she had cared for, dragging her away from
them.
They are not my sort of people. Alma does not care for
me personally. Little cries and excitement and affection.
She wants to ; but she does not care for anyone personally.
Neither of them do. They live in a world. ..." Michael
Angelo" and "Stevenson" and "Hardy" and " Durer "
and that other man, . . . Alma . . . popping and sweep-
ing gracefully about with little cries and clever sayings and
laughter, trying to be real; in a bright outside way, show-
ing all the inside things because she kept crushing them
down. It was so tiring that one could not like being with
her. She seemed to be carrying something off all the time ;
and to be as if she were afraid if the talk stopped for a
moment, it would be revealed.
In the teashop with Alma alone it had been different;
all the old school-days coming back as she sat there. Her
eager story. It was impossible to do anything but hold
her hands and admire her bravery and say you did not care.
But it was not quite real ; it was too excited and it was
wrong, certainly wrong, to go down not really caring. I
need not go down again.
2
Cold and torpid she got up and stepped into an empty
carriage. Both windows were shut and the dry stuffy air
seemed almost warm after her exposure. She let one down
a little ; sheltered from the damp the little stream of out-
i 3 o THE TUNNEL
side air was welcome and refreshing. She breathed deeply,
safe, shut in and moving on. With an unnecessarily vigor-
ous swing of her arms she hoisted her pilgrim basket on to
the rack. Of course, she murmured smiling, of course I
shall go down again . . . rather.
3
That extraordinary ending of fear of the great man at
the station. Alma and the little fair square man not much
taller than herself looking like a grocer's assistant with a
curious kind confidential . . . unprejudiced eye . . . they
had come, both of them, out of their house to the station
to meet her ..." this is Hypo " and the quiet shy walk
to the house he asking questions by saying them — state-
ments. You caught the elusive three-fifteen. This is
your bag. We can carry it off without waiting for the
. . . British porter. You've done your journey brilliantly.
We haven't far to walk.
4
The strange shock of the bedroom, the strange new thing
springing out from it . . . the clear soft bright tones, the
bright white light streaming through the clear muslin, the
freshness of the walls . . . the flattened dumpy shapes of
dark green bedroom crockery gleaming in a corner ; the
little green bowl standing in the middle of the white spread
of the dressing table cover . . . wild violets with green
leaves and tendrils put there by somebody with each leaf
and blossom standing separate . . . touching your heart ;
joy, looking from the speaking pale mauve little flowers to
the curved rim of the green bowl and away to the green
crockery in the corner ; again and again the fresh shock
of the violets . . . the little cold change in the room after
the books, strange fresh bindings and fascinating odd shapes
THE TUNNEL 131
and sizes, gave out their names . . . The White Boat —
Praxiter — King Chance — Mrs. Prendergast's Palings
. . . the promise of them in their tilted wooden case by the
bedside table from every part of the room, their unchanged
names, the chill of the strange sentences inside — like a sort
of code written for people who understood, written at
something, clever raised voices in a cold world. In Mrs.
Prendergast's Palings there were cockney conversations
spelt as they were spoken. None of the books were about
ordinary people . . . three men, seamen, alone, getting
swamped in a boat in shallow water in sight of land ... a
man and a girl he had no right to be with wandering on the
sands, the cold wash and sob of the sea; her sudden cold
salt tears; the warmth of her shuddering body. Praxiter
beginning without telling you anything, about the thoughts
of an irritating contemptuous superior man, talking at the
expense of everybody. Nothing in any of them about
anything one knew or felt; casting you off . . . giving a
chill ache to the room. To sit . . . alone, reading in the
white light, amongst the fresh colours — but not these
books. To go downstairs was a sacrifice : coming back
there would be the lighting of the copper candlestick, twist-
ing beautifully up from its stout stem. What made it diff-
erent to ordinary candlesticks? IV hat f It was like ... a
gesture.
" You knew Susan at school." The brown, tweed-
covered arm of the little square figure handed a tea-cup.
The high huskily hooting voice . . . what was the over-
whelming impression? A common voice, with a cockney
twang. Overwhelming. " What was Susan like at
school ? " The voice was saying two things ; that was it ;
doing something deliberately; it was shy and determined
133 THE TUNNEL
and deliberate and expectant. Miriam glanced incredul-
ously, summoning all her forces against her sense of strange
direct attack, pushing through and out to some unknown
place, dreading her first words, not taking in a further re-
mark of the live voice. She could get up and go away for
ever ; or speak and whatever she spoke would keep her there
for ever. Alma, sitting behind the tea-tray in a green
Alma dress with small muslin cuffs and collars had be-
trayed her into this. Alma had been got by this and had
brought her to the test of it. The brown walls, brown
paper all over, like parcel paper and Japanese prints ; noth-
ing else, high-backed curious shaped wooden chairs all with
gestures, like the candlestick, and the voice that was in the
same difficult, different world as the books upstairs. . . .
Alma had betrayed her, talking as if they were like other
people and not saying anything about this strange cold dif-
ference. Alma had come to it and was playing some part
she had taken up . . . there was some wrong hurried rush
somewhere within the beautiful room. Stop, she wanted
to say, you're all wrong. You've dropped something you
don't know anything about deliberately. Alma ought to
have told you. Hasn't she told you?
" Alma hasn't changed " she said, desperately questioning
the smooth soft movements of the smooth soft hands, the
quiet controlled pose of the head. Alma had the same
birdlike wide blink and flash of her limpid brown eyes, the
same tight crinkle and snicker when she laughed, the same
way of saying nothing or only the clever superficially true
things men said. Alma had agreed with this man and had
told him nothing or only things in the clever way he would
admire.
He made little sounds into his handkerchief. He was
nonplussed at a dull answer. It would be necessary to be
brilliant and amusing to hold his attention — in fact to tell
THE TUNNEL 133
lies. To get on here one would have to say clever things
in a high bright voice.
The little man began making statements about Alma.
Sitting back in his high-backed chair with his head bent
and his small fine hands clasping his large handkerchief he
made little short statements, each improving on the one
before it and coming out of it, and little subdued snortings
at the back of his nose in the pauses between his sentences
as if he were afraid of being answered or interrupted be-
fore he developed the next thing. Alma accompanied his
discourse with increasing snickerings. Miriam after eagerly
watching the curious mouthing half hidden by the droop-
ing straggle of moustache and the strange concentrated
gleam of the grey blue eyes staring into space, laughed
outright. But how could he speak so of her? He met the
laughter with a minatory outstretched forefinger, and raised
his voice to a soft squeal ending as he launched with a little
throw of the hand his final jest, in a rotund crackle of high
hysterical open-mouthed laughter. The door opened and
two tall people were shown in ; a woman with a narrow
figure and a long dark-curtained sallow horse-like face,
dressed in a black striped cream serge coat and skirt and a
fair florid trouble fickle smiling man in a Norfolk tweed
and pale blue tie. " Hullo " said the little man propelling
himself out of his chair with a neat swift gesture and stand-
ing small and square in the room making cordial sounds and
moving his arms about as if to introduce and seat his guests
without words and formalities. Alma's thin excited hub-
bub and the clearly enunciated, obviously prepared facet-
iousnesses of the newcomers — his large and tenor and
florid ... a less clever man than Mr. Wilson . . . and
hers bass and crisp and contemptuous . . . nothing was
hidden from her; she would like the queer odd people who
went about at Tansley Street *=» was broken into by the en^
134 THE TUNNEL
try of three small young men, all three dark and a little
grubby and shabby looking. The foremost stood with vivid
eager eyes wide open as if he had been suddenly checked
in the midst of imparting an important piece of news. Alma
came forward to where they stood herded and silent just
inside the door and made little faint encouraging maternal
sounds at them as she shook hands.
As she did this Miriam figured them in a flash coming
down the road to the house ; their young men's talk and
arguments, their certainty of Tightness and completeness,
their sudden embarrassment and secret anger with their
precipitate rescuer. Mr. Wilson was on his feet again, not
looking at them nor breaking up the circle already made,
but again making his sociable sounds and circular move-
ments with his arms as if to introduce and distribute them
about the room. The husband and wife kept on a dialogue
in strained social voices as if they were bent on showing
that their performance was not dependant on an audience.
Miriam averted her eyes from them, overcome by painful
visions of the two at breakfast or going home after social
occasions. The three young men retreated to the window
alcove behind the tea-table one of them becoming Miriam's
neighbour as she sat in the corner near the piano whither
she had fled from the centre of the room when the husband
and wife came in.
It was the young man with the important piece of news.
He sat bent forward holding his cup and plate with out-
stretched arms. His headlong expression remained un-
changed. Wisps of black hair stood eagerly out from his
head and a heavy thatch fell nearly to his eyebrows. " Did
anybody see anything of Mrs. Binks at the station ? " asked
Alma from her table. " Oh my dear " she squealed gently
as the maid ushered in a little lady in a straight dress of red
flannel frilled with black chiffon at the neck and wrists,
THE TUNNEL 135
" we were all afraid you weren't coming." " Don't any-
body move " — the deep reedy voice reverberated amongst
the standing figures; the firm compact undulating figure
came across the room to Alma. Its light-footed swiftness
and easy certainty filled Miriam with envy. The envy
evaporated during the embracing of Alma and the general
handshaking. The low strong reedy voice went on saying
things out into the silence of the room in a steady complete
way. There was something behind it all that did not show,
or showed in the brilliant ease, something that Miriam did
not envy. She tried to discover what it was as the room
settled, leaving Mrs. Binkley on a low chair near to Alma
taking tea and going on with her monologue, each of her
pauses punctuated by soft appreciative sounds from Alma
and little sounds from Mr. Wilson. She was popular with
them. Mr. Wilson sat surveying her. Did they know how
hard she was working? Perhaps they did and admired
or even envied it. But what was it for? Surely she must
feel the opposition in the room? Alma and Mr. Wilson
approved and encouraged her exhibition. She was in their
curious league for keeping going high-voiced clever sayings.
So had the husband appeared to be at first. Now he sat
silent with a kind polite expression about his head and fig-
ure. But his mouth was uneasy, he was afraid of some-
thing or somebody and was staring at Mrs. Binkley. The
wife sat in a gloomy abstraction smoking a large cigar-
ette . . . she was something like Mrs. Kronen in her way;
only instead of belonging to South Africa she had been a
hard featured English school-girl ; she was still a hard-fea-
tured English school-girl, with the oldest eyes Miriam had
ever seen.
" Why not write an article about a lamp-post ? " said
one of the young men suddenly in a gruff voice in answer
to a gradually growing murmur of communications from
136 THE TUNNEL
one of his companions. Miriam breathed easier air. The
shameful irritating tension was over. It was as if fresh
wonderful life-giving things that were hovering in the
room, driven back into corners, pressing up and away
against the angles of the ceiling and about the window-
door behind the young men and against the far-away door
of the room, came back, flooding all the spaces of the room.
Mr. Wilson moved in his chair, using his handkerchief
towards the young men with an eye on the speaker. " Or
a whole book " murmured the young man farthest from
Miriam in an eager cockney voice. The two young men
were speaking towards Mr. Wilson, obviously trying to draw
him in, bringing along one of his topics ; something that
had been discussed here before. There would be talk,
men's talk, argument and showing off; but there would be
something alive in the room. In the conflict there would
be ideas, wrong ideas, men taking sides, both right and both
wrong; men showing off; but wanting with all their wrong-
ness to get at something. Perhaps somebody would say
something. She regretted her shy refusal of a cigarette
from Mr. Wilson's large full box. It stood open now by
the side of the tea-tray. He would not offer it again.
Cigarettes and talk. . . . What would Mr. Hancock think?
" People do not meet together for conversation, nowa-
days." . . . There was going to be conversation, literary
conversation and she was going to hear it ... be in it.
Clever literary people trying to say things well; of course
they were all literary ; they were all the same set, knowing
each other, all calling Mr. Wilson "Hypo"; talk about
books was the usual Saturday afternoon thing here ; and
she was in it and would be able to be in it again, any week.
It was miraculous. All these people were special people,
emancipated people. Probably they all wrote, except the
women. There were too many women. Somehow or other
THE TUNNEL 137
she must get a cigarette. Life, suddenly full of new things
made her bold. Presently, when the conversation was
general she would beg one of the young man at her side.
Mr. Wilson would not turn to her again. She had failed
twice already in relation to him ; but after her lame refusal
of the cigarette which he had accepted instantly and sat
down with, he had glanced sharply at her in a curious per-
sonal way, noticing the little flat square of white collarette
— the knot of violets upon it, the long-sleeved black nun's-
veiling blouse, the long skirt of her old silkette evening
dress. These items had made her sick with anxiety in their
separate poverty as she put them on for the visit ; but his
eyes seemed to draw them all together. Perhaps there in
the dark corner they made a sort of whole. She rejoiced
gratefully in the memory of Mag's factory girl, in her own
idea of having the sleeves gauged at the wrists in defiance
of fashion, to make frills extending so as partly to cover
her large hands ; over the suddenly realised possibility of
wearing the silkette skirt as a day skirt. She must remain
in the corner, not moving, all the afternoon. If she moved
in the room the bright light would show the scrappiness of
her clothes. In the evening it would be all right. She sat
back in her corner, happy, and forgetful. She had not
had so much tea as she wanted. She had refused the
cigarette against her will. Now she was alive. These
weak things would not happen again, and next time she
would bring her own cigarettes. To take out a cigarette
and light it here, at home amongst her own people. These
were her people. There was something here in the exciting
air that she did not understand ; something that was going
to tax her more than she had ever been taxed before. She
had found her way to it through her wanderings ; it had
come; it was her due. It corresponded to something in
herself, shapeless and inexpressible ; but there. She knew
138 THE TUNNEL
it by herself, sitting in her corner; her own people would
know it, if they could see her here; but no one here would
find it out. Every one here was doing something; or the
wife of somebody who did something. They were like a
sort of secret society ... all agreed about something . . .
about what? What was it Mr. Wilson was so sure about?
. . . They would despise everybody who was living an or-
dinary life, or earning a living in anything but something
to do with books. Seeing her there they would take for
granted that she too, was somebody - . . and she was some-
how, within herself somewhere; although she had made her-
self into a dentist's secretary. She was better qualified to
be here and to understand the strange secret here, in the
end, than anyone else she knew. But it was a false position,
unless they all know what she was. If she could say clever
things they would like her: but she would be like Alma
and Mrs. Binkley; pretending; and without any man to
point to as giving her the right to be about here. It was
a false position. It was as if she were there as a candidate
to become an Alma or a Mrs. Binkley ; imitating the clever
savings of men, or flattering them.
"Do it Gowry," said Mr. Wilson ... "a book" . . .
he made his little sound behind his nose as he felt for the
phrases that were to come after his next words ..." a
— er — book; about a lamp-post. You see" he held up
his minatorv finger to keep off an onslaught and quench
an eager monologue that began pouring - from Miriam's
nearest neighbour, and went on in his high weak husky
voice. The young men were quiet. For a few moments
the red ladv and Alma made bright conversation as if
nothing were happening: but with a curious hard empti-
ness in their voices, like people rehearsing and secretly angry
with each other. Then thev were silent, sitting posed and
attentive, with uneasy intelligent smiling faces ; their cos-
THE TUNNEL 139
tumes and carefully arranged hair useless on their hands.
Mrs. Binkley did not suffer so much as Alma; her corset-
less eager crouch gave her the appearance of intentness,
her hair waved naturally, had tendrils and could be left
to look after itself ; her fresh easy strength was ready for
the next opportunity. It was only something behind her
face that belied her happy pose. Alma was waiting in some
curious fixed singleness of tension; her responses hovered
fixed about her mouth, waiting for expression, she sat fixed
in a frozen suspension of deliberate amiability and approval,
approval of a certain chosen set of things ; approval which
excluded everything else with derision ... it was Alma's
old derision, fixed and arranged in some way by Mr. Wilson.
" There will be books — with all that cut out — him and
her — all that sort of thing. The books of the future will
be clear of all that."
Miriam sat so enclosed in her unarmed struggle with the
new definition of a book that the entry of the newcomers
left her unembarrassed. Two rotund ruddy men in mud-
spotted tweeds, both fair, one with a tuft like a cockatoo
standing straight up from his forehead above a smooth
pink face, the other older than anybody in the room, with
a shaggy head and a small pointed beard. They came in
talking aloud and stumped about the room, making their
greetings. Miriam bowed twice and twice received a
sturdy handclasp and the kindly gleam of blue eyes, one
pair large, mild and owl-like behind glasses ; the other
fierce and glinting, a shaft of whimiscal blue light. The
second pair of eyes surely would not agree with what Mr.
Wilson had been saying. But their coming in had broken
a charm ; the overwhelming charm of the way he put
things ; so that even while you hated what he was saying
i 4 o TH E TUNNEL
and his way of stating things as if they were the final gospel
and no one else in the world knew anything at all, you
wanted him to go on ; only to go on and to keep on going on.
It was wrong somehow ; he was all wrong; " though I speak
with the tongues of men and of angels"; it was wrong
and somehow wicked ; but it caught you, it had caught
Alma and all these people ; and in a sense he despised them
all, and was talking to something else ; the thing he knew ;
the secret that made him so strong, even with his weak
voice and weak mouth ; strong and fascinating. It was
wrong to be here ; it would be wrong to come again ; but
there was nothing like it anywhere else ; no other such
group of things ; and thought and knowledge of things.
More must be heard. It would be impossible not to risk
everything to hear more.
Alma ordered fresh tea ; Mr. Wilson and the husband
and the two new men were standing about. The elder man
was describing in a large shouting voice a new mantel-
piece — a Tudor mantelpiece. What was a Tudor mantel-
piece? ... to buy a house to put round it. What a clever
idea. . . . Little Mr. Wilson seemed to be listening; he
squealed amendments of the jests between the big man's
boomings . . . buy a town to put round it. . . . What a
lovely idea . . . buy a nation to put round it . . . there
was a burst of guffaws. Mr. Wilson's face was crimson ;
his eyes appeared to be full of tears. The big man went
on. Mrs. Binkley kept uttering deep reedy caressing laughs.
Two of the young men were leaning forward talking eagerly
with bent heads. Miriam's neighbour sat upright with
his hands on his knees, his eyes glaring as if ... as if he
were just going to jump out of his skin. Hidden by the
increased stir made by the re-entry of the maid, and en-
couraged by the extraordinary clamour of hilarious voices
Miriam ventured to ask him if he would perform an act of
THE TUNNEL 141
charity by allowing her to rob him of one of his cigarettes.
She liked her unrecognisable voice. It was pitched deep,
but strong; a little like Mrs. Binkley's. The young man
started and turned eagerly towards her, stammering and
muttering and fumbling about his person. " I swear " he
brought out, " I could cut my throat . . . my God . . .
oh here we are." Seizing the open box from the tea-table
he swung round with his crossed legs extending across her
corner so that she was cut off from the rest of the room,
and held the box eagerly towards her. They both took
cigarettes and he lit them with matches obtained from his
neighbour. " Thank you " said Miriam blissfully drawing
" that has saved my life." Precipitately restoring the
matches he swung round again leaning forward with his
elbow on his knee, blocking out Miriam's view. Before it
was blocked out she had caught the eye of Mr. Wilson
who was standing facing her in the little group of men about
the tea-table and still interpolating their hubbub with
husky squeals of jocularity, quietly observing the drama
in her corner. For the moment she did not wish to listen ;
Alma's appreciative squeals were getting strained and the
big man was a bore. Seen sitting in profile taking his tea
he reminded her of Mr. Staple-Craven ; her eye caught
and recoiled from weak patches, touches of frowsy softness
here and there about the shaggy head. Cut off from the
room safe in the extraordinary preoccupation of the young
man whose eager brooding was moving now towards some
imminent communication — she had undisturbed knowledge
of what she had done. Speech and action had launched
her, for good or ill, into the strange tide running in this
house. Its cold waters beat against her breast. She was no
longer quite herself. There was something in it that quick-
ened all her faculties, challenged all the strength she
possessed. By speech and action she had accepted some-
143 THE TUNNEL
thing she neither liked, nor approved nor understood ; re-
fusal would have left its secret unplumbed, standing aside
in her life, tormenting it. The sense of the secret in-
toxicated her . . . perhaps I am selling my soul to the
devil. But she was glad that Mr. Wilson had witnessed her
launching.
" You are magnificent " gasped the young man glaring
at the wall. " I mean you are simply magnificent." He
flashed unconscious eyes at her — he had no consciousness
of the cold tide with its curious touch of evil ; it was hand
in hand with him and his simplicity that she had stepped
down into the water — and hurried on. "An angel of
dreams. Dreams . . . you know — I say," he spluttered
incoherently, " I must tell you." His working preoccupied
face turned to face hers with a jerk that brought part of the
heavy shelf of hair across one of his eyes. " I've been doing
the best work this week I ever did in my life ! " Red
flooded the whole of his face and the far-away glare of his
one visible eye became a blaze of light, near, and smiling a
guilty delighted smile. He was demanding her approval,
her sympathy, just on the strength of her being there. It
was the moment of consenting to Alma that had brought
this. However it had come she would have been unable
to withstand it. He wanted approval and sympathy ; some-
one here had some time or other shut him up ; perhaps
he was considered second-rate, perhaps he was second-rate ;
but he was innocent as no one else in the room was innocent.
" Oh, I am glad " she replied swiftly. Putting the cigarette
on the edge of the piano he seized one of her hands and
crushed it between his own. His face perspired and there
were tears in his eye. " Do tell me about it " she said with
bold uneasy eagerness hoping he would drop her hand
when he spoke. " It's a play " he shouted in a low whisper,
a spray of saliva springing through his lips " a play — it's
THE TUNNEL 143
the finest stuff I ever rout." Were all these people either
cockney or with that very bland anglican cultured way of
speaking — like the husband and the man with the Tudor
mantelpiece ?
7
" I can of course admit that the growth of corn was, at
first, accidental and unconscious, and that even after the
succession of processes began to be grasped and the soil
methodically cultivated the success of the crop was sup-
posed to depend upon the propitiation of a god. I can see
that the discovery of the possibility of growing food would
enormously alter the savage's conception of God, by intro-
ducing a new set of attributes into his consciousness of him ;
but in defining the God of the Christians as a corn deity
you and Allen are putting the cart before the horse."
That was it, that was it — that was right somehow ; there
was something in this big red- faced man that was not in
Mr. Wilson ; but why did his talk sound so lame and dull,
even while he was saving God — and Mr. Wilson's, while
he made God from the beginning a nothing created by the
fears and needs of man, so thrilling and convincing, so
painting the world anew ? He was wrong about everything
and yet while he talked everything changed in spite of your-
self.
The earlier part of the afternoon looked a bright happy
world behind the desolation of this conflict; the husband
and wife and the young men and Mrs. Binkley and the
bright afternoon light, dear far-off friends . . . with-
standing in their absence the chilly light of Mr. Wilson's
talk. Who was Mr. Wilson? But he was so certain that
men had created God . . . life in that thought was a night-
mare. Nothing that could happen could make it anything
but a nightmare henceforth ... it did not matter what
144 TH E TUNNEL
happened, and yet he seemed pleased, amused about every-
thing and eager to go on and " do " things and get things
done. . . . His belief about life was worse than agnosticism.
There was no doubt in it. " Mr. G " was an invention of
man. There was nothing but man ; man, coming from the
ape, some men a little cleverer than others, men had dis-
covered science, science was the only enlightenment, science
would put everything right ; scientific imagination, scienti-
fic invention. Man. Women were there, cleverly devised
by nature to ensnare man for a moment and produce more
men ; to bring scientific order out of primeval chaos ; chaos
was decreasing order increasing ; there was nothing worth
considering before the coming of science ; the business of
the writer was imagination, not romantic imagination, but
realism, fine realism, the truth about " the savage " about
all the past and present, the avoidance of cliche . . . what
was cliche? . . .
" Well my dear man you've got the Duke of Argyll to
keep you company " sighed Mr. Wilson with a smothered
giggle, getting to his feet.
Miriam went from the sitting room she had entered in
another age with the bedroom violets pinned against her
collarette, stripped and cold and hungry into the cold of
the brightly-lit little dining room. The gay cold dishes,
the bright jellies and fruits, the brown nuts, the pretty
Italian wine in thin white long-necked decanters . . .
Chianti . . . Chianti . . . they all seemed familiar with
the wine and the word ; perhaps it was a familiar wine
at the Wilson supper-parties; they spoke of it sitting at
the little feast amongst the sternness of nothing but small
drawings and engravings on walls that shone some clear
light tone against the few pieces of unfamiliar grey-brown
furniture like people clustering round a fire. But it was a
THE TUNNEL 145
feast of death; terrible because of their not knowing that
it was a feast of death. The wife of the cockatoo had come
in early enough to hear nearly the whole of the conversa-
tion and had sat listening to it with a quiet fresh talkative
face under her fresh dark hair; the large deep furrow be-
tween her eyebrows was nothing to do with anything here,
it was permanent, belonging to her life. She had brought
her life in with her and kept it there, the freshness and
the furrow ; she seemed now, at supper to be out for the
evening, to enjoy herself — at the Wilson's . . . coming to
the Wilson's . . . for a jolly evening, just as anybody would
go anywhere for a jolly evening. She did not know what
was there, what it all meant. Perhaps because of the two
little boys. She, with two little unseen boys and the big
house so near, big and full of her and noise and things,
and her freshness and the furrow of her thought about it
prevented anything from going on; the dreadful thing had
to be dropped where it was, leaving the big man who had
fought to pretend to be interested and amused, leaving Mr.
Wilson with the last word and his quiet smothered giggle.
Alma tried to answer Mrs. Pinner's loud fresh talking
in the way things had been answered earlier in the after-
noon before the departure of all the other people. Every-
thing she said was an attempt to beat things up. Every
time she spoke Miriam was conscious of something in the
room that would be there with them all if only Alma would
leave off being funny; something there was in life that
Alma had never yet known, something that belonged to an
atmosphere she would call " dull." Mr. Wilson knew that
something . . . had it in him somewhere, but feared it and
kept it out by trying to be bigger, by trying to be the biggest
thing there was. Alma went on and on, sometimes uncom-
fortably failing, her thin voice sounding out like a cork-
screw in a cork without any bottle behind it, now and again
146 THE TUNNEL
provoking a response which made things worse because it
brought to the table the shamed sense of trying to keep
something going. . . . The clever excitements would not
come back. Mrs. Binkley would have helped her. . . .
Miriam sat helpless and miserable between her admiration
of Alma's efforts and her longing for the thing Alma kept
out. Her discomfiture at Alma's resentment of her dul-
ness and Alma's longing for Mrs. Binkley was made endur-
able by her anger over Alma's obstructiveness. Mr. Pinner
and the big man were busily feeding. Mrs. Pinner laughed
and now and again tried to imitate Alma; as if she had
learned how it was done by many visits to the Wilson's,
and then forgot and talked in her own way, forgetting to
try to say good things. Alma grew smaller as supper went
on and Mr. and Mrs. Pinner larger and larger. Together
they were too strong in their sense of some other life and
some other way of looking at things to give the Wilson
way a clear field. Mr. Wilson began monologues in favour-
able intervals, but they tailed off for lack of nourishing
response. Miriam listened eagerly and suspiciously ; lost
in admiration and a silent, mentally wordless opposition.
She felt the big man was on her side and that the Pinners
would be if they could understand. They only saw
the jokes . . . the — the, higher facetiousness . . . good
phrase, that was the Chianti. And they were getting used
to that; perhaps they were secretly a little tired of it.
8
After supper Mr. Pinner sang very neatly in a small clear
tenor voice an English translation of Es war em Konig im
Thule. Miriam longed for the German words ; Mr. Pinner
cancelled even the small remainder of the German senti-
ment by his pronunciation of the English rendering; " there
was a king of old tame " he declared and so on throughout
THE TUNNEL 147
the song. Alma followed with a morsel of Chopin. The
performance drove Miriam into a rage. Mr. Pinner had
murdered his German ballad innocently, his little Oxford
voice and his false vowels did not conceal the pleasure he
took in singing his unimagined little song, Alma played her
piece at her audience, every line of her face and body pro-
claiming it fine music, the right sort of music, and depre-
cating all the compositions that were not " music." It was
clear that her taste had become cultivated, that she knew
now, that the scales had fallen from her eyes as they had
fallen from Miriam's eyes in Germany; but the result
sent Miriam back with a rush to cheap music, sentimental
" obvious " music, shapely waltzes, the demoralising chro-
matics of Gounod, the demoralising descriptive passion
pieces of Chauminade, those things by Liszt whom some-
body had called a charlatan who wrote to make your blood
leap and your feet dance and made your blood leap and
your feet dance . . . why not? . . .
Her mind went on amazed at the rushing together of
her ideas on music, at the amount of certainty she had
accumulated. Any of these things she declared to herself
played, really played, would be better than Alma's Chopin.
The Wilsons had discovered " good " music, as so many
English people had, but they were all wrong about music;
nearly all English people were. Only in England would
either the song or the solo have been possible. The song
was innocent, the solo was an insult. The player's air of
superiority to other music was insufferable ; her way of
playing out bar by bar of the rain on the roof as if she were
giving a lesson was a piece of intellectual snobbery. Chopin
she had never met, never felt or glimpsed. Chopin was a
shape, an endless delicate stern rhythm as stern as anything
in music ; all he was came through that, could come only
through it and she played tricks with the shape, falsified
i 4 8 THE TUNNEL
all the values, outdid the worst trickery of the music she
was deprecating. At the end of the performance which
was applauded with a subdued reverence, Miriam eased
her agony by humming the opening phase of the motive
again and again in her brain and very nearly aloud, it was
such a perfect rhythmic drop. For long she was haunted
and tortured by Alma's horrible holding back of the third
note for emphasis where there was no emphasis ... it was
like . . . finding a wart at the dropping end of a fine tendril,
she was telling herself furiously while she fended off Alma's
cajoling efforts to make her join in a game of cards. She
felt too angry and too suffering — what was this wrong
thing about music in all English people — even if she had
not been too shy to exhibit her large hands and her stupidity
at cards. So they were going to play cards, actually cards.
The room felt cold to her in her long suppressed anger and
misery. She began to wish the Pinners would go. Sitting
by the fire shivering and torpid she listened to Mrs. Pinner's
outcries and the elaboration between the rounds of jests
that she felt were weekly jests. Sitting there dully listening
she began to have a sort of insight into the way these jests
were made, it was a thing that could be cultivated. Her
tired brain experimented. Certain things she heard she
knew she would remember; she felt she would repeat
them — with an air of originality. They would seem very
brilliant in any of her circles — though the girls did that
sort of thing rather well : but in a less " refined " way ;
that was true! This was the sort of thing the girls did;
only their way was not half so clever ... if she did, every-
one would wonder what was the matter with her ; and she
would not be able to keep it up, without a great deal of
practice; and it would keep out something else . . . but
perhaps for some people there was something in it; it was
their way. It had always been Alma's way a little. Only
THE TUNNEL 149
now she did it better. Perhaps ... it was like Chopin's
shape. . . . They do not know how angry I have been . . .
they are quite amiable. I am simply horrid . . . wanting
Alma to know I know she's wrong quite as much as I care
for Chopin; perhaps more ... no; if anybody had played,
I should be happy; perfectly happy . . . what does that
mean . . . because real musicians are not at all nice people
..." a queer soft lot." But why are the English so awful
about music? They are poets. Why are they not musi-
cians? I hope I shall never hear Alma play Beethoven. As
long as she plays Chopin like that I shall never like her. . . .
Perhaps English people ought never to play, only to listen
to music. They are not innocent enough to play. They
cannot forget themselves.
At ten o'clock they trooped into the kitchen. Miriam,
half asleep and starving for food, eagerly ate large biscuits
too hungry to care much for Alma's continued resentment
of her failure to join the card party and her unconcealed
contempt of her sudden return to animation at the prospect
of nourishment. She had never felt so hungry.
9
Going at last to her room Miriam found its gleaming
freshness warm and firelit. Warm fresh deeps of softly
coloured room that were complete before she came in with
her candle. She stood a moment imagining the emptiness.
The April night air was streaming gently in from meadows.
Going across to the window she hesitated near the flowered
curtain. It stirred gently ; but not in that way as if moved
by ghostly fingers. The meadows here were different.
They might grow the same again. But woods and meadows
were alwavs there, away from London. One could go to
them. They were going on all the time. All the time in
London spring and summer and autumn were passing un-
150 THE TUNNEL
seen. But this was not the time. They were different here.
She pulled a deep wicker chair close up to the exciting white
ash-sprinkled hearth. The evening she had left in the
flames downstairs was going on up here. To-morrow,
to-day, in a few hours she would be sitting with them
again, facing flames ; no one else there. She sat with
her eyes on the flames. A clock struck two. . . . I've got
to them at last, the people I ought to be with. The books
in the corner showed their bindings and opened their pages
here and there. They made a little sick patch on her heart.
They approved of them. Other people approved of things.
Nothing had been done yet that anybody could approve
of . . . the something village of Grandpre . . . und dann
sagte darauf, die gute verniinftige Hausfrau. ... It all
floated in the air. They would see it if somebody showed
it. They would be angry and amused if anybody tried
to show it. It was wrong in some way to try and show the
things you were looking at. Keep quiet about them.
Then somebody else expressed them ; and those other peo-
ple turned to you and demanded your admiration — and
wondered why you were furious. It's too long to wait, until
the things come up of themselves. You must attend to
them. . . .
How the fragrance of the cigarette stood out upon the
fresh warm air . . . that was perique, that curious strong
flavour. They were very strong, he had said so ; but
downstairs, talking like that they had had no particular
flavour, just cigarettes, bringing the cigarette mood . . .
no wonder he had been surprised, really surprised, at her
smoking so many . . . but then he had been surprised at
her eating a hard apple at midnight . . . the sitting room
had suddenly looked familiar going into it alone while
they were seeing out the Pinners and the big man. Strange
unknown voices that perhaps she would not hear again,
THE TUNNEL 151
going out into the night . . . their voices jesting the last
jests as the guests went down the garden, sounding in the
hall, familiar and homely, well known to her, presently
coming back into the sitting room ; the fire burning brightly
like any other fire, the exciting deep pinkness of the shaded
lamplight like nothing else in the world. Alma knew it,
rushing in . . . whirling about with Alma in that room
with that afternoon left in it; the sounds of bolting and
locking coming in from the hall.
10
..." You looked extraordinarily pretty. . . ."
" You have come through it all remarkably well "...
remarkable had a k in it in English, and German, merk-
wiirdig, and perhaps in Scandinavian languages ; but not
in other languages ; it was one of the things that separated
England from the south . . . remarkable . . . hard and
chilly.
" You know you're awfully good stuff. You've had an
extraordinary variety of experience ; you've got your free-
dom ; you ought to write."
" That is what a palmist told me at Newlands. It was
at a big afternoon ' at home ' ; there was a palmist in a
little dark room sitting near a lamp ; she looked at nothing
but your hands ; she kept saying whatever you do, write.
If you haven't written yet, write, if you don't succeed go
on writing."
" Just so, have you written ? "
" Ah, but she also told me my self-confidence had been
broken ; that I used to be self-confident and was so no
longer. It's true."
"Have you written anything?"
" I once sent in a thing to Home Notes. They sent it
back but asked me to write something else and suggested
a few things."
i 5 2 THE TUNNEL
"If they had taken your stuff you would have gone on
and learnt to turn out stuff bad enough for Home Notes
and gone on doing it for the rest of your life."
" But then an artist, a woman who had a studio in Bond
Street and knew Leighton, saw some things I had tried
to paint and said I ought to make any sacrifice to learn
painting, and a musician said the same about music."
" You could work in writing quite well with your present
work."
. . . "Pieces of short prose; anything; a description of
an old woman sitting in an omnibus . . . anything. There's
plenty of room for good work. There's the Academy al-
ways ready to consider well-written pieces of short prose.
