Ann Veronica: A Modern Love Story

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thought that she was in love-in love!-that marvellous state! that I really believe she had some dim idea of talking to him about it. At any rate, it would be good to hear

Ramage a little disp

n hundred pounds in th

arating," sai

he said; "it's only

can buy all sort

that on

n cheer me," he said, "except champagne." He meditated. "T

er him and regarding Ann Veronica with the slightly projectin

back for

med: "I believe I

hat," said Ann

o you

xactly a depressi

don't

s," said Ann Ver

! Being in lo

to make

's that?" The waiter had inter

e wondered why she thought love made people happy, and began to talk of the smilax and pinks that ad

love. "What made you think" he said, abruptly, with the g

ow it

t h

o insistent. "Women know these t

about feminine instinct. It's one of our conventional superstitions. A woman

with a judicial expression of face

Ramage, i

nd into which, indeed, he was trying to throw much more expression than they could carry. There w

with her or not in love with her." Her mind went off to Capes. Her thoughts took words for themselves. "She can't. I suppose it depends on her own state of mind. If one wants a thing very much, perhaps one is incli

t be able to infer Capes from the things she

" he

," she said "I'm afraid I'm a lit

into deep reflection as the waiter

to the opera, Ann Ve

or t

we go

ke to listen to mus

ist

heard Trista

l go. There's sure to

lly of you," sa

f you to come

r of the street traffic from under slightly drooping eyelids, while Ramage sat closer to her than he need have done, and glanced ever and again at her face, a

s and shaded lights. She had never been to the opera before except as one of a congested mass of people in the cheaper seats, and with backs and heads and women's hats for the frame of the spectacle; there was by contrast a fine large sense of space and ease in her present position. The curtain rose out of the concluding bars of the overture and revealed Isolde on the prow of the barbaric ship. The voice of the young seaman came floating down from the masthead

e out of her confused dream of involuntary and commanding love in a glory of sound and colors to discover that Ramage wa

" he said, sighing dee

te still lo

had drunk that lov

e. It makes me desire life beyond measure. Life! Life and love! It makes me want

ful," said Ann Ver

ested her beyond measure. But also this must not go on. She felt he was going to say something more-something still more personal and intimate. She was curious, and at the same time clearly resolved she must not hear it. She felt she must get him talking upon some impersonal theme at any cost. She snatched

ith an air of

to be hesitating between two courses of action. "I don't know much about the technique

lf by plunging into a

hing between them, ignored the slipping away of the

do in this eventuality or that. Her mind had been and was full of the thought of Capes, a huge generalized Capes-lover. And in some incomprehensible way, Ramage was confused with Capes; she had a grotesque disposition to persuade herself that this was really Capes who surrounded her, as it were, with wings of desire. The fact that it was her trust

I love you, Ann Veronica. I love

warm nearness of his. "DON'T!" she said, an

ing to keep his hold upon her; "my God!

red in whispers, for there was the white arm of a woman in t

This isn't

eager undertones against an auditor

have tried not to tell you-tried to be simply your friend. It is no good. I want you. I worship you. I would

in at her quick defensive movement.

rotest against his advances as an insult. But she did not in the least want to do that. These sweeping dignities were not within the compass of her will; she remembered she liked Ramage, and owed things to

quick undertones that sh

lked. I have always loved you. I don't care what divides us. I don't care

g of Tristan and King Mark, like a voice heard in a bad

m, and the second climax was ending in wreaths and reek of melodies; and then the curtain was coming down in a series of short rushes, the music had ended, and the people were stirring and breaking out into applause,

ger and flushed and troubled. His eyes caught at hers with passionate inquiries. "Tell me," he said; "speak to me." She realized it was possible to be sorry for him-acutely sorry for the situation.

