H. Wells - Ann Veronica

"But who could have lent you money?"

"I pawned my pearl necklace. I got three pounds, and there's

three on my watch."

"Six pounds. H'm. Got the tickets? Yes, but then--you said you

borrowed?"

"I did, too," said Ann Veronica.

"Who from?"

She met his eye for a second and her heart failed her. The truth

was impossible, indecent. If she mentioned Ramage he might have

a fit--anything might happen. She lied. "The Widgetts," she

said.

"Tut, tut!" he said. "Really, Vee, you seem to have advertised

our relations pretty generally!"

"They--they knew, of course. Because of the Dance."

"How much do you owe them?"

She knew forty pounds was a quite impossible sum for their

neighbors. She knew, too, she must not hesitate. "Eight

pounds," she plunged, and added foolishly, "fifteen pounds will

see me clear of everything." She muttered some unlady-like

comment upon herself under her breath and engaged in secret

additions.

Mr. Stanley determined to improve the occasion. He seemed to

deliberate. "Well," he said at last slowly, "I'll pay it. I'll

pay it. But I do hope, Vee, I do hope --this is the end of these

adventures. I hope you have learned your lesson now and come to

see--come to realize --how things are. People, nobody, can do as

they like in this world. Everywhere there are limitations."

"I know," said Ann Veronica (fifteen pounds!). "I have learned

that. I mean--I mean to do what I can." (Fifteen pounds.

Fifteen from forty is twenty-five.)

He hesitated. She could think of nothing more to say.

"Well," she achieved at last. "Here goes for the new life!"

"Here goes for the new life," he echoed and stood up. Father and

daughter regarded each other warily, each more than a little

insecure with the other. He made a movement toward her, and then

recalled the circumstances of their last conversation in that

study. She saw his purpose and his doubt hesitated also, and

then went to him, took his coat lapels, and kissed him on the

cheek.

"Ah, Vee," he said, "that's better! and kissed her back rather

clumsily. "We're going to be sensible."

She disengaged herself from him and went out of the room with a

grave, preoccupied expression. (Fifteen pounds! And she wanted

forty!)

Part 4

It was, perhaps, the natural consequence of a long and tiring and

exciting day that Ann Veronica should pass a broken and

distressful night, a night in which the noble and self-subduing

resolutions of Canongate displayed themselves for the first time

in an atmosphere of almost lurid dismay. Her father's peculiar

stiffness of soul presented itself now as something altogether

left out of the calculations upon which her plans were based,

and, in particular, she had not anticipated the difficulty she

would find in borrowing the forty pounds she needed for Ramage.

That had taken her by surprise, and her tired wits had failed

her. She was to have fifteen pounds, and no more. She knew that

to expect more now was like anticipating a gold-mine in the

garden. The chance had gone. It became suddenly glaringly

apparent to her that it was impossible to return fifteen pounds

or any sum less than twenty pounds to Ramage --absolutely

impossible. She realized that with a pang of disgust and horror.

Already she had sent him twenty pounds, and never written to

explain to him why it was she had not sent it back sharply

directly he returned it. She ought to have written at once and

told him exactly what had happened. Now if she sent fifteen

pounds the suggestion that she had spent a five-pound note in the

meanwhile would be irresistible. No! That was impossible. She

would have just to keep the fifteen pounds until she could make

it twenty. That might happen on her birthday--in August.

She turned about, and was persecuted by visions, half memories,

half dreams, of Ramage. He became ugly and monstrous, dunning

her, threatening her, assailing her.

"Confound sex from first to last!" said Ann Veronica. "Why can't

we propagate by sexless spores, as the ferns do? We restrict

each other, we badger each other, friendship is poisoned and

buried under it! . . . I MUST pay off that forty pounds. I

MUST."

For a time there seemed no comfort for her even in Capes. She

was to see Capes to-morrow, but now, in this state of misery she

had achieved, she felt assured he would turn his back upon her,

take no notice of her at all. And if he didn't, what was the

good of seeing him?

"I wish he was a woman," she said, "then I could make him my

friend. I want him as my friend. I want to talk to him and go

about with him. Just go about with him."

She was silent for a time, with her nose on the pillow, and that

brought her to: "What's the good of pretending?

"I love him," she said aloud to the dim forms of her room, and

repeated it, and went on to imagine herself doing acts of

tragically dog-like devotion to the biologist, who, for the

purposes of the drama, remained entirely unconscious of and

indifferent to her proceedings.

At last some anodyne formed itself from these exercises, and,

with eyelashes wet with such feeble tears as only

three-o'clock-in-the-morning pathos can distil, she fell asleep.

Part 5

Pursuant to some altogether private calculations she did not go

up to the Imperial College until after mid-day, and she found the

laboratory deserted, even as she desired. She went to the table

under the end window at which she had been accustomed to work,

and found it swept and garnished with full bottles of re-agents.

Everything was very neat; it had evidently been straightened up

and kept for her. She put down the sketch-books and apparatus

she had brought with her, pulled out her stool, and sat down. As

she did so the preparation-room door opened behind her. She

heard it open, but as she felt unable to look round in a careless

manner she pretended not to hear it. Then Capes' footsteps

approached. She turned with an effort.

"I expected you this morning," he said. "I saw--they knocked off

your fetters yesterday."

"I think it is very good of me to come this afternoon."

"I began to be afraid you might not come at all."

"Afraid!"

"Yes. I'm glad you're back for all sorts of reasons." He spoke a

little nervously. "Among other things, you know, I didn't

understand quite--I didn't understand that you were so keenly

interested in this suffrage question. I have it on my conscience

that I offended you--"

"Offended me when?"

"I've been haunted by the memory of you. I was rude and stupid.

We were talking about the suffrage--and I rather scoffed."

"You weren't rude," she said.

"I didn't know you were so keen on this suffrage business."

"Nor I. You haven't had it on your mind all this time?"

"I have rather. I felt somehow I'd hurt you."

"You didn't. I--I hurt myself."

"I mean--"

"I behaved like an idiot, that's all. My nerves were in rags. I

was worried. We're the hysterical animal, Mr. Capes. I got

myself locked up to cool off. By a sort of instinct. As a dog

eats grass. I'm right again now."

"Because your nerves were exposed, that was no excuse for my

touching them. I ought to have seen--"

"It doesn't matter a rap--if you're not disposed to resent

the--the way I behaved."

"_I_ resent!"

"I was only sorry I'd been so stupid."

"Well, I take it we're straight again," said Capes with a note of