Write something and send it to me."
Nearing London shivering and exhausted she recalled
Sunday morning and the strangeness of it being just as it
had promised to be. Happy waking with a clear refreshed
brain in a tired drowsy body, like the feeling after a dance ;
making the next morning part of the dance, your mind
full of pictures and thoughts and the evening coming up
again and again, one great clear picture in the foreground
of your mind. The evening in the room as you sat propped
on your pillows drinking the clear pale curiously refreshing
tea left by the maid on a little wooden tray by your bed-
side ; its fragrance drew you to sip at once, without adding
milk and sugar. It was delicious ; it steamed aromatically
up your nostrils and went straight to your brain ; potent
without being bitter. Perhaps it was "China" tea; it
must be. The two biscuits on the little plate disappeared
rapidly, and she poured in milk and added much sugar
to her remaining tea to appease her hunger. The evening
stayed during her deliberately perfunctory toilet ; she wanted
only to be down. It began again unbroken with the first
cigarette after breakfast, when a nimble remark thrown out
THE TUNNEL 153
from the excited gravity of her happiness made Mr. Wil-
son laugh. She was learning how to do it. It stayed on
through the day, adding the day to itself in a chain, a
morning of talk, a visit to Mr. Wilson's study — the curious
glimpses of pinewood from the windows ; pinewood look-
ing strange and far-away — there were people in Wey-
bridge to whom those woods were real woods where they
walked and perhaps had the thoughts that woods bring;
here they were like woods in a picture book; not real,
just a curious painted background for Mr. Wilson's talk
... all those books in fifty years' time burnt up by the
air; he did not seem to think it an awful idea . . . you can
do anything with English . . . and then the names of
authors who had done some of these things with English
. . . making it sing and dance and march, making it like
granite or like film and foam. Other languages were more
simple and single in texture; less flexible. . . . Gazing
out at the exciting silent pines — so dark and still, waiting,
not knowing about the wonders of English — Miriam
recalled her impressions of those of the authors she knew.
It was true that those were their effects and the great
differences between them. How did he come to know all
about it and to put it into words? Did the authors know
when they did it? She passionately hoped not. If they
did, it was a trick and spoilt books. Rows and rows of
" fine " books ; nothing but men sitting in studies doing
something cleverly, being very important, " men of let-
ters " ; and looking out for approbation. If writing meant
that, it was not worth doing. English a great flexible lan-
guage ; more than any other in the world. But German was
the same? Only the inflections filled the sentences up with
bits. English was flexible and beautiful. Funny. For-
eigners did not think so. Many English people thought
foreign literature the best. Perhaps Mr. Wilson did not
154 THE TUNNEL
know much foreign literature. But he wanted to ; or he
would not have those translations of Ibsen and Bjornsen.
German poetry marched and sang and did all sorts of things.
Anyhow it was wonderful about English — but if books
were written like that, sitting down and doing it cleverly
and knowing just what you were doing and just how some-
body else had done it, there was something wrong, some
mannish cleverness that was only half right. To write
books, knowing all about style would be to become like a
man. Women who wrote books and learned these things
would be absurd and would make men absurd. There was
something wrong. It was in all those books upstairs.
" Good stuff " was wrong, a clever trick, not worth doing.
And yet everybody seemed to want to write.
The rest of the day — secret and wonderful. Sitting
about, taken for one of the Wilson kind of people, someone
who was writing or going to write, by the two Scotch pro-
fessors ; sitting about listening to their quiet easy eager un-
concerned talk, seeing them " all round " as Mr. Wilson saw
them, the limits of professorship and teaching, the silly
net and trick of examinations, their simplicity and their
helplessness ; playing the lovely accompaniment like quiet
waves, of Schubert's Ave Maria, the sudden, jolly, senti-
mental voice of Professor Evvings, his nice attentions . . .
if it had been Wimpole Street or anywhere in society he
would not have seen me. . . .
It would be wrong to try and write just because Mr.
Wilson had said one ought. . . . The reasons he had given
for writing were the wrong ones . . . but it would be
impossible to go down again without doing some writing.
. . . Impossible not to go down again. . . . They knew one
was " different " ; and liked it and thought it a good thing; a
sort of distinction. No one had thought that before. It
made them a home and a refuge. The only refuge there
THE TUNNEL 155
was except being by oneself . . . only their kind of dif-
ference was not the same. They thought nearly everyone
" futile " and " dull " — everyone who did not see things
in their way was that. Presently they would find that
one was not different in the same way. He had spoken
of people who grow " dull " as you get to know them.
Awful . . . perhaps already, he meant
" It's all very well . . . people read Matthew Arnold's
simple profundities; er — simple profundities; and learn
his little trick; and go about — hcna, hcna, — arm in arm
with this swell . . . hcna . . . puffing with illumination.
All about nothing. It's all, my dear Miss Henderson,
about absolutely nothing."
The train stopped. Better not to go down again. There
was something all wrong in it. Wrong about everything.
The Pinners and the big man were right . . . but there
was something dreadful in them, the something that is in
all simple right sort of people, who just go on, never think-
ing about anything. Were they good and right? It did
not enter their heads to think that they were wrong in
associating with him. . . . Here in London it seemed
wrong . . . she hurried wearily with aching head up the
long platform. The Wimpole Street people would cer-
tainly think it wrong; if they knew about the marriage.
They knew he was a coming great man ; the great new
" critic " ; a new kind of critic . . . they knew everybody
was beginning to talk about him. But if they knew they
would not approve. They would never understand his
way of seeing things. Impossible to convey anything to
them of what the visit had been.
156 THE TUNNEL
ii
The hall clock said half-past nine. The hall and the
large rooms had shrunk. Everything looked shabby and
homely. The house was perfectly quiet. Passing quietly
and quickly into her room she found the table empty.
The door into the den was shut and no sound came from
behind it. No one but James had seen her. The holiday
was still there. Perhaps there would be time to take hold
in the new way before anyone discovered her and made
demands. Perhaps they were all three wanting her at this
moment. But the house was so still, there was nothing
urgent. Perhaps she would never feel nervous at Wim-
pole Street again. It was really all so easy. There was
nothing she could not manage if only she could get a fair
start and get everything in order and up to date. Her
mind tried to encircle the book-keeping. There must be a
plan for it all ; so much work on the accounts to keep the
whole ledger-full sent out to date, so much on the address
books, and so much on the monthly cash books — a little
of all these things every day in addition to the day's work,
whatever happened ; that would do it. Then there would
be no muddle and nothing to worry about and perhaps time
to write. They must be told that she would use any spare
time there was on other things. . . . They would be quite
ready for that provided the books were always up to date
and the surgeries always in order. That is what a Wilson
would have done from the first.
12
" Mr. Grove to see you, miss."
" Mr. Grove?"
" Yes miss : a dark gentleman."
Miriam rose from her chair. James had gone after a
THE TUNNEL 157
moment of sympathetic waiting, back down the basement
stairs to her dinner. Miriam felt herself very tall and
slender — set apart and surrounded ; healed of all fighting
and effort. She went quicky through the hall thinking of
nothing; herself, walking down Harriett's garden path.
At the door of the waiting-room she hesitated. Mr. Grove
was the other side of the door, waiting for her to come in.
She opened the door with a flourish and advanced with
stiffly outstretched hand. Before she said " teeth ? " in a
cheerful breezy professional tone that exploded into the
past and scattered it she saw the pained anxiousness of his
face and the flush that had risen under his dark skin.
" No " he said recoiling swiftly from his limp handshake
and sitting abruptly down on the chair from which he had
risen. Miriam watched him go helplessly on to say in stiff
resentfulness what he had come to say while she stood
apologetically at his chair side.
" I meant to write to you — two or three times."
" Oh why didn't you ? " she responded emphatically. . . .
Why can't I be quiet and hear what he has to say? He
must have wanted to see me dreadfully to come here like
this.
His eyes were fixed blindly upon the far-off window.
" Yes. I wanted to very much. How do you like your
life here? " He was flushing again. His skin still had that
shiny film over it, so unlike the clear snaky brilliance of the
eyes. They were dreadful and all the rest flappy and
floppy and somehow feverish.
" Oh — I like it immensely."
" That is a very good thing."
" Do you like your life? "
He drew in his lower lip on an indrawn breath and held
it with his teeth. His eyes were thinking busily under a
slight frown.
I5 8 THE TUNNEL
" That is one of the tilings I wished to discuss with you."
" Oh do discuss it with me," cried Miriam.
" I am very glad you are getting on here so well " he
murmured thoughtfully, gazing through the window, to
and fro as if scanning the opposite house-fronts.
" Oh, I like it immensely " said Miriam after a silence.
Her head was beginning to ache. He sat quite still, scan-
ning to and fro, his lip recaptured under his teeth.
" They are such nice people. I like it for so many
things."
He looked absently round at her.
" M-yes. On several occasions I thought of writing to
you."
" Yes " said Miriam sitting down opposite to him.
He shifted a little in his chair to keep his way clear to
the window.
For a few moments they sat silent; then he suddenly
took out his watch and stood up.
Miriam rose. "Have you seen the Ducayne's lately?'
she asked hurriedly, moving nervously towards the door.
Murmuring an indistinct response he led the way to the
door and held it open for her.
James was coming forward with a patient. They stood
aside for the patient to pass in, James waiting to escort Mr.
Grove to the front door. They shook hands limply and
silently. Miriam stood watching his narrow loosely knit
clerical back as he plunged along through the hall and out.
She turned as James turned from the door. . . . What
it must have cost him to break in here and ask for me
. . . how silly and how rude I was. ... I can't believe
he's been ; it's like a dream. He's seen me in the new life
changed . . . and I'm not really changed.
CHAPTER VII
WHY must I always think of her in this place. ... It
is always worst just along here. . . . Why do I
always forget there's this piece . . . always be hurrying
along seeing nothing and then suddenly Teetgen's Teas
and this row of shops. I can't bear it. I don't know what
it is. It's always the same. I always feel the same. It is
sending me mad. One day it will be worse. If it gets any
worse I shall be mad. Just here. Certainly. Something
is wearing out in me. I am meant to go mad. If not I
should not always be coming along this piece without know-
ing it, whichever street I take. Other people would know
the streets apart. I don't know where this bit is or how
I get to it. I come every day because I am meant to go
mad here. Something that knows brings me here and is
making me go mad because I am myself and nothing
changes me.
iS9
CHAPTER VII I
THE morning went on. It seemed as though there was
to be no opportunity of telling Mr. Hancock until
lunch had changed the feeling of the day. He knew there
was something. Turning to select an instrument from a
drawer she was at work upon he had caught sight of her
mirth and smiled his amusement and anticipation into the
drawer before turning gravely back to the chair. Perhaps
that was enough, the best, like a moment of amusement you
share with a stranger and never forget. Perhaps by the
time she was able to tell him he would be disappointed.
No. It was too perfect. Just the sort of thing that amused
him.
He had one long sitting after another, the time given
to one patient overlapping the appointment with the next
so that her clearings and cleansings were down with a patient
in the chair, noiselessly and slowly, keeping her in the room,
making to-day seem like a continuation of yesterday after-
noon. Yesterday shed its radiance. The shared mirth
made a glowing background to her toil. The duties accu-
mulating downstairs made her continued presence in the
surgery a sort of truancy. She felt more strongly than
ever the sense of her usefulness to him. She had never so
far helped him so deftly and easily, being everywhere and
nowhere, foreseeing his needs without impeding his move-
ments, doing everything without reminding the patient that
there was a third person in the room. She followed sym-
pathetically the long slow processes of excavation and root
160
THE TUNNEL 161
treatment, the delicate shaping and undercutting of the walls
of cavities, the adjustment and retention of the many ap-
pliances for the exclusion of moisture, the insertions of the
amalgams and pastes whose pounding and mixing made a
recurrent crisis in her morning. She wished again and
again that the dentally ignorant dentally ironic world could
see the operator at his best; in his moments of quiet intense
concentration on giving his best to his patients.
The patients suffering the four long sittings were all of
the best group, leisurely and untroubled as to the mounting
up of guineas and three of them intelligently appreciative
of what was being done. They knew all about the " status "
of modern dentistry and the importance of teeth. They
were all clear serene tranquil cheerful people who probably
hardly ever went to a doctor. They would rate oculists
and dentists on a level with doctors and two of them at
least would rate Mr. Hancock on a level with anybody. . . .
Tomorrow would be quite different, a rush of gas cases,
that man who was sick if an instrument touched the back
of his tongue; Mrs. Wolff, disputing fees, the deaf-mute,
the grubby little man on a newspaper ... he ought to
have no patients but these intelligent ones and really nerv-
ous and delicate people and children.
3
" I sometimes wish I'd stuck to medicine."
"Why?"
" Well — I don't know. You know they get a good deal
more all round out of their profession than a dentist does.
It absorbs them more. ... I don't say it ought not to
be the same with dentistry. But it isn't. I don't know a
dentist who wants to go on talking shop until the small
1 62 THE TUNNEL
hours. I'm quite sure / don't. Now look at Randle.
He was dining here last night. So was Bentley. We
separated at about midnight ; and Randle told me this
morning that he and Bentley walked up and down Harley
Street telling each other stories, until two o'clock."
" That simply means they talk about their patients."
" Well — yes. They discuss their cases from every
point of view. They get more human interest out of their
work."
"Of course everybody knows that medical students and
doctors are famous for stories. But it doesn't really mean
they know anything about people. I don't believe they do.
I think the dentist has quite as much opportunity of study-
ing human nature. Going through dentistry is like dying.
You must know almost everything about a patient who has
had much done, or even a little '- "
" The fact of the matter is their profession is a hobby to
them as well as a profession. That's the truth of the mat-
ter. Now I think a man who can make a hobby of his
profession is a very fortunate man."
4
How surprised the four friendly wealthy patients, especi-
ally the white-haired old aristocrat who was always pressing
invitations upon him would have been, ignoring or treating
her with the kindly consideration due to people of her
station, if they could have seen inside his house yesterday
and beheld her ensconced in the most comfortable chair
in his drawing-room . . . talking to Miss Szigmondy.
5
Each time she came downstairs she sat urgently down
to the most pressing of her clerical duties and presently
found her mind ranging amongst thoughts whose begin-
THE TUNNEL 163
nings she could not remember. She felt equal to anything.
Every prospect was open to her. Simple solutions to
problems that commonly went unanswered round and round
in her head presented themselves in flashes. At intervals
she worked with a swiftness and ease that astonished her,
making no mistakes, devising small changes and adjust-
ments that would make for the smoother working of the
practice, dashing off notes to friends in easy expressive
phrases that came without thought.
Rushing up towards lunch time in answer to the bell
she found Mr. Hancock alone. He turned from the wash-
stand and stood carefully drying his hands. " Are they
showing up ? " he murmured and seeing her, smiled his
sense of her eagerness to communicate and approached a
few steps waiting and smiling with the whole of his face
exactly as he would smile when the communication was
made. There was really no need to tell. Miriam glanced
back for an incoming patient. " Miss Szigwowdy " she
began in a voice deep with laughter.
He laughed at once, with a little backward throw of his
head just as the patient came in. Miriam glided swiftly
into her corner.
7
At tea-time she found herself happily exhausted, sitting
alone in the den waiting for the sound of footsteps. For
the first time the gas-stove was unlit. The rows of asbes-
tos balls stood white and bare. But a flood of sunlight
came through the western panes of the newly washed sky-
light. The little low tea-table with its fresh uncrumpled
low hanging white cover and compact cluster of delicate
china stood in full sunshine amidst the comfortable winter
1 64 THE TUNNEL
shabbiness. The decorative confusion on the walls shone
richly out in the new bright light. It needed only to have
all the skylights open the blue of the sky visible, the thin
spring air coming in, the fire alight making a summery glow,
to be perfect ; like spring tea-time in a newly visited house.
The Wilsons sitting-room would be in an open blaze of
shallow spring sunshine. She saw it going on day by day
towards the rich light of summer . . jealously. One
ought to be there every day. So much life would have
passed through the room. Every day last week has been
full of it, everything changed by it, and now, since yesterday
it seemed months ago. It seemed too late to begin going
down again. One thing blots out another. You cannot
have more than one thing intensely. Quite soon it would
be as if she had never been down; except in moments
now and again, when something recalled the challenge of
their point of view. They would not want her to go down
again unless she had begun to be different. Until yesterday
she might have begun. But yesterday afternoon they had
been forgotten so completely, and waking up from yester-
day she no longer wanted to begin their way of being
different. But other people had already begun to iden-
tify her with them. That came of talking. If she had
said nothing, nothing would have been changed ;
either at Wimpole Street or with the girls. Did they
really like reading " The Evolution of the Idea of God "
or were they only pretending? Sewing all the time,
busily, like wives, instead of smoking and listening and
thinking.
Which was the stronger? The interest of getting the
whole picture there, and struggling with Mr. Wilson's de-
ductions or the interest of getting the girls to grasp and
THE TUNNEL 165
admire his conclusions even while she herself refused
them. . . .
" Why can't I keep quiet about the things that happen ?
It's all me, my conceit and my way of rushing into things."
. . . But other people were the same in a way. Only there
was something real in their way. They believed in the
things they rushed into. " Miss Henderson knows the
great critic, intimately." He had thought that would im-
press Miss Szigmondy. It did. For a moment she had
stopped talking and looked surprised. There was time to
disclaim, to tell them they were being impressed in the
wrong way ; to tell them something, to explain in some way.
The moment had passed, full of terrible far-off trouble,
" decisive."
There is always a fraction of a second when you know
what you are doing. Miss Szigmondy would have gone
on talking about bicycling until Mr. Hancock came back.
There was no need to say suddenly, without thinking about
it " I am dying to learn." Really that sudden remark was
the result of having failed to speak when they were all
talking about Mr. Wilson. If, then, one had suddenly
said " I am dying to learn bicycling " or anything they
would have known something of the truth about Mr.
Wilson. It was the worrying thought of him, still there,
that made one say, without thinking, " I am dying to
learn." It was too late. It linked up with the silence about
Mr. Wilson and left one being a person who knew and
altogether approved of Mr. Wilson and wanted to learn
bicycling. Altogether wrong. " You know — I don't ap-
prove of Mr. Wilson ; and you might not if you heard him
talk, and ... his marriage . . . you know. . . ."
... If I had done that, I should have been easy and
1 66 TH E TUNNEL
strong and could have ' made conversation ' when she began
talking about bicycling. I was like the man who proposed
to the girl at the dance because he could not think of any-
thing to say to her. He could not think of anything to
say because he had something on his mind. . . .
And Miss Szigmondy would not have called this morning.
" No one can pronounce my name. You had better call
me Thegese my dear girl. Yes, do; I want you to." She
had said that with a worried face, a sudden manner of
unsmiling intimacy. She certainly had some plan. Stand-
ing there with her broken hearted voice and her anxious
face she seemed to be separate from the room, even from
her own clothes. Yet something within her was moving so
quickly that it made one breathless. She was so intent that
she was unconscious of the appealing little figure she made
huddled in her English clothes. She stood dressed and
determined and prosperous her smart little toque held closely
against her dark hair and sallow face with the kind of
chenille-spotted veil that was a rampart against every-
thing in the world to an Englishwoman. But it did not
touch her or do anything for her. It gave an effect of
prison bars behind which she was hanging her head and
weeping and appealing. One could have laughed and
gathered her up. Why was she forlorn ? Why did she
imagine that one was also forlorn? The sight of her made
all the forlornness one had ever seen or read about seem
peopled with knowledge and sympathy and warm thoughts
that flew crowding along one's brain as close and bright
as the texture of everybody's everyday. Rut the eyes were
anxious and preoccupied, blinking now and then in her
long unswerving appealing gaze, shutting swiftly for light-
ning calculations between her rapid appealing statements.
What was she trying to do?
THE TUNNEL 167
She tried to stand in front of everything, to put every-
thing aside as if it were part of something she knew.
Laughing over it with Mr. Hancock would not dispose of
that. After the fun of telling him, she would still be there,
with the two bicycle lessons that were going begging. He
knew already that she had been and would assume that
she had suggested things and that one was not going to do
them. If one told him about the lessons he would say that
is very kind and would mean it. He was always fine in
thinking a " kind " action kind . . . but she does not come
because she wants me. She does not want anybody. She
does not know the difference between one person and
another. . . . He knows only her social manner. She has
never been alone with him and come close and shown him
her determination and her sorrow . . . sorrow . . . sor-
row. . . .
He could never see that it was impossible without forcibly
crushing her, to get out of doing some part of what she
desired. . . .
If one were drawn in and did things, let oneself want
to do things for anyone else, there would be a change in the
atmosphere at Wimpole Street. That never occurred to
him. But he would feel it if it happened. If there were
someone near who made distractions there would be a
difference, something that was not given to him. He was
so unaware of this. He was absolutely ignorant of what
it was that kept things going as they were.
CHAPTER IX
THE cycling school was out of sight and done with and
Miriam hurried down the Chalk Farm Road. If
only she could see an omnibus and be in it going anywhere
down away from the north. Miss Szigmondy had brought
shame and misery upon her, in Chalk Farm. There was
nothing there to keep off the pain. Once back she would
never think of Chalk Farm again. How could anyone think
it was a place, like other places ? It was torture even to be
in it, going through it. ... Of course the man had thought
I should take on a course of lessons and pay for them. I
have to learn everything meanly and shamefully. He
thinks I'm getting all I can for nothing. The people in the
bus will see me pay my fare and I shall be all right again,
going down there. What an awful road, going on and on
with nothing in it. I am ashamed and helpless ; helpless.
It's no use to try and do anything. It always exposes me
and brings this maddening shame and pain. It's over again
this time and I shall soon forget it altogether. I might just
as well begin to stop thinking about it now. It's this part
of London. It's like Banbury Park. To people are ab-
solutely awful. They take cycling lessons quite coolly.
They are not afraid of anybody. To them this part is the
best bit of North London. They are that sort of people.
They are all alike. All of them would dislike me. I
should die of being with them.
Why is it that no one seems to know what north London
168
THE TUNNEL 169
is ? They say it is healthy and open. Perhaps I shall meet
someone who feels like I do about it and would get ill and
die there. It is not imagination. It is a real feeling that
comes upon me. . . .
The north London omnibus reached the tide of the
Euston Road and pulled up at Portland Road station.
Miriam got out weak and ill. The first breath of the cen-
tral air revived her. Standing there, the omnibus looked
like any other omnibus. She crossed the road, averting her
eyes from the north-going roads on either side of the church
and got into the inmost corner of another bus. She wanted
to ride about, getting from bus to bus, inside London un-
til her misery had passed. Opposite her was a stout woman
in a rusty bonnet and shawl and dust-defaced black skirt,
looking about with eyes that did not see what they looked
at, all the London consciousness in her. Miriam sat gaz-
ing at her. The woman's eyes crossed her and passed un-
perturbed. . . .
The lane of little shops flowed away, their huddled detail
crushing together, wide shop windows glittered steadily by
and narrowed away. When the bus stopped at Gower
Street the spire of St. Pancras church came into sight
spindling majestically up, screened by trees.
The trees in Endsleigh Gardens came along gently wav-
ing their budding branches in bright sunshine. The colour
of the gardens was so intense that the sun must just be
going to set behind Euston Station. The large houses
moved steadily behind the gardens in blocks, bright white,
with large quiet streets opening their vistas in between the
blocks, leading to green freshness and then safely on down
into Soho. The long square came to an end. The shrub-
trimmed base of St. Pancras church came heavily nearer
and stopped. As Miriam got out of the bus she watched
its great body rise in clear sharp outline against the blue.
i 7 o TH E TUNNEL
Its clock was booming the hour out across the gardens
through the houses and down into the squares. On this
side its sound was broken up by the narrow roar of the
Euston Road and the clamour coming right and left from
the two great stations.
Her feet tramped happily across the square of polished
roadway patterned with shadows and along the quiet clean
sunlit pavement behind the gardens. It was always bright
and clean and quiet and happy there, like the pavement
of a road behind a sea-front. The sound of a mail van
rattling heavily along Woburn Place changed to a soft
rumble as she turned in between the great houses of Tans-
ley Street and walked along its silent corridor of afternoon
light. Sparrows were cheeping in the stillness. To be
able to go down the quiet street and on into the squares —
on a bicycle. ... I must learn somehow to get my balance.
To go along, like in that moment when he took his hands
off the handle-bars, in knickers and a short skirt and all the
summer to come. . . . Everything shone with a greater in-
tensity. Friends and thought and work were nothing com-
pared to being able to ride alone, balanced, going along
through the air.
On the hall table was a post-card. " Come round on
Sunday if you're in town — Irlandisches Ragout. Mag."
Her heart stirred: that settled it — the girls wanted her;
Mag wanted her. She took Alma's crumpled letter from
her pocket and glanced through it once more ..." such
a dull Sunday and all your fault. Why did you not come?
Come on Saturday an\ time or Sunday morning if you
can't manage the week-end?" What a good thing she had
not written promising to go. She would be in London,
safe in Kennett Street for Sunday. Mag was quite right;
going away unsettled you for the week and you did not
get Sunday. She looked at her watch, five-thirty; in half
THE TUNNEL 171
an hour the girls would probably be at Slater's; the Lon-
don week-end could begin this minute ; all the people who
half-expected her, the Brooms, the Pernes, Sarah and Har-
riett, the Wilsons, would be in their homes far away; she
safe in Bloomsbury, in the big house the big kind streets,
Kennett Street; places they none of them knew; safe for
the whole length of the week-end. Saturday had looked
so obstructed, with the cycling lesson, and the visit to Miss
Szigmondy and the many alternatives for the rest of the
time. ..." Oh I've got about fifty engagements for Sat-
urday " and now Saturday was clear and she felt equal to
anything for the week-end. What a discovery, standing
hidden there in the London house, to drop everything and go
down, with all the discarded engagements, all the solicitous
protecting friends put aside ; easy and alone through the
glimmering green squares to the end of the Strand and find
Slater's. . . . I'll never stir out of London again. The
girls are right. It isn't worth it.
She saw the girls seated at a table at the far end of the
big restaurant and shyly advanced.
"Hulloh child!"
"What you having?" she asked sitting down opposite
to them. The empty white table-cloth shone under a
brilliant incandescent light; far away down the vista the
door opened on the daylit street.
" Isn't it a glorious Spring evening? " Spring? It was,
of course. Everyone had been saying the spring would
never come, but to-day it was very warm. Spring was here
of course. Perspiring in a dusty cycling school and sitting
in a hot restaurant was not spring. Spring was somewhere
far away. Going to stay and talk in people's houses did
not bring Spring — landscapes belonging to people were
i 7 2 TH E TUNNEL
painted; you must be alone ... or perhaps at the Brooms.
Perhaps next week-end at the Brooms would be in time for
the spring; in their back garden, the watered green lawn and
the sweetbriar and the distant trees in the large garden
beyond the fence. In London it was better not to think
about the times of year.
But Mag seemed to find Spring in London. Her face
was all glowing with the sense of it.
'* What you having? "
" Have you observed with what a remarkable brilliance
the tender green shines out against the soot-black
branches?" Yes, that was wonderful but what was the
joke?
" Every spring I have spent in Lonndonn I have heard
that remark at least fifty times."
Miriam laughed politely. " Jan, what have you or-
dered?"
" We've ordered beef my child, cold beefs and salads."
"Do you think I should like salad?"
" If you had a brother would he like salad?"
" Do they put dressing on it? If I could have just plain
lettuce."
" As for it my child, ask and it shall be given unto thee."
" A waitress brought the beef and salad, two glasses with
an inch of whisky in each, and a large syphon.
Miriam ordered beef and potatoes.
" I suppose the steak and onion days are over."
" T shan't have another steak and onions, please God,
until next November."
Miriam laughed delightedly.
" Why haven't you gone away for the week-end, child ? "
" I told you she wouldn't."
" I don't know. I wanted to come down here."
" Is that a compliment to us?"
THE TUNNEL 173
" I say, I've had a bicycle lesson."
Both faces came up eagerly.
" You remember ; that extraordinary woman I met at
the Royal Institution."
The faces looked at each other.
" Oh you know ; I told you about it — the two lessons
she didn't want."
" Go on my child; we remember; go on."
Miriam sat eating her beef.
" Go on Miriam. You've really had a lesson. I'm de-
lighted my child. Tell us all about it."
" D'you remember the extraordinary moment when you
felt the machine going along; even with the man holding
the handle-bars ? "
" You wait until there's nobody to hold the handle-bars."
" Have you been out alone yet ? "
The two faces looked at each other.
"Shall we tell her?"
" You must tell me ; es ist bestimmt in Gottes Rath."
They leaned across the table and spoke low one after
the other. " We went out — last night — after dark —
and rode — round Russell Square — twice — in our
knickers "
"No. Did you really? How simply heavenly."
" It was. We came home nearly crying with rage at not
being able to go about, permanently, in nothing but knick-
ers. It would make life an absolutely different thing."
" The freedom of movement."
" Exactly. You feel like a sprite you are so light."
" And like a poet though you don't know it."
" You feel like a sprite you are so light, and you feel so
strong and capable and so broadshouldered you could knock
down a policeman. Jan and I knocked down several last
night."
174 THE TUNNEL
"Yes; and it is not only that; think of never having to
brush your skirt."
" I know. It would be bliss."
" I spend half my life brushing my skirt. If I miss a
day I notice it — if I miss two days the office notices it. If
I miss three days the public notices it."
" La vie est dure; pour les femmes."
" You don't want to be a man Jan."
" Oh I do, sometimes. They have the best of every-
thing all round."
" / don't. I wouldn't be a man for anything. I wouldn't
have a man's — consciousness, for anything."
" Why not asthore ? "
" They're too absolutely pig-headed and silly. . . ."
"Isn't she intolerant?"
Miriam sat flaring. That was not the right answer.
There was something; and they must know it; but they
would not admit it.
"Then you can both really ride?"
" We do nothing else ; we've given up walking ; we no
longer walk up and downstairs ; we ride."
Miriam laughed her delight. "I can quite understand;
it alters everything. I realised that this afternoon at the
school. To be able to bicycle would make life utterly
different ; on a bicycle you feel a different person ; nothing
can come near you, you forget who you are. Aren't you
glad you are alive to-day, when all these things are hap-
pening? "
" What things little one ? "
" Well cycling and things. You know girls when I'm
thirty I'm going to cut my hair short and wear divided
skirts."
Both faces came up.
" Why on earth ? "
THE TUNNEL 175
" I can't face doing my hair and brushing skirts and
keeping more or less in the fashion, that means about two
years behind because I never realise fashions till they're
just going, even if I could afford to, — all my life."
" Then why not do it now ? "
" Because all my friends and relatives would object. It
would worry them too — they would feel quite sure then I
should never marry — and they still entertain hopes,
secretly."
" Don't you want to marry — ever ; ever ? "
" Well — it would mean giving up this life."
" Yes, I know. I agree there. That can't be faced."
" I should think not. Aren't you going to have any pud-
ding?"
" But why thirty ? Why not thirty-one ? "
" Because nobody cares what you do when you're thirty ;
they've all given up hope by that time. Aren't you two
going to have any pudding? "
" No. But that is no reason why you should not."
" What a good idea — to have just one dish and coffee."
" That's what we think ; and it's cheap."
" Well, I couldn't have had any dinner at all only I'm
cadging dinner with you to-morrow."
" What would you have done ? "
" An egg, at an A. B. C."
" How fond you are of A. B. C's."
" I love them."
" What is it that you love about them."
"Chiefly I think their dowdiness. The food is honest;
not showy, and they are so blissfully dowdy."
Both girls laughed.
" It's no good. I have come to the conclusion I like
dowdiness. I'm not smart. You are."
" This is the first we have heard of it."
176 THE TUNNEL
" Well you know you are. You keep in the fashion. It
may be quite right, perhaps you are more sociable than I
am.
" One is so conspicuous if one is not dressed more or less
like other people."
"That's what I hate; dressing like other people. If I
could afford it I should be stylish — not smart. Perfect
coats and skirts and a few good evening dresses. But you
must be awfully well off for that. If I can't be stylish I'd
rather be dowdy and in a way I like dowdiness even better
than stylishness."
The girls laughed.
"But aren't clothes awful, anyhow? I've spent four and
eleven on my knickers and I can't possibly get a skirt till
next year if then, or afford to hire a machine."
" Why don't you ask them to raise your salary ? "
"After four months? Beside any fool could do the
work."
" If I were you I should tell them. I should say ' Gentle-
men — I wish for a skirt and a bicycle.' "
" Mag, don't be so silly."
" I can't see it. They would benefit by your improved
health and spirits. Jan and I are new women since we have
learned riding. / am thinking of telling the governor I
must have a rise to meet the increased demands of my
appetite. Our housekeeping expenses I shall say are
doubled. What will you? Que faire?"
" You see the work I'm doing is not worth more than a
pound a week — my languages are no good there. I sup-
pose I ought to learn typing and shorthand ; but where could
I find the money for the training?"
"Will you teach her shorthand if I teach her typing?"
" Certainly if the child wants to learn. I don't advise
her."
THE TUNNEL 177
" Why not Jan. You did. How long would it take me
in evenings ? "
" A year at least, to be marketable. It's a vile thing to
learn, unless you are thoroughly stupid."
" That's true. Jan was a perfect fool. The more in-
telligent you are the longer you take."
" You see it isn't a language. It is an arbitrary system
of signs."
" With your intelligence you'd probably grow grey at the
school. Wouldn't she, Jan ? "
" Probably."
" Besides I can't imagine Mistress Miriam in an office."
" Nobody would have me. I'm not business-like enough.
I am learning book-keeping at their expense. And don't
forget they give me lunch and tea. I say are we going to
read ' The Evolution Idea of God ' to-night? "
" Yes. Let's get back and get our clothes off. If I
don't have a cigarette within half an hour I shall die."
" Oh, so shall I. I had forgotten the existence of cigar-
ettes."
Out in the street Miriam felt embarrassed. The sunset
glow broke through wherever there was a gap towards the
north-west, and flooded a strip of the street and struck a
building. The presence of the girls added a sharpness to
its beauty, especially the presence of Mag who felt the
spring even in London. But both of them seemed entirely
oblivious. They marched along at a great rate, very up-
right and swift — like grenadiers — why grenadiers? Like
grenadiers, making her hurry in a way that increased the
discomfort of her hard cheap down-at-heel shoes. Their
high-heeled shoes were in perfect condition and they went
on and on laughing and jesting as if there were no spring
evening all round them. She wanted to stroll, and stop at
every turn of the road. She grew to dislike them both
178 THETUNNEL
long before Kennett Street was reached, their brisk gait
as they walked together in step, leaving her to manoeuvre
the passing of pedestrians on the narrow pavements of the
side streets, the self-confident set of their this-season's
clothes, " line " clothes, like everyone else was wearing,
everyone this side of the west-end; Oxford Street clothes
. . . and to long to be wandering home alone through the
leafy squares. Were people who lived together always like
this, always brisk and joking and keeping it up? They
got on so well together . . . and she got on so well too
with them. " No one ever feels a third " Mag had said.
I am tired, too tired. They are stronger than I am. I
feel dead ; and they are perfectly fresh.
" D'you know I believe I feel too played out to read "
she said at their door.
" Then come in and smoke " said Mag taking her arm.
" The night is yet young."
CHAPTER X
MIRIAM swung her legs from the table and brought
her tilted chair to the ground. The leads sloped
down as she got to her feet and the strip of sky disappeared.