said, "please don'

o speak a

I don't want to hear you. If I had known that you ha

elp it? How can

insisted. "P

you. I must say wh

t now-n

"I never planned it-

anations, and as acutely that explanations we

can't-Not now. Will you ple

ing to guess at the m

n't wan

I must-

about this. I

t n

ou. I love yo

talk to me now. There is a place-This isn't the

emotion, and he laid his hand on hers upon her knee. "I am the most foolish of men. I was stupid-stupid and impulsive beyond measure

im with perplex

aid. And let us go on with our evening. Why not? Imagin

m enormously. She felt this was the sensib

hed her and q

me other time. Somewhere, where we ca

nd deliberate and beautiful. "Yes," she said, "that is what we ought to do."

aid with queer exaltation, and his grip tighte

n Veronica, and drew her

? At least, you heard the first act. And all the third act is love-sick music. Tristan dying and Isolde coming to crown his death. Wagner had just bee

mations of lovers separated-lovers separated with scars and memories between them, and the curtain w

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e met him graciously and kindly as a queen who knows she must needs give sorrow to a faithful liege. She was unusually soft and gentle in her manner to him. He was wearing a new silk hat, with a slightly more generous brim than its

have a private room," he said. "

a French admiral and discretion beyond all limits in his manner. He seemed to have expected them. He ushered them with an amiable flat hand i

nn Veronica, dimly appreh

al preoccupation of manner, then roused himself to take her jacket, a little awkwardly, and hand it to the waiter who hung it in the corner

le fussily, "until these interruptions of the service are over

e fraction of a second

h of it amazin

out of the poorest little love-story for a r

ev

sibly and unfortunately in love with a wealthy patroness, and then out of his brain comes THIS, a tapestry of glo

n, but all sorts of odd questions were running through her mind. "I wonde

t is the chief thing in life, and everything else goes down before it. Everything, my dear, everything!... But

d him with an almost ostentatious discretion. Ramage stood up, and suddenly turned the key in the door in an off-hand manner. "Now,"

the key startled her, but she did not see how she could make an

nd stood quite still, looking at her

ay?" Her voice was flat and faint. Suddenly she had become afra

ery hard and earnestly.

own and put one arm about her and seized her hands with his disengaged hand and kissed her-kissed her almost u

gave a shout and whirled head over heels. Everything in the world had changed for her. If hate could kil

lasping her resolutely i

mixed with her breath. Her eye met his four inches away, and his was g

chest and hers. They began to wrestle fiercely. Each became frightfully aware of the other as a plastic energetic body, of the strong muscles of neck aga

in the High School. Her defence ceased rapidly to be in any sense ladylike, and became vigorous and effective; a strand of black hair that had escaped its hairpins came at

th, strenuously inflicting agony, and he cri

ronica. "Why did y

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as flushed, and her eyes were bright and angry; her breath came sobbing, and her hair was all abroad in wandering strands of bla

ge, speaking the simplest

ight-" panted

asked, "did you h

had not deliberately attempted to cau

dreamt!"

you expect me to

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waiter, the whole situation. She understood. She leaped to a world of shabby knowledge, of fur

ted to have a talk

to make lo

e added, in her

with me," said Ann Veroni

ting. "I am in love with you. You know I am in love with you. And then you go-and ha

Ann Veronica. "What

all a good description of her attitude. She was an indignant queen, no doubt she was alarmed and disgusted within limits; but she was highly excited, and there was something, some low adventurous strain in her being, some element, subtle at least if base, going about the rioting ways and crowded insurgent meeting-places of her mind declaring that the whole affair was after all-they are

ed and vanished and loathing came, and she really began to be thoro

. He had meant to be master of his fate that evening and it had escaped him altogether. It had, as it were, bl

"I brought you here

idea of making love. You h

the most beautiful, the most desirable thing I have ever met in this world. It was good to kiss you, even a

reasonably, Mr. Ramag

Don't go back into Victorian respectability and pretend you don't know and you can't think and all the rest of it. One comes at last to the step from dreams t

