The Transvaal from Within: A Private Record of Public Affairs

ks and hands. On the vagueness of the market-place the gilded statue, with its sheen obscured, loomed shapeless as she passed. She heard the lumber and creak of a

its leagues of houses, not a door among its countless doors to reveal a friend. She would go there because she was adrift

s under the wearisomeness of the worries. It is the situation of few to emerge from the wreck of a home without any personality dominating their consciousness as th

her, it is difficult to determine what would have become of him; but, dying first, he had her protection to the end. She found herself after the funeral with a crop of bills, some shabby furniture, and the necessity for earning a living. The furniture and the bills were easy to dispose of; they represented a sum in division with nothing over. The problem was, what was she fitted to do? She knew none of those things which used to be called "accomplishments," and which are to-day the elements of education. Her French was the French of "Le Petit Précepteur"; in German she was still bewildered by the article. And, a graver drawback, since the selling-price of education is

she gave satisfaction in her probation, and became at last a nurse like the others, composed and reliable. When that stage arrived, she owned to having fai

o would listen. The person who heard most was she, since it was she who had the most to do for him, and she began by feeling sympathetic. He was a paying patient, or he would have had to limp away much so

She stooped, and across the supper-tray, they kissed. Then she went upstairs, and cri

lacked the courage to avow. And when at last he went away their engagement was made public, and

ybody shook her hand and wished her a life of happiness, for she was popular. Carew met her at Euston. He had written that he had dropped into a good part, anti that they would shortly be starting toge

iscovered her past, but the law would not annul his blunder. He was bound to a harlot, and he loved Mary. Wo

ed himself for not having disclosed his position in the first instance. He had excused his cowardice by calling it "expedience," but, to do him justice, he did not

ise. His insistence on the nobility of consent went very far with her; it did seem a beautiful thing to let sunshine into her lover's life at the cost of her own transgression. And then, in the background, burnt a hot shame at the thought of being questioned and commiserated when she returned to the hospital with a petition to be reinstalled. The arguments of both were very stale, and equally they blinked the fact that the practical use of matrimony is to protect woman

s West Hartlepool, and he and she had lodgings outside the town in a little sea-swept village-a stretch of sand, and a lane or two, with a sprinkling of cottages-called Seaton Carew,

ock struck five, and she st

s; yards were preternaturally lengthened; and ever pressing on, yet ever with a lonely vista to be covered, the walk began to be

e no indications of life about the place; the booking-office was fast shut, and between the dimly-burning l

ter his advent she was able to procure a ticket-a third-class ticket, which diminished the little sum in her possession by eight shi

to a standstill and the name of a station was bawled. When St. Pancras was reached, her limbs were cramped as she descended among the groups of dreary-faced passengers, and the load on her mind lay like a physical weight. She

brought her tea and bread-and-butter at a sloppy table. The repast, if not enjoyable, served to refresh her and was worth the fourpence that she could very ill

g at five minutes to eight would look strange. Still, she could not reconcile herself to going back; and she

t opposite the house where she had given herself to Tony. The sudden sight of it was not the shock that she would have imagined it would prove; indeed, she was sensible of a dull sort of wonder at the absence of sensation. But for the veranda and confirmatory number, the outside would have borne no significance to her; yet it had been in that house--What a landmark in her life's history was represented by that house!' What emotions had flooded her soul behind the stolid frontage that she had n

he wanted a lodging, became helplessly incoherent-as is the manner of serv

air of interruption; and when she perceived that the stranger on the threshold was a young woman, and a charming woman, and a woman by herself, the a

g for a room

householder, eye

to let, I thin

here's

w it, however; she stood on

it-if it isn't inc

She preceded her to the top-floor, but

ellow chairs, and a bed of parti-coloured clothing. Nevertheles

rent?" she

r husband would

d? No, I'm

loves, but saw that it would have been wiser to

even shillings. You'd be able to

d, not a little surprised. "I've only ju

o you w

ing for a room. You want references

e ladies," answered

d; she thought that she had

. "I'm a stranger in London, so I can't refer you to anyone

must ask you to look s

solence of the treatment she had received, and she had yet to learn that it is possible for an unaccompanied woman to seek a lodging until she falls exhausted on the pavemen

cted to a room, only to be cross-examined and refused, as with her first venture, just when she was at the point of engaging it. Sometimes a room was displayed indiffer

d be unendurable-but some of the apartments that Carew and she had occupied when they had come to town between the tours. N

orner of the trunk that she had left behind in Leicester; it might long ago have got destroyed-she did not know. It had never occurred to her that the resumption of her former calling would one day present itself as her natural resource. In ordinary circumstances the loss would have been a trifle; but she felt it an impossibility to refer directly to the Matron, because to do so would lead to the exposure of what had happened in the interval. The absence of a certifica

o' milk," or mysterious breakfasts folded in scraps of newspaper. Each atom of the awakening bustle passed her engrossed by its own existence, operated by its separate interests, revolving in its individual world. London looked to her

ed Room to Let" suspended from a blind, and her efforts to gain shelter succeeded at last. It was an unpretentious little

ho was dressed like a lady, she added eighteenpence to the rent that she usually ask

of the truckle-bed-stead. "Dinners I can't do for yer, but as far as breakfas', and a cup o' tea in the eveni

and afternoon, if you can manage it, will do very nicely, thank you." She

break yer! You'll pay

in the jostle of existence profited by the misfortu

bodily relief than the mental burden. It was afternoon by the time she faced the necessity for returning to St. Pancras for her bag; a

light, and she was puzzled by the dizziness until she remembered she had had nothing to eat since eight o'clock. The thought of food was sickening, though; and it

To realise that it was only this morning that the blow had fallen upon her was impossible; an interval of several days appeared to roll between the poky attic and her farewell; the calamity seemed already old. "Oh, Tony!" she murmured. She got out his likeness. "Yours ever"-the mockery of it! She did not hate him, she did not even tell herself that she did; she contemplated the faded photograph quite gently, and held it before her a long time. It had been taken in Manchester, and she recalled the afternoon that it was done. All sorts of trivialities in connection with it recurred to her. He was wearing a lawn tie, and she remembered tha

nk, and abusing his wife with disjointed violence. Next the woman's voice arose shrieking

meless, there would be the lodging to pay for again, and the breakfasts and teas supplied in the meanwhile. She would have to spend money outside as well; she had to dine, however poorly, and there were postage-stamps, and perhaps train fares, to b