The sunlight made a broad strip of gold along the parapet
and a dazzling plaque upon the slope of the leads. She
lounged into the shadowy middle of the room and stood
feeling tall and steady and easy and agile in the freedom
of knickers. The clothes lying on the bed were trans-
formed. " I say " she murmured. Her cigarette end
wobbling encouragingly from the corner of her lips as she
spoke, " they're not bad." She strolled about the room
glancing at them from different points of view. They
really made quite a good whole. It was the lilac that made
them a good whole, the fresh heavy blunt cones of pure
colour. In the distance the bunched ribbon looked almost
all green. She drew the hat nearer to the light and the
ribbon became mauve with green shadows and green with
mauve shadows as it moved. The girl had been right about
bunching the ribbon a little way up the sugar-loaf and
over the wide brim. It broke the papery stiffness of the
lilac and the harshness of the black straw. The straw
looked very harsh and black in the clearer light. Out of
doors it would look almost as if it had been done with that
awful shiny hat polish. If the straw had been dull and
silky and some shaded tone of mauve and green it would
have been one of those hats that give you a sort of mad-
i79
180 THE TUNNEL
ness, taking your eyes in and in, with the effect of a misty
distant woodland brought near and moving, depths of inter-
woven colour under your eyes. But it would not have gone
with the black and white check. The black part of the hat
was right for the tiny check. That is the idea of some
smart woman. ... I did not think of it in the shop, but
I got it right somehow, I can see now. It's right. Those
might be someone else's things. . . . The sight of the black
suede gloves and the lace-edged handkerchief and the
powder box laid out on the chest of drawers made her
eager to begin. This was dressing. The way to feel you
were dressing was to put everything out first and come
back as another person and make a grand toilet. It makes
you feel free and leisurely. There had been the long
strange morning. In half an hour the adventure would
begin and go on and be over. The room would not be
in it. Something nice or horrible would come back. But
the room would not be changed.
She found the dark green Atlas 'bus standing ready by
the curb and waited until it was just about to start, looking
impatiently up and down the long vistas of the empty Sun-
day street, and then jumped hurriedly in with the polite
half-irritated resignation of the man about town who finds
himself stranded in a godforsaken part of London, and
steered herself carefully against the swaying of the vehicle
along between the rows of seated forms, keeping her eyes
carefully averted and fixed upon distant splendours. Secur-
ing an empty corner she sat down provisionally, on the
edge of the seat, occupying the least possible space, clear
of her neighbour, her eyes turned inwards on splendours
still raking the street, her person ready to leap up at the
sight of a crawling hansom — telling herself in a drawl
THE TUNNEL 181
that she felt must somehow be audible to an observant
listener how damnable it was that there were not hansoms
in these remarkable backwoods — so damned inconvenient
when your own barrow is laid up at Windover's. But a
hansom might possibly appear. . . . She turned to the
little corner window at her side and gazed with fierce ab-
straction down the on-coming street. Presently she would
really be in a hansom. Miss Szigmondy had mentioned
hansoms . . . supposing she should have to pay her share?
Her heart beat rapidly and her face flushed as she thought
of the fourpence in her purse. She would not be able
even to offer. But if Miss Szigmondy were alone she
would take cabs. There would be no need to mention it.
The ambling trit-trot of the vehicle gradually prevailed
over the mood in which she had dressed. She was be-
coming aware of her companions. Presently she would
be taking them all in and getting into a world that had
nothing to do with her afternoon. Turning aside so that
her face could not be seen and her own vision might be
restricted to the roadway rolling slowly upon her through
the little end window she dreamed of contriving somehow
or other to save money for hansoms. Hansoms were a
necessary part of the worldly life. Floating about in a
hansom in the west-end, in the season was like nothing else
in the world. It changed you, your feelings, manner, bear-
ing, everything. It made you part of a wonderful exclu-
sive difficult triumphant life, a streak of it, going in and
out. It cut you off from all personal difficulties, made you
drop your personality and lifted you right out into the
freedom of a throng of happy people, a great sunlit tide
singing, all the same laughing song, wave after wave, ad-
vancing, in open sunlight. It took you on to a great stage,
lit and decked, where you were lost, everything was lost
and forgotten in the masque. Nothing personal could
1 82 THE TUNNEL
matter so long as you were there and kept there, day and
night. Everyone was invisible and visionless, united in
the spectacle, gliding and hiding the underworld in a bril-
liant embroidery . . . continuously.
As they rumbled up Baker Street, she wondered im-
patiently why Miss Szigmondy had not appointed a meet-
ing place in the West end. Raker Street began all right ;
one felt safe going up Orchard Street, past the beautiful
china shop and the Romish richness of Rurns and Oates.
seeing the sequestered worldliness of Granville Place and
rolling through Portman Square with its enormous grey
houses masking hidden wealth ; but after that it became a
dismal corridor retreating towards the full chill of the north.
If they had met in Piccadilly they could have driven
straight down through heaven into Chelsea. Perhaps it
would not be heaven with Miss Szigmondy. She would
not know the difference in the feeling of the different parts
of London. She would drive along like a foreigner — or
a member of a provincial antiquarian society, " intelli-
gently " noticing things, knowing about the buildings and
the statues. Londoners were always twitted with not
knowing about London . . . the reason why they jested
about it, half proudly, was their consciousness of being
Londoners, living in London, going about happy, the minute
they were outside their houses, looking at nothing and feel-
ing everything, like people wandering happily from room to
room in a well known house at some time when every-
body's attention was turned away by a festival or a catas-
trophe. . . . London was like a prairie. In a hansom it
would be heaven, with anybody. A hansom saved you
from your companion more than any other vehicle. You
were as much outside it in London as you were inside with
your companion, if you were anywhere south of Maryle-
bone . . . the way the open hood framed the vista. . . .
THE TUNNEL 183
3
There was a hansom waiting outside Miss Szigmondy's
garden gate. The afternoon would begin at once with a
swift drive back into the world. Miss Szigmondy met her
in the dark hall, with an outbreak of bright guttural talk,
talking as she collected her things, breaking in with shouted
instructions to an invisible servant. Her voice sounded
very foreign in the excited upper notes, but it rang, a thin
wiry ring, not shrieking and breaking like the voices of
excited Englishwomen, perhaps that was " voice produc-
tion."
In the cab she sat sorting her cards, reading out names.
Miriam thrilled as she heard them. Miss Szigmondy's
attention was no longer on her. Her mind slipped easily
back; the intervening time fell away. She was going with
her sisters along past the Burlington Arcade, she saw the
pillar box, the old man selling papers, the old woman with
the crooked black sailor hat and the fringed shawl, sitting
on a box behind her huge basket of tulips and daffodils
. . . the great grimed stone pillars, the court yard beyond
them blazing with sunshine, the wide stone steps at the far
end of the court yard leading up into cool shadow, the
turnstile and great hall, an archway, and the sudden fresh
blaze of colours. . . .
But the hansom had turned into the main road and was
going north. They were going even further north than
Miss Szigmondy's ... up a straight empty Sunday subur-
ban road between rows of suburban houses with gardens
that tried to look pretty ... an open silly prettiness like
suburban ladies coming up to town for matinees ... If
there were artists living up here it would not be worth
while to go and see them. . . .
1 84 THE TUNNEL
As the afternoon wore on it dawned upon Miriam that
if Miss Szigmondy were to be at the poet's house in even-
ing dress by half past six, they had seen nearly all they were
going to see. There could be no thought of Chelsea. But
she answered with a swift negative when Miss Szigmondy
enquired as they were shown into their hansom outside
their eighth large Hampstead house whether she were tired.
Her unsatisfied consciousness ran ahead, waiting; just be-
yond, round the next corner was something that would
relieve the oppression. " I just want to run in and see
that poor boy Gilbert Haze." Then it was over and she
must go on enduring whilst Miss Szigmondy paid a call ;
unable to get free because she was being paid for and
could not afford to go back alone. They drove for some
distance, the large houses disappeared, they were in amongst
little drab roadways like those round about Mornington
Road. Perhaps if she improvised an engagement she
could find her way to Regent's Park and get back. But
they had come so far. They must be on the outskirts of
N.W., perhaps even in N. They pulled up before a small
drab villa. The sun had gone behind the clouds, the short
street was desolate. No touch of life or colour anywhere,
hardly a sign of spring in the small parched shrub-filled
front gardens, uniformly enclosed by dusty railings. She
dreaded her wait alone in the cab with her finery and her
empty afternoon while Miss Szigmondy visited her sick
friend.
" Come along," said Miss Szigmondy from the little
garden path " poor creature you do look tired." Miriam
got angrily out of the cab. Whose fault was it that she
was tired? Why did Miss Szigmondy go to these things?
THE TUNNEL 185
She had not cared and was not disappointed at not caring.
She was just the same as when she had started out.
" I will wait in the garden " she said hurriedly as the door
opened on the house of sickness. A short young man with
untidy dark hair and a shabby suit stood in the doorway.
His brilliant dark eyes smiled sharply at Miss Szigmondy
and shot beyond her towards Miriam as he stood aside hold-
ing the door wide. " Come along " shouted Miss Szig-
mondy disappearing. Miriam came reluctantly forward
and got herself through the door, reaping the second cu-
rious sharp smile as she passed. The young man had an
extraordinary face, cheerful and grimy, like a street arab ;
he was rather like a street arab. Miss Szigmondy was talk-
ing loudly from a little room to the right of the door.
Miriam's embarrassment in the impossibility of explaining
her own superfluous presence was not relieved when she
entered the room. The young man was clearly not pre-
pared. It was a most unwarrantable intrusion. She stood
at a loss behind Miss Szigmondy who was planted, still
eagerly talking, on the small clear space of bare boards —
cracked and dusty, like a warehouse — in the middle of the
room and tried not to see anything in particular; but her
eyes already had the sense that there was nothing to sit
upon, no corner to retire into, nothing but an extraordinary
confusion of shabby dust-covered things laid bare by the
sunlight that poured through the uncurtained window.
Her eyes took refuge in the face of the young man con-
fronting Miss Szigmondy, making replies to her volley of
questions. He had no front teeth, nothing but blackened
stumps ; dreadful, one ought not to look, unless he were
going to be helped. Perhaps Miss Szigmondy was going
to help him. But he did not look ill. His bright glancing
eyes shot about as if looking at something that was not
1 86 THE TUNNEL
there and he answered Miss Szigmondy's sallies with a sort
of cheerful convulsion of his whole frame. He seemed to
be " on wires " ; but not weak ; strong and cheerful ; happy ;
a kind of cheerfulness and happiness she had never met
before. It was quiet. It came from him soundlessly mak-
ing within his pleasant voice a gay noise that conquered
the strange embarrassing room. Presently in answer to a
demand from Miss Szigmondy he opened folding doors
and ushered them into an adjoining room.
5
Miriam stood holding the little group in her hands long-
ing for words. She could only smile and smile. The
young man stood by looking at it and smiling, too, giving
his attention to Miss Szigmondy's questions about some
larger white things standing in the bare room. When he
moved away towards these and she could leave off wonder-
ing whether it would do to say " and is this really going to
the Academy next week " instead of again repeating " how
beautiful," and her eye could run undisturbed over and
over the outlines of the two horses, impressions crowded
upon her. The thing moved and changed as she looked
at it ; it seemed as if it must break away, burst out of her
hands into the surrounding atmosphere. Everything about
took on a happy familiarity, as if she had long been in the
bright bare plaster-filled little room. From the edges of
the small white group a radiance spread freshening the
air, flowing out into the happy world, flowing back over
the afternoon, bringing parts of it to stand out like great
fresh bright Academy pictures. The great studios open-
ing out within the large garden-draped Hampstead houses
rich and bright with colour in a golden light, their fur
rugs and tea services on silver trays, and velvet coated men,
wives with trailing dresses and the people standing about.
THE TUNNEL 187
at once conspicuous and lost, were like Academy pictures.
It was all real now, the pictures on the great easels, scraps
of the Academy blaze ; the studio with the bright light, and
marble, and bright clear tiger skins on the floor, the big
clean fresh tiger almost filling the canvas ... the dark
studio with antique furniture and pictures of people stand-
ing about in historical clothes. . . .
" Goodness gracious, isn't she a swell ! "
"Are they all right?"
"Are you a millionaire my dear? Have they raised your
salary? "
" Do you really like them ? "
" Yes. I've never seen you look so nice. You ought
always to go about in a large black hat trimmed with
lilac."
" Didn't one of the artists want to paint your portrait."
" They all did. I've promised at least twenty sittings."
" Come nearer to the lamp fair child that I may be even
more dazzled by thy splendour."
" I'm awfully glad you like them — they'll have to go
on for ever."
" Where on earth did you find the money child ? "
" Borrowed it from Harry. It was her idea. You see
I shall get four pounds for my four weeks' holiday ; and if
I go to stay with them it won't cost me anything; so she
advanced me two pounds."
" And you got all this for two pounds ? "
" Practically ; the hat was ten and six and the other things
twenty seven and six and the gloves half a crown."
"Where did you get them?"
" Edgward Road."
"And just put them on?"
1 88 TH E TUNNEL
" It is really remarkable. Do you realise how lucky you
are in being a stock size?"
" I suppose I am. But you know the awful thing about
it is that they will never come in for Wimpole Street."
" Why on earth not ? What could be more ladylike,
more — simple, more altogether suitable?"
" You see I have to wear black there."
"What an extraordinary idea. Why?"
" Well they asked me to. I don't know. I believe it's
the fault of my predecessor. They told me she rustled
and wore all kinds of dresses "
" I see — a series of explosions."
" On silk foundations."
" But why should they assume that you would do the
Same?"
" I don't know. It's an awful nuisance. You can't get
black blouses that will wash; it will be awful in the sum-
mer; besides it's so unbecoming."
" There I can't agree. It would be for me. It makes
me look dingy ; but it suits you, throws up your rose-leaf
complexion and your golden hair. But I call it jolly hard
lines. I'd like to see the governor dictating to me what I
should wear."
" It's so expensive if one can't wear out one's best things."
"It's intolerable. Why do you stand it?"
"What can I do?"
" Tell them you must either wear scarlet at the office
or have a higher screw."
" It isn't an office you see. I have to be so much in the
surgeries and interviewing people in the waiting-room, you
know."
" Yes — from dukes to dustmen. But would either the
dukes or the dustmen disapprove of scarlet."
" One has to be a discreet nobody. It's the professional
THE TUNNEL 189
world; you don't understand; you are equals, you two,
superiors, pampered countesses in your offices."
" Well I think it's a beastly shame. I should brandish
a pair of forceps at Mr. Hancock and say ' scarlet — or I
leave.' "
" Where should I go, I have no qualifications."
" You wouldn't leave. They would say ' Miss Hender-
son wear purple and yellow, only stay.' I think it's a re-
flection on her taste, don't you Jan. "
" Certainly it is. It is fiendish. But employers are fiends
to women."
" I haven't found that soh."
" Ah you keep yours in order, you rule them with a rod
of iron."
" I do. I believe in it."
" I envy you your late hours in the morning."
" Ah-ha — she's had a row about that."
"Have you Mag?"
" Not a row ; simply a discussion."
"What happened?"
" Simply this. The governor begged me — almost in
tears — to come down earlier — for the sake of the dis-
cipline of the office."
"What did you say?"
"I said Herr Epstein; what can I do? How do you
suppose I can get up, have breakfast and be down here
before eleven? "
"What did he say?"
He protested and implored and offered to pay cabs for
me.
" Good Lord Mag, you are extraordinary."
" I am not extraordinary and it is no concern of the
Deity's. I fail to see why I should get to the office earlier
than I do. I don't get my letters before half -past eleven.
i 9 o THE TUNNEL
I am fresh and gay and rested, I get through my work be-
fore closing-time. I work like anything whilst I am there."
" And you still go down at eleven? "
" I still go down at eleven."
" I do envy you. You see my people always want me
most first thing in the morning. It's awful, if one has been
up very late."
"And what is our life worth without late hours? The
evening is the only life we have."
" Exactly. And they are the same really. They do their
work to be free of it and live."
" Precisely ; but they are waited on. They have their
houses and baths and servants and meals and comforts.
We get up in cold rooms untended and tired. They ought
to be first at the office and wait upon us."
" She is a queen in her office ; waited upon hand and
foot."
"Well — why not? I do them the honour of bringing
my bright petunia clad feminine presence into their dingy
warehouse ; I expect some acknowledgment of the honour."
" You don't allow them either to spit or swear."
"I do not; and they appreciate it."
" Mine are beasts. I defy anyone to do anything with
them. I loathe the city man."
Miriam sighed. In neither of these offices she felt sure,
could she hold her own — and yet compared to her own
long day — what freedom the girls had — ten to five and
eleven to six and any clothes they found it convenient to
wear. But city men ... no restrictions were too high a
price to pay for the privileges of her environment ; the
association with gentlemen, her quiet room, the house, the
perpetual interest of the patients, the curious exciting
streaks of social life, linking up with the past and carrying
the past forward on a more generous level. The girls had
THE TUNNEL 191
broken with the past and were fighting in the world. She
was somehow between two worlds, neither quite sheltered,
nor quite free . . . not free as long as she wanted, in spite
of her reason to stay on at Wimpole Street and please the
people there. Why did she want to stay? What future
would it bring? Less than ever was there any chance of
saving for old age. She could not for ever go on being
secretary to a dentist. . . . She drove these thoughts away ;
they were only one side of the matter; there were other
things ; things she could not make clear to the girls ; nor
to anyone who could not see and feel the whole thing from
inside, as she saw and felt it. And even if it were not so,
if the environment of her poorly paid activities had been
trying and unsympathetic, at least it gave seclusion, her own
room to work in, her free garret and her evening and
week-end freedom. But what was she going to do with
it?
" Tell us about the shoiv, Miriam. Cease to gaze at Jan's
relations ; sit down, light a cigarette."
" These German women fascinate me," said Miriam
swinging round from the mantelshelf ; they are so like Jan
and so utterly different."
" Yes ; Jan is Jan and they are Minna and Erica."
Taking a cigarette from Mag's case Miriam lit it at the
lamp. Before her eyes the summer unrolled — concerts
with Miss Szigmondy, going in the cooling day in her new
clothes, with a thin blouse, from daylight into electric
light and music, taking off the zouave inside and feeling
cool at once, the electric light mixing with the daylight,
the cool darkness to walk home in alone, full of music
that would last on into the next day ; Miss Szigmondy's
musical at homes, evenings at Wimpole Street, week-ends
in the flowery suburbs windows and doors open, cool rooms,
gardens in the morning and evening, week-ends in the
i 9 2 T H E T U N N E L
country, each journey like the beginning of the summer
holiday, week-ends in town, Sunday afternoons at Mr.
Hancock's and Miss Szigmondy's — all taking her away
from Kennett Street. All these things yielded their best
reality in this room. Glowing brightly in the distance they
made this room like the centre of a song. But a week-end
taken up was a week-end missed at Kennett Street. It
meant missing Slater's on Saturday night, the week end
stretching out ahead immensely long, the long evening with
the girls, its lateness protected by the coming Sunday, wak-
ing lazily fresh and happy and easy-minded on Sunday
morning, late breakfast, the cigarette in the sunlit window
space, its wooden sides echoing with the clamour of St.
Pancras bells, the three voices in the little rooms, irlan-
disches ragout, the hours of smoking and talking out and
out on to strange promontories where everything was real
all the time, the faint gradual coming of the twilight, the
evening untouched by the presence of Monday, no hurry
ahead, no social performances, no leave-taking, no railway
journey.
" Yes ; John is Londonised ; she looks German ; her voice
suggests the whole of Germany ; these girls are Germany
untouched, strong, cheerful, musical, tree-filled Germany,
without any doubts. They've got Jan's sense of humour
without her cynicism."
"Is that so, Jan?"
" Yes I think perhaps it is. They are sweet simple
children." Yes sweet — but maddening too. German
women were so sure and unsuspicious and practical about
life. Jan had some of that left. But she was English too,
more transparent and thoughtful.
" The show ! The show ! "
She told them the story of the afternoon in a glowing
precis, calling up the splendours upon which she felt their
THE TUNNEL 193
imaginations at work, describing it as they saw it and as
with them, in retrospect, she saw it herself. Her descrip-
tions drew Mag's face towards her, glowing, wrapt and
reverent. Jan sat sewing with inturned eyes and half open,
half-smiling appreciative face. They both fastened upon
the great gold-framed pictures, asking for details. Pres-
ently they were making plans to visit the Academy and fore-
telling her joy in seeing them again and identifying them.
She had not thought of that; certainly, it would be de-
lightful ; and perhaps seeing the pictures in freedom and
alone she might find them wonderful.
" Why do you say their wives were all like cats ? "
" They were." She called up the unhatted figures mov-
ing about among the guests in trailing gowns, — keeping
something up, pretending to be interested, being cattishly
nice to the visitors, and thinking about other things all the
time. ... I can't stand them, oh, I can't stand them. . . .
But the girls would not have seen them in that way; they
would have been interested in them and their dresses, they
would have admired the prettiness of some of them and
found several of them ' charming ' ... if Mag were an
artist's wife she would behave in the way those women
behaved. . . .
"Were they all sXikef " that was half sarcastic. . . .
" Absolutely. They were all cats, simply."
" Isn't she extraordinary? "
" It's the cats who are extraordinary. Why do they do
it girls! Why do they do it?" She flushed feeling in-
sincere. At this moment she felt that she knew that Mag
in social life, would conform and be a cat. She had never
thought of her in social life; here in poverty and freedom
she was herself.
"Do phwatt me dear?"
" Oh let them go. It makes me tired, even to think of
194 THE TUNNEL
them. The thought of the sound of their voices absolutely
wears me out."
" I'm not laaazy — I'm tie-erd — I was born tie-erd."
" I say girls, I want to ask you something."
" Well ? "
" Why don't you two write ? "
"Write?"
"Write what?"
" Us ? "
" Just as we are, without one " —
"Flea — I know. No. Don't be silly. I'm perfectly
serious. I mean it. Why don't you write things — both
of you. I thought of it this morning."
Both girls sat thoughtful. It was evident that the idea
was not altogether unfamiliar to them.
" Someone kept telling me the other day I ought to write
and it suddenly struck me that if anyone ought it's you
two. Why don't you Mag?"
" Why should I ? Have I not already enough on my fair
young shoulders? "
" Jan, why don't you? "
" I, my dear? For a most excellent reason."
"What reason?" demanded Miriam in a shaking voice.
Her heart was beating; she felt that a personal decision
was going to be affected by Jan's reason, if she could be got
to express it. Jan did not reply instantly and she found
herself hoping that nothing more would be said about
writing, that she might be free to go on cherishing the idea,
alone and unbiassed.
" I do not write " said Jan slowly, " because I am per-
fectly convinced that anything I might write would be
medicore."
Miriam's heart sank. If Jan, with all her German know-
ledge and her wit and experience of two countries felt this,
THE TUNNEL 195
it was probably much truer of herself. To think about
it, to dwell upon the things Mr. Wilson had said was simply
vanity. He had said anyone could learn to write. But he
was clever and ready to believe her clever in the same way,
and ready to take ideas from him. It was true she had
material, " stuff " as he called it, but she would not have
known it, if she had not been told. She could see it now,
as he saw it, but if she wrote at his suggestion, a borrowed
suggestion, there would be something false in it, clever
and false.
" Yes — I think Jan's right," said Mag cheerfully.
" That is an excellent reason and the true one."
It was true. But how could they speak so lightly and
cheerfully about writing . . . the thing one had always
wanted to do, that everyone probably secretly wanted to
do, and the girls could give up the idea without a sigh.
They were right. It would be wrong to write mediocre
stuff. Why was she feeling so miserable? Of course be-
cause neither of them had suggested that she should write.
They knew her better than Mr. Wilson and it never oc-
curred to them that she should write. That settled it.
But something moved despairingly in the void.
" Do you think it would be wrong to write mediocre
stuff ? " she asked huskily.
" It would be worse than wrong child — it would be
foolish; it wouldn't sell."
CHAPTER XI
EVERYTHING was ready for the two o'clock patient.
There was no excuse for lingering any longer. Half
past one. Why did they not come up? On her way to
the door she opened the corner cupboard and stood near
the open door hungry, listening for footsteps on the base-
ment stairs, dusting and ranging the neat rows of bottles.
At the end of five minutes she went guiltily down. If he
had finished his lunch they would wonder why she had
lingered so long. If she had hurried down as soon as she
could no one would have known that she hoped to have
lunch alone. Now because she had waited deliberately
someone would read her guilt. She wished she were one
of those people who never tried to avoid anything. The
lunch-room door opened and closed as she reached the
basement stairs. James's cheerful footsteps clacked along
— neat high-heeled shoes — towards the kitchen. She had
taken something in. They were still at lunch, uncon-
sciously, just in the same way. No. She was glad she was
not one of those people who just went on — not avoiding
things. . . .
Mr. Hancock was only just beginning his second course.
He must have lingered in the workshop. . . . He was help-
ing himself to condiments; Mr. Orly proffered the wooden
pepper mill; "oh — thank you"; he screwed it with an
air of embarrassed appreciativeness. There was a curious
fresh lively air of embarrassment in the room making a
196
THE TUNNEL 197
stirring warmth in its cellar-like coolness. Miriam slipped
quietly into her place hoping she was not an interloper.
At any rate everyone was too much engrossed to ponder
over her lateness. Mr. Orly was sitting with his elbows
on the table and his serviette crumpled in his hands, ready
to rise from the table, beaming mildness and waiting. Mrs.
Orly sat waiting and smiling with her elbows on the table.
" Ah," said Mr. Orly gently as Miriam sat down, "here
comes the clerical staff."
Miriam beamed and began her soup. It was James
waiting to-day too, with her singing manner ; a happy day.
Mrs. Orly asked a question in her happiest voice. They
were fixing a date. . . . They were going ... to a theatre
. . . together. Her astonished mind tried to make them
coalesce . . . she saw them sitting in a row, two different
worlds confronted by one spectacle . . . there was not a
scrap of any kind of performance that would strike them
both in the same way.
"Got anything on on Friday Miss Henderson?"
The sudden question startled her. Had it been asked
twice? She answered, stammering, in amazed conscious-
ness of what was to follow and accepted the invitation in a
flood of embarrassment. Her delight and horror and as-
tonishment seemed to flow all over the table. Desperately
she tried to gather in all her emotions behind an easy ap-
preciative smile. She felt astonishment and dismay com-
ing out of her hair, swelling her hands, making her clumsy
with her knife and fork. Far away, beyond her grasp
was the sense she felt she ought to have, the sense of be-
longing; socially. It was being offered. But something
or someone was fighting it. Always, everywhere someone
or something was fighting it.
Mr. Orly had given a ghostly little chuckle. " Like
dining at restaurants?" he asked kindly and swiftly.
198 THE TUNNEL
" I don't think I ever have."
" Then we shall have the pleasure of initiating you.
Like caviare? "
" I don't even know what it is " said Miriam trying to
bring gladness into her voice.
"Oh — this is great. Caviare to the million eh? — oh,
I ought not to have put it like that, things one would rather
have said otherwise — no offence intended — none taken
I hope — don't yeh know really ? — Sturgeon's roe,
y'know."
"Oh, I know I don't like roe" said Miriam gravely.
" Chalk it up. Miss Henderson doesn't like roe."
Miriam flushed. Pressing back through her anger to
what had preceded she found inspiration.
" My education has been neglected."
" Quite so, but now's your chance. Seize your oppor-
tunity ; carpe diem. See?"
" I thought it was caviare, not carp " said Mr. Hancock
quietly.
Was it a rescue, or a sacrifice to the embarrassing occa-
sion? She had never heard him jest with the Orlys. Mrs.
Orly chuckled gleefully, flashing out the smile that Miriam
loved. It took every line from her care-fashioned face and
lit it with a most extraordinary radiance. She had smiled
like that as a girl in response to the jests of her many
brothers . . . her eyes were sweet ; there was a perfect
sweetness in her somewhere.
" Bravo Hancock, that's a good one. ... Ye gods and
fishes large and small listen to that" he murmured half
turning towards the door.
The clattering of boots on the stone stairs was followed
by the rattling of the loose door knob and the splitting
open of the door. Mr. Leyton shot into the room search-
ing the party with a swift glance and taking his place in
THE TUNNEL 199
the circle in a state of headlong silent volubility. By the
way he attacked his lunch it was clear he had a patient
waiting or imminent. It occurred to Miriam to wonder
why he did not always arrange his appointments round
about lunch-time . . . but any such manoeuvre would be
discovered and things would be worse than ever. Mr.
Orly watched quietly while he refused Mrs. Orly's offer to
ring for soup, devouring bread and butter until she should
have carved for him, — and then extended his invitation
to his son.
" Oh, is this the annual ? " asked Mr. Leyton gruffy.
"What's the show?"
" My dear will you be so good as to inform Mr. Leyton
of "
" Don't be silly Ro " said Mrs. Orly trying to laugh
" we're going to Hamlet Ley."
" We have the honour of begging Mr. Leyton's company
on the occasion of our visit, dinner included, to
" What's the date ? " rapped Mr. Leyton with his tumbler
to his lips.
" The date, ascertained as suited to all present with the
exception of your lordship — oh my God, Ley " sighed Mr.
Orly hiding his face in his serviette, his huge shoulders
shaking.
" What have I done now ? " asked Mr. Leyton, gasping
after his long drink.
" Don't be so silly Ley. You haven^ answd fathez
queshun."
" How can I answer till I'm told the date?"
" Don't be silly, you can come any evening."
" Friday " whispered Miriam.
"What?" said Mr. Orly softly, emerging from his
serviette, " a traitor in the camp? "
aoo THE TUNNEL
" Friday is it ? Well, then it's pretty certain I can't
come."
" Don't be silly Ley — you haven't any engagements."
"Haven't I? There's a sing-song at Headquarters Fri-
day."
" Enough, my dear, enough, press him no more " said
Mr. Orly rising. " Far be it from us to compete. Going
to sing Ley or to song, eh? Never mind boy, sorry you
can't come " he added, sighing gustily as he left the room.
" You'll be able to come Ley won't you ? " whispered
Mrs. Orly impatiently lingering.
"If you'd only let me know the date beforehand instead
of springing it on me."
" Don't be si'y Ley it vexes Father so. You needn't go
to the si'y sing-song."
" I don't see how I can get out of it. It's rather a big
function ; as an officer I ought to be there."
" Oh never mind ; you'd better come."
Mr. Orly called from the stairs.
" All right darling " she said in anxious cheerful level
tones hurrying to the door. " You must come Ley, you
can manage somehow."
Miriam sat feeling wretchedly about in her mind. Mr.
Leyton was busily finishing his lunch. In a moment Mr.
Hancock would re-assert himself by some irrelevant in-
sincerity. She found courage to plunge into speech, on
the subject of her two lessons at the school. Her story
strove strangely against the echoes and fell, impeded. It
was an attempt to create a quiet diversion. ... It should
have been done violently . . . how many times had she
seen it done, the speaker violently pushing off what had
gone before and protruding his diversion, in brisk animated
deliberately detached tones. But it was never really any
good. There was always a break and a wound, something
THE TUNNEL 201
left unhealed, something standing unlearned . . . some-
thing that can only grow clear in silence. . . .
" You'll never learn cycling like that " said Mr. Leyton
with the superior chuckle of the owner of a secret, as he
snatched up a biscuit and made off. She clung fearfully
to his cheerful harassed departing form. There was noth-
ing left now in the room but the echoes. Mr. Hancock sat
munching his bircuits and cheese with a look of determined
steely preoccupation in his eyes that were not raised above
the level of the spread of disarray along the table; but she
could hear the busy circulation of his thoughts. If now
she could endure for a moment. But her mind flung
hither and thither seeking with a loathed servility some
alien neutral topic. She knew anything she might say with
the consciousness of his thoughts in her mind would be
resented and slain. To get up and go quietly away with
some murmured remark about her work would be to leave
him with his judgment upon her. What he wanted was
to give her an instruction about something in a detached
professional voice and get rid of her, believing that she had
gone unknowing, and remaining in his circle of reasonable
thoughts. She hit out with all her force, coming against
the buttress of silent angry forehead with random speech.
" I can't believe that it's less than two months to the
longest day."
" Time flies " responded Mr. Hancock grimly. She re-
coiled exhausted by her effort and quailed under the pang
in the midday gaslit room of realisation of the mean-
ing of her words. Her eye swept over the grey-clad form
and the blunted features seeking some power that would
stay the inexorable consumption of the bright passing days.
" ' Tempus fugit ' I suppose one ought to say " he said
with a little laugh getting up.
" Oui," said Miriam angrily, " le temps s'envole ; die
Zeit vergeht, in other words."
CHAPTER XII
RUNNING upstairs to Mr. Hancock's room a quarter
of an hour before his arrival in the morning Miriam
found herself wishing that she lived altogether at Wimpole
Street. They were all so kind. Life would be simplified
if she could throw in her lot with them. Coming in to
breakfast after the lesson had been a sort of home-coming.
There were pleasant noises about the house ; the family
shouted carelessly to each other on the stairs, the school-
boy slid down the banisters ; the usual subdued manner
of the servants was modified by an air of being a possession
of the house and liking it. They rushed quietly and happily
about. The very aroma of the coffee seemed tranquilly
to feed one. At breakfast everyone was cheerful and kind.
It was home. They were so sympathetic and amused over
the adventure. The meeting in the freshness of the morn-
ing made everything easier to handle. It gave the morn-
ing a beginning and shed its brightness over the professional
hush that fell upon the house at nine o'clock. It would
make lunch-time more easy ; and at the end of the day,
if asked, she would join the family party again.
While Mr. Hancock was looking through his letters she
elaborately suppressed a yawn.
" How did you get on ? " he asked, with prompt amuse-
ment, his eyes on a letter.
"Well, I couldn't get off ; that was just it" murmured
Miriam quietly, enjoying her jest ; how strong she felt
after her good breakfast. . . .
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THE TUNNEL 203
He turned an amused enquiring face and they both
laughed.
Everything in the room was ready for the day's work.
She polished the already bright set of forceps with a
luxurious sense of leisure.
" It was perfectly awful. When we got to the Inner
Circle Mr. Leyton simply put me on the bicycle and sent
me off. He rode round the other way and I had to go on
and on. He scorched about and kept passing me."
Mr. Hancock waited smiling for the more that stood in
her struggling excited voice.
" There were people going round on horse-back and a
few other people on bicycles."
" I expect they all gave you a pretty wide berth."
" They did; except one awful man, an old gentleman
sailing along looking at nothing."
"What happened?" laughed Mr. Hancock delightedly.
" It was awful, I was most fearfully rude — I shouted
' Get out of the way ' and / was on the wrong side of the
road; but miles off, only I knew I couldn't get back I had
forgotten how to steer."
"What did he do?"
" He swept round me looking very frightened and dis-
turbed."
"Hadn't you a bell?"
" Yes, but it meant sliding my hand along. I daren't
do that ; nobody seemed to want it, they all glided about ;
they were really awfully nice. I had to go on because I
couldn't get off. I can wobble along, but I can't mount
or dismount. I was never so frightened in my life."
" I'm afraid you've had a very drastic time."
" I fell off in the end I was so dead beat."
" But this is altogether too drastic. Where was Ley-
ton?"
20 4 T H E T U N N E L
" Rushing round and round meeting me and then over-
taking me, startling me out of my wits by ringing behind
for me to get to the side. Nobody else did that. It was
awfully kind. I went tacking about from side to side."
" I'm afraid you've had a very drastic time. I think
you'd better come up this evening and learn getting on and
off on the lawn ; that's the way to do it."
" Oh " said Miriam gratefully ; " but I have no machine.
Mrs. Orly lent me hers."
" I daresay we can hire a machine."
CHAPTER XIII
MIRIAM found it difficult to believe that the girl
was a dental secretary. She swept about among
Miss Szigmondy's guests in a long Liberty dress, her hands
holding her long scarf about her person as if she were
waiting for a clear space to leap or run, staying nowhere,
talking here and there with the assurance of a successful
society woman, laughing and jesting, swiftly talking down
the group she was with and passing on with a shouted
remark about herself as she had done in the library on the
night of Lord Kelvin's lecture. ..." I'm tired of being
good ; I'm going to try being naughty for a change." Mr.