-I didn't suppose for on

thing with your mind. You are afraid of kisses. You are afraid of the warmth in

a step t

think you understand. I don't love you. I don't. I can't love you. I lov

ew aspect of the situation. "You

lse. I could not d

stion. His hand went with an almost instinctive inquiry to his jawbone again. "Then why the devil," he dem

ell me" he said, "that you have a lover? Whi

ned her. She felt she must fly before it and could no longer do so. She did no

get out of this horrible little room. It has all been a mistak

d of anything so cool. If he wants you, let him get you. You're mine. I've paid for you and helped you, and I'm going to conquer you somehow-i

ronica; with the cleares

ed a wine-glass from the table to smash noisily on the floor. She caught at the idea.

he said, "you'

reproving magistrates, a crowded court, public disgrace. She saw her aunt i

ocking at the door, and

eath, "you can't face it." A

ll right," he said, reassuri

r hair, while Ramage parleyed with inaudible interrogations. "A glass slipped from the table," he explained.... "Non. Fas du to

d grimly, with three

and began to put it on. He regarded that per

word with you about all this. Do you mean to tell me

t," said Ann Ve

pect that I sh

uld-would think it was possible-

know there

gs for you? The abstract pleasure of goodness? Are you one of the members of that great white sisterhood that takes and does not give? Th

Ann Veronica, "y

ven with friends, would you have it all Give on one side and all Take on the other?... Does HE kno

was stung to

ous! You understand nothing. You are-horr

ricks of evasion, you're a sex of swindlers. You have all the instinctive dexterity of parasi

know!" cried

, you

ote of weeping broke her voice for a moment as she burs

oa

elf called

e both under

ve every penn

e it-when

to work at shirt-makin

does gloss over her ethical positions. You're all dependents-all of you. By instinct. Only you good ones-shirk. You shirk a strai

d Ann Veronica, "

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not get aw

"Oh, Ann Veronica!" he cried, "I cannot let you go like

rude and alarming and senseless things. His vicious abusiveness vanished. He suddenly became eloquent and plausible. He did make her perceive something of the acute, tormenting desire for

tter all her dreams of a way of living for women that would enable them to be free and spacious and friendly with men, and tha

he had let him start. And at the thought of that other lover-he was convinced that that beloved person was a lover, and she found herself unable to say a word to explain to him that this other person, the person she loved, did not even know of her love-Ramage grew angry and

ess in his eyes than a fraud and mockery that made her denial a maddening and outrag

hink of that check you endorsed. There it is-against you. I defy you to explain it away.

claring her undying resolve to repay him at

lit landing. She went past three keenly observant and ostentatiously preoccupied waiters down the thick-carpeted staircase and out

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itting-room again, every nerve in her body

t on the bed and sat

piece of coal into indignant flame-spurting fra

presses it better. I'm in a mess-a nasty

ca?-you're in a nasty, f

t made a silly

s! I haven't

hen, suddenly remembering the lodger bel

woman up to date. By Jove! I'm begi

eronica! You silly young woma

this sort of thin

ed lips savagely with the back

Aunt Jane had her quiet moments. Most of them didn't, anyhow. They were properly brought up, and sat still and straight, and took the luck fate brought them as

orld of fine printed cambrics and escorted maidens, of delicate secondary meanings and refined allusiveness, presen

er if I've been properly brought up. If I had been quite quiet and white

sted with herself; she was wrung with a passionate and belated desire

tails recur

d I put my knuckles in his n

sound the h

ronica, you nearly thr

her own foolish w

... Why aren't you folded up clean in lavender-as every young

o the fire wi

me in the slightest degre

e was no doubt, she did not sleep. The more she disentangled the lines of her situation the deeper grew her self-disgust. Occasionally the mere fact of lying i

which she would say to herself, "Now

hich she must labor for even a foothold in the world. She had flung away from her father's support with the finest assumption of personal independence. And here she was-in a mess because it had been impossible for h

uestion as pass from it to her insoluble i

early half of it, and had no conception of how such a sum could be made good again. She though

her blind, and stared out of window at a dawn-cold vision of chimneys for a time, and then went and sat

ntly desire to save her face in Morningside Park, and for long hours she could think of n

as a chorus-g

lation from her father by a threat to seek that position, and then with overwhelming clearness it came to her that whatever happened she would never be able to tell her father about her debt. The completest c

she promena

An idiot girl in an asylum wou

worst of all conceivable combinations. I wi

find that check endor

t arise out of Ramage's antagonism, for he had been so bitter and sav

envelope to Ramage, and scrawled on a half-sheet of paper, "The rest shall follow." The money would be available in the afternoon, and she would send him four five-pound notes. The rest she meant to keep

