Part 79 (1/2)

”What, darling?”

”That it had been burnt to the ground before anyone else got it,”

breaks out t.i.ta, in a little storm of grief and despair.

”Yes, I know; I can feel with you,” says Margaret, pressing her back into a chair, and hovering over her with loving touches and tender words. ”But, after all, t.i.ta, one has to give up things daily. It is life. Life is one long surrender.”

”My surrender has been done in a bundle,” says t.i.ta indignantly.

”Other people do their surrenders by degrees, year after year; but in _one_ year I have lost everything--my home, my money, my husband.”

Margaret notes with fear that she has put her husband last in the list of her losses.

”Not that I care a fig about Maurice,” continues t.i.ta, with a tilt of her chin that would have made any man admire her. ”I was delighted to get rid of _him.”_ Then, glancing at Margaret, she flings her arms round her neck again. ”No; don't look at me like that. I'm a wretch. But _really,_ Margaret, you know that Maurice was a wretch, too!”

”Well, well!” says Margaret sadly. ”It seems useless to defend Maurice--you know how sorry I am for you always,” she goes on gently. ”To come from riches to poverty is one of the worst things the word offers; but to be very rich is not well, t.i.ta. It clogs the mind; it takes one away from the very meaning of life. Money hardens the soul; it keeps one away from touch with the inner circle of humanity--from the misery, the sorrow, the vice! It is bad to be too rich.”

”Yet you are rich, Margaret!”

”Yet--yes; and it frightens me,” says she, in a low tone.

t.i.ta rubs her cheek softly against hers.

”Yet _you_ are not far from the kingdom of G.o.d!” says she.

The little kittenish gesture and the solemn phrase! Margaret presses t.i.ta to her. What a strange child she is! What a mixture!

”Neither are you, I trust,” says she.

”So you see riches have got nothing to do with it,” says t.i.ta, breaking into a gay, irresistible little laugh.

Miss Knollys laughs too, in spite of herself, and then grows suddenly very grave. There is something she must say to t.i.ta.

CHAPTER XX.

HOW MARGARET STARTS AS A SPECIAL PLEADER, AND IS MUCH WORSTED IN HER ARGUMENT; AND HOW A SIMPLE KNOCK AT THE HALL DOOR SCATTERS ONE BEING WHO DELIGHTS IN WAR.

”I think you ought to see your husband,” says Margaret.

It is a bombsh.e.l.l! t.i.ta withdraws her arms from round Margaret's neck and looks at her like one seeing her for the first time. It is plain to Margaret that she is very angry.

Poor Margaret! She feels torn in twain. Rylton, as has been said, had called twice during the past ten days, but on neither of those occasions had seen t.i.ta. t.i.ta, indeed, had obstinately refused to come downstairs, even though Margaret had gone up to fetch her.

Margaret had not forgotten that occasion. She had found the girl in her room.

”Never, never, never!” said t.i.ta, in answer to all her entreaties, who had screwed herself into the farthest corner of her room between a wardrobe and a table--a most uncomfortable position, but one possessed of certain advantages. It would be difficult, for example, to dislodge her from it. And she gave Margaret the impression, as she entered the room, that she thought force was about to be resorted to.

”It is your duty to come downstairs and see him,” Margaret had said.

She always brought in poor Duty, who certainly must have been f.a.gged to death at that time.