Hancock had stood planted before her in laughing admira-
tion, waiting for the next thing that she might say. How
could he of all men in the world be taken out of himself
by an effective trick? He had laughed more spontaneously
than Miriam had ever seen him do. What zvas this effective
thing? An appearance of animation. That it seemed,
could make any man, even Mr. Hancock, if it were free
from any suggestion of loudness or vulgarity, stand gaping
and disarmed. Why had he volunteered the information
that she was eighteen and secretary to his friend in Harley
Street. " You don't seem very keen " ; that was her voice
from the other end of the room ; using the new smart word
with a delicate emphasis, pretending interest in something,
meaning nothing at all. She was a middle-aged woman,
she would never be older than she was now. She saw
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nothing and no one, nor ever would. In all her life she
would never be arrested by anything. Nice kind people
would call her " a charming girl." ..." Charming girls "
were taught to behave effectively and lived in a brilliant
death, dealing death all round them. Nothing could live in
their presence. No natural beauty, no spectacle of art, no
thought, no music. They were uneasy in the presence of
these things, because their presence meant cessation of
"charming" behaviour — except at such moments as they
could use the occasion to decorate themselves. They had
no souls. Yet in social life nothing seemed to possess any
power but their surface animation.
There was real power in that other woman. Her strong
young comeliness was good, known to be good. It was
strange that a student of music should be known for her
work among the poor. The serene large outlines of her
form gave out light in the room; and the light on her
white brow unconscious above her deliberately kind face
was the loveliest thing to be seen; the deliberately kind
face spoiled it, and would presently change it ; unless some
great vision came to her it would grow furrowed over " the
housing problem " and the face would dry up, its white
life cut off at a source; at present she was at the source;
one could tell her anything. Mr. Hancock recognised her
goodness, spoke of her with admiration and respect. What
was she doing here, among all these worldly musicians?
She would never be a musician, never a first-class musician.
Then she had ambition. She was poor. Someone was
helping her . . . Miss Szigmondy! Why? She must
know she would never make a musician. Miriam cowered
in her corner. The good woman was actually going to
sing before all these celebrities. What a fine great free
voice. ..." When shall we meet — refined and free,
THE TUNNEL 207
amongst the moorland brack-en . . ." if Mr. Hancock could
have heard her sing that, surely his heart must have gone
out to her? She knew, to her inmost being, what that
meant. She longed for cleansing fires, even she with her
radiant forehead ; her soul flew out along the sustained
notes towards its vision, her dark eyes were set upon it
as she sang, the clear tones of her voice called to the com-
panion of her soul for the best that was in him. She was
the soul of truth, countering no cost. She would attain her
vision, though the earthly companion she longed for might
pass her by. The pure beauty of the moorland would re-
main for her, would set itself along the shores of her life
forever. . . .
But she could not sing. It was the worst kind of Eng-
lish singing, all volume and emphasis and pressure. Was
there that in her goodness too . . . deliberate kindness to
everybody. Was that a method — just a social method?
She was one of those people about whom it would be said
that she never spoke ill of anyone. But was not indis-
criminate deliberate conscious goodness to everybody an
insult to humanity ? People who were like that never knew
the difference between one person and another. ' Philan-
thropic ' people were never sympathetic. They pitied.
Pity was not sympathy. It was a denial of something. It
assumed that life was pitiful. Yet her clear eyes would see
through anything, any evil thing to the human being be-
hind. But she knew it, and practised it like a doctor. She
had never been amazed by the fact that there were any
human beings at all . . . and with all her goodness she had
plans and ambitions. She wanted to be a singer — and
she was thinking about somebody. Men were dazzled by
the worldly little secretary and they reverenced the singer
and her kind. Irreligious men would respect religion for
208 THE TUNNEL
her sake — and would wish, thinking of her, to live in a
particular kind of way ; but she would never lead a man to
religion because she had no thoughts and no ideas.
The surprise of finding these two women here and the
pain of observing them was a just reward for having come
to Miss Szigmondy's At Home without a real impulse —
just to see the musicians and to be in the same room with
them. All that remained was to write to someone about
them by name. There was nothing to do but mention their
names. There was no wonder about them. They were
all fat. Not one of them was an artist and they all hated
each other. It was like a ballad concert. They all sang
in the English way. They were not in the least like the
instrumentalists; or St. James's Hall Saturday afternoon
audiences, not that kind of "queer soft lot"; not shadowy
grey or dead white or with that curious transparent look ;
they all looked ruddy or pink, and sleek; they had the
same sort of kindly commonsense as Harriett's Lord and
Lady Bollingdon . . . perhaps to keep a voice going it was
necessary to be fat.
CHAPTER XIV
' T T was simply heavenly going off — all standing in the
J_ hall in evening dress while the servants blew for
hansoms. I wore my bridesmaid's dress with a piece of
tulle arranged round the top of the bodice. It was wrong
at the back so I had to sit very carefully the whole evening
to prevent it going up like a muffler, but never mind; it
was heavenly I tell you. We bowled off down through
the west-end in three hansoms one behind the other, in
the dark. You know the gleam and shine inside a hansom
sprinting along a dark empty street where the lamps are
few and dim; (see 'The Organist's Daughter') and then
came the bright streets all alight and full of dinner and
theatre people in evening dress in hansoms and you kept
getting wedged in between other hanjsoms with people
talking and laughing all round you ; and it took about ten
minutes to get from the end of Regent Street across to
the other side of Piccadilly where we dined in wicked
Rupert Street. Just as the caviare was brought in we heard
that the Prince of Wales had won the Derby. Shakespeare
is extraordinary. I had no idea Hamlet was so full of
quotations."
Miriam flushed heavily as the last words ran automatically
from her pen. The sense of the richly moving picture that
had filled her all the morning and now kept her sitting
happily under the hot roof at her small dusty table in the
full breadth of Saturday afternoon would be gone if she
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210 THE TUNNEL
left that sentence. She felt a curious painful shock at the
tips of her ringers as she re-read it; a current singing within
her was driven back by it. . . . Mrs. Orly's face had been
all alive and alight when she had leant forward across
Mr. Hancock and said the words that had seemed so mean-
ingless and irritating. Perhaps she too had felt something
she wanted to express and had lost it at that moment. Cer-
tainly both she and Mr. Orly would feel the beauty of
Shakespeare. But the words had shattered the spell of
Shakespeare and writing them down like that was spoiling
the description of the evening, though Harriett would not
think so.
But anyhow the letter would not do for Harriett — even
if words could be found to express " Shakespeare." That
would not interest Harriett. She would think the effort
funny and Miriamish but it would not mean anything to
her. She had been to Shakespeare because she adored Ellen
Terry and put up with Irving for her sake. . . . People
in London seemed to think that Irving was just as great
as Ellen Terry. . . . Perhaps now Irving would seem
different. Perhaps Irving was great. ... I will go and
hear Irving in Shakespeare ... no money and no theatres
except with other people. . . . The rest of the letter would
simply hurt Harriett, because it would seem like a re-
flection on theatres with her. Theatres with her had
had a magic that last night could not touch . . . sitting
in the front row of the pit, safely in after the long wait,
the walls of the theatre going up, softly lit buff and gold,
fluted and decorated and bulging with red curtained boxes,
the clear view across the empty stalls of the dim height
of fringed curtain hanging in long straight folds, the cer-
tainty that Harriett shared the sense of the theatre, that
for her too when the orchestra began the great motion-
less curtain shut them in in a life where everything else in
THE TUNNEL 211
the world faded away and was forgotten, the sight of the per-
fection of happiness on Harriet's little buff-shadowed face,
the sudden running ripple, from side to side, of the igniting
footlights . . . the smoothly clicking rustle of the with-
drawing curtain . . . the magic square of the lit scene . . .
the daily growth of the charm of these things during that
week when they had gone to a theatre every night, so that on
looking back the being in the theatre with the certainty of
the moving changing scenes ahead was clearer than either
of the plays they had seen. . . . She sat staring through the
open lattice. . . . The sound of the violin from the house
down the street that had been a half-heard obligato to her
vision of last night came in drearily, filling the space whence
the vision had departed, with uneasy questions. She turned
to her letter to recapture the impulse with which she had
sat down. ... If she turned it into a letter to Eve, all the
description of the evening would have to be changed ; Eve
knew all about grandeurs, with the Greens large country
house and their shooting-boxes and visits to London hotels ;
the bright glories must go — overwhelming and unex-
pressed. Why did that make one so sad ? Was it because it
suggested that one cared more for the gay circumstances
than for the thing seen ? What was it they had seen ? Why
had they gone? What was Shakespeare? Her vision re-
turned to her as she brooded on this fresh problem. The
whole scene of the theatre was round her once more ; she
was sitting in the half darkness gazing at the stage. What
had it been for her ? What was it that came from the stage ?
Something — real ... to say that drove it away. She
looked again and it clustered once more, alive. The gay
flood of the streets, the social excitements and embarrass-
ments of the evening were a conflagration ; circling about
the clear bright kernel of moving lights and figures on the
stage. She gazed at the bright stage. Moments came
ai2 THE TUNNEL
sharply up, grouped figures, spoken words. She held them,
her contemplation aglow with the certainty that something
was there that set her alight with love, making her whole
in the midst of her uncertainty and ignorance. Words and
phrases came, a sentence here and there that had suddenly
shaped and deepened a scene. Perhaps it was only in see-
ing Shakespeare acted that one could appreciate him? But
it was not the acting. No one could act. They all just
missed it. It was all very well for Mag to laugh. They
did just miss it. . , , "Why, my child? In what way?"
" They act at the audience, they take their cues too quickly
and have their emotions too abruptly ; and from outside not
inside." " But if they felt it at all, all the time, they would
go mad or die." " No, they would not. But even if they
did not feel it, if they looked, it would be enough. They
don't look at the thing they are doing." It was not the
acting. Nor the play. The characters of the story were al-
ways tiresome. The ideas, the wonderful quotations if you
looked closely at them were everyone's ideas ; things that ev-
erybody knew. To read Shakespeare carefully all through
would only be to find all the general things somewhere or
other. But that did not matter. Being ignorant of him and
of history did not matter, as long as you heard him.
Poetry! The poetry of Shakespeare . . . ? Primers of
literature told one that. It did not explain the charm.
Just the sound. Music. Like Beethoven. Bad acting can-
not spoil Shakespeare. Bad playing cannot destroy Bee-
thoven. It was the sound of Shakespeare that made the
scenes real — that made Winter's Tale, so long ago and so
bewildering, remain in beauty. ..." Dear Eve, Shakes-
peare is a sound . . ." She tore up the letter. The next
time she wrote to Eve she must remember to say that.
The garret was stifling. Away from the brilliant window
the room was just as hot; the close thick smell of dust sick-
THE TUNNEL 213
ened her. She came back to the table, sitting as near as
possible to the open. The afternoon had been wasted try-
ing to express her evening and nothing had been expressed.
The thought of last night was painful now. She had spoiled
it in some way. Her heart beat heavily in the stifling room.
Her head ached and her eyes were tired. She was too tired
to walk ; and there was no money ; barely enough for next
week's A.B.C. suppers. There was no comfort. It was
May ... in a stuffy dusty room. May. Her face quiv-
ered and her head sank upon the hot table.
CHAPTER XV
NEARLY all the roses were half-opened buds ; firm
and stiff. Larger ones put in here and there gave
the effect of mass. Closest contemplation enhanced the
beauty of the whole. Each rose was perfect. The radiant
mass was lovely throughout. The body of the basket
curved firmly away to its slender hidden base; the smooth
sweep of the rim and the delicate high arch of the handle
held the roses perfectly framed. It was a perfect gift. . . .
Tt had been quite enough to have the opportunity of doing
little things for Mrs. Berwick . . . the surprise of the
roses. The surprise of them. Roses, roses, roses ... all
the morning they had stood, making the morning's work
happy ; visible all over the room. Everyone in the house
had had the beautiful shock of them. And they were still
as they had been when they had been gathered in the dew.
If they were in water by the end of the afternoon the buds
would revive and expand . . . even after the hours in the
Lyceum. If they were thrown now into the waste-paper
basket it would not matter. They would go on being per-
fect — to the end of life. "And as long; as my heart is
bea-ting ; as long ; as my eyes ; have ; tears."
Winthrop came up punctually at one o'clock as he had
promised. " It would save you comin' down if I was to
ph-come up." It would go on then. He had thought about
it and meant to do it. She opened the cash box quickly and
214
THE TUNNEL 215
deftly in her gratitude and handed him his four sovereigns
and the money for the second mechanic and the apprentices.
He waited gently while she counted it out. Next Saturday
she would have it ready for him. " Thank you Miss ;
ph — ph Good afternoon " he said cheerfully. " Good after-
noon Mr. Winthrop " she responded busily with all her heart
and listened as he clattered away downstairs. A load was
lifted from Saturday mornings, for good. No more going
down to run the gauntlet of the row of eyes and get herself
along the bench, depositing the various sums. Nothing in
future but the letters, the overhauling of Mr. Hancock's
empty surgery, the easy lunch with Mr. Leyton, and the
week-end. She entered the sums in the petty cash book.
There was that. They would always be that week after
week. But to-day the worrying challenge of is disappeared
in the joy of the last entry. " Self " she wrote, the light
across the outspread prospect of her life steadying and
deepening as she wrote, " one pound, five." The five, writ-
ten down, sent a thrill from the contemplated page. Taking
the customary sovereign from the cash-box she placed it
carefully in the middle pocket of her purse and closed the
clip. The five shillings she distributed about the side-pock-
ets; half a crown, a shilling, two sixpenny bits and six cop-
pers. The purse was full of money. By September she
would have about four pounds five in hand and two pounds
ten of her month's holiday money still unspent ; six pounds
fifteen ; she could go to a matinee every week and still have
about half the four pounds five ; about four pounds fifteen
altogether ; enough to hire a bicycle for the month and buy
some summer blouses for the holiday. . . . She pocketed
the heavy purse. Why was there always a feeling of guilt
about a salary? It was the same every week. The life at
Wimpole Street was so full and so interesting; she was
learning so much and seeing so much Salary was out of
216 THE TUNNEL
place — a payment for leading a glorious life, naif of which
was entirely her own. The extra five shillings was a present
from the Orlys and Mr. Hancock. She could manage on
the pound. The new sum was wealth, superfluity. They
would expect more of her in future. Surely it would be
possible to give more ; with so much money ; to find the spirit
to come punctually at nine ; always to have everything in
complete readiness in all three surgeries ; to keep all the books
up to date. . . . But they would not have given her the rise
at the end of five months if they had not felt she was worth
it. . . . It would make all the difference to the summer.
Hopefully she took a loose sheet of paper and made two
lists of the four pages of the week's entries — dissecting
them under the heads of workshop and surgery. About
fifteen pounds had been spent. Again and again with heat-
ing head she added her pages of small sums, getting each
time slightly different results, until at last they balanced
with the dissected lists — twice in succession. The hall
clock struck one and Mr. Leyton came downstairs rattling
and rattled into her room. " How d'you like this get up? "
The general effect of the blue grey uniform and brown
leather belt and bandolier was pleasing " Oh, jolly " she said
abstractedly to his waiting figure. He clattered downstairs
to lunch. Everybody had outside interests. Mr. Hancock
would be on the Broads by now. Her afternoon beckoned,
easy with the superfluity of money. Anxiously she counted
over the balance in the cash box. It was two and nine-
pence short. Damnation. Damnation. " Put it down to
stamps — or miscellanea ; not accounted for." She looked
back through her entries. Stamps, one pound, at the be-
ginning of the week. Stamps, ten shillings yesterday. It
could not be that. It was some carlessness — something
not entered — or a miscalculation. Something she had paid
out to the workshop in the middle of a rush and forgotten
THE TUNNEL 217
to put down. She went back through her entries one by
one with flaring cheeks ; recovering the history of the week
and recalling incidents. Nothing came that would account
for the discrepancy. It was simply a mistake. Something
had been put down wrong. The money had been spent.
But was it a workshop or a surgery expense that had gone
wrong? " Postage etc.: two and nine," would make it all
right — but the account would not be right. Either the
workshop or the surgery account must suffer. It would
be another of those little inaccurate spots that came every
few weeks ; that she would always have to remember . . .
her mind toiled, goaded and hot. . . . Mr. Orly had bor-
rowed five pounds to buy tools at Buck and Hickman's
and come back with the money spent and some of the tools
to be handed to the practice. Perhaps it was in balancing
that up that the mistake had occurred ... or the electric
lamp account; some for the house, some for the practice
and some for the workshop. Thoroughly miserable she
made a provisional entry of the sum against surgery in pen-
cil and left the account unbalanced. Perhaps on Monday
it would come right. When the ledgers were all in place
and the safe and drawers locked she stretched her limbs and
forced away her misery. The roses reproached her, but
only for a moment. They understood, in detail, as clearly
as she did, all the difficulties. They took her part. Stand-
ing there waiting, they too felt that there was nothing now
but lunch and Irving.
With the basket of roses over her arm she walked as
rapidly as possible down to Oxford Circus taking the first
turning out of Wimpole Street to hurry the more secretly
and conveniently. A 'bus took her to Charing Cross where
she jumped off as soon as it began pulling up and ran
218 THE TUNNEL
down the Strand. As soon as she felt herself flying to-
wards her bourne the fears that last week's magic would
have disappeared left her altogether. Last week had been
wonderful, an adventure her first deliberate piece of daring
in London. Inside the theatre the scruples and the daring
had been forgotten. To-day again everything would be
forgotten, everything; to-day's happiness was more secure;
it would not mean going almost foodless over the week-
end and without an egg for supper all next week ; there
was no anticipation of disapproving eyes in the theatre
this week ; the sense of the impropriety of going alone
had gone ; it would never return ; the feeling of selfishness
in spending money on a theatre alone was still there, but a
voice within answered that — saying that there was no one
at hand to go and no one she knew who would find at the
Lyceum performance just what she found, no one to whom
it would mean much more than a theatre ; like any other
theatre and a play, amongst other plays, with a celebrated
actor taking the chief part . . . except Mag. Mag had
been with her as she gazed. Mag was with her now. Mag,
fulfilling one or other of her exciting Saturday afternoon
engagements would sit at her side.
Easy and happy she fled along . . . her heart greeting
each passenger in the scattered throng she threaded, her
eyes upon the traffic in the roadway. A horseless broug-
ham went by, moving smoothly and silently amongst the
noisy traffic — the driver looked as though he were fastened
to the front of the vehicle, a little tin driver on a clock-
work toy ; there was nothing between him and the road
but the platform of the little tank on which his feet were
set. He looked as if he were falling off. If anything
ran into him there was nothing to protect him. It left
an uncomfortable memory ... it would only be for car-
riages ; the well-loved horse omnibuses would go on . . .
THE TUNNEL 219
it must be somewhere near here ..." Lyceum Pit," there
it was, just ahead, easily discernible. Last week when
she had had to ask, she had not noticed the words printed
on the side of the passage that showed as you came down
the Strand. The pavement was clear for a moment and
she rounded the near angle and ran home down the passage
without slackening her pace, her half-crown ready in her
hand, a Lyceum pittite.
3
The dark pit seemed very full as she entered the door
at the left hand corner ; dim forms standing at the back
told her there were no seats left ; but she made her way
across to the right and down the incline hoping for a
neglected place somewhere on the extreme right. Her
vain search brought her down to the barrier and the end
of her inspection of the serried ranks of seated forms to
her left swept her eyes forward. She was just under the
overhanging balcony of the dress-circle ; the well of the
theatre opened clear before her as she stood against the
barrier, the stalls half full and filling with dim forms gliding
in right and left, the upward sweep of the theatre walls
covered with boxes from which white faces shone in the
gloom, a soft pervading saffron light, bright light heavily
screened. There was space all round her, the empty gang-
way behind, the gangway behind the stalls just in front
of the barrier, the view clear away to the stage over the
heads of the people sitting in the stalls. . . . Why not
stay here? If people stood at the back of the pit they might
stand in front. She retreated into the angle made by the
out-curving wall of the pit and the pit barrier. Putting
down the basket of roses on the floor at her side she leaned
against the barrier with her elbows on its rim.
220 THE TUNNEL
He was there before he appeared ... in the orchestra,
in the audience, all over the house. Presently, in a few
moments he was going to appear, moving and speaking on
the stage. Someone might come forward and announce
that he was ill or dead. He would die ; perhaps only years
hence; but long before one was old . . . death of Henry
Irving. No more thoughts of that; he is there — perhaps
for twenty years ; coming and going, having seasons at the
Lyceum. He knew he must die ; he did not think about it.
He would turn with a smile and go straight up, in a rosy
chariot . . . well done thou good and faithful and happy
servant. He would go, closing his eyes upon the vision
that was always in them, something they saw, something
they gave out every moment. Whom the gods love die
young . . . not always young in years, but young always ;
trailing clouds of glory. It is always the unexpected that
happens. Things you dread never happen. That is
Weber — or Meyerbeer. Who chooses the music? Perhaps
he does.
The orchestration brought back last week's performance.
It was all there, behind the curtain. Shylock, swinging
across the stage with his halting dragging stride ; halting,
standing with bent head ; shut-in, lonely sweetness. She
looked boldly now, untrammelled in her dark corner at the
pictures which had formed part of her distant view all last
week in the far-away life at Wimpole Street; the great
scenes . . . beautifully staged; "Irving always stages
everything perfectly " — and battled no longer against her
sympathy for Shylock. It no longer shocked her to find
herself sharing something of his longing for the blood of
the Christians. It was wrong; but were not they too
THE TUNNEL 221
wrong? They must be; there must be some reason for
this certainty of sympathy with Shylock and aversion from
Bassanio. It might be a wrong reason, but it was there
in her. Mag said " that's his genius ; he makes you sym-
pathise even with Shylock. . . ." He shows you that you
do sympathise with Shylock ; Mag thinks that is something
to admit shamefacedly. Because those other people were
to her just "people." Bassanio — was it not just as
wrong to get into debt and raise money from the Jews
as to let money out on usury? But it was his friend. He
was innocent Never mind. They were all, all, smug and
complacent in their sunshine. Polished lustful man, with
his coarse lustful men friends. Portia and Nerissa were
companions in affliction. Beautiful first of all ; as lovely
and wandering and full of visions as Shylock until their
lovers came. Hearn was right. English lovers would
shock any Japanese. Not that the Japanese were prudish.
According to him they were anything but . . . they would
not talk as Englishmen did among themselves and in mixed
society in a sort of code ; thinking themselves so clever ;
anyone could talk a code who chose to descend to a me-
chanical trick.
How much more real was the relation between Portia
and Nerissa than between either of the sadly jesting women
and their complacently jesting lovers. Did a man ever
speak in a natural voice — neither blustering, nor display-
ing his cleverness, nor being simply a lustful slave?
Women always despise men under the influence of passion
or fatigue. What horrible old men those two would be —
still speaking in put on voices to hide their shame, pompous
and philosophising. ..." Man's love is of man's life a
thing apart . . ." so much the worse for man ; there must
be something very wrong with his life. But it would go
on until men saw and admitted this. . . . Portia was right
222 THE TUNNEL
when she preached her sermon — it made everyone feel
sorry for all harshness — then one ought not to be harsh
to the blindness of men . . . somebody had said men would
lose all their charm if they lost their vanity and childish
cocksureness about their superiority — to force and brow-
beat them into seeing themselves would not help — but
that is what I want to do. I am like a man in that, over-
bearing, bullying, blustering. I am something between a
man and a woman ; looking both ways. But to pretend one
did not see through a man's voice would be treachery.
Nearly all men will hate me — because I can't play up for
long. Harshness must go ; perhaps that was what Christ
meant. But Portia only wanted to save Bassanio's life ;
and did it by a trick. It was not a Daniel come to judg-
ment; it showed the folly of law; pettifogging; the abuse
of the letter of the law. She was harsh to Shylock. Which
is most cruel, to take life or to torture the living? The
Christians were so self-satisfied ; going off to their love-
making; that spoiled the play, their future was much more
dark and miserable than the struggle between the sensual
Englishman and the wily Jew. The play ought to have
ended there, with the woman in the cap and gown pleading,
showing something that could not be denied — ye are all
together in one condemnation. In that moment Portia
was great, her red robe shone and lit the world. She ought
to have left them all and gone through all the law courts
of the world; showing up the law. Wit. Woman's wit.
Men at least bowed down to that; though they did not
know what it was. ' Wit ' used to mean knowledge —
" in-wit," conscience. The knowledge of woman is larger,
bigger, deeper, less wordy and clever than that of men.
Certainly. But why do not men acknowledge this? They
talk about mother-love and mother-wit and instinct, as if
they were mysterious tricks. They have no real knowl-
THE TUNNEL 223
edge, but of things ; a sort of superiority they get by being
free to be out in the world amongst things ; they do not un-
derstand people. If a woman is good it is all right; if she
is bad it is all wrong. Cherchez la femme. Then every-
thing in life depends upon women? "A civilisation can
never rise above the level of its women." Perhaps if
women became lawyers they would change things. Women
do not respect law. No wonder, since it is folly, an end-
less play on words. Portia? She had been quite com-
placent about being unkind to the Jew. She had been in-
vented by a man. There was no reality in any of Shake-
speare's women. They please men because they show
women as men see them. All the other things are invisible ;
nothing but their thoughts and feelings about men and
bothers. Shakespeare did not know the meaning of the
words and actions of Nerissa and Portia when they were
alone together, the beauty they knew and felt and saw,
holy beauty everywhere. Shakespeare's plays are ' uni-
versal ' because they are about the things that everybody
knows and hands about, and they do not trouble anybody.
They make everyone feel wise. It isn't what he says it's
the way he says all these things that don't matter and leave
everything out. It's all a sublime fuss.
Italians ! Of course. Well — Europeans. It is the
difference between the Europeans and the Japanese that
Hearn had meant.
5
Then there is tragedy! Things are not simple right
and wrong. There are a million sides to every question;
as many sides as there are people to see and feel them
and in all big national struggles two clear sides, both right
and both wrong. The man who wrote " The Struggle
against Absolute Monarchy " was a Roundhead ; and he
224 THE TUNNEL
made me a Roundhead; Green's History is Roundhead.
I never saw Charles' point of view or thought about it ;
but only of the unjust levies and the dissolution of Parlia-
ment and the dissoluteness of the Court. If I had seen
Irving then it would have made a difference. He could
never have been Cromwell. He is Charles. Things hap-
pen. People tell him things and he cannot understand.
He believes in divine right . . . sweet and gentle, with per-
fect manners for all . . . perfect in private life . . . the
first gentleman in the land, the only person free to have
perfect manners ; the representative of God on earth.
" Decaying feudalism." But they ought not to have killed
him. He cannot understand. He is the scapegoat. Free-
dom looks so fine in your mind. Parliaments and Trial by
Jury and the abolition of the Star Chamber and the triumph
of Cromwell's visionaries. But it means this gentle velvet-
coated figure with its delicate ruffled hands, its sweetness
and courtesy, going with bandaged eyes — to death. Was
there no way out? Must one either be a Royalist or a
Roundhead. Must monarchies decay? Then why did
the Restoration come? What do English people want?
" A limited Monarchy " ; a King controlled by Parlia-
ment. As well not have a King at all. Who would not
rather live with Charles than with Cromwell? Charles
would have entertained a beggar royally. Cromwell was
too busy with "affairs of State" to entertain beggars.
Charles dying for his faith was more beautiful than Crom-
well fighting for his reason. Yet the people must be free ;
there must be justice. Kings ought to be taught differ-
ently. He did not understand. No one believing in divine
right can understand. Was the idea of divine right a mis-
take? Can no one be trusted ? Cromwell's son was a weak
fool. How can a country be ruled? People will never
agree. What ought one to be if one can neither be quite a
THE TUNNEL 225
Roundhead nor quite a Cavalier? They worshipped two
gods. Are there two Gods? . . . Irving . . . walking
gently about inside Charles feeling as he felt the beauty
of the sunlit garden, the delicate clothes, the refinement of
fine living, the charm of perfect association, the rich beauty
of each day as it passed. . . . Charles died with all that in
his eyes, knowing it good. Cromwell was a farmer. Christ
was a carpenter. Christ did not bother about kings.
" Render unto Caesar."
CHAPTER XVI
THEY had walked swiftly and silently along through
the bright evening daylight of the Finchley Road.
Miriam held her knowledge suspended, looking forward
to the enclosure at the end of the few minutes' walk. But
the conservatoire was not enclosed. The clear bright light
flooding the rows and rows of seated summer clad Hamp-
stead people and lighting up every corner of the level square
hall was like the outside evening daylight. The air seemed
as pure as the outside air. She followed Mr. Hancock to
their seats at the gangway end of the fourth row passing
between the sounds echoing thinly from the platform and
the wave of attention sweeping towards the platform from
the massed rows of intelligent faces. As they sat down the
chairman's voice ceased and the lights were lowered ; but
so slightly that the hall was still perfectly exposed and clear.
The people still looked as though they were out of doors
or in their large houses. This was modern improvement —
hard clear light. Their minds and their thoughts and their
lives and their clothes were always in it. She stared at the
screen. A large slide was showing, lit from behind. It
made a sort of stage scenery for the rest of the scene, all
in one light. She fixed her attention. An enormous ves-
sel with its side stove in, yes, " stove in " ; in a dock. They
got information at any rate and then perhaps got free and
thought their own thoughts. No. They would follow
and think and talk intelligently about the information.
226
THE TUNNEL 227
Rattling their cultured voices. Mad with pretences . . .
In dry dock, going to be repaired. Gazing sternly at the
short man with the long pointer talking in an anxious high
thin voice, his head with its upstanding crest of hair half-
turned towards the audience, she suppressed a giggle.
Folding her hands she gazed, shaking in every limb, not
daring to follow what he said for fear of laughing aloud.
Shreds of his first long sentence caught in her thoughts
and gave her his meaning, shaking her into giggles. Her
features quivered under her skin as she held them in forcing
her eyes towards the distances of sky beyond the ship.
Her customary expletives shot through her mind in rapid
succession with each one the scarves and silk and velvet
of the audience grew brighter about the edge of her circle
of vision.
She was an upstart and an alien and here she was. It
was more extraordinary in this Hampstead clarity than
at a theatre or concert in town. It was a part of his
world . . . and theirs ; one might get the manner and still
keep alive. . . . Was he out of humour because he had
realised what he had done or because she had been late for
dinner? Was he thinking what his behaviour amounted
to in the eyes of his aunt and cousins ; even supposing
they did not know that the invitation to dinner and the
lecture had been given only this afternoon? He must have
known it was necessary to go home and tidy up. When
he said the conservatoire was so near that there would be
plenty of time was not that as good as saying she might be
a little late? Why had he not said they were staying with
him? Next week was full of appointments for their teeth.
So he knew they were coming . . . and then to go march-
ing in to the midst of them three quarters of an hour late
228 THE TUNNEL
and to be so dumbfounded as to be unable to apologise
. . . my dear I shall never forget the faces of those women.
I could not imagine at first what was wrong. He was look-
ing so strange. The women barely noticed me — barely
noticed me. " I'm afraid dinner will be spoiled " he said,
in his way. They had all been sitting round the fire three
mortal quarters of an hour waiting for me!" How they
would talk. Their thoughts and feelings about employees
could be seen at a glance. It was bad enough for them to
have a secretary appearing at dinner the first evening of
their great visit. And now they were sitting alone round
the fire and she was at the lecture alone, unchaperoned,
with him, " she had the effrontery to come to dinner three
quarters of an hour late . . ." featherly hair and peri-
winkle eyes and white noses ; gentle die-away voices. Per-
haps the thought of his favourite cousins coming next
week buoyed him up. No wonder he wanted to get away to
the lecture. He had come, reasonably ; not seeing why he
should not; just as he would have gone if they had not
been there. Now he saw it as they saw it. There he sat.
She gazed at the shifting scenes . . . ports and strange
islands in distant seas, sunlit coloured mountains tops
peaking up from forests. The lecturing voice was far
away, irrelevant and unintelligible. Peace flooded her.
CHAPTER XVII
THE patient sat up with a groan of relief. His dark
strong positive liverish profile turned away towards
the spittoon. There was a clean broad gap of neck between
the strong inturned ending of his hair and the narrow strip
of firm heavily glazed blue white collar fitting perfectly
into the collar of the well-cut grey coat clothing the firm
balk of his body. " To my mind there's no reason why
they shouldn't do thoroughly well " he said into the spit-
toon. All the hospitals would employ 'em in the end.
They're more natty and conscientious than men and there's
nothing in the work they can't manage."
" No, I think that's so."
Miriam cleared her throat emphatically. They had no
right to talk in that calm disposing way in the presence of a
woman. Mr. Hancock felt that too. That kind of man
was always nice to women. Strong and cheerful and help-
ing them ; but with his mind full of quotations and general-
isations. He would bring them out anywhere. It would
never occur to him that the statement of them could be
offensive. His newspaper office would be full of little
girls. " It's those little ph'girls." But the Amalgam
Company probably had quite uneducated girls. Nobody
ought to be asked to spend their lives calculating decimal
quantities. The men who lived on these things had their
drudgery done for them. They did it themselves first.
Yes, but then it meant their future. A woman clerk never
229
2 3 o THE TUNNEL
becomes a partner. There was no hope for women in
business. That man's wife would be wealthy and screened
and looked after all her days; he working. He would live
as long as she — a little old slender nut-brown man.
" What was the employment Mr. Dolland was speaking
of?"
" Dispensing. I think he's quite right. And it's not at
all badly paid."
" It ought not to be. Think of the responsibility and
anxiety."
" It's a jolly stiff exam too."
" I like the calm way he talks, as if it were his business
to decide what is suitable."
Mr. Hancock laughed. " He's a very influential man,
you know," he said going to the tube. " Yes? — Oh, show
them up."
Miriam detected the note that meant a trial ahead and
went about her clearing with quiet swift busy sympathy.
Rut Mr. Dolland had been a good introduction to the try-
ing hour. Her thoughts followed his unconsciousness
down to his cab. She saw the spatted boot on the foot-
plate, the neat strong swing of the body, the dip of the
hansom, the darkling face sitting inside under the shiny
hat . . . the room had become dreadful; empty and silent;
pressed full with a dreadful atmosphere; those women
from Rochester — but they always sat still. These people
were making little faint fussings of movement, like the
creakings of clothes in church and the same silent hostile
feeling; people being obliged to be with people. There
were two or three besides the figure in the chair. Mr.
Hancock had got to work with silent assiduity. His face
when he turned to the cabinet was disordered, separate
from the room and from his work ; a most curious expres-
sion. He turned again, busily. It was something in the
THE TUNNEL 231
mouth, resentful, and a bad-tempered look in the eyes;
a look of discomposed youth. Of course. The aunt and
cousins. Had she cut them, standing with her back to the
room, or they her? She moved sideways with her bundle
of cleaned instruments to the cabinet putting them all on
the flap and beginning to open drawers, standing at his
elbow as he stood turned away from the chair mixing a
paste.
" You might leave those there for the present " he mur-
mured. She turned and went down the room between the
unoccupied seated figures, keeping herself alert to respond
to a greeting. They sat vacant and still. Ladies in
church. Acrimonious. Querulously dressed in pretty
materials and colours that would only keep fresh in the
country. She went to the door lingeringly. It was so
familiar. There had been all that at Babington. It was
that that was in these figures straggling home from school,
in pretty successful clothes, walking along the middle of
the sunlit road . . . May-bell deah . . . not balancing
along the row of drain pipes nor pulling streaks of Berk-
shire goody through their lips. This was their next stage.
When she reached the stairs she felt herself wrapped in
their scorn. It was true ; there was something impregnable
about them. They sat inside a little fortress, letting in only
certain people. But they did not know she could see every-
thing inside the fortress, hear all their thoughts much more
clearly than the things they said. To them she was a closed
book. They did not want to open it. But if they had
wanted to they could not have read.