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er sleepless night had left her languid but not stupefied, and for

this life of hers was doomed to almost immediate collapse; that in a little while these studi

wintry sunshine, spent the rest of the lunch-hour in a drowsy gloom, which she imagined to be thought upon the problems of her position, on a seat in Regent's Park. A girl of fifteen or sixteen gave her a handbill that she regarded as

ica was preoccupied and heavy-eyed. Miss Klegg raised the question of women's suffrage, and he set himself to provoke a duel between her

d back with an uncompromising vigor that was his way of complimenting her intelligence. But this afternoon it discovered an unusual vein of irritability in her. He had been reading Belfort Bax, and declared himself a

Miss Klegg contrad

eedom-the man she loved, the one man she cared should unlock the way to the wide world for her imprisoned feminine possibilities, and he seemed reg

the same words she used at every discussi

place was the little world, the home; that their power lay not in votes but in

Miss Garvice, "but to mingle in them is just to sacri

be just and so forth, but, after all, it is how things are. Women are not in the world in the same sense that men are-fighting individuals in a scramble.

aid Ann Veronica;

ittle refuge. Anyhow, t

as the master at t

that go to make him a tolerable master. Nature is a mother; her sympathies

h sudden anger, "that you could

er cup beside Miss Garvice's. She address

ndure it,"

ned to her in

queens.... Then we find out. We find out no man will treat a woman fairly as man to man-no man. He wants you-or he doesn't; and then he helps some other woman against you.... What

and there was so much that struggled for expression. "Women are mocked

led to flounder on. "Think of the mockery!" she said. "Think how dumb we find ourselves and stifled! I know we seem to have a sort of freedom.... Have you ever

ting," said C

her that he should stand within three yards of her unsuspectingly, with an incalculably vast power over her happiness. She was sore with the perplexitie

ged upon her, and that the tears were brimming over her eyes. She felt a storm of emotion surging up within her. She became aware of the Scotch student

an irresistible invitation-the one alternative

her intention, sprang to his feet,

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k?" she said to herself, as

gings. She wanted air-and the distraction of having moving and changing things about her. The evenings were beginning to draw out, and it would not be dark for an hour. She resolved

ying after her, and glanced back to find Mis

a pace, and Miss K

o across

I'm going to-day

at it. I thought Mr

hat. I've had a

egg went on in a small, even voice; "MOST

nd that litt

After you went he got up and took refuge in the pr

of sitting on people. He wouldn't like it if people did it to him. He jumps the words out of yo

us

rightfully clever

ociety, and he can't be much

ry well," sai

ty. He must have married wh

" said An

ss Klegg, and was struck by a thought that

d away sharply. Some automaton within her produced in a qui

he ball to reach us

nn Veronica, resuming the conversation with a

s Klegg; "I though

a, offhandedly. "Never

new. I thought every o

t w

separated from his wife. There was

t ca

lmost had to leave the schools. If it hadn't been for Professor

vorced, do

I forget the particulars, but I know it was someth

was silent

" said Miss Klegg. "Or I wouldn

h entanglement. And, anyhow, it doesn't matter to us." She turned abruptly at right an

ere coming right

o. I just wanted a breath of air. And they'll shut

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ut ten o'clock that night when a sealed an

olded within it were the notes she had sen

cannot let you do

em into the fire. Instantly she seized the poker and made a desperate effort to get them out ag

econds crouching at the

ng up at last, "that about