The insolence of it. Her social position had been ident-
ical with theirs and his. Her early circumstances a good
deal more ambitious and generous. . . . ' A moment of my
232 THE TUNNEL
consciousness is wider than any of theirs will be in the
whole of their lives.' ... If she could have stayed in all
that, she would have been as far as possible just the same,
sometimes . . . for certain purposes. A little close group,
loyal and quarrelsome for ends that any woman could see
through. Fawning and flattering and affectionate to each
other and getting half-maddened by the one necessity. The
girls would repeat the history of their mother, and get her
sour faced pretty delicate refinement. They were so ex-
quisite, now, to look at — the flower-like edges of their
faces, unchanging from morning to night ; warmth and
care and cleanliness and rich clean food ; no fatigue or
worry or embarrassment, once they had learned how to sit
and move and eat. To many men they would appear
angels. They would not meet many in the Berkshire val-
ley. But their mother would manoeuvre engagements for
them and their men would see them as angels fresh from
their mother's hands; miracles of beauty and purity. . . .
Refined shrews, turning in circles, like moths on pins ;
brainless, mindless, heartless, the prey of the professions ;
priests, doctors and lawyers. These two groups kept each
other going. There was something hidden in the fact that
these women's men always entered professions.
3
Large portions of the mornings and afternoons of that
week were free from visits to the upstairs surgery. From
Tuesday morning she kept it well filled with supplies ;
guessing that she was to be saved further contact with the
aunt and cousins; and drew from the stimulus of their
comings and goings, the sound of their voices in the hall
and on the stairs a fund of energy that filled her unex-
pected stretches of leisure with unceasing methodical la-
bour. Uninterrupted work on the ledgers awakened her
THE TUNNEL 233
interest in them, the sense that the books were nearly all
up to date, the possibility of catching up altogether before
the end of the week brought a relief and a sense of mastery
that made the June sunshine gay morning after morning
as she tramped through it along the Euston Road. Every
hour was full of a strange excitement. Wide vistas shone
ahead. On the first of September shone a blinding rad-
iance. She would get up that morning in her dusty garret
in the heat and dust of London with nothing to do for a
month ; and ride away, somewhere, ride away through the
streets, free, out to the suburbs, like a Sunday morning ride,
and then into the country. She had weathered the winter
and the strange beginnings and would go away to come
back ; the rest of the summer till then would go dancing,
like a dream. There was all that coming ; making her heart
leap when she thought of it, unknown Wiltshire — with
Leader landscapes for a week and then something else.
And meanwhile Wimpole Street. She went about her work
borne along unwearied upon a tide that flowed out in
glistening sunlit waves over the sunlit shore of the world.
The doors and windows of her cool shaded room opened
upon a life that spread out before her fanwise towards
endless brilliant distances. Moments of fatigue, little ob-
stinate knots and tangles of urgent practical affairs did
their utmost to convince her that life was a perpetual con-
flict, nothing certain and secure but the thwarting and dis-
crediting of the dream-vision ; every contact seemed to
end in an assurance of her unarmed resourceless state.
Pausing now and again to balance her account, to try to
find a sanction for her joy, she watched and felt the little
stabs of the actual facts as they would be summarised by
some disinterested observer, and again and again saw them
foiled. They danced, comically powerless against some
unheard piping; motes, funny and beloved, in the sunbeam
234 T H E T U N N E L
of her life. . . . Next week and the coming of the favourite
cousins made a bright barrier across the future and a little
fence round her labours. Everything must be ordered and
straight before then. She must be free and reproachless
for the wonders and terrors of their visit. . . . Perhaps
there might be only the one meeting; the evening already
arranged might be all the week's visit would bring. The
week would pass unseen by her and everything would be
as before. As before; was not that enough, and more
than enough ?
4
Her rare visits to the surgery were festivals. Free from
the usual daily fatigue of constant standing for reiterated
clearances and cleansings of small sets of instruments, she
swept full of cheerful strength, her mind free for method,
her hands steady and deft, upon the accumulations left by
long sittings, rapping out her commentary upon his pro-
longed endurance by emphatic bumpings of basins and
utensils ; making it unnecessary for him to voice the con-
trolled exasperation that spoke for her from every move-
ment and tone. Once or twice she felt it wavering towards
speech and whisked about and bumped things down with
extra violence. Once or twice he smiled into her angry
face and she feared he was going to speak of them.
CHAPTER XVIII
IT was a sort of formality. They all three seemed to
be waiting for something to begin. They were not
at ease. Perhaps they had come to the end of everything
they had to say to each other and had only the memory
of their common youth to bind them to each other. Mem-
bers of the same family never seemed to be quite at ease
sitting together doing nothing. These three met so seldom
that they were obliged when they met to appear to be
giving their whole attention to each other, sitting con-
fronted and trying to keep talk going all the time. That
made everyone speak and smile and look self-consciously.
Perhaps they reminded each other by their mutual pres-
ence that the dreams of their youth had not been fulfilled.
And the cousins were formal. Like the other cousins they
belonged to the prosperous provincial middle class that al-
ways tries to get its sons into professions. Without the
volume of Sophocles one would have known he was part
of a school and she would have been nothing but the wife
or daughter or sister of an English professional man. It
was always the same world; once the only world that was
worthy of one's envious admiration and respect; changed
now ..." hardworked little text book people and here
and there an enlightened thwarted man." . . . Was Mr.
Canfield thwarted? There was a curious look of lonely
enlightenment about his head. At the University, and
now and again with a head master or a fellow assistant-
master he had had moments of exchange and been happy
235
236 THE TUNNEL
for a moment and seen the world alight. But his happiest
times had been in loneliness, with thoughts coming to him
out of books. They had been his solace and his refuge
since he was fifteen; and in spite of the hair greying his
temples he was still fifteen: within him were all the dreams
and all the dreadful crudities of boyhood ... he had
never grown to man's estate. . . . He had understood at
once. " It always seems unnecessary to explain things
to people ; you feel while you are explaining that they will
meet the same thing themselves, perhaps in some different
form ; but certainly, because things are all the same." " Oh
yes ; that's certainly so." He had looked pleased and
lightened. Darkness and cold had come in an instant with
Mrs. Canfield's unexpected reverent voice. " I don't quite
understand what that means ; tell me." She had put down
her fancy work and lifted her flower-like face, not sus-
piciously as the other cousins would have done, but with
their type of gentle formal refinement and something of
their look. She could be sour and acid if she chose. She
could curl her lips and snub people. What was the secret
of the everlasting same aw fulness of even the nicest of re-
fined sheltered middle-class English-woman? He had
stumbled and wandered through a vague statement. He
knew that all the long loneliness of his mind lay revealed
before one — and yet she had been the dream and wonder
and magic of his youth and still was his dear companion.
The ' lady ' was the wife for the professional Englishman
— simple sheltered domesticated, trained in principles she
did not think about and living by them ; revering profes-
sional and professionally successful men ; never seeing the
fifth-form schoolboys they all were. No woman who saw
them as they were with their mental pride and vanity and
fixity, would stay with them ; no woman who saw their
veiled appetites. . . . But where could all these wives go?
THE TUNNEL 237
Throughout the evening she was kept quiet and dull
and felt presently very weary. Her helpless stock-taking
made it difficult to face the strangers, lest painful illumina-
tion and pity and annoyance should stream from her too
visibly. . . . Perhaps they too took stock and pitied ; but
they were interested, a little eager in response and though
too well bred for questions, obviously full of unanswered
surmises, which perhaps presently they would communicate
to each other. There were people who would say she was
too egoistic to be interested in them, a selfish, unsocial,
unpleasant person and they were kind charming people,
interested in everybody. That might be true. . . . But it
was also true that they were eager and interested because
their lives were empty of everything but principles and a
certain fixed way of looking at things ; and one could be
fond of their niceness and respectful to their goodness
but never interested because one knew everything about
them, even their hidden thoughts and the side of them
that was not nice or good without having any communica-
tion with them. . . . He had another side ; but there was
no place in his life which would allow it expression. It
could only live in the lives of people met in books ; in
sympathies here and there for a moment ; in people who
passed " like ships in the night " ; in moments at the be-
ginning and end of holidays when things would seem real,
and as if henceforth they were going to be real every day.
If it found expression in his life, it would break up that
life. Anyone who tried to make it find personal expression
would be cruel ; unless it were to turn him into a reformer
or the follower of a reformer. That could happen to him.
He was secretly interested in adventurers and adventuresses.
CHAPTER XIX
IT had evidently been a great festival. One of the events
of Mr. Hancock's summer; designed by him for the
happiness and enjoyment of his friends and enjoyed by
him in labouring to those ends. It was beautiful to look
back upon ; in every part ; the easy journey, the approach
to the cottage along the mile of green-feathered river, the
well-ordered feast in the large clean cottage ; the well-
thought out comfort of the cottage bedrooms, the sight of
the orchard lit by Chinese lanterns, the lantern-lit boats,
the drifting down the river in the soft moonlit air; the
candle lit supper table, morning through the cottage win-
dows, upstairs and down, far away from the world, people
meeting at breakfast like travellers in a far-off country,
pleased to see well known faces . . . the morning on the
green river . . . the gentleness and kindliness and quiet
dignity of everybody, the kindly difficult gently jesting dis-
cussion of small personal incidents ; the gentle amiable
strains; the mild restrained self-effacing watchfulness of
the women ; the uncompeting mutual admiration of the
men ; the general gratitude of the group when one or other
of the men filled up a space of time with a piece of modestly
narrated personal reminiscence. . . .
Never, never could she belong to that world. It was a
perfect little world ; enclosed ; something one would need
238
THE TUNNEL 239
to be born and trained into ; the experience of it as an out-
sider was pure pain and misery; admiration, irritation and
resentment running abreast in a fever. Welcome and kind-
liness could do nothing; one's own straining towards it,
nothing; a night of sleepless battering at its closed doors,
nothing. There was a secret in it, in spite of its simple
seeming exterior ; an undesired secret. Something to which
one could not give oneself up. Its terms were terms on
which one could not live. That girl could live on them, in
spite of her strenuous different life in the east-end settle-
ment ... in spite of her plain dull dress and red hands.
She knew the code; her cheap straw hat waved graciously,
her hair ruffled about her head in soft clouds. Why had he
never spoken of her uncle's cottage so near his own? She
must be always there. When she appeared in the surgery
she seemed to come straight out of the east-end ... his
respect for workers amongst the poor ... his general mild
revulsion from philanthropists ; but down here she was not
a philanthropist . . . outwardly a girl with blowy hair and
a wavy hat, smiling in boats, understanding botany and
fishing . . . inwardly a designing female, her mind lit by
her cold intellectual " ethical " — hooooo — the very sound
of the word — "ethical Pantheism"; cool and secret and
hateful. " Rather a nice little thing " ; " pretty green
dress"; nice!
CHAPTER XX
MIRIAM turned swiftly in her chair and looked up.
But Mr. Hancock was already at the door. There
was only a glimpse of his unknown figure arrested for a
moment with its back to her as he pulled the door wide
enough to pass through. The door closed crisply behind
him and his crisp unhastening footsteps went away out of
hearing along the thickly carpeted hall.
" Dear me ! " she breathed through firmly held lips,
standing up. Her blood was aflame. The thudding of her
heart shook the words upon her breath. She was fighting
against something more than amazement. She knew that
only part of her refused to believe. In a part of her brain
illumination leaving the shock already far away in the past,
was at work undisturbed, flowing rapidly down into
thoughts set neatly in the language of the world. She held
them back, occupying herself irrelevantly about the room,
catching back desperately at the familiar trains of revery
suggested by its objects; cancelling the incident and sum-
moning it again and again without prejudice or after-
thought. Each time the shock recurred unchanged, firmly
registered, its quality indubitable. She sat down at last
to examine it and find her thoughts. Taking a pencil in a
trembling hand she began carefully adding a long column
of figures. A system of adding that had been recommended
to her by the family mathematician now suggested itself for
the first time in connection with her own efforts. . . .
240
THE TUNNEL 241
How dare he?
It was deliberate. A brusque casual tone, deliberately
put on ; a tone he sometimes used to the boys downstairs,
or to cabmen. How did he dare to use it to her? It must
cease instantly. It was not to be suffered for a moment.
Not for a moment could she hold a position which would
entitle any one, particularly any man to speak to her in
that — outrageous — official tone. Why not? It was the
way of business people and officials all the world over. . . .
Then he should have begun as he meant to go on. . . .
I won't endure it now. No one has ever spoken to me in
that way — and no one shall, with impunity. I have been
fortunate. They have spoiled me. ... I should never
have come if I had found they had that sort of tone. It
was his difference that made me come.
Those two had talked to him and made him think. The
aunt and cousins had prepared the way. But their hostility
had been harmless. These two had approved. That was
clear at the week-end. They must have chaffed him and
given him their blessing. Then, for the first time, he had
thought, sitting alone and pondering reasonably. It was
he himself who had drawn back. He was quite right. He
belonged to that side of society and must keep with them
and go their way. Very wise and right . . . but damn his
insolent complacency. . . .
1
" Everything a professional man does must stablise his
position." Perhaps that is true. But then his business
relationships must be business relationships from the first
. . . that was expected. The wonder of the Wimpole
Street life was that it had not been so. Instead of an
employer there had been a sensitive isolated man; pros-
242 THE TUNNEL
perous and strong outwardly and as suffering and perplexed
in mind as any one could be. He had not hesitated to seek
sympathy.
3
Any fair-minded onlooker would condemn him. Any-
one who could have seen the way he broke through resist-
ance to social intercourse outside the practice. He may
have thought he was being kind to a resourceless girl. It
was not to resourcelessness that he had appealed. It was
not that. That was not the truth.
4
He would have cynical thoughts. The truth was that
something came in and happened of itself before one knew.
A woman always knows first. It was not clear until Bab-
ington. But there was a sharp glimpse then. He must
have known how amazed they would be at his cycling over
after he had neglected them for years, on that one Sunday.
They had concealed their amazement from him. But it
was they who had revealed things. There was nothing
imaginary after that in taking one wild glance and leaving
things to go their way. Nothing. No one was to blame.
And now he knew and had considered and had made an
absurd reasonable decision and taken ridiculous prompt
action.
A business relationship ... by all means. But he shall
acknowledge and apologise. He shall explain his insulting
admission of fear. He shall admit in plain speech what
has accounted for his change of manner.
Then that little horror is also condemned. She is not a
wealthy efficient woman of the world.
THE TUNNEL 243
Men are simply paltry and silly — all of them.
In pain and fear she wandered about her room, listening
for her bell. It had gone; the meaning of their days had
gone; trust and confidence could never come back. A
door was closed. His life was closed on her for ever. . . .
5
The bell rang softly in its usual way. The incident had
been an accident; an illusion. Even so; she had been
prepared for it, without knowing she was prepared, other-
wise she would not have understood so fully and instantly.
If she had only imagined it, it had changed everything,
her interpretation of it was prophetic; just as before he
had not known where they were so now the rupture was
imminent whether he knew it or no. She found herself
going upstairs breathing air thick with pain. This was
dreadful. . . . She could not bear much of this. . . . The
patient had gone. He would be alone. They would be
alone. To be in his presence would be a relief . . . this
was appalling. This pain could not be endured. The
sight of the room holding the six months would be intoler-
able. She drew her face together, but her heart was beating
noisily. The knob of the door handle rattled in her trem-
bling hand . . . large flat brass knob with a row of grooves
to help the grasp . . . she had never observed that before.
The door opened before her. She flung it wider than
usual and pushed her way, leaving it open ... he was
standing impermanently with a sham air of engrossment
at his writing table and would turn on his heel and go
the moment she was fairly across the room. Buoyant with
pain she flitted through the empty air towards the distant
bracket-table. Each object upon it stood marvellously clear.
She reached it and got her hands upon the familiar instru-
244 THE TUNNEL
merits ... no sound ; he had not moved. The flame of
the little spirit-lamp burned unwavering in the complete
stillness . . . now was the moment to drop thoughts and
anger. Up here was something that had been made up here,
real and changeless and independent. The least vestige of
tumult would destroy it. It was something that no one
could touch ; neither his friends nor he nor she. They
had not made it and they could not touch it. Nothing
had happened to it ; and he had stood quietly there long
enough for it to re-assert itself. Steadily with her hands
full of instruments she turned towards the sterilising tray.
The room was empty. Pain ran glowing up her arms from
her burden of nauseating relics of the needs of some com-
placent patient . . . the room was stripped, a west-end
surgery, among scores of other west-end surgeries, a prison
claiming her by the bonds of the loathsome duties she had
learned.
CHAPTER XXI
TO-DAY the familiar handwriting brought no relief.
This letter must be the final explanation. She
opened it, standing by the hall table. " Dear Miss Hender-
son — you are very persistent." She folded the letter up
and walked rapidly out into the sunshine. The way down
to the Euston Road was very long and sunlit. It was rad-
iant with all the months and weeks and days. She thought
of going on with the unread letter and carrying it into the
surgery, tearing it up into the waste paper basket and say-
ing I have not read this. It is all right. We will not
talk any more. One thing would have gone. But there
would be a tremendous cheerfulness and independence
and the memory of the things in the other letters. The
letter once read two things would have gone, everything.
She paused at the corner of the gardens looking down at
the pavement. There was in some way that would not
come quite clear so much more at stake than personal
feelings about the insulting moment. It was something
that stuck into everything, made everything intolerable
until it was admitted and cancelled. As long as he went
on hedging and pretending it was not there there could
be no truth anywhere. It was something that must go out
of the world, no matter what it cost. It would be smiling
and cattish and behaving to drop it. Explained, it would
be wiped away, and everything else with it. To accept
his assertions would be to admit lack of insight. That
245
246 THE TUNNEL
would be treachery. The continued spontaneity of manner
which it would ensure would be the false spontaneity that
sat everywhere . . . all over that woman getting into the
'bus ; brisk cheerful falsity. She glanced through to the
end of the letter ..." foolish gossip which might end
by making your position untenable." Idiot. Charming
chivalrous gentleman.
I want to have it both ways. To keep the consideration
and flout the necessity for it. No one shall dare to protect
me from gossip. To prove myself independent and truth-
demanding I would break up anything. That's damned
folly. Never mind. Why didn't he admit it at once?
He hated being questioned and challenged. He may have
thought that manner was " the kindest way." It is not
for him to choose ways of treating me. This cancels the
past. But it admits it. Not to admit the past would be
to go on for ever in a false position. He still hides. But
he knows that I know he is hiding. Where we have been
we have been. It may have been through a false estimate
of me to begin with. That does not matter. Where we
have been we have been. That is not imagination. One
day he will know it is not imagination. There is some-
thing that is making me very glad. A painful relief. Some-
thing forcing me back upon something. There is some-
thing that I have smashed, for some reason I do not know.
It's something in my temper, that flares out about things.
Life allows no chance of getting at the bottom of
things. . . .
I have nothing now but my pained self again, having
violently rushed at things and torn them to bits. It's all
my fault from the very beginning. But I stand for some-
THE TUNNEL 247
thing. I would dash my head against a wall rather than
deny it. I make people hate me by knowing them and dash-
ing my head against the wall of their behaviour. I should
never make a good chess-player. Is God a chess-player?
I shan't leave until I have proved that no one can put me
in a false position. There is something that is untouched
by positions. . . .
I did not know what I had. . . . Friendship is fine fine
porcelain. I have sent a crack right through it. . . .
Mrs. Bailey . . . numbers of people I never think of
would like to have me always there. . . .
The sky fitting down on the irregular brown vista bore
an untouched life. . . . There were always mornings; at
work. I am free to work zealously and generously with
and for him.
At least I have broken up his confounded complacency.
He will be embarrassed. / shan't.
CHAPTER XXII
** A ND at fifty, when a woman is beginning to sit
. . . /"A down intelligently to life — behold, it is be-
ginning to be time to take leave. . . ."
That woman was an elderly woman of the world ; but
a dear. She understood. She had spent her life in
amongst people, having a life of her own going on all the
time ; looking out at something through the bars, whenever
she was alone and sometimes in the midst of conversations ;
but no one would see it, but people who knezv. And now
she was free to stop out and there was hardly any time left.
But there was a little time. Women who know are quite
brisk at fifty. " A man must never be silent with a woman
unless he wishes for the quiet development of a relationship
from which there is no withdrawing ... if ordinary social
intercourse cannot be kept up he must fly ... in silence
a man is an open book and unarmed. In speech with a
man a woman is at a disadvantage — because they speak
different languages. She may understand his. Hers he
will never speak nor understand. In pity, or from other
motives she must therefore, stammeringly, speak his. He
listens and is flattered and thinks he has her mental measure
when he has not touched even the fringe of her conscious-
ness. . . . Outside the life relationship men and woman
can have only conversational, and again conversational,
interchange." . . . That's the truth about life. Men and
women never meet. Inside the life relationship you can
248
THE TUNNEL 249
see them being strangers and hostile; one or the other
or both, completely alone. That was the world. Social
life. In social life no one was alive but the lonely women
keeping up half-admiring half-pitying endless conversations
with men, with one little ironic part of themselves . . .
until they were fifty and had done their share of social life.
But outside the world — one could be alive always. Fifty.
Thirty more years. . . .
When I woke in the night I felt nothing but tiredness
and regret for having promised to go. Now, I never felt
so strong and happy. This is how Mag is feeling. Their
kettle is bumping on their spirit lamp too. She loves the
sound just in this way, the Sunday morning sound of the
kettle with the air full of coming bells and the doors open-
ing — I'm half-dressed, without any effort — and shutting
up and down the streets is perfect, again, and again; at
seven o'clock in the silence, with the air coming in from
the Squares smelling like the country is bliss. " You know,
little child, you have an extraordinary capacity for hap-
piness." I suppose I have. Well ; I can't help it. ... I
am frantically frantically happy. I'm up here alone, frant-
ically happy. Even Mag has to talk to Jan about the happy
things. Then they go, a little. The only thing to do is
either to be silent or make cheerful noises. Bellow. If you
do that too much people don't like it. You can only keep
on making cheerful noises if you are quite alone. Perhaps
that is why people in life are always grumbling at ' annoy-
ances ' and things ; to hide how happy they are ..." there
is a dead level of happiness all over the world " — hidden.
People go on about things because they are always trying
to remember how happy they are. The worse things are
the more despairing they get, because they are so happy.
250 T H E T U N N E L
You know what I mean. It's there — there's nothing else
there. . . . But some people know more about it than
others. Intelligent people. I suppose I am intelligent. I
can't help it. I don't want to be different. Yes I do — oh
Lord yes I do. Mag knows. But she goes in amongst
people and the complaints and the fuss and takes sides.
But they both come out again; to be by themselves and
talk about it all . . . they sit down intelligently to life.
. . . They do things that have nothing to do with their
circumstances. They were always doing things like this
all the year round. Spring and Summer and Autumn and
Winter things. They had done, for years. The kind of
things that made independent elderly women, widows and
spinsters who were free to go about, have that look of
intense appreciation ..." a heart at leisure from itself
to soothe and sympathise " ; no, that type was always in-
clined to revel in other people's troubles. It was some-
thing more than that. Never mind. Come on. Hurry
up. Oh — for a man, oh for a man oh for a man — sion
in the skies. . . . Wot a big voice I've got, Mother.
3
" Cooooooo — ooo — er — Bill." The sudden familiar
sound came just above her head. Where was she? What
a pity. The boys had wakened her. Then she had been
asleep! It was perfect. The footsteps belonging to the
voice had passed along just above her head ; nice boys, they
could not help chi-iking when they saw the sleeping figures,
but they did not mean to disturb. They had wakened her
from her first day-time sleep. Asleep! She had slept in
broad sunlight at the foot of the little cliff. Waking in
the day time is perfect happiness. To wake suddenly and
fully, nowhere ; in paradise ; and then to see sharply with
large clear strong eyes the things you were looking at when
THE TUNNEL 251
you fell asleep. She lay perfectly still. Perhaps the girls
were asleep. Presently they would all be sitting up again
and she would have to begin once more the tiring effort to
be as clever as they were. But it would be a little differ-
ent now that they had all lain stretched out at the foot of
the cliffs asleep. She was changed. Something had hap-
pened since she had fallen asleep 4 disappointment in the
east-coast sea and the little low cliff, wondering why she
could not see and feel them like the seas and cliffs of her
childhood. She could see and feel them now, as long as
no one spoke and the first part of the morning remained
far away. She closed her eyes and drifted drowsily back
to the moment of being awakened by the sudden cry. In
the instant before her mind had slid back and she had lis-
tened to the muffled footsteps thudding along the turf of
the low cliff above her head, waiting angrily and anxiously
for further disturbance, she had been perfectly alive, see-
ing; perfect things all round her, no beginning or ending
. . . there had been moments like that, years ago, in gar-
dens, by seas and cliffs. Her mind wandered back amongst
these ; calling up each one with perfect freshness. They
were all the same. In each one she had felt exactly the
same; outside life, untouched by anything, free. She had
thought they belonged to the past, to childhood and youth.
In childhood she had thought each time that the world had
just begun and would always be like that; later on, she now
remembered, she had always thought when such a moment
came that it would be the last and clung to it with wide
desperate staring eyes until tears came and she had turned
away from some great open scene with a strong conscious
body flooded suddenly by a strong warm tide to the sad
dark world to live for the rest of her time upon a memory.
But the moment she had just lived was the same, it was ex-
actly the same as the first one she could remember, the
252 THE TUNNEL
moment of standing, alone, in bright sunlight on a narrow
gravel path in the garden at Babington between two banks
of flowers, the flowers level with her face and large bees
swinging slowly to and fro before her face from bank to
bank, many sweet smells coming from the flowers and
amongst them a strange pleasant smell like burnt paper.
... It was the same moment. She saw it now in just the
same way ; not remembering going into the garden or any
end to being in the bright sun between the blazing flowers,
the two banks linked by the slowly swinging bees, nothing
else in the world, no house behind the little path, no garden
beyond it. Yet she must somehow have got out of the
house and through the shrubbery and along the plain path
between the lawns.
4
All the six years at Babington were the blazing alley of
flowers without beginning or end, no winters, no times of
day or changes to be seen. There were other memories,
quarrelling with Harriett in the nursery, making paper pills,
listening to the bells on Sunday afternoon, a bell and a
pomegranate, a bell or a pomegranate round about the
hem of Aaron's robe, the squirting of water into one's
aching ear, the taste of an egg after scarlet fever, the witch
in the chimney, cowslips balls, a lobster walking upstairs
on its tail, dancing in a ring with grown-ups, the smell of
steam and soap the warm smell of the bath towel, Martha's
fingers warming one's feet, her lips kissing one's back,
something going to happen to-morrow, crackling green
paper clear like glass and a gold paper fringe in your hand
before the cracker went off; an eye blazing out of the wall
at night " Thou God seest me," apple pasties in the garden ;
coming up from the mud pies round the summer house to
bed, being hit on the nose by a swing and going indoors
THE TUNNEL 253
screaming at the large blots of blood on the white pinafore,
climbing up the cucumber frame and falling through the
glass at the top, blowing bubbles in the hay-loft and singing
Rosalie the Prairie Flower, and whole pieces of life indoors
and out coming up bit by bit as one thought, but all mixed
with sadness and pain and bothers with people. They did
not come first or without thought. The blazing alley came
first without thought or effort of memory. The flowers
all shining separate and distinct and all together, indistinct
in a blaze. She gazed at them . . . sweet Williams of
many hues, everlasting flowers gold and yellow and brown
and brownish purple, pinks and petunias and garden daisies
white and deep crimson . . . then memory was happiness,
one happiness linked to the next. ... It was the same
already with Germany . . . the sunny happy beautiful
things came first ... in a single glance the whole of the
time in Germany was beautiful, golden happy light, and
people happy in the golden light, garlands of music, and
the happy ringing certainty of voices, no matter what
they said, the way the whole of life throbbed with beauty
when the hush of prayers was on the roomful of girls . . .
the wonderful house, great dark high wooden doors in the
distance thrown silently open, great silent space of sun-
light between them, high windows, alight against the shad-
ows of rooms ; the happy confidence of the open scene.
. . . Germany was a party, a visit, a gift. It had been, in
spite of everything in the difficult life, what she had
dreamed it when she went off; all woods and forests and
music . . . happy Hermann and Dorothea happiness in the
summer twilight of German villages. It had become that
now. The heart of a German town was that, making one
a little homesick for it. . . . The impulse to go and the
going had been right. It was part of something . . . with
a meaning; perhaps there is happiness only in the things
254 THE TUNNEL
one does deliberately without a visible reason; drifting off
to Germany, because it called ; coming here to-day ... in
freedom. If you are free you are alive . . . nothing that
happens in the part of your life that is not free, the part
you do and are paid for, is alive. To-day, because I am
free I am the same person as I was when I was there, but
much stronger and happier because I know it. As long as
I can sometimes feel like this nothing has mattered. Life
is a chain of happy moments that cannot die.
" Damn those boys — they woke me up."
" Did they Mag; so they did me; did you dream? " Per-
haps Mag would say something . . . but people never
seemed to think anything of " dropping off to sleep."
" I drempt that I dwelt in Marble Halls ; you awake von
Bohlen?"
" I don't quite know."
" But speaking tentatively. . . ."
" A long lean mizzerable tentative "
" I perceive that you are still asleep. Shall I sing it —
" I durr-e-empt I da-w^-elt in ma-ha-har-ble halls."
" Cooooo — oooo — er Bill." The response sounded
faintly from far away on the cliffs.
" Cooooo — ooo — er Micky " warbled Miriam. " I like
that noise. When they are further off I shall try doing it
very loud to get the proper crack."
" I think we'd better leave her here, don't you von
Bohlen?"
Was it nearly tea-time? Would either of them soon
mention tea? The beauty of the rocks had faded. Yet,
if they ceased being clever and spoke of the beauty, it would
not come back. The weariness of keeping things up went
on. When the gingernuts and lemonade were at last set
out upon the sand, they shamed Miriam with the sense of
her long preoccupation with them. The girls had not
THE TUNNEL 255
thought of them. They never seemed to flag in their way
of talking. Perhaps it was partly their regular meals. It
was dreadful always to be the first one to want food. . . .
But she was happier down here with them than she
would have been alone.
Going alone for a moment in the twilight across the
little scrub, as soon as she had laughed enough over leaving
the room in the shelter of a gorse bush, she recovered the
afternoon's happiness. There was a little fence, bricks
were lying scattered about and half-finished houses stood
along the edge of the scrub. But a soft land-breeze was
coming across the common carrying the scent of gorse ;
the silence of the sea reminded her of its presence beyond
the cliffs ; her own gorse-scented breeze, and silent sea and
sunlit cliffs.
CHAPTER XXIII
COOL with sound short sleep she rose early, the mem-
ory of yesterday giving a Sunday leisure to the
usual anxious hurry of breakfast. She was strong with
her own possessions. Wimpole Street held nothing but her
contract of duties to fulfil. These she could see in a clear
vexatious tangle, against the exciting on-coming of every-
body's summer; an excitement that was enough in itself.
Patients were pouring out of town — in a fortnight the
Orlys would be gone ; all Mr. Orly's accounts must be out
by then. In a month Mr. Hancock would go. For a
month before her own holiday there would be almost noth-
ing to do. If everyone's accounts were examined before
then, she could get them off at leisure during that month
. . . then for this month there was nothing to do but the
lessening daily duties and to get everyone to examine ac-
counts; then the house to herself, with only Mr. Leyton
there ; the cool ease of summer in her room, and her own
month ahead.
The little lavatory with its long high window sending
in the light from across the two sets of back to back tree-
shaded Bloomsbury gardens, its little shabby open sink-
cupboard facing her with its dim unpolished taps and the
battered enamel cans on its cracked and blistered wooden
top became this morning one of her own rooms, a happy
256
THE TUNNEL 257
little corner in the growing life that separated her from
Wimpole Street. There were no corners such as this in
the beautiful clever Hampstead house; no remote shabby
happy corners at all; nothing brown and old and at peace.
Between him and his house were his housekeeper and ser-
vants; between him and his life was his profession . . .
and the complex group of people with whom he must
perpetually deal, with whom he dealt in alternations of
intimacy and formality. He was still at his best in his
practice. That was still his life. There was nothing more
real as yet in his life than certain times and moments in his
room at Wimpole Street. . . . Life had answered no other
questions for him. . . . His thought-life and his personal
life were troubled and dark and cold ... in spite of his
attachment to some of his family group ... he could
buy beautiful things, and travel freely in his leisure . . .
perhaps that, those two glorious things, were sufficient
compensation. But there was something wrong about them ;
they gave a false sense of power . . . the way all those
people smiled at each other when they went about and
bought things, picked up a fine thing at a bargain, or gave
a price whose size they were proud of . . . thinking other
people's thoughts . . . apart from this worldly side of his
life, he was entirely at Wimpole Street; the whole of him;
an open book; there was nothing else in his life, yet . . .
his holiday with those two men — even the soft-voiced sen-
suous one who would quote poetry and talk romantically
and cynically about women in the evenings — would bring
nothing else. Yet he was counting upon it so much that
he could not help unbending about his boat and his boots
and his filters . . . perhaps all that was the best of the holi-
day — men were never tired of talking about the way they
did this and that . . . clever difficult things that made all
the difference; but they missed all the rest. Even when
258 THE TUNNEL
they sat about smoking their minds were fussing. The
women in their parties dressed, and smiled and appreciated.
There would be no real happiness in such a party . . . ex-
cept when the women were alone, doing the things with no
show about them. Supposing I were able to go anywhere
on this page . . . Ippington . . . 295m; pop. 760 . . .
trains to Tudworth and thence two or three times daily . . .
Spray Bay Hotel ... A sparrow cheeped on the window
sill and fluttered away. The breath of happiness poured In
at the high window ; all the places in the railway guide told
over their charms ; mountains and lakes and rivers, innum-
erable strips of coast, village streets to walk along for the
first time, leading out . . . going, somewhere, in a train.
Standing on tiptoe she gazed her thoughts across the two
garden spaces towards the grimed backs of the large brown
houses. Why was one allowed to be so utterly happy?
There it was . . . happily here and happily going away . . .
away.
CHAPTER XXIV
'TT^HERE; how d'ye like that, eh? A liberal educa-
tion in twelve volumes with an index. Read them
when ye want to. See ? " . . .
They looked less set up like that in a row than when
they had lain about on the floor of the den . . . taking
up Dante and Beethoven at tea time.
"Books posted? I wonder I'm not more rushed. I say
— v'you greased all Hancock's and the Pater's instru-
ments ? "
He knows I'm slacking . . . he'll tell the others when
they come back. . . .
Mr. Leyton's door shut with a bang. He would be sitting
reading the newspaper until the next patient came. The
eternal sounds of laughter and dancing came up from the
kitchen. The rest of the house was perfectly still. Her
miserable hand reopened the last page of the Index. There
were five or six more entries under " Woman."
3
If one could only burn all the volumes ; stop the publica-
tion of them. But it was all books, all the literature in the
world, right back to Juvenal . . . whatever happened, if it
could all be avenged by somebody in some way, there was
all that . . . the classics, the finest literature, — " unsur-
259
260 T H E TUNNEL
passed." Education would always mean coming in contact
with all that. Schoolboys got their first ideas. . . . How
could Newnham and Girton women endure it? How could
they go on living and laughing and talking?
And the modern men were the worst ..." we can
now, with all the facts in our hands sit down and examine
her at our leisure." There was no getting away from the
scientific facts . . . inferior; mentally, morally, intellec-
tually and physically . . . her development arrested in the
interest of her special functions . . . reverting later to-
wards the male type ... old women with deep voices and
hair on their faces . . . leaving off where boys of eighteen
began. If that is true everything is as clear as daylight.
" Woman is not undeveloped man but diverse " falls to
pieces. Woman is undeveloped man ... if one could die
of the loathsome visions ... I must die. I can't go on liv-
ing in it . . . the whole world full of creatures; half-human.
And I am one of the half -human ones or shall be if I don't
stop now.
Boys and girls were much the same . . . women stopped
being people and went off into hideous processes. What
for? What was it all for? Development. The wonders
of science. The wonders of science for women are nothing
but gynaecology — all those frightful operations in the
" British Medical Journal " and those jokes — the hundred
golden rules. . . . Sacred functions . . . highest possibili-
ties . . . sacred for what ? The hand that rocks the cradle
rules the world? The Future of the Race? What world?
What race? Men. . . . Nothing but men; forever.
If by one thought all the men in the world could be
stopped, shaken and slapped. There must, somewhere be
THE TUNNEL 261
some power that could avenge it all . . . but if these men
were right there was not. Nothing but Nature and her
decrees. Why was nature there? Who started it? If
nature " took good care " this and that . . . there must
be somebody. If there was a trick there must be a trickster.
If there is a god who arranged how things should be between
men and women and just let it go and go on I have no
respect for him. I should like to give him a piece of my
mind. . . .
It will all go on as long as women are stupid enough to
go on bringing men into the world . . . even if civilised
women stop the colonials and primitive races would go on.
It was a nightmare.
They invent a legend to put the blame for the existence
of humanity on woman and if she wants to stop it they
talk about the wonders of civilisation and the sacred re-
sponsibilities of motherhood. They can't have it both ways.
They also say women are not logical.
They despise women and they want to go on living — to
reproduce — themselves. None of their achievements, no
" civilisation," no art, no science can redeem that. There
is no pardon possible for man. The only answer to them
is suicide ; all women ought to agree to commit suicide.
4
The torment grew as the August weeks passed. There
were strange interesting things unexpectedly everywhere.
Streets of great shuttered houses, their window, boxes flow-
erless, all grey cool and quiet and untroubled on a day of
cool rain ; the restaurants were no longer crowded ; tortur-
ing thought ranged there unsupported, goaded to madness,
262 T H E T U N N E L
just a mad feverish swirling in the head, ranging out, driven
back by the vacant eyes of little groups of people from the
country. In familiar people appeared in the parks and
streets talking and staring eagerly about, women in felt
boat-shaped hats trimmed with plaid ribbons — Americans.
They looked clever — and ignorant of worrying thoughts.
Men carried their parcels. But it was just the same. It
was impossible to imagine these dried, yellow-faced women
with babies. But if they liked all the fuss and noise and
talk as much as they seemed to do. ... If they did not,
what were they doing? What was everybody doing? So
busily.
5
Sleeplessness and every day a worse feeling of illness.
Every day the new torture. Every night the dreaming
and tossing in the fierce, stifling, dusty heat, the awful
waking, to know that presently the unbearable human
sounds would begin again ; the torment of walking through
the streets the solitary torment of leisure to read again in
the stillness of the office ; the moments of hope of finding
a fresh meaning; hope of having misread.
There was nothing to turn to. Books were poisoned.
Art. All the achievements of men were poisoned at the
root. The beauty of nature was tricky feminity. The
animal world was cruelty. Humanity was based on cruelty.
Jests and amusements were tragic distractions from tragedy.
Religion was the only hope. But even there there was no
hope for women. No future life could heal the degradation
of having been a woman. Religion in the world had nothing
but insults for women. Christ was a man. If it was true
that he was God taking on humanity — he took on male
THE TUNNEL 263
humanity . . . and the people who explained him, St. Paul
and the priests, the Anglicans and the non-Conformists
it was the same story everywhere. Even if religion could
answer science and prove it wrong there was no hope, for
women. And no intelligent person can prove science wrong.
Life is poisoned, for women, at the very source. Science
is true and will find out more and more and things will grow
more and more horrible. Space is full of dead worlds.
The world is cooling and dying. Then why not stop now?
7
" Nature's great Salic Law will never be repealed."
" Women can never reach the highest places in civilisation."
Thomas Henry Huxley. With side-whiskers. A bouncing
complacent walk. Thomas Henry Huxley. {Thomas
Ztabington Macazday.) The same sort of walk. Eminent
men. Revelling in their cleverness. " The Lord has de-
livered him into my hand." He did not believe in any fu-
ture for anybody. But he built his life up complacently
on home and family life while saying all those things about
women, lived on them and their pain, ate their food, en-
joyed the comforts they made . . . and wrote conceited
letters to his friends about his achievements and his stomach
and his feelings.
8
What is it in me that stands back? Why can't it explain?
My head will burst if it can't explain. If I die now in
wild anger it only makes the thing more laughable on the
whole. . . . That old man lives quite alone in a little gas-
lit lodging. When he comes out he is quite alone. There
is nothing touching him anywhere. He will go quietly
on like that till he dies. But he is me. I saw myself in
his eyes that day. But he must have money. He can live
264 THE TUNNEL
like that with nothing to do but read and think and roam
about because he has money. It isn't fair. Some woman
cleans his room and does his laundry. His thoughts about
women are awful. It's the best way . . . but I've made
all sorts of plans for the holidays. After that I will save
and never see anybody and never stir out of Bloomsbury.
The woman in black works. It's only in the evenings she
can roam about seeing nothing. But the people she works
for know nothing about her. She knows. She is sweeter
than he. She is sweet. I like her. But he is more me.
CHAPTER XXV
THE room still had the same radiant air. Nothing
looked worn. There was not a spot anywhere.
Bowls of flowers stood about. The Coalport tea service
was set out on the little black table. The draw-thread work
table cover. . . . She had arranged the flowers. That was
probably all she did ; going in and out of the garden, in
the sun, picking flowers. The Artist's Model and The
Geisha and the Strand Musicals still lay about; the curious
new smell came from the inside of the piano. But there
was this dreadful tiredness. It was dreadful that the
tiredness should come nearer than the thought of Harriett.
A pallid worried disordered face looked back from the strip
of glass in the overmantel. No need to have looked. Al-
ways now, away from London, there was this dreadful real-
isation of fatigue, dreadful empty sense of worry and hurry
. . . feeling so strong riding down through London, every-
thing dropping away, nothing to think of ; off and free, the
holiday ahead, nothing but lovely, lonely freedom all round
one.
Perhaps Harriett would be nervous and irritable. She
had much more reason to be. But even if she were it
would be no good. It would be impossible to conceal
this frightful fatigue and nervousness. Harriett must un-
derstand at once how battered and abject one was. And
265
266 THE TUNNEL
it was a misrepresentation. Harriet knew nothing of all
one had come from ; all one was going to in the distance.
Maddening. . . . Lovely ; how rich and good they looked,
more honest than those in the London shops. Harriet or
Mrs. Thimm or Emma had ordered them from some con-
fectioner in Chiswick. Fancy being able to buy anything
like that without thinking. How well they went with the
black piano and the Coalport tea-service and the garden
light coming in. Gerald did not think that women were
inferior or that Harriet was a dependent. . . . But Gerald
did not think at all. He knew nothing was too good for
Harriett. Oo, / dunno, she would say with a laugh. She
thought all men were duffers. Perhaps that was the best
way. Selfish babies. But Gerald was not selfish. He
would never let Harriet wash up if he were there. He
would never pretend to be ignorant of ' mysteries ' to get
out of doing things. I get out of doing things — in houses.
But women won't let me do things. They all know I want
to be mooning about. How do they know it? What is it?
But they like me to be there. And now in houses there's
always this fearful worry and tiredness. What is the mean-
ing of it?
Heavy footsteps came slowly downstairs.
" I put tea indoors. I thought Miss Miriam'd be warm
after her ride.
A large undulating voice with a shrewd consoling glance
in it. She must have come to the kitchen door to meet
Harriett in the hall.
" Yes, I'ke spect she will." It was the same voice she
had had in the nursery, resonant with practice in speaking
to new people. Miriam felt tears coming.
" Hullo, you porking? Isn't it porking?"
" Simply porked to death my dear. Forked to Death "
bawled Miriam softly, refreshed and delighted. Harriett
THE TUNNEL 267
was still far off, but she felt as if she had touched her.
Even the end of the awful nine months was not changing
her. Her freshly shampooed hair had a leisurely glint.
There was colour in her cheeks. She surreptitiously rubbed
her own hot face. Her appearance would improve now with
every hour. By the evening she would be her old self.
After tea she would play The Artist's Model and The
Geisha.
" Let's have tea. I was asleep. I didn't hear you come."
She sank into one of the large chairs, her thin accordion
pleated black silk tea-gown billowing out round her squared
little body. Even her shoulders looked broader and squarer.
From the little pleated white chiffon chemisette her radiant
firm little head rose up, her hair glinting under the light of
the window behind her. She looked so fine — such a " fine
spectacle " — and seemed so strong. How did she feel ?
Mrs. Thimm brought the teapot. The moment she had
gone Harriett handed the rich cakes. Mrs. Thimm beam-
ing, shedding strong beams of happiness and approval. . . .
" Come on " said Harriett. " Let's tuck in. There's
some thin bread and butter somewhere but I can't eat any-
thing but these things."
"Can't you?"
" The last time I went up to town Mrs. Bollingdon and
I had six between us at Slater's and when we got back we
had another tea."
" Fancy you!"
" I know. I can't 'elp it."
" I can't 'elp it, Micky. Love\&y b-hird."
The fourth cup of creamy tea; Harriett's firm ringed
hand ; the gleaming serene world ; the sunlit flower-filled
garden shaded at the far end by the large tree the other
side of the fence coming in, one with the room ; the sun
going to set and bring the evening freshness and rise to-
268 T H E T U N N E L
morrow. Twenty-eight leisurely teas, twenty-eight long
days; a feeling of strength and drowsiness. Nothing to
do but clean the bicycle and pump up the tyres on the lawn,
to-morrow. Nothing — after carrying the bicycle from the
coal cellar up the area steps and through the house into the
Tansley Street back yard. Nothing more but setting out
after two nights of sleep in a cool room.
3
"That your machine in the yard, Mirry?"
" Yes; I've hired it, thirty bob for the whole month."
" Well, if you're going a sixty-mile ride on it I advise
you to tighten up the nuts a bit."
" I will if you'll show me where they are. I've got a
lovely spanner. Did you look in the wallet?"
" I'll have a look at it all over if you like."
" Oh Gerald you saint. . . ."
" Now he's happy," said Harriett as Gerald's white flan-
nelled figure flashed into the sunlight and disappeared
through the yard gate.
" Ph — how hot it is; it's this summer-house."
" Let's go outside if you like," said Miriam lazily, " it
seems to me simply perfect in here."
" It's all right — ph — it's hot everywhere," said Harriett
languidly. She mopped her face. Her face emerged from
her handkerchief fever-flushed, the eyes large and dark and
brilliant ; her lips full and drawn in and down at the corners
with a look of hopeless anxiety.
Anger flushed through Miriam. Harriett at nineteen, in
the brilliant beauty of the summer afternoon facing hope-
less fear.
" That's an awfully pretty dress " she faltered nervously.
Harriett set her lips and stretched both arms along the
elbows of her basket chair.
THE TUNNEL 269
" You could have it made into an evening gown."
" I loathe the very sight of it. I shall burn it the minute
I've done with it."
It was awful that anything that looked so charming could
seem like that.
" D'you feel bad ? Is it so awful ? "
" I'm all right, but I feel as if I were bursting. I wish
it would just hurry up and be over."
" I think you're simply splendid."
" I simply don't think about it. You don't think about
it except now and again when you realise you've got to go
through it and then you go hot all over."
' The head's a bit wobbly," said Gerald riding round the
lawn.
" Does that matter?"
1 Well, it doesn't make it any easier to ride, especially
with this great bundle on the handle-bars. You want a
luggage-carrier."
" I daresay. I say Gerald, show me the nuts to-morrow,
not now."
The machine was lying upside down on the lawn with
its back wheel revolving slowly in the air.
" The front wheel's out of the true."
" What do you think of the saddle? "
" The saddle's all right enough."
" It's a Brooks's, B. 40 ; about the best you can have. It's
my own and so's the Lucas's Baby bell."
" By Jove, she's got an adjustable spanner."
" That's not mine nor the repair outfit ; Mr. Leyton lent
me those."
" And vaseline on the bearings."
" Of course."
" I don't think much of your gear-case, my dear."
" Gerald, do you think it's all right on the whole ? "
270 THE TUNNEL
" Well, it's sound enough as far as I can see ; bit squiffy
and wobbly. I don't advise you to ride it in traffic or with
this bundle."
" I must have the bundle. I came down through Totten-
ham Court Road and Oxford Street and Bond Street and
Piccadilly all right."
" Well, there's no accounting for tastes. Got any oil ? "
" There's a little oil can in the wallet wrapped up in the
rag. It's lovely; perfectly new."
CHAPTER XXVI
THERE was a strong soft grey light standing at the
side of the blind . . . smiling and touching her as
it had promised. She leaped to the floor and stood looking
at it swaying with sleep. Ships sailing along with masts
growing on them, poplars streaming up from the ships, all
in a stream of gold. . . . Last night's soapy water poured
away and the fresh poured out ready standing there all
night, everything ready. ... I must not forget the extra
piece of string. . . . Je-ru-sa-tetn the Gol-den, with-milk-
and-hun-ney — blest. . . . Sh, not so much noise . . . be-
neath thy con, tern, pla, tion, sink, heart, and, voice, o,
pressed.
I know not, oh, I, know, not.
Sh — Sh . . . hark hark my soul angelic songs arc swelling
O'er earth's green fields, and ocean's wave-beat shore . . .
damn — blast where are my bally knickers ? sing us sweet
fragments of the songs above.
The green world everywhere, inside and out ... all along
the dim staircase, waiting in the dim cold kitchen.
No blind, brighter. Cool grey light, a misty windless morn-
ing. Shut the door.
They stand those halls of zi-on
All jubilant with song.
271
272 THE TUNNEL
As she neared Colnbrook the road grew heavier and a
closer mist lay over the fields. It was too soon for fatigue
but her knees already seemed heavy with effort. Getting
off at the level crossing she found that her skirt was sodden
and her zouave spangled all over with beads of moisture.
She walked shivering across the rails and remounted rapidly,
hoisting into the saddle a draggled person that was not her
own and riding doggedly on beating back all thoughts but
the thought of sunrise.
3
"Is this Reading?"
The cyclist smiled as he shouted back. He knew she
knew. But he liked shouting too. If she had yelled Have
you got a soul, it would have been just the same. If every-
one were on bicycles all the time you could talk to every-
body, all the time, about anything . . . sailing so steadily
along with two free legs . . . how much easier it must
be with your knees going so slowly up and down . . . how
funny I must look with my knees racing up and down in
lumps of skirt. But I'm here, at the midday rest. It must
be nearly twelve.
Drawing into the curb near a confectioner's she thought
of buying two bars of plain chocolate. There was some sort
of truth in the Swiss Family Robinson. If you went on,
it was all right. There was only death. People frightened
you about things that were not there. I will never listen
to anybody again ; or be frightened. That cyclist knew,
as long as he was on his bicycle. Perhaps he has people
who make him not himself. He can always get away again.
Men can always get away. I am going to lead a man's life
always getting away. . . .
THE TUNNEL 273
Wheeling her machine back to the open road she sat down
on a bank and ate the cold sausage and bread and half of the
chocolate and lay down to rest on a level stretch of grass
in front of a gate. Light throbbed round the edges of the
little high white fleecy clouds. She swung triumphantly
up. The earth throbbed beneath her with the throbbing
of her heart ... the sky steadied and stood further off,
clear peaceful blue with light near soft bunches of cloud
drifting slowly across it. She closed her eyes upon the
dazzling growing distances of blue and white and felt the
horizon folding down in a firm clear sweep round her green
cradle. Within her eyelids fields swung past green, corn-
fields gold and black, fields with coned clumps of harvested
corn, dusty gold, and black, on either side of the bone-
white grass trimmed road. The road ran on and on lined
by low hedges and the strange everlasting back-flowing
fields. Thrilling hedges and outstretched fields of distant
light, coming on mile after mile, winding off, left behind
..." it's the Bath Road I shall be riding on ; I'm going
down to Chiswick to see which way the wind is on the
Bath Road. . . ." Trees appeared golden and green and
shadowy with warm cool strong shaded trunks coming
nearer and larger. They swept by, their shadowy heads
sweeping the lower sky. Poplars shot up drawing her eyes
to run up their feathered slimness and sweep to the top of
the pointed plumes piercing the sky. Trees clumped in
masses round houses leading to villages that shut her into
little corridors of hard hot light . . . the little bright
sienna form of the hen she had nearly run over; the land
stretching serenely out again, rolling along, rolling along
in the hot sunshine with the morning and evening fresh-
ness at either end . . . sweeping it slowly in and out of the
deeps of the country night . . . eyelids were transparent.
It was light coming through one's eyelids that made that
274 THE TUNNEL
clear soft buff; soft buff light filtering through one's body
. . . little sounds, insects creeping and humming in the
hedge, sounds from the grass. Sudden single quiet sounds
going up from distant fields and farms, lost in the sky.
4
I've got my sea-legs . . . this is riding — not just strain-
ing along trying to forget the wobbly bicycle, but feeling
it wobble and being able to control it . . . being able to
look about easily . . . there will be a harvest moon this
month, rolling up huge and hot, suddenly over the edge
of a field; the last moon. I shall see that anyhow what-
ever the holiday is like. It will be cold again in the winter.
Perhaps I shan't feel so cold this winter.
5
She recognised the figure the instant she saw it. It was
as if she had been riding the whole day to meet it. Com-
pletely forgotten it had been all the time at the edge of
the zest of her ride. It had been everywhere all the time
and there it was at last dim and distant and unmistakable
. . . coming horribly along, a murk in the long empty
road. She slowed up looking furtively about. The road
had been empty for so long. It stretched invisibly away
behind, empty. There was no sound of anything coming
along; nothing but the squeak squeak of her gear-case;
bitter empty fields on either side, greying away to the twi-
light, the hedges sharp and dark, enemies ; nothing ahead
but the bare road, carrying the murky figure ; there all
the time ; and bound to come. She rode on at her usual
pace struggling for an absorption so complete as to make
her invisible, but was held back by her hatred of herself
for having wondered whether he had seen her. The figure
was growing more distinct. Murky. Murk from head to
THE TUNNEL 275
foot. Wearing openly like a coat the expression that could
be seen hidden inside everybody. She had made an enemy
of him. It was too late. The voice in her declaring sym-
pathy, claiming kinship faded faint and far away within
her . . . hullo old boy, isn't it a bloody world ... he would
know it had come too late. He came walking along, slowly
walking like someone in a procession or a quickly moving
funeral ; like someone in a procession, who must go on. He
was surrounded by people, pressed in and down by them,
wanting to kill everyone with a look and run, madly, to
root up trees and tear down the landscape and get outside
... he is myself. . . . He stood still. Her staring eyes
made him so clear that she saw his arrested face just be-
fore he threw out an arm and came on, stumbling. Meas-
uring the width of the roadway she rode on slowly along
the middle of it, pressing steadily and thoughtlessly forward,
her eyes fixed on the far-off" spaces of the world she used to
know, towards a barrier of swirling twilight. He was quite
near, slouching and thinking and silently talking, on and
on. He was all right poor thing. She put forth all her
strength and shot past him in a sharp curve, her eye just
seeing that he turned and stood, swaying.
What a blessing he was drunk what a blessing he was
drunk she chattered busily, trying to ignore her trembling
limbs. Again and again as she steadied and rode sturdily
and blissfully on came the picture of herself saying with
confidential eagerness as she dismounted " I say — make
haste — there's a madman coming down the road — get be-
hind the hedge till he's gone — I'm going for the police."
A man would not have been afraid. Then men arc more
independent than women. Women can never go very far
from the protection of men — because they are physically
inferior. But men are afraid of mad bulls. . . . They have
to resort to tricks. What was that I was just thinking?
276 T H E T U N N E L
Something I ought to remember. Women have to be pro-
tected. But men explain it the wrong way. It was the
same thing. . . . The polite protective man was the same ;
if he relied on his strength. The world is the most sickening
hash. . . . I'm so sorry for you. / hate humanity too.
Isn't it a lovely day? Isn't it? Just look.
The dim road led on into the darkness of what appeared
to be a private estate. The light from the lamp fell upon
wide gates fastened back. The road glimmered on ahead
with dense darkness on either side. There had been no
turning. The road evidently passed through the estate.
She rode on and on between the two darknesses, her light
casting a wobbling radiance along her path. Rustling
sounded close at hand, and quick thuddings startled her
making her heart leap. The hooting of an owl echoed
through the hollows amongst the trees. Stronger than fear
was the comfort of the dense darkness. Her own dark-
ness by right of riding through the day. Leaning upon
the velvety blackness she pushed on, her eyes upon the little
circle of light, steady on the centre of the pathway, wobbling
upon the feet of the trees emerging in slow procession on
either side of the way.
7
The road began to slope gently downwards. Wearily
back-pedalling she crept down the incline her hand on the
brake, her eyes straining forward. Hard points of gold
light — of course. She had put them there herself. Marl-
borough . . . the prim polite lights of Marlborough ; little
gliding lights, welcoming, coming safely up as she descended.
They disappeared. There must have been a gap in the trees.
Presently she would be down among them.
THE TUNNEL 277
8
" Goode Lord — it's a woman."
She passed through the open gate into the glimmer of
a descending road. Yes. Why not? Why that amazed
stupefaction? Trying to rob her of the darkness and the
wonderful coming out into the light. The man's voice
went on with her down the dull safe road. A young lady,
taking a bicycle ride in a daylit suburb. That was what
she was. That was all he would allow. It's something in
men.
9
" You don't think of riding up over the downs at this
time of night ? " It was like an At home. Everybody in
the shop was in it, but she was not in it. Marlborough
thoughts rattling in all the heads; with Sunday coming.
They had sick and dying relations. But it was all in Marl-
borough. Marlborough was all round them all the time,
the daily look of it, the morning coming each day excit-
ingly, all the people seeing each other again and the day
going on. They did not know that that was it; or what
it was they liked. Talking and thinking with the secret
hidden all the time even from themselves. But it was
that that made them talk and make such a to do about
everything. They had to hide it because if they knew they
would feel fat and complacent and wicked. They were fat
and complacent because they did not know it.
" Oh yes I do," said Miriam in feeble husky tones.
She stood squarely in front of the grating. The people
became angry gliding forms ; cheated ; angry in an eternal
resentful silence ; pretending. The man began thoughtfully
ticking off the words,
278 T H E T U N N E L
" How far have you come " he said suddenly pausing
and looking up through the grating.
" From London."
" Then you've just come down through the Forest."
" Is that a forest? "
" You must have come through Savernake."
" I didn't know it was a forest."
" Well I don't advise you to go on up over the downs
at this time of night."
If only she had not come in she could have gone on
without knowing it was " the downs."
" My front tyre is punctured " she said conversationally,
leaning a little against the counter.
The man's face tightened. " There's Mr. Drake next
door would mend that for you in the morning."
" Next door. Oh, thank you." Pushing her sixpence
under the rail she went down the shop to the door seeing
nothing but the brown dusty floor leading out to the help-
less night.
Why did he keep making such impossible suggestions?
The tyre was absolutely flat. How much would a hotel
cost? How did you stay in hotels . . . hotels . . . her
hands went busily to her wallet. She drew out the repair
outfit and Mr. Leyton's voice sounded, emphatic and argu-
mentative " You know where you are and they don't rook
you." There was certain to be one in a big town like this.
She swished back into the shop and interrupted the man
with her eager singing question.
" Yes " came the answer, " there's a quiet place of that
sort up the road, right up against the Forest."
" Has my telegram gone ? Can I alter it ? "
" No, it's not gone, you're just in time."
It was the loveliest thing that could have happened. The
day was complete, from morning to night.
THE TUNNEL 279
10
Someone brought in the meal and clattered it quietly
down, going away and shutting the door without a word.
A door opened and the sound of departing footsteps ceased.
She was shut in with the meal and the lamp in the little
crowded world. The musty silence was so complete that
the window hidden behind the buff and white blinds and
curtains must be shut. The silence throbbed. The throb-
bing of her heart shook the room. Something was telling
the room that she was the happiest thing in existence. She
stood up, the beloved little room moving as she moved,
and gathered her hands gently against her breast, to . . .
get through, through into the soul of the musty little room.
..." Oh. . . ." She felt herself beating from head to
foot with a radiance, but her body within it was weak
and heavy with fever. The little scene rocked, crowding
furniture, antimacassars, ornaments, wool mats. She
looked from thing to thing with a beaming, feverish, frozen
smile. Her eyes blinked wearily at the hot crimson flush
of the mat under the lamp. She sank back again her heavy
light limbs glowing with fever. " By Jove, I'm tired. . . .
I've had nothing since breakfast m — but a m-bath bun
and an acidulatudd drop." . . . She laughed and sat whis-
tling softly . . . Jehosophat — Manchester — Mesopotamia
— beloved — you sweet sweet thing — Veilchen, unter Gras
versteckt — out of it all — here I am. I shall always stay in
hotels. . . . Glancing towards the food spread out on a
white cloth near the globed lamp she saw beyond the table
a little stack of books. Ham and tea and bread and butter.
. . . Leaning unsteadily across the table . . . battered and
ribbed green binding and then a short moral story or nat-
ural history — blue, large and fat, a ' story-book ' of some
kind . . . she drew out one of the undermost volumes. . . .
2 8o THE TUNNEL
" Robert Elsmere " ! Here, after all these years in this little
outlandish place. She poured out some tea and hurriedly
slid a slice of ham between two pieces of bread and butter
and sat back with the food drawn near, the lamplight glar-
ing into her eyes, the printed page in exciting shadow. Ev-
erything in the room was distinct and sharp, — morning
strength descended upon her.
ii
How he must have liked and admired. It must have
amazed him ; a woman setting forth and putting straight
the muddles of his own mind. " Powerful " he probably
said. It was a half jealous keeping to himself of a fine,
good thing. If he could have known that it would have
been, just at that very moment, the answer to my worry
about Christ he would have been jealous and angry quite
as much as surprised and pleased and sympathetic . . .
he was afraid himself of the idea that anyone can give
up the idea of the divinity of Christ and still remain re-
ligious and good. He ought to have let me read it. . . .
If he could have stated it himself as well, that day by the
gate he would have done so ..." a very reasonable di-
lemma my dear." He knew I was thinking about things.
But he had not read Robert Elsmere then. He was jealous
of a thunderbolt flung by a woman. . . .
12
And now I've got beyond Robert Elsmere. . . . That's
Mrs. Humphry Ward and Robert Elsmere ; that's gone.
There's no answering science. One must choose. Either
science or religion. They can't both be true. This is the
same as Literature and Dogma. . . . Only in Literature
and Dogma there is that thing that is perfectly true — that
THE TUNNEL 281
thing — what is it ? What was that idea in Literature and
Dogma ?
13
I wonder if I've strained my heart. This funny feeling
of sinking through the bed. Never mind. I've done the
ride. I'm alive and alone in a strange place. Everything's
alive all round me in a new way. Nearer. As the flame of
the candle had swelled and gone out under her blowing
she had noticed the bareness of everything in the room —
a room for chance travellers, nothing that anyone could
carry away. She could still see it as it was when she moved
and blew out the candle, a whole room swaying sideways
into darkness. The more she relinquished the idea of harm
and danger, the nearer and more intimate the room became.
. . . No one can prevent my being alone in a strange place,
near to things and loving them. It's more than worth half
killing yourself. It makes you ready to die. I'm not going
to die, even if I have strained my heart. ' Damaged myself
for life.' I am going to sleep. The dawn will come, no
one knowing where I am. Because I have no money I must
go on and stay with these people. But I have been alive
here. There's hardly any time. I must go to sleep.
CHAPTER XXVII
BEING really happy or really miserable makes people
like you and like being with you. They need not
know the cause. Someone will speak now, in a moment.
. . . Miriam tried to return to the falling rain, the soft
light in it, the soft light on the greenery, the intense green
glow everywhere . . . misty green glow. But her eyes fell
and her thoughts went on. They would have seen. Her
face must be speaking of their niceness in coming out on
the dull day so that she might drive about once more in
Lord Lansdowne's estate. Someone will speak. Perhaps
they had not found forgetfulness in the green through the
rain under the grey. Moments came suddenly in the lanes
between the hedges, like that moment that always came
where the lane ran up and turned and the fields spread out
in the distance. But usually you could not forget the chaise
and the donkey and the people. In here amongst the green
something always came at once and stayed. Perhaps they
did not find it so, or did not know they found it, because of
their thoughts about the " fine estate." They seemed quite
easy driving in the lanes, as easy as they ever seemed when
one could not forget them. What were they doing when
one forgot them ? They knew one liked some things better
than others ; or suddenly liked everything very much indeed
. . . she said you were apathetic . . . what does that mean
. . . what did she mean . . . with her one could see noth-
28a
THE TUNNEL 283
ing and sat waiting ... I said I don't think so, I don't
think she is apathetic at all. Then they understood when
one sat in a heap. . . . They had been pleased this morn-
ing because of one's misery at going away. They did not
know of the wild happiness in the garden before breakfast
nor that the garden had been so lovely because the strain of
the visit was over, and London was coming. They did not
know that the happiness of being in amongst the greenery
to-day, pouring out one's heart in farewell to the great trees
had grown so intense because the feeling of London and
freedom was there. They could not see the long rich win-
ter, the lectures and books, out of which something was
coming. . . .
" It's a pity the rain came."
Ah no, that is not rain. It is not raining. What is ' rain-
ing ' ? What do people think when they say these things ?
" We are like daisies, drenched in dew." She pursed up
her face towards the sky.
They laughed and silence came again. Heavy and happy.
" I'm glad you came up. I want to ask you what is to
be done about Hendie."
Miriam looked about the boudoir. Mrs. Green had
hardly looked at her. She was smiling at her fancy work.
But if one did not say something soon she would speak
again, going on into things from her point of view. Doctor
and medicine. Eve liked it all. She liked Mrs. Green's
clever difficult fancy work and the boudoir smell of Turkish
beans and the house and garden and the bazaars and village
entertainments and the children's endless expensive clothes
and the excitements and troubles about that fat man. Down
here she was in a curious flush of excitement all the time
herself. . . .
284 THE TUNNEL
" I think she wants a rest."
" I told her so. But resting seems to make her worse.
We all thought she was worse after the holidays."
Miriam's eyes fell before the sudden glance of Mrs.
Green's blue green eye. She must have seen her private
vision of life in the great rich house . . . misery, death with
no escape. But they had Eve. Eve did not know what
was killing her. She liked being tied to people.
" She is very nervous."
" Yes. I know it's only nerves. I've told her that."
" But you don't know what nerves are. They're not just
nothing. . . ."
" You're not nervous."
" Don't you think so?"
" Not in the way Hendie is. You're a solid little person."
Miriam laughed and thought of Germany and Newlands
and Banbury Park. But this house would be a thousand
times worse. There was no one in it who knew anything
about anything. That was why when she was not too bad
Eve thought it was good for her to be there.
" I think she's very happy here."
" I'm glad you think that. But something must be done.
She can't go on with these perpetual headaches and sleep-
lessness and attacks of weepiness."
" I think she wants a long rest."
" What does she do with her holidays? Doesn't she rest
then?"
" Yes, but there are always worries " said Miriam des-
perately.
" You have had a good deal to worry — how is your
father?"
How much do you know about that. . . . How does it
strike you. . . .
" He is all right, I think."
THE TUNNEL 285
" He lives with your eldest sister."
" Yes."
" That's very nice for him. I expect the little grandson
will be a great interest."
" Yes."
" And your youngest sister has a little girl ? "
"Yes."
" Do you like children ? "
" Yes."
" I expect you spend a good deal of your time with your
sisters."
" Well — it's a fearful distance." Why didn't you ask
me all these things when I was staying with you. There's
no time now. . . .
" Do you like living alone in London ? "
" Well — I'm fearfully busy."
" I expect you are. I think it's wonderful. But you
must be awfully lonely sometimes."
Miriam fidgeted and wondered how to go.
" Well — come down and see us again. I'm glad I had
this chance of talking to you about Hendie."
" Perhaps she'll be better in the winter. I think she's
really better in the cold weather."
" Well — we'll hope so," said Mrs. Green getting up.
" I can't think what's the matter with her. There's nothing
to worry her down here."
" No " said Miriam emphatically in a worldly tone of
departure. " Thank you so much for having me " she
said feebly as they passed through the flower-scented hall
the scent of the flowers hanging delicately within the
stronger odour of the large wood-fire.
" I'm glad you came. We thought it would be nice for
both of you."
" Yes it was very kind of you. I'm sure she wants a
286 THE TUNNEL
complete rest." Away from us away from you in some
new place. . . .
In the open light of the garden Mrs. Green's eyes were
almost invisible points. She ought to do her hair smaller.
The fashionable bundle of little sausages did not suit a
large head. The eyes looked more sunken and dead than
Eve's with her many headaches. But she was strong — a
strong hard thunder-cloud at breakfast. Perhaps very un-
happy. But wealthy. Strong, cruel wealth, eating up lives
it did not understand. How did Eve manage to read Music
and Morals and Olive Schreiner here?
CHAPTER XXVIII
""\>T ISS DEAR to see y° u Miss -"
J[ \ J_ " Is there anyone else in the waiting room ? "
" No miss — nobody."
Miriam went in briskly. ..." Well ? How is the de-
cayed gentlewoman?" she said briskly from the doorway.
She hardly looked. She had taken in the close-fitting bonnet
and chin bow and the height-giving look of the long blue
uniform cloak together with the general aspect of the heavily
shaded afternoon room. . . .
" Oh, she's very well."
Miss Dear had stood quite still in her place half way
down the room between the sofa and the littered waiting
room table. She made a small controlled movement with
her right hand as Miriam approached. Miriam paused with
her hand on a " Navy League," absorbed in the low sweet
even tone. She found herself standing reverently, pulled
up a few inches from the dark figure. Suddenly she was
alight with the radiance of an uncontrollable smile. Her
downcast eyes were fixed upon a tall slender figure in a
skimpy black dress, tendrils of fine gold hair dancing in the
rough wind under a cornflower blue toque, a clear living
rose-flush. . . . Something making one delicate figure more
than the open width of the afternoon, the blue afternoon
sea and sky. She looked up. The shy sweet flower pink
face glowed more intensely under the cap of gold hair
clasped flatly down by the blue velvet rim of the bonnet.
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288 THETUNNEL
The eyes, now like Weymouth Bay, now like Julia Doyle's,
now a clear expressionless blue, were fixed on hers ; the
hesitating face was breaking again into watchful speech.
But there was no speech in the well-remembered outlines
moulding the ominous cloak. Miriam flung out to stem
the voice, rushing into phrases to open the way to the hall
and the front door. Miss Dear stood smiling and laughing
her little smothered obsequious laugh, just as she had done
at Bognor, making one feel like a man.
"Well — I'm most frightfully busy," wound up Miriam
cheerfully turning to the door. " That's London — isn't
it? One never has a minute."
Miss Dear did not move. " I came to thank you for the
concert tickets," she said in the even thoughtful voice
that dispersed one's thoughts.
" Oh yes. Was it any good? "
" I enjoyed it immensely," said Miss Dear gravely. " So
did Sister North," she added, shaking out the words in
delicate laughter.
. . . / don't know ' Sister North.' ..." Oh, good " said
Miriam opening the door.
" It was most kind of you to send them. I'm going to
a case to-morrow, but I shall hope to see you when I come
back."
" Sister North sported a swell new blouse " said Miss
Dear in clear intimate tones as she paused in the hall to
take up her umbrella.
" I hope it won't rain," said Miriam formally, opening
the front door.
" She was no end of a swell " pursued Miss Dear, hitch-
ing her cloak and skirt from her heels with a neat cuffed
gloved hand, quirked compactly against her person just un-
der her waist and turned so that her elbow and forearm
made a small compact angle against her person. She spoke
THE TUNNEL 289
over her shoulder, her form slenderly poised forward to de-
scend the steps; " I told her she would knock them." She
was aglow with the afternoon sunlight streaming down the
street.
Miriam spoke as she stepped down with delicate plunges.
She did not hear and paused turning on the last step.
" It was too bad of you " shouted Miriam smiling " to
leave my sister alone at the Decayed Gentlewomen's."
" I couldn't help myself," gleamed Miss Dear. " My
time was up."
" Did you hate being there ? "
Miss Dear hung, poised and swaying to some inner breeze.
Miriam gazed, waiting for her words, watching the in-
turned eyes control the sweet lips flowering for speech.
" It was rather comical " — the eyes came round, clear
pure blue ; — " until your sister came." The tall slender
figure faced the length of the street; the long thin blue
cloak flickering all over gave Miriam a foresight of the
coming swift hesitating conversational progress of the figure
along the pavement, the poise of the delicate surmounting
head, slightly bent, the pure brow foremost, shading the
lowered thoughtful eyes, the clear little rounded dip of
the chin indrawn.
" I'm glad she gave me your address," finished Miss
Dear a little furrow running along her brow in control of
the dimpling flushed oval below it. " I'll say au revoir
and not good bye for the present."
"Good bye," flung Miriam stiffly at the departing face.
Shutting the neglected door she hurried back through the
hall and resumed her consciousness of Wimpole Street with
angry eager swiftness. . . . Eve, getting mixed up with
people ... it is right . . . she would not have been angry
if I had asked her to be nice to somebody. ... I did not
mean to do anything ... I was proud of having the
2QO THE TUNNEL
tickets to send ... if I had not sent them I should have
had the thought of all those nurses, longing for something
to do between cases. They are just the people for the
Students Concerts ... if she comes again. ..." I can't
have social life, unfortunately," how furious I shall feel
saying that "you see I'm so fearfully full up — lectures
every night and I'm away every week-end . . . and I'm not
supposed to see people here "
CHAPTER XXIX
MIRIAM had no choice but to settle herself on the
cane-seated chair. When Miss Dear had drawn
the four drab coloured curtains into place the small cubicle
was in semi-darkness.
" I hope the next time you come to tea with me it will
be under rather more comfortable circumstances."
" This is all right," said Miriam in abstracted impatient
continuation of her abounding manner. Miss Dear was
arranging herself on the bed as if for a long sitting. The
small matter of business would come now. Having had
tea it would be impossible to depart the moment the dis-
cussion was over. How much did the tea cost here ? That
basement tea-room, those excited young women and middle-
aged women watchful and stealthy and ugly with poverty
and shifts, those tea-pots and shabby trays and thick bread
and butter were like the Y.W.C.A. public restaurant at the
other end of the street — fourpence at the outside; but
Miss Dear would have to pay it. She felt trapped ..." a
few moments of your time to advise me " and now half
the summer twilight had gone and she was pinned in this
prison face to face with anything Miss Dear might choose
to present; forced by the presences audible in the other
cubicles to a continuation of her triumphant tea-room man-
ner.
" You must excuse my dolly." She arranged her skirt
neatly about the ankle of the slippered bandaged foot.
291
292 THE TUNNEL
Anyone else would say what is the matter with your foot.
... It stuck out, a dreadfully paddled mass, dark in the
darkness of the dreadful little enclosure in the dreadful
dark hive of women, collected together only by poverty.
" Have you left your association? "
"Oh no, de-er! not permanently of course," said Miss
Dear pausing in her tweaklings and adjustments of draperies
to glance watchfully through the gloom.
" I'm still a member there."
" Oh yes."
" But I've got to look after myself. They don't give you
a chance."
"No "
" It's rush in and rush out and rush in and rush out."
" What are you going to do ? . . . what do you want
with me. . . ."
" What do you mean de-er."
" Well I mean, are you going on nursing."
" Of course de-er. I was going to tell you."
Miriam's restive anger would not allow her to attend
fully to the long story. She wandered off with the dreadful
idea of nursing a " semi-mental " sitting in a deck-chair
in a country garden, the hopeless patient, the nurse half
intent on a healthy life and fees for herself, and recalled
the sprinkling of uniformed figures amongst the women
crowded at the table, all in this dilemma, all eagerly intent ;
all overworked by associations claiming part of their fees
or taking the risks of private nursing, all getting older;
all anyhow as long as they went on nursing bound to live
on illness; to live with illness knowing that they were
living on it. Yet Mr. Leyton had said that no hospital
run by a religious sisterhood was any good . . . these
women were run by doctors. . . .
" You see de-er it's the best thing any sensible nurse can
THE TUNNEL 293
do as soon as she knows a sufficient number of influenchoo
peopoo — physicians and others."
" Yes, I see." . . . But what has all this to do with
me. . . .
" I shall keep in correspondence with my doctors and
friends and look after myself a bit."
" Yes, I see," said Miriam eagerly. " It's a splendid plan.
What did you want to consult me about ? "
" Well you see it's like this. I must tell you my little
difficulty. The folks at thirty-three don't know I'm here
and I dont' want to go back there just at present. I was
wondering if when I leave here you'd mind my having my
box sent to your lodgings. I shan't want my reserve things
down there."
" Well — there isn't much room in my room."
" It's a flat box. I got it to go to the Colonies with a
patient."
" Oh, did you go? . . ." Nurses did see life ; though they
were never free to see it in their own way. Perhaps some
of them . . . but then they would not be good nurses.
" Well I didn't go. It was a chance of a life-time. Such
a de-er old gentleman — one of the Fitz-Duff family. It
would have been nurse companion. He didn't want me
in uniform. My word. He gave me a complete outfit,
took me round, coats and skirts at Peters, gloves at Pen-
berthy's, a lovely gold-mounted umbrella, everything the
heart could desire. He treated me just like a daughter."
During the whole of this speech she redeemed her words
by little delicate bridling movements and adjustments, her
averted eyes resting in indulgent approval on the old gentle-
man.
"Why didn't you go?"
" He died dear."
" Oh I see."
294 THE TUNNEL
44 It could go under your bed, out of the way."
44 I've got hat-boxes and things. My room is full of
things I'm afraid."
44 P'raps your landlady would let it stand somewhere."
44 I might ask her — won't they let you leave things here? "
44 They would I daresay," frowned Miss Dear "' but I
have special reasons. I don't wish to be beholden to the
people here." She patted the tendrils of her hair, looking
about the cubicle with cold disapproval.
44 I daresay Mrs. Bailey wouldn't mind. But I hardly
like to ask her you know. There seems to be luggage piled
up everywhere."
44 Of course I should be prepared to pay a fee."
. . . What a wonderful way of living . . . dropping a
trunk full of things and going off with a portmanteau;
starting life afresh in a new strange place. Miriam re-
garded the limber capable form outstretched on the narrow
bed. This dark little enclosure, the forced companionship
of the crowd of competing adventuresses, the sounds of
them in the near cubicles, the perpetual sound filling the
house like a sea of their busy calculations ... all this was
only a single passing incident . . . beyond it were the wide
well-placed lives of wealthy patients.
Miss Younger is a sweet woman."
Miriam's eyes awoke to affronted surprise.
44 You know de-er ; the wan yow was sitting by at tea-
time. I told you just now."
" Oh " said Miriam guiltily.
Miss Dear dropped her voice ; " she's told me her whole
story. She's a dear sweet Christian woman. She's work-
ing in a settlement. She's privately engaged to the Bishop.
It's not to be published yet. She's a sweet woman."
Miriam rose. " I've got to get back, I'm afraid."
THE TUNNEL 295
" Don't hurry away, dear. I hoped you would stay and
have some supper."
" I really can't " said Miriam wearily.
" Well, perhaps we shall meet again before Thursday.
You'll ask Mrs. Bailey about my box," said Miss Dear get-
ting to her feet.
" Fancy your remembering her name " said Miriam with
loud cheerfulness, fumbling with the curtains.
Miss Dear stood beaming indulgently.
All the way down the unlit stone staircase they rallied
each other about the country garden with the deck chairs.
" Well " said Miriam from the street, " I'll let you know
about Mrs. Bailey."
" All right dear, I shall expect to hear from you ; au
revoir " cried Miss Dear from the door. In the joy of her
escape into the twilight Miriam waved her hand towards
the indulgently smiling form and flung away, singing.
CHAPTER XXX
"D EGULAR field-da y' eh Miss Hens'n Look
[^ here " Mr. Orly turned towards the light
coming in above the front door to exhibit his torn waist-
coat and broken watch-chain. " Came for me like a fury.
They've got double strength y'know when they're under.
Ever seen anything like it?"
Miriam glanced incredulously at the portly frontage.
" Fancy breaking the chain " she said, sickened by the
vision of small white desperately fighting hands. He gath-
ered up the hanging strings of bright links, his powerful
padded musicianly hands finding the edges of the broken
links and holding them adjusted with the discoloured rav-
aged fingers of an artizan. " A good tug would do it," he
said kindly. " A chain's no stronger than the weakest
link " he added with a note of dreamy sadness, drawing a
sharp sigh.
" Did you get the tooth out " clutched Miriam auto-
matically making a mental note of the remark that flashed
through the world with a sad light, a lamp brought into a
hopeless sick-room . . . keeping up her attitude of response
to show that she was accepting the apology for the extrem-
ities of rage over the getting of the anaesthetist. Mrs. Orly
appearing in the hall at the moment, still flushed from
the storm, joined the group and outdid Miriam's admiring
amazement, brilliant smiles of relief garlanding her gentle
296
THE TUNNEL 297
outcry. " Hancock busy ? " said Mr. Orly in farewell as
he turned and swung away to the den followed by Mrs.
Orly, her unseen face busy with an interrupted errand.
He would not hear that her voice was divided. . . . No
one seemed to be aware of the divided voices ... no men.
Life went on and on, a great oblivious awfulness, sliding
over everything. Every moment things went that could
never be recovered ... on and on, and it was always too
late, there was always some new thing obliterating every-
thing, something that looked new, but always turned out
to be the same as everything else, grinning with its same-
ness in an awful blank where one tried to remember the
killed things ... if only everyone would stop for a moment
and let the thing that was always hovering be there, let it
settle and intensify. But the whole of life was a conspiracy
to prevent it. Was there something wrong in it? It could
not be a coincidence the way life akvays did that . . . she
had reached the little conservatory on the half landing,
darkened with a small forest of aspidistra. The dull dust-
laden leaves identified themselves with her life. What
had become of her autumn of hard work that was to lift
her out of her personal affairs and lead somewhere? Al-
ready the holiday freshness and vigour had left her; and
nothing had been done. Nothing was so strong as the de-
sire that everything would stop for a moment and allow her
to remember . . . wearily she mounted the remaining stairs
to Mr. Hancock's room. " I think " said a clear high con-
fident voice from the chair and stopped. Miriam waited
with painful eagerness while the patient rinsed her mouth ;
" that that gentleman thinks himself a good deal cleverer
than he is," she resumed sitting back in the chair.
" I am afraid I'm not as familiar with his work as I ought
to be, but I can't say I've been very greatly impressed as
far as I have gone."
298 THE TUNNEL
" Don't go any further. There's nothing there to go
for."
Who are you speaking of? How do you know? What
have you got that makes you think he has nothing? — Mir-
iam almost cried aloud. Could she not see, could not both
of them see that the quiet sheen of the green-painted win-
dow-frame cast off their complacent speech? Did they not
hear it tinkle emptily back from the twined leaves and ten-
drils, the flowers and butterflies painted on the window
in front of them? The patient had turned briskly to the
spittoon again after her little speech. She would have a
remark ready when the brisk rinsing was over. There could
be no peace in her presence. Even when she was gagged
there would be the sense of her sending out little teasing
thoughts and comments. They could never leave anything
alone ... oh it was that woman ... the little gold knot
at the back of the cheerful little gold head; hair that curled
tightly about her head when she was a baby and that had
grown long and been pinned up, as the clever daughter of
that man; getting to know all he had said about women.
If she believed it she must loathe her married state and her
children . . . how could she let life continue through her?
Perhaps it was the sense of her treachery that gave her that
bright brisk amused manner. It was a way of carrying
things off, that maddening way of speaking of everything as
if life were a jest at everybody's expense ... all " clever "
women seemed to have that, never speaking what they
thought or felt, but always things that sounded like quota-
tions from men ; so that they always seemed to flatter or
criticise the men they were with according as they were as
clever as some man they knew, or less clever. What was
she like when she was alone and dropped that bright manner.
..." Have you made any New Year resolutions? I don't
THE TUNNEL 299
make any. My friends think me godless, / think them lack-
ing in common sense "... exactly like a man ; taking up
a fixed attitude . . . having a sort of prepared way of tak-
ing everything . . . like the Wilsons . . . anything else was
' unintelligent ' or ' absurd ' . . . their impatience meant
something. Somehow all the other people were a reproach.
If some day everyone lived in the clear light of science,
" waiting for the pronouncements of science in all the affairs
of life," waiting for the pronouncements of those sensual
dyspeptic men with families who thought of women as ex-
isting only to produce more men . . . admirably fitted by
Nature's inexorable laws for her biological role . . . per-
haps she agreed or pretended to think it all a great lark . . .
the last vilest flattery . . . she had only two children . . .
si la femme avait plus de sensibilite elle ne retomberait pas si
facilement dans la grossesse. ... La femme, c'est peu gal-
ant de le dire, est la femelle de l'homme. The Frenchman at
any rate wanted to say something else. But why want to
be gallant . . . and why not say man ; it is not very graceful
to say it, is the male of woman. If women had been the
recorders of things from the beginning it would all have
been the other way round . . . Mary. Mary, the Jewess,
write something about Mary the Jewess; the Frenchman's
Queen of Heaven.
Englishmen ; the English were " the leading race."
" England and America together — the Anglo-Saxon peoples
— could govern the destines of the world." What world?
. . . millions and millions of child-births . . . colonial
women would keep it all going . . . and religious people
. . . and if religion went on there would always be all the
people who took the Bible literally . . . and if religion were
not true then there was only science. Either way was
equally abominable . . . for women.
3oo THETUNNEL
The far end of the ward was bright sunlight . . . there
she was enthroned, commanding the whole length of the
ward, sitting upright, her head and shoulders already con-
versational, her hands busy with objects on the bed towards
which her welcoming head was momentarily bent ; like a
hostess moving chairs in a small drawing room . . . chrys-
anthemums all down the ward — massed on little tables . . .
a parrot sidling and bobbing along its perch, great big funny
solemn French grey, fresh clean living French grey pure in
the sunlight, a pure canary coloured beak . . . clean grey
and yellow ... in the sun ... a curious silent noise in the
stillness of the ward.
" I couldn't hear ; I wasn't near enough."
" Better late than never, I said."
" D'you know I thought you'd only been here a few days
and to-day when I looked at your letter I was simply as-
tounded. You're sitting up."
" I should hope I am. They kept me on my back, half
starving for three weeks."
" You look very pink and well now."
" That's what Dr. Ashley Densley said. You ought to
have seen me when I came in. You see I'm on chicken
now."
" And you feel better."
" Well, — you can't really tell how you are till you're up."
"When are you going to get up?"
" Tomorrow I hope dear. So you see you're just in
time."
" Do you mean you are going away? "
" They turn you out as soon as you're strong enough to
stand."
" But — how can you get about? "
THE TUNNEL 301
" Dr. Ashley Densley has arranged all that. I'm going
to a convalescent home."
" Oh, that's very nice."
" Poor Dr. Ashley Densley, he was dreadfully upset."
" You've had some letters to cheer you up." Miriam
spoke impatiently, her eyes rooted on the pale leisurely
hands mechanically adjusting some neatly arranged papers.
"No de-er. My friends have all left me to look after
myself this time but since I've been sitting up, I've been
trying to get my affairs in order."
" I thought of bringing you some flowers but there was
not a single shop between here and Wimpole Street."
" There's generally women selling them outside. But I'm
glad you didn't; I've too much sympathy with the poor
nurses."
Miriam glanced fearfully about. There were so many
beds with forms seated and lying upon them . . . but there
seemed no illness or pain. Quiet eyes met hers ; everything
seemed serene; there was no sound but the strange silent
noise of the sunlight and the flowers. Half way down the
ward stood a large three-fold screen covered with dark
American cloth.
" She's unconscious today," said Miss Dear; "she won't
last through the night."
" Do you mean to say there is someone dying there?"
" Yes de-er."
" Do you mean to say they don't put them into a separate
room to die?"
" They can't dear. They haven't got the space " flashed
Miss Dear.
Death shut in with one lonely person. Brisk nurses
putting up the screen. Dying eyes cut off from all but
those three dark surrounding walls, with death waiting
3oa THE TUNNEL
inside them. Miriam's eyes filled with tears. There, just
across the room, was the end. It had to come somewhere;
just that; on any summer's afternoon . . . people did
tilings ; hands placed a screen, people cleared you away.
... It was a relief to realise that there were hospitals to
die in ; worry and torture of mind could end here. Perhaps
it might be easier with people all round you than in a little
room. There were hospitals to be ill in and somewhere
to die neatly, however poor you were. It was a relief . . .
" she's always the last to get up ; still snoring when every-
body's fussing and washing." That would be me ... it
lit up the hostel. Miss Dear liked that time of fussing and
washing in company with all the other cubicles fussing and
washing. To be very poor meant getting more and more
social life with no appearances to keep up, getting up each
day with a holiday feeling of one more day and the surprise
of seeing everybody again; and the certainty that if you
died somebody would do something. Certainly it was this
knowledge that gave Miss Dear her peculiar strength. She
was a nurse and knew how everything was done. She
knew that people, all kinds of people were people and would
do things. When one was quite alone one could not believe
this. Besides no one would do anything for me. I don't
want anyone to. I should hate the face of a nurse who
put a screen round my bed. I shall not die like that. I
shall die in some other way, out in the sun, with — yes -
oh yes — Tah-dee, t'dee, t'dee — t'dee.
" It must be funny for a nurse to be in a hospital."
" It's a little too funny sometimes dear — you know too
much about what you're in for."
" Ilikeyourredjacket. Good Heavens! "
" That's nothing dear. He does that all the afternoon."
" How can you stand it?"
" It's Hobson's choice, madam."
THE TUNNEL 303
The parrot uttered three successive squawks fuller and
harsher and even more shrill than the first.
"He's just tuning up; he always does in the afternoon
just as everybody is trying to get a little sleep."
" But I never heard of such a thing ! It's monstrous, in
a hospital. Why don't you all complain."
" 'Sh dear ; he belongs to Matron."
" Why doesn't she have him in her room ? Shut up,
polly." "
" He'd be rather a roomful in a little room."
" Well — what is he here? It's the wickedest thing of
its kind I've ever heard of ; some great fat healthy woman
. . . why don't the doctors stop it ? "
" Perhaps they hardly notice it dear. There's such a
bustle going on in the morning when they all come round."
" But hang it all she's here to look after you, not to leave
her luggage all over the ward."
3
The ripe afternoon light . . . even outside a hospital
. . . the strange indistinguishable friend, mighty welcome,
unutterable happiness. Oh death, where is thy sting?
Oh grave, where is thy victory? The light has no end. I
know it and it knows me, no misunderstanding, no barrier.
I love you — people say things. But nothing that anybody
says has any meaning. Nothing that anybody says has any
meaning. There is something more than anything that
anybody says, that comes first, before they speak . . .
vehicles travelling along through heaven; everybody in
heaven without knowing it ; the sound the vehicles made
all together, sounding out through the universe . . . life
touches your heart like dew; that is true ... the edge of
his greasy knowing selfish hair touches the light ; he brushes
it; there is something in him that remembers. It is in
304 T HE TUNNEL
everybody; but they won't stop. How maddening. But
they know. When people die they must stop. Then they
remember. Remorse may be complete ; until it is complete
you cannot live. When it is complete something is burned
away . . . ou-agh, flows out of you, burning, inky, acid,
flows right out . . . purged . . . though thy sins are as
scarlet they shall be white as snow. Then the light is there,
nothing but the light, and new memory, sweet and bright ;
but only when you have been killed by remorse.
This is what is meant by a purple twilight. Lamps
alight, small round lights, each in place, shedding no
radiance, white day lingering on the stone pillars of the
great crescent, the park railings distinct, the trees shrouded
but looming very large and permanent, the air wide and
high and purple, darkness alight and warm. Far far away
beyond the length of two endless months is Christmas.
This kind of day lived for ever. It stood still. The whole
year, funny little distant fussy thing stood still in this sort
of day. You could take it in your hand and look at it.
Nobody could touch this. People and books and all those
things that men had done, in the British Museum were a
crackling noise, outside. . . . Les yeux gris, vont au
paradis. That was the two poplars standing one each side
of the little break in the railings, shooting up ; the space
between them shaped by their shapes, leading somewhere,
I must have been through there; it's the park. I don't re-
member. It isn't. It's waiting. One day I will go
through. Les yeux gris, vont au paradis. Going along,
along, the twilight hides your shabby clothes. They are
not shabby. They are clothes you go along in. funny ;
jolly. Everything's here, any bit of anything, clear in your
brain ; you can look at it. What a terrific thing a person is ;
bigger than anything. How funny it is to be a person.
THE TUNNEL 305
You can never not have been a person. Bouleversement.
It's a fait bouleversant. C/im^-how-rummy. It's enough.
Du, Heilige, rufe dein Kind zuriick, ich habe genossen dass
irdische Gliick; ich habe geliebt und gelebet. . . . Oh let
the solid earth not fail beneath my feet, until I am quite
quite sure. . . . Hullo, old Euston Road, beloved of my
soul, my own country, my native heath. There'll still be a
glimmer on the table when I light the lamp . . . how shall
I write it down, the sound the little boy made as he care-
fully carried the milk jug . . . going along, trusted, trusted,
you could see it, you could see his mother. His legs came
along, little loose feet, looking after themselves, pottering,
behind him. All his body was in the hand carrying the milk
jug. When he had done carrying the milk jug he would
run; running along the pavement amongst people, with
cool round eyes not looking at anything. Where the crowd
prevented his running he would jog up and down as he
walked, until he could run again, bumping solemnly up and
down amongst the people ; boy.
4
The turning of the key in the latch was lively with the
vision of the jumping boy. The flare of the match in the
unlit hall lit up eternity. The front door was open, eternity
poured in and on up the stairs. At one of those great stair-
case windows where the last of the twilight stood a sudden
light of morning would not be surprising. Of course a
letter; curly curious statements on the hall-stand.
There is mother-of-pearl, nacre; twilight nacre; crepus-
cule nacre ; I must wait until it is gone. It is a visitor ;
pearly freshness pouring in ; but if I wait I may feel dif-
ferent. With the blind up the lamp will be a lamp in it;
twilight outside, the lamp on the edge of it, making the
room gold, edged with twilight.
3 o6 THETUNNEL
I can't go to-night. It's all here; I must stay here.
Botheration. It's Eve's fault. Eve would rather go out
and see that girl than stay here. Eve likes getting tied up
with people. I zvon't get tied up; it drives everything away.
Now I've read the letter I must go. There'll be afterwards
when I get back. No one has any power over me. I shall
be coming back. I shall always be coming back.
5
Perhaps it had been Madame Tussaud's that had made
this row of houses generally invisible ; perhaps their own
aw fulness. When she found herself opposite them, Miriam
recognised them at once. By day they were one high long
lifeless smoke-grimed facade fronted by gardens colourless
with grime, showing at its thickest on the leaves of an
occasional laurel. It had never occurred to her that the
houses could be occupied. She had seen them now and
again as reflectors of the grime of the Metropolitan Rail-
way. Its smoke poured up over their faces as the smoke
from a kitchen fire pours over the back of a range. The
sight of them brought nothing to her mind but the inside
of the Metropolitan Railway; the feeling of one's skin
prickling with grime the sense of one's smoke-grimed
clothes. There was nothing in that strip between Madame
Tussaud's and the returning into Baker Street but the sense
of exposure to grime ... a little low grimed wall sur-
mounted by paintless sooty iron railings. On the other
side of the road a high brown wall, protecting whatever
was behind, took the grime in one thick covering, here it
spread over the exposed gardens and facades turning her
eyes away. To-night they looked almost as untenanted as
she had been accustomed to think them. Here and there on
the black expanse a window showed a blurred light. The
THE TUNNEL 307
house she sought appeared to be in total darkness. The
iron gate crumbled harshly against her gloves as she set
her weight against the rusty hinges. Gritty dust sounded
under her feet along the pathway and up the shallow steps
leading to the unlit doorway.
Her flight up through the sickly sweet-smelling murk
of the long staircase ended in a little top back room brilliant
with unglobed gaslight. Miss Dear got her quickly into
the room and stood smiling and waiting for a moment for
her to speak. Miriam stood nonplussed, catching at the
feelings that rushed through her and the thoughts that
spoke in her mind. Distracted by the picture of the calm
tall, gold-topped figure in the long grey skirt and the pale
pink flannel dressing- jacket. Miss Dear was smiling the
smile of one who has a great secret to impart. There was
a saucepan or frying pan or something — with a handle —
sticking out. ..." I'm glad you've brought a book " said
Miss Dear. The room was closing up and up . . . the
door was shut. Miriam's exasperation flew out. She felt
it fly out. What would Miss Dear do or say? "I 'oped
you'd come " she said in her softest most thoughtful tones.
" I've been rushing about and rushing about." She turned
with her swift limber silent-footed movement to the thing
on the gas-ring. " Sit down dear " she said, as one giving
permission, and began rustling a paper packet. A haddock
came forth and the slender thoughtful fingers plucked and
picked at it and lifted it gingerly into the shallow steaming
pan. Miriam's thoughts whirled to her room, to the dark
sky-domed streets, to the coming morrow. They flew about
all over her life. The cane-seated chair thrilled her with a
fresh sense of anger.
308 T H E T U N N E L
" I've been shopping and rushing about " said Miss Dear
disengaging a small crusty loaf from its paper bag. Miriam
stared gloomily about and waited.
"Do you like haddock, dear?"
" Oh — well — I don't know — yes I think I do."
The fish smelled very savoury. It was wonderful and
astonishing to know how to cook a real meal ; in a tiny
room; cheap ... the lovely little loaf and the wholesome
solid fish would cost less than a small egg and roll and but-
ter at an A. B.C. How did people find out how to do these
things ?
" You know how to cook ? "
" I laddock doesn't hardly need any cooking " said Miss
Dear, shifting the fish about by its tail.
7
" What is your book dear? "
- Oh — Villette."
" Is it a pretty book ? "
She didn't want to know. She was saying something
else. . . . How to mention it? Why say anything about
it? But no one had ever asked. No one had known.
This woman was the first. She of all people was causing
the first time of speaking of it.
" I bought it when I was fifteen," said Miriam vaguely,
" and a Byron — with some money I had ; seven and six."
" Oh yes."
" I didn't care for the Byron ; but it was a jolly edition ;
padded leather with rounded corners and gilt edged leaves."
" Oh."
" I've been reading this thing ever since I came back from
my holidays."
" It doesn't look very big."
THE TUNNEL 309
Miriam's voice trembled. " I don't mean that. When
I've finished it I begin again."
" I wish you would read it to me."
Miriam recoiled. Anything would have done ; Donovan
or anything. . . . But something had sprung into the room.
She gazed at the calm profile, the long slender figure, the
clear grey and pink, the pink frill of the jacket falling back
from the soft fair hair turned cleanly up, the clean fluffy
curve of the skull, the serene line of the brow bent in
abstracted contemplation of the steaming pan. " I believe
you'd like it " she said brightly.
" I should love you to read to me when we've 'ad our
supper."
'/ Oh — I've had my supper."
" A bit of haddock won't hurt you dear. . . . I'm afraid
we shall have to be very knockabout; I've got a knife and
a fork but no plates at present. It comes of living in a
box" said Miss Dear pouring off the steaming water into
the slop-pail.
" I've had my supper — really. I'll read while you have
yours."
" Well, don't sit out in the middle of the room dear."
" I'm all right " said Miriam impatiently, finding the
beginning of the first chapter. Her hands clung to the book.
She had not made herself at home as Eve would have done
and talked. Now, those words would sound aloud, in a
room. Someone would hear and see. Miss Dear would
not know what it was. But she would hear and see some-
thing.
" It's by a woman called Charlotte Bronte " she said and
began headlong with the gaslight in her eyes.
The familiar words sounded chilly and poor. Everything
in the room grew very distinct. Before she had finished
the chapter Miriam knew the position of each piece of furni-
3 io THE TUNNEL
ture. Miss Dear sat very still. Was she listening patiently
like a mother, or wife, thinking of the reader as well as
of what was read, and with her own thoughts running along
independently, interested now and again in some single
thing in the narrative, something that reminded her of some
experience of her own or some person she knew? Xo,
there was something different. However little she saw
and heard, something was happening. They were looking
and hearing together . . . did she feel anything of the
grey . . . grey . . . grey made up of all the colours there
are; all the colours, seething into an even grey ... she
wondered as she read on almost by heart, at the rare free-
dom of her thoughts, ranging about. The book was cold
and unreal compared to what it was when she read it alone.
But something was happening. Something was passing to
and fro between them, behind the text; a conversation be-
tween them that the text, the calm quiet grey that was the
outer layer of the tumult, brought into being. If they
should read on, the conversation would deepen. A glow
ran through her at the thought. She felt that in some
way she was like a man reading to a woman, but the read-
ing did not separate them like a man's reading did. She
paused for a moment on the thought. A man's reading
was not reading; not a looking and a listening so that things
came into the room. It was always an assertion of himself.
Men read in loud harsh unnatural voices, in sentences, or
with voices that were a commentary on the text, as if they
were telling you what to think . . . they preferred reading
to being read to; they read as if they were the authors of
the text. Nothing could get through them but what they
saw. They were like showmen. . . .
" Go on, dear."
" My voice is getting tired. It must be all hours. I
ought to have gone; ages ago," said Miriam settling her-
THE TUNNEL 311
self in the little chair with the book standing opened on the
floor at her side.
" The time does pass quickly, when it is pleasantly oc-
cupied."
A cigarette now would not be staying on. It would be
like putting on one's hat. Then the visit would be over;
without having taken place. The incident would have
made no break in freedom. They had been both absent
from the room nearly all the time. Perhaps that was why
husbands so often took to reading to their wives, when
they stayed at home at all ; to avoid being in the room
listening to their condemning silences or to their speech,
speech with all the saucepan and comfort thoughts simmer-
ing behind it.
" I haven't had much time to attend to study. When
you've got to get your living there's too much else to do."
Miriam glanced sharply. Had she wanted other things
in the years of her strange occupation? She had gone in
for nursing sentimentally and now she knew the other
side ; doing everything to time, careful carrying out of the
changing experiments of doctors. Her reputation and liv-
ing depended on that; their reputation and living depended
on her. And she had to go on, because it was her living.
. . . Miss Dear was dispensing little gestures with bent
head held high and inturned eyes. She was holding up the
worth and dignity of her career. It had meant sacrifices
that left her mind enslaved. But all the same she thought
excuses were necessary. She resented being illiterate. She
had a brain somewhere, groping and starved. What could
she do? It was too late. W r hat a shame . . . serene
golden comeliness, slender feet and hands, strange ability
and knowledge of the world, and she knew, knew there was
something that ought to be hers. Miriam thrilled with pity.
The inturned eyes sent out a challenging blue flash that
3 i2 TH E TUN NEL
expanded to a smile. Miriam recoiled battling in the grip
of the smile.
" I wish you'd come round earlier to morrow dear, and
have some supper here."
" How long are you going to stay here ? "... to come
again and read further and find that strange concentration
that made one see into things. Did she really like it?
" Well dear you see I don't know. I must settle up my
affairs a little. I don't know where I am with one thing
and another. I must leave it in the hands of an 'igher
power." She folded her hands and sat motionless with
inturned eyes, making the little movements with her lips
that would lead to further speech, a flashing forth of some-
thing. . . .
" Well, I'll see " said Miriam getting up.
11 I shall be looking for you."
CHAPTER XXXI
IT was . . . jolly; to have something one was obliged
to do every evening — but it could not go on. Next
week-end, the Brooms, that would be an excuse for making
a break. She must have other friends she could turn to
. . . she must know one could not go on. But bustling off
every evening regularly to the same place with things to
get for somebody was evidently good in some way . . .
health-giving and strength-giving. . . .
She found Miss Dear in bed ; sitting up, more pink and
gold then ever. There was a deep lace frill on the pink
jacket. She smiled deeply, a curious deep smile that looked
like " a smile of perfect love and confidence "... it zws
partly that. She was grateful, and admiring. That was
all right. But it could not go on ; and now illness. Miriam
was aghast. Miss Dear seemed more herself than ever,
sitting up in bed, just as she had been at the hospital.
"Are you ill?"
" Not really ill, de-er. I've had a touch of my epilepti-
form neuralgia." Miriam sat staring angrily at the floor.
" It's enough to make anyone ill."
"What is?"
" To be sitoowated as I am."
" You haven't been able to hear of a case? "
" How can I take a case dear when I haven't got my
uniforms ? "
3i3
3 i4 THE TUNNEL
" Did you sell them?"
" A r o de-er. They're with all the rest of my things at
the hostel. Just because there's a small balance owing they
refuse to give up my box. I've told them I'll settle it as
soon as my pecuniary affairs are in order."
11 I see. That was why you didn't send your box on to
me? You know I could pay that off if you like, if it isn't
too much."
" No dear I couldn't hear of such a thing."
" But you must get work, or something. Do your friends
know how things are? "
" There is no one I should care to turn to at the mo-
ment."
" Rut the people at the Nursing Association?"
Miss Dear flushed and frowned. " Don't think of them
dear. I've told you my opinion of the superintendent and
the nurses are in pretty much the same box as I am. More
than one of them owes me money."
"But surely if they knew "
" I tell you I don't wish to apply to Baker Street at the
present time."
" But you must apply to someone. Something must be
done. You see I can't, I shan't be able to go on in-
definitely."
Miss Dear's face broke into weeping. Miriam sat smart-
ing under her own brutality . . . poverty is brutalising, she
reflected miserably, excusing herself. It makes you help-
less and makes sick people fearful and hateful. It ought
not to be like that. One can't even give way to one's na-
tural feelings. What ought she to have done? To have
spoken gently . . . you see dear . . . she could hear
women's voices saying it . . . my resources are not un-
limited, we must try and think what is the best thing to be
done . . . humbug . . . they would be feeling just as
THE TUNNEL 315
frightened just as self-protecting, inside. There were
people in books who shouldered things and got into debt,
just for any casual, helpless person. But it would have to
come on somebody, in the end. What then? Bustling
people with plans . . . ' it's no good sitting still waiting for
Providence ' . . . but that was just what one wanted to
avoid ... it had been wonderful, sometimes in the little
room. It was that that had been outraged. It was as if
she had struck a blow.
" I have done something dear."
"What?"
" I've sent for Dr. Ashley-Densley."
" There is our gentleman," said Miss Dear tranquilly
just before midnight. Miriam moved away and stood by
the window as the door split wide and a tall grey-clad
figure plunged lightly into the room. Miriam missed his
first questions in her observations of his well-controlled
fatigue and annoyance, his astonishing height and slender-
ness and the curious wide softness of his voice. Suddenly
she realised that he was going. He was not going to take
anything in hand or do anything. He had got up from the
chair by the bedside and was scribbling something on an
envelope ... no sleep for two nights he said evenly in the
soft musical girlish tones. A prescription . . . then he'd
be off.
"Do you know Thomas's?" he said colourlessly.
" Do you know Thomas's — the chemist — in Baker
Street?" he said casting a half-glance in her direction as
he wrote on.
" I do," said Miriam coldly.
" Would you be afraid to go round there now ? "
"What is it you want?" said Miriam acidly.
316 THE TUNNEL
" Well, if you're not afraid, go to Thomas's, get this
made up, give Miss Dear a dose and if it does not take
effect, another in two hours' time."
" You may leave it with me."
"All right. I'll be off. I'll try to look in sometime
to-morrow," he said turning to Miss Dear. " Bye-bye "
and he was gone.
When the grey of morning began to show behind the blind
Miriam's thoughts came back to the figure on the bed.
Miss Dear was peacefully asleep lying on her back with
her head thrown back upon the pillow. Her face looked
stonily pure and stern ; and colourless in the grey light.
There was a sheen on her forehead like the sheen on the
foreheads of old people. She had probably been asleep
ever since the beginning of the stillness. Everybody was
getting up. " London was getting up." That man in the
Referee knew what it was, that feeling when you live right
in London, of being a Londoner, the thing that made it
enough to be a Londoner, getting up, in London ; the thing
that made real Londoners different to everyone else, going
about with a sense that made them alive. The very idea
of living anywhere but in London, when one thought about
it, produced a blank sensation in the heart. What was
it I said the other day? "London's got me. It's taking
my health and eating up my youth. It may as well have
what remains. . . ." Something stirred powerfully, unable
to get to her through her torpid body. Her weary brain
spent its last strength on the words, she had only half
meant them when they were spoken. Now, once she was
free again, to be just a Londoner she would ask nothing
more of life. It would be the answer to all questions ;
the perfect unfailing thing, guiding all one's decisions.
THE TUNNEL 317
And an ill-paid clerkship was its best possible protection ;
keeping one at a quiet centre, alone in a little room, un-
touched by human relationships, undisturbed by the neces-
sity of being anything. Nurses and teachers and doctors
and all the people who were doing special things sur-
rounded by people and talk were not Londoners. Clerks
were, unless they lived in suburbs, the people who lived
in St. Pancras and Bloomsbury and in Seven Dials and all
round Soho and in all the slums and back streets every-
where were. She would be again soon . . . not a woman
... a Londoner.
She rose from her chair feeling hardly able to stand.
The long endurance in the cold room had led to nothing
but the beginning of a day without strength — no one
knowing what she had gone through. Three days and
nights of nursing Eve had produced only a feverish gaiety.
It was London that killed you.
" I will come in at lunch-time " she scribbled on the
back of an envelope, and left it near one of the hands out-
stretched on the coverlet.
Outdoors it was quite light, a soft grey morning, about
eight o'clock. People were moving about the streets. The
day would be got through somehow. Tomorrow she would
be herself again.
4
" Has she applied to the Association to which she be-
longs?"
" I think she wishes for some reason to keep away from
them just now. She suggested that I should come to you
when I asked her if there was anyone to whom she could
turn. She told me you had helped her to have a holiday
in a convalescent home." These were the right people.
The quiet grey house, the high church room, the delicate
318 THE TUNNEL
outlines of the woman, clear and fine in spite of all the
comfort. . . . The All Souls Nursing Sisters. . . . They
were different . . . emotional and unhygienic . . . cush-
ions and hot water bottles . . . good food . . . early serv-
ice — Lent — stuffy churches — fasting. But they would
not pass by on the other side . . . she sat waiting . . . the
atmosphere of the room made much of her weeks of charity
and her long night of watching, the quiet presence in it
knew of these things without being told. The weariness
of her voice had poured out its burden, meeting and flowing
into the patient weariness of the other women and chang-
ing. There was no longer any anger or impatience. To-
gether, consulting as accomplices, they would see what was
the best thing to do — whatever it was would be something
done on a long long road going on forever ; nobody outside,
nobody left behind. When they had decided they would
leave it, happy and serene and glance at the invisible sun
and make little confident jests together. She was like Mrs.
Bailey — and someone further back — mother. This was
the secret life of women. They smiled at God. But they
all flattered men. All these women. . . .
" They ought to be informed. Will you call on them —
to-day? Or would you prefer that I should do so?"
"I will go — at lunch-time" said Miriam promptly.
" Meanwhile I shall inform the clergy. It is a case for
the parish. You must not bear the responsibility a moment
longer."
Miriam relaxed in her capacious chair, a dimness before
her eyes. The voice was going on, unnoticing, the figure
had turned towards a bureau. There were little straggles
about the fine hair — Miss Jenny Perne — the Pernes. She
was a lonely old maid. . . . One must listen . . . but Lon-
don had sprung back ... in full open midday roar;
THE TUNNEL 319
brilliant and fresh ; dim, intimate, vast, from the darkness.
This woman preferred some provincial town . . . Wolver-
hampton . . . Wolverhampton ... in the little room in
Marylebone Road Miss Dear was unconsciously sleeping
— a pauper.
5
There was a large bunch of black grapes on the little
table by the bedside and a book.
" Hullo you literary female " said Miriam seizing it
. . . Red Pottage ... a curious novelish name, difficult to
understand. Miss Dear sat up, straight and brisk, bloom-
ing smiles. What an easy life. The light changing in
the room and people bringing novels and grapes, smart
new novels that people were reading.
" What did you do at lunch time dear? "
" Oh I had to go and see a female unexpectedly."
" I found your note and thought perhaps you had called
in at Baker Street."
" At your Association, d'you mean ? Oh my dear lady."
Miriam shook her thoughts about, pushing back. " She
owes money to almost every nurse in this house and seems
to have given in in every way " and bringing forward " one
of our very best nurses for five years."
" Oh I went to see the woman in Queen Square this
morning."
" I know you did dear." Miss Dear bridled in her secret
way, averted, and preparing to speak. It was over. She
did not seem to mind. " I liked her " said Miriam hastily,
leaping across the gap, longing to know what had been done,
beating out anywhere to rid her face of the lines of shame.
She was sitting before a judge . . . being looked through
and through. . . . Noo, Tonalt, suggest a tow-pic. . . .
320 THETUNNEL
" She's a sweet woman " said Miss Dear patronisingly.
" She's brought you some nice things "... poverty was
worse if you were not poor enough. . . .
" Oh no dear. The curate brought these. He called
twice this morning. You did me a good turn. He's a real
friend."
" Oh — oh, I'm so glad."
" Yes — he's a nice little man. He was most dreadfully
upset."
"What can he do?"
" How do you mean dear? "
" Well in general ? "
" He's going to do everything dear. I'm not to worry."
" How splendid ! "
" He came in first thing and saw how things stood and
came in again at the end of the morning with these things.
He's sending me some wine, from his own cellar."
Miriam gazed, her thoughts tumbling incoherently.
" He was most dreadfully upset. He could not write
his sermon. He kept thinking it might be one of his own
sisters in the same sitawation. He couldn't rest till he came
back."
Standing back ... all the time . . . delicately preparing
to speak . . . presiding over them all . . . over herself
too . . .
" He's a real friend."
"Have you looked at the book?" There was nothing
more to do.
" No dear. He said it had interested him very much.
He reads them for his sermons you see "... she put out
her hand and touched the volume . . . John's books . . .
Henry is so interested in photography . . . unknowing pa-
tronising respectful gestures. , , , " Poor little man. He
was dreadfully upset,''
THE TUNNEL 321
" We'd better read it."
" What time are you coming dear ? "
"Oh — well."
" I'm to have my meals regular. Mr. Taunton has seen
the landlady. I wish I could ask you to join me. But he's
been so generous. I mustn't run expenses up you see dear."
" Of course not. I'll come in after supper. I'm not
quite sure about to-night."
" Well — I hope I shall see you on Saturday. I can give
you tea."
" I'm going away for the week-end. I've put it off and
off. I must go this week."
Miss Dear frowned. " Well dear, come in and see me
on your way."
Miss Dear sat down with an indrawn breath.
Miriam drew her Gladstone bag a little closer. " I have
only a second."
" All right dear. You've only just come."
It was as if nothing had happened the whole week. She
was not going to say anything. She was ill again just in
time for the week-end. She looked fearfully ill. Was
she ill ? The room was horrible — desolate and angry. . . .
Miriam sat listening to the indrawn breathings.
"What is the matter?"
" It's my epileptiform neuralgia again. I thought Dr.
Ashley-Densley would have been in. I suppose he's off for
the week-end."
She lay back pale and lifeless looking with her eyes closed.
" All right, I won't go, that's about it," said Miriam
angrily.
322 THETUNNEL
7
" Have another cup dear. He said the picture was like
me and like my name. He thinks it's the right name for
me — ' you'll always be able to inspire affection ' he said."
" Yes that's true."
" He wants me to change my first name. He thought
Eleanor would be pretty."
44 I say; look here."
" Of course I can't make any decision until I know cer-
tain things."
44 D'you mean to say . . . goodness ! "
Miss Dear chuckled indulgently, making little brisk
movements about the tea-tray.
" So I'm to be called Eleanor Dear. He's a dear little
man. I'm very fond of him. But there is an earlier
friend."
44 Oh "
44 I thought you'd help me out."
44 Well dear, I thought you wouldn't mind calling and
finding out for me how the land lies."
Miriam's eyes fixed the inexorable shapely outlines of the
tall figure. That dignity would never go ; but there was
something that would never come . . . there would be
nothing but fuss and mystification for the man. She would
have a house and a dignified life. He, at home, would have
death. But these were the women. But she had liked the
book. There was something in it she had felt. But a man
reading, seeing only bits and points of view would never
find that far-away something. She would hold the man by
being everlasting mysteriously up to something or other
behind a smile. He would grow sick to death of mysterious
nothings; of things always centering in her, leaving every-
THE TUNNEL 323
thing else outside her dignity. Appalling. What zvas she
doing all the time, bringing one's eyes back and back each
time after one had angrily given in, to question the ruffles
of her hair and the way she stood and walked and prepared
to speak.
" Oh ... ! of course I will — you wicked woman."
" It's very puzzling. You see he's the earlier friend."
" You think if he knew he had a rival. Of course.
Quite right."
" Well dear, I think he ought to know."
" So I'm to be your mamma. What a lark."
Miss Dear shed a fond look. " I want you to meet my
little man. He's longing to meet you ? "
" Have you mentioned me to him."
" Well dear who should I mention if not you? "
8
" So I thought the best thing to do would be to come
and ask you what would be the best thing to do for her."
" There's nothing to be done for her." He turned away
and moved things about on the mantelpiece. Miriam's
heart beat rebelliously in the silence of the consulting-room.
She sat waiting stifled with apprehension, her thoughts on
Miss Dear's familiar mysterious figure. In an unendurable
impatience she waited for more, her eye smiting the tall
averted figure on the hearthrug, following his movements
. . . small framed coloured pictures — very brilliant — pho-
tographs? — of dark and fair women, all the same, their
shoulders draped like the Soul's Awakening, their chests
bare, all of them with horrible masses of combed out
waving hair like the woman in the Harlene shop only waving
naturally. The most awful minxes . . . his ideals. What
a man. What a ghastly world. "If she were to go to the
south of France, at once, she might live for years "...
324 T H E TU N N KL
this is hearing about death, in a consulting-room . . . no
ape . . . everything in the room holding you in. The
Death Sentence. . . . People would not die if they did not
go to consulting-rooms . . . doctors make you die . . .
they watch and threaten.
"What is the matter with her?" (Hit with it, don't
be so important and mysterious.
" Don't you know, my dear girl?" Dr. Densley wheeled
round with searching observant eyes.
"Hasn't she told you?" he added quietly with his eyes
on his nails. " She's phthisical. She's in the first stages
of pulmonary tuberculosis."
The things in the dark room darkled with a curious dull
flash along all their edges and settled in a stilling dusky
gloom. Everything in the room dingy and dirty and de-
caying, but the long lean upright figure. In time he would
die of something, Phthisis . . . that curious terrible damp
mouldering smell, damp warm faint human fungus . . .
in Aunt Henderson's bedroom. . . . But she had got bet-
ter. . . . But the curate ought to know. But perhaps he
too, perhaps she had imagined that. . . .
" It seems strange she has not told such an old friend."
" I'm not an old friend. I've only known her about two
months. I'm hardly a friend at all."
Dr. Densley was roaming about the room. " You've been
a friend in need to that poor girl " he murmured contem-
plating the window curtains. " I recognised that when I
saw you in her room last week." How superficial. . . .
"Where did you meet her?" he said, a curious gentle
high tone on the where and a low one on the meet as if
he were questioning a very delicate patient.
" My sister picked her up at a convalescent home."
He turned very sharply and came and sat down in a low
chair opposite Miriam's low chair.
THE TUNNEL 325
" Tell me all about it my dear girl " he said sitting for-
ward so that his clasped hands almost touched Miriam's
knees.
9
" And she told you I was her oldest friend," he said
getting up and going back to the mantelpiece.
" I first met Miss Dear " he resumed after a pause,
speaking like a witness " last Christmas. I called in at
Baker Street and found the superintendent had four of her
disengaged nurses down with influenza. At her request I
ran up to see them. Miss Dear was one of the number.
Since that date she has summoned me at all hours on any
and every pretext. What I can, I have done for her. She
knows perfectly well her condition. She has her back
against the wall. She's making a splendid fight. But the
one thing that would give her a chance she obstinately re-
fuses to do. Last summer I found for her employment in
a nursing home in the South of France. She refused to go,
though I told her plainly what would be the result of an-
other winter in England."
"Ought she to marry?" said Miriam suddenly, closely
watching him.
" Is she thinking of marrying, my dear girl " he an-
swered, looking at his nails.
" Well of course she might "
" Is there a sweetheart on the horizon?"
" Well she inspires a great deal of affection. I think she
is inspiring affection now."
Dr. Densley threw back his head with a laugh that caught
his breath and gasped in and out on a high tone, leaving
his silent mouth wide open when he again faced Miriam
with the laughter still in his eyes.
" Tell me my dear girl " he said smiting her knee with
326 THE TUNNEL
gentle affection, " is there someone who would like to
marry her? "
"What I want to know" said Miriam very briskly "is
whether such a person ought to know about the state of
her health." She found herself cold and trembling as she
asked. Miss Dear's eyes seemed fixed upon her.
" The chance of a tuberculous woman in marriage " re-
cited Dr. Densley " is a holding up of the disease with
the first child ; after the second she usually fails."
Why children? A doctor could see nothing in marriage
but children. This man saw women with a sort of admir-
ing pity. He probably estimated all those women on the
mantelpiece according to their child-bearing capacity.
" Personally, I do not believe in forbidding the marriage
of consumptives ; provided both parties know what they
are doing; and if they are quite sure they cannot do with-
out each other. We know so little about heredity and dis-
ease, we do not know always what life is about. Person-
ally I would not divide two people who are thoroughly de-
voted to each other."
" No " said Miriam coldly.
" Is the young man in a position to take her abroad ? "
" I can't tell you more than I know " said Miriam im-
patiently getting up.
Dr. Densley laughed again and rose.
" Pm very glad you came my dear girl. Come again
soon and report progress. You're so near you can run in
any time when you're free."
" Thank you " said Miriam politely, scrutinising him
calmly as he waved and patted her out into the hall.
10
Impelled by an uncontrollable urgency she made her
way along the Marylebone Road. Miss Dear was not ex-
THE TUNNEL 327
pecting her till late. But the responsibility, the urgency.
She must go abroad. About Dr. Densley. That was easy
enough. There was a phrase ready about that somewhere.
Three things. But she could not go abroad to-night. Why
not go to the Lyons at Portland Road station and have a
meal and get calm and think out a plan? But there was no
time to lose. There was not a moment to lose. She ar-
rived at the dark gate breathless and incoherent. A man
was opening the gate from the inside. He stood short and
compact in the gloom holding it open for her.
" Is it Miss Henderson? " he said nervously as she passed.
" Yes " said Mriiam stopping dead, flooded with sadness.
" I have been hoping to see you for the last ten days "
he said hurriedly and as if afraid of being overheard. In
the impenetrable gloom darker than the darkness his voice
was a thread of comfort.
" Oh yes."
" Could you come and see me ? "
" Oh yes of course."
" If you will give me your number in Wimpole Street
I will send you a note."
11
" My dear!"
The tall figure, radiant, lit from head to foot, " as the
light on a falling wave " ..." as the light on a falling
wave." . . .
Everything stood still as they gazed at each other. Her
own self gazed at her out of Miss Dear's eyes.
" Well I'm bothered " said Miriam at last, sinking into a
chair.
" No need to be bothered any more dear " laughed Miss
Dear.
" It's extraordinary." She tried to recover the glory of
328 THE TUNNEL
the first moment in speechless contemplation of the radiant
figure now moving chairs near to the lamp. The disap-
pearance of the gas, the shaded lamp, the rector's wife's
manner, the rector's wife's quiet stylish costume; it was
like a prepared scene. How funny it would be to know a
rector's wife.
" He's longing to meet you. I shall have a second room
to-morrow. We will have a tea party."
" It was to-day, of course."
"Just before you came" said Miss Dear her glowing
face bent, her hands brushing at the new costume. You'll
be our greatest friend."
" But how grand you are."
" He made my future his care some days ago dear. As
long as I live you shall want for nothing he said."
" And to-day it all came out."
" Of course he'll have to get a living dear. But we've
decided to ignore the world."
What did she mean by that. . . .
" You won't have to."
" Well dear I mean let the world go by."
" I see. He's a jewel. I think you've made a very good
choice. You can make your mind easy about that. I saw
the great medicine man to-day."
" It was all settled without that dear. I never even
thought about him.
" You needn't. No woman need. He's a man who
doesn't know his own mind and never will. I doubt very
much whether he has a mind to know. If he ever marries
he will marry a wife, not any particular woman ; a smart
worldly woman for his profession, or a thoroughly healthy
female who'll keep a home in the country for him and have
children and pour out his tea and grow things in the gar-
THE TUNNEL 329
den, while he flirts with patients in town. He's most
awfully susceptible."
" I expect we shan't live in London."
"Well that'll be better for you won't it?"
" How do you mean de-er ? "
" Well. I ought to tell you Dr. Densley told me you
ought to go abroad."
" There's no need for me to go abroad dear, I shall be
all right if I can look after myself and get into the air."
" I expect you will. Everything's happened just right
hasn't it?"
" It's all been in the hands of an 'igher power, dear."
Miriam found herself chafing again. It had all rushed
on, in a few minutes. It was out of her hands completely
now. She did not want to know Mr. and Mrs. Taunton.
There was nothing to hold her any longer. She had seen
Miss Dear in the new part. To watch the working out of
it, to hear about the parish, sudden details about people
she did not know — intolerable.
CHAPTER XXXII
THE short figure looked taller in the cassock, funny
and hounded, like all curates ; pounding about and
arranging a place for her and trying to collect his thoughts
while he repeated how good it was of her to have come.
He sat down at last to the poached eggs and tea laid on one
end of the small book-crowded table.
" I have a service at four-thirty " he said busily eating
and glaring in front of him with unseeing eyes, a little
like Mr. Grove only less desperate because his dark head
was round and his eyes were blue — " so you must excuse
my meal. I have a volume of Plato here."
" Oh yes " said Miriam doubtfully.
" Are you familiar with Plato? "
She pondered intensely and rushed in just in time to
prevent his speaking again.
" I should like him I know — I've come across extracts in
other books."
" He is a great man ; my favourite companion. I spend
most of my leisure up here with Plato."
" What a delightful life " said Miriam enviously, looking
about the small crowded room.
" As much time as I can spare from my work at the
Institute and the Mission chapel ; they fill my active hours."
Where would a woman, a wife-woman, be in a life like
this? He poured himself out a cup of tea; the eyes turned
towards the tea-pot were worried and hurried ; his whole
330
THE TUNNEL 331
compact rounded form was a little worried and anxious.
There was something — bunnyish about him. Reading
Plato the expression of his person would still have some-
thing of the worried rabbit about it. His face would be
calm and intent. Then he would look up from the page,
taking in a thought and something in his room would bring
him back again to worry. But he was too stout to belong
to a religious order.
" You must have a very busy life " said Miriam, her
attention wandering rapidly off hither and thither.
" Of course " he said turning away from the table to the
fire beside which she sat. " I think the clergy should keep
in touch to some extent with modern thought — in so far
as it helps them with their own particular work."
Miriam wondered why she felt no desire to open the
subject of religion and science; or any other subject. It
was so extraordinary to find herself sitting tete-a-tete with
a clergyman, and still more strange to find him communica-
tively trying to show her his life from the inside. He went
on talking, not looking at her but gazing into the fire. She
tried in vain to tether her attention. It was straining away
to work upon something, upon some curious evidence it
had collected since she came into the room ; and even with
her eyes fixed upon his person and her mind noting the
strange contradiction between the thin rippling many-but-
toned cassock and the stout square-toed boots protruding
beneath it, she could not completely convince herself that
he was there.
" . . . novels; my friends to recommend any that might
be helpful."
He had looked up towards her with this phrase.
" Oh yes, Red Pottage " she said grasping hurriedly and
looking attentive.
" Have you read that novel ? "
332 THE TUNNEL
<i
No. I imagined that you had because you lent it to
Miss Dear."
" Miss Dear has spoken to you of me."
" Oh yes."
" Of you she has spoken a great deal. You know her
very well. It is because of your long friendship with her
that I have taken courage to ask you to come here and dis-
cuss with me about her affairs."
" I have known Miss Dear only a very short time " said
Miriam, sternly gazing into the fire. Nothing should per-
suade her to become the caretaker of the future Mrs.
Taunton.
" That surprises me very much indeed " he said propping
his head upon his hand by one finger held against a tooth.
He sat brooding.
" She is very much in need of friends just now " he said
suddenly and evenly towards the fire without removing
his finger from his tooth.
" Yes " said Miriam gravely.
" You are, nevertheless, the only intimate woman friend
to whom just now she has access."
" I've done little things for her. I couldn't do much."
" You are sorry for her," Mr. Taunton was studying
her face and waiting.
" Well — I don't know — she " she consulted the fire in-
tensely, looking for the truth ; " she seems to me too strong
for that." Light! Women have no pity on women . . .
they know how strong women are ; a sick man is more help-
less and pitiful than a sick woman; almost as helpless as
a child. People in order of strength . . . women, men,
children. This man without his worldly props, his money
and his job and his health had not a hundredth part of the
strength of a woman . . . nor had Dr. Densley. . . .
" I think she fascinated me."
THE TUNNEL 333
Mr. Taunton gathered himself together in his chair and
sat very upright.
" She has an exceptional power of inspiring affection —
affection and the desire to give her the help she so sorely
needs."
" Perhaps that is it " said Miriam judicially. But you
are very much mistaken in calling on me for help . . .
' domestic work and the care of the aged and the sick ' —
very convenient — all the stuffy nerve-racking never-end-
ing things to be dumped on to women — who are to be
openly praised and secretly despised for their unselshness
— I've got twice the brain power you have. You are some-
thing of a scholar; but there is a way in which my time is
more valuable than yours. There is a way in which it is
more right for you to be tied to this woman than for me.
Your reading is a habit, like most men's reading, not a
quest. You don't want it disturbed. But you are kinder
than I am. You are splendid. It will be awful — you
don't know how awful yet — poor little man.
" I think it has been so in my case if you will allow me
to tell you."
" Oh yes do " said Miriam a little archly — " of course —
I know — I mean to say Miss Dear has told me."
" Yes " he said eagerly.
" How things are " she finished looking shyly into the fire.
" Nevertheless if you will allow me I should like to tell
you exactly what has occurred and to ask your advice as
to the future. My mother and sisters are in the Midlands."
" Yes " said Miriam in a carefully sombre non-committal
tone ; waiting for the revelation of some of the things men
expect from mothers and sisters and wondering whether
he was beginning to see her unsuitability for the role of
convenient sister.
" When my rector sent me to look up Miss Dear " he
334 THE TUNNEL
began heavily " I thought it was ail ordinary parish case
and I was shocked beyond measure to find a delicately
nurtured ladylike girl in such a situation. I came back
here to my rooms and found myself unable to enter into
my usual employments. I was haunted by the thought
of what that lonely girl who might have been one of my
own sisters — must be suffering and enduring and I re-
turned to give what relief I could without waiting to report
the case to my rector for ordinary parish relief. I am not
dependent on my stipend and I felt that I could not with-
hold the help she ought to have. I saw her landlady and
made arrangements as to her feeding and called each day
myself to take little things to cheer her — as a rule when
my day's work was done. I have never come in contact
with a more pathetic case. It did not occur to me for
... a moment that she viewed my visits and the help I
was so glad to be able to give ... in ... in any other
light . . . that she viewed me as other than her parish
priest."
" Of course not " said Miriam violently.
" She is a singularly attractive and lovable nature. That
to my mind makes her helplessness and resourcelessness all
the more painfully pathetic. Her very name " he
paused gazing into the fire. " I told her lately in one of
her moments of deep depression that she would never
want for friends, that she would always inspire affection
wherever she went and that as long as I lived she should
never know want. Last week — the day I met you at the
gate — finding her up and apparently very much better, I
suggested that it would be well to discontinue my visits
for the present, pointing out the social reasons and so
forth ... I had with me a letter from a very pleasant
Home in Bournemouth. She had hinted much earlier that
THE TUNNEL 335
a long rest in some place such as Bournemouth was what
she wanted to set her up in health. I am bound to tell
you what followed. She broke down completely, told me
that, socially speaking, it was too late to discontinue my
visits ; that people in the house were already talking."
" People in that house! " — you little simpleton — "Who?
It is the most monstrous thing I ever heard."
" Well — there you have the whole story. The poor
girl's distress and dependence were most moving. I have
a very great respect for her character and esteem for her
personality — and of course I am pledged."
" I see," said Miriam narrowly regarding him. Do you
want to be saved — ought I to save you — why should I
save you — it is a solution of the whole thing and a use for
your money — you won't marry her when you know how ill
she is.
" It is of course the immediate future that causes me
anxiety and disquietude. It is there I need your advice and
help."
" I see. Is Miss Dear going to Bournemouth ? "
" Well ; that is just it. Now that the opportunity is there
she seems disinclined to avail herself of it. I hope that
you will support me in trying to persuade her."
" Of course. She must go."
" I am glad you think so. It is obvious that definite plans
must be postponed until she is well and strong."
" You would be able to go down and see her."
" Occasionally, as my duties permit, oh yes. It is a very
pleasant place and I have friends in Bournemouth who
would visit her."
" She ought to be longing to go " said Miriam on her
strange sudden smile. It had come from somewhere ; the
atmosphere was easier; suddenly in the room with her was
336 THE TUNNEL
the sense of bluebells, a wood blue with bluebells, and dim
roofs, roofs in a town . . . sur les toits . . . and books ;
people reading books under them.
Mr. Taunton smiled too.
" Unfortunately that is not so " he said leaning back in
his chair and crossing his legs comfortably.
" You know " he said turning his blue gaze from the fire
to Miriam's face, " I have never been so worried in my life
as I have during the last ten days. It's upsetting my win-
ter's work. It is altogether too difficult and impossible. I
cannot see any possible adjustment. You see I cannot pos-
sibly be continually interrupted and in such — strange ways.
She came here yesterday afternoon with a list of complaints
about her landlady. I really cannot attend to these things.
She sends me telegrams. Only this morning there was a
telegram. Come at once. Difficulty with chemist. Of
course it was impossible for me to leave my work at a
moment's notice. This afternoon I called. It seems that
she was under the impression that there had been some
insolence ... it absorbs so much time to enter into long
explanations with regard to all these people. I cannot do
it. That is what it comes to. I cannot do it."
Ah. You've lost your temper; like anyone else. You
want to shelve it. Anyone would. But being a man you
want to shelve it on to a woman. You don't care who hears
the long tales as long as you don't. . . .
" Have you seen her doctor? "
" No. I think just now he is out of town."
"Really? Are you sure?"
" You think I should see him."
" Certainly."
" I will do so on the first opportunity. That is the next
THE TUNNEL 337
step. Meantime I will write provisionally to Bourne-
mouth."
" Oh, she must go to Bournemouth anyhow ; that's set-
tled."
" Perhaps her medical man may help there."
" He won't make her do anything she doesn't mean to
do."
" I see you are a reader of character."
" I don't think I am. I always begin by idealising
people."
" Do you indeed ? "
" Yes, always ; and then they grow smaller and smaller."
"Is that your invariable experience of humanity?"
" I don't think I'm an altruist."
" I think one must have one's heroes."
"In life or in books?"
" In both perhaps — one has them certainly in books —
in records. Do you know this book ? "
Miriam sceptically accepted the bulky volume he took
down from the book-crowded mantelshelf.
" Oh how interesting " she said insincerely when she had
read Great Thoughts from Great Lives on the cover. . . .
I ought to have said I don't like extracts. " Lives of great
men all remind us. We can make our lives sublime," she
read aloud under her breath from the first page. ... I
ought to go. I can't enter into this. ... I hate ' great
men ' I think. . . .
" That book has been a treasure-house to me — for many
years. I know it now almost by heart. If it interests you,
you will allow me I hope to present it to you."
" Oh you must not let me deprive you of it — oh no. It
is very kind of you ; but you really mustn't." She looked
up and returned quickly to the fascinating pages. Sentences
shone out striking at her heart and brain . . . names in
338 THE TUNNEL
italics ; Marcus Aurelius . . . Lao-Tse. Confucius . . .
Clement of Alexandria . . . Jacob Boehme. " It's full of
the most fascinating things. Oh no ; I couldn't think of
taking it. You must keep it. Who is Jacob Boehme?
That name always fascinates me. I must have read some-
thing, somewhere, a long time ago. I can't remember.
But it is such a wonderful name."
" Jacob Boehme was a German visionary. You will find
of course all shades of opinion there."
" All contradicting each other ; that's the worst of it.
Still, I suppose all roads lead to Rome."
" I see you have thought a great deal."
" Well " said Miriam feverishly, " there's always scioice,
always all that awful business of science, and no getting rid
of it."
" I think — in that matter — one must not allow one's
mind to be led away ? "
" But one must keep an open mind."
"Are you familiar with Professor Tyndall?"
" Only by meeting him in books about Huxley."
" Ah — he was very different ; very different."
" Huxley " said Miriam with intense bitterness " was an
egoistic adolescent — all his life. I never came across any-
thing like his conceited complacency in my life. The very
look of his side-whiskers, — well, there you have the whole
man." Her heart burned and ached, beating out the words.
She rose to go holding the volume in hands that shook to
the beating of her heart. Far away in the bitter mist of the
darkening room was the strange little figure.
" Let me just write your name in the book."
" Oh, well, really, it is too bad — thank you very much."
He carried the book to the window-sill and stood writing
his bent head very dark and round in the feeble grey light.
Happy monk alone up under the roof with his Plato. It
was a shame.
CHAPTER XXXIII
"\\ 7HAT a huge room?"
VV "Isn't it a big room. Come in young lady."
Miriam crossed to the fireplace through a warm faintly
sweet atmosphere. A small fire was smoking and the gas
was partly turned down but the room was warm with a
friendly brown warmth. Something had made her linger
in the hall until Mrs. Bailey had come to the dining-room
door and stood there with the door wide open and some-
thing to communicate waiting behind her friendly greetings.
As a rule there was nothing behind her friendly greetings
but friendly approval and assurance. Miriam had never
seen the dining-room door open before and sought dis-
traction from the communicativeness by drifting towards
it and peering in. Once in and sitting in the chair between
the fireplace and Mrs. Bailey's tumbled work-basket stand-
ing on the edge of the long table, bound to stay taking
in the room until Mrs. Bailey returned, she regretted look-
ing in. The hall and the stairs and her own room would
be changed now she knew what this room was like. In
her fatigue she looked about half taking in half recoiling
from the contents of the room. " He stopped and got off
his bicycle and I said you don't seem very pleased to see
me." Already he knew that they were tiresome strangers
to each other. " I can't go dancing off to Bournemouth
at a moment's notice dear." " Well, I strongly advise you
339
34 o T H E T U N N E L
to go as soon as you can." " Of course I'm going, but I
can't just dance off." " Don't let liim get into the habit
of associating you with the idea of worry." If she didn't
worry him and was always a little ill, and pretty ..." he
says he can't do without her. I've told him without reserve
what the chances are and given them my blessing." Did
he really feel that suddenly sitting there in the consulting-
room? If only she wouldn't be so mysterious and im-
portant about nothing. . . .
There was a hugeness in the room, radiating from the
three-armed dim-globed chandelier, going up and up; to
the high heavily-moulded smoke-grimed ceiling, spreading
out right and left along the length of the room, a large
enclosed quietness, flowing up to the two great windows,
hovering up and down the dingy rep and dingy lace curtains
and the drab coloured Venetian blinds through whose chinks
the street came in. Tansley Street was there, pressing its
secret peace against the closed windows. Between the
windows a long strip of mirror framed in tarnished gilt,
reflected the peace of the room. Miriam glanced about
peering for its secret; her eye running over the length of
the faded patterned deep fringed table cover, the large
cracked pink bowl in the centre, holding an aspidistra . . .
brown cracked leaves sticking out ; the faded upholstery
of the armchair opposite her, the rows of dining-room
chairs across the way in line with the horsehair sofa; the
piano in the space between the sofa and the window; the
huge mirror in the battered tarnished gilt frame sweep-
ing half way up the wall above the mantelpiece, reflecting
the pictures and engravings hung rather high on the op-
posite wall, bought and liked long ago, the faded hearthrug
under her feet, the more faded carpet disappearing under
the long table, the dark stare of the fireplace, the heavy
marble mantelpiece, the marble cased clock and opaque pink
THE TUNNEL 341
glass fat-bodied jugs scrolled with a dingy pattern, dusty
lustres, curious objects in dull metal. . . .
" It'll give my chicks a better chance. It isn't fair on
them — living in the kitchen and seeing nobody."
" And you mean to risk sending the lodgers' away."
" I've been thinking about it some time. When the
dining-room left I thought I wouldn't fill up again. Miss
Campbell's going too."
"Miss Campbell?"
" The drawn-room and drawn-room bedroom . . . my
word . . . had her rooms turned out every week, carpets
up and all."
" Every iveek! "
" Always talking about microbes. My word."
"How awful. And all the other people?"
" I've written them " smiled Mrs. Bailey at her busily
interlacing fingers.
" Oh."
" For the 14th prox ; they're all weekly."
" Then if they don't stay as boarders they'll have to
trot out at once."
" Well I thought if I was going to begin I'd better take
the bull by the horns. I've heard of two. Norwegian
young gentlemen. They're coming next week and they
both want large bedrooms."
" I think it's awful pluckly if you've had no experience."
" Well, young lady, I see it like this. What others have
done, I can. I feel I must do something for the children.
Mrs. Reynolds has married three of her daughters to
boarders. She's giving up. Elsie is going into the typing."
" You haven't written to me."
" You stay where you are, young lady."
34a T II E TU NNEL
"\\\11 — 1 think it's awfully sweet of you Mrs. Bailey."
" Don't you think about that. It needn't make any dif-
ference to you."
"Well — of course — if you heard of a hoarder "
Mrs. Bailey made a little dab at Miriam's knee. " You
stay where you arc my dear."
" I do hope it will he a success. The house will be com-
pletely changed."
" I know it's a risk. But if you get on it pays better.
There's less 'work in it and you've got a house to live in.
Nothing venture, nothing have. It's no good to be back-
ward in coming forward nowadays. We've got to march
with the times."
Miriam tried to see Mrs. IJailey presiding, the huge table
lined with guests. She doubted. Those boarding-houses
in YVoburn Place, the open windows in the summer, the
strange smart people, in evening dress, the shaded lamps,
she would be lost. She could never hold her own. The
quiet house would be utterly changed. There would be
people going about, in possession, all over the front steps
and at the dining-room windows and along the drawing-
room balcony.
This book ia DUE mi the laAjckite stamped helow
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JUN 1 1933
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