Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. II, 1889.djvu/12

 playing “There is a happy land, far, far away,” and that hymn makes too great a demand upon the imagination to soothe amid instant miseries.

In Mrs. Peckover’s kitchen the music was audible in bursts. Clem and her mother, however, it neither summoned to prepare for church, nor lulled into a mood of restful reverie. The two were sitting very close together before the fire, and holding intimate converse; their voices kept a low murmur, as if, though the door was shut, they felt it necessary to use every precaution against being overheard. Three years have come and gone since we saw these persons. On the elder, time has made little impression; but Clem has developed noticeably. The girl is now in the very prime of her ferocious beauty. She has grown taller and somewhat stouter; her shoulders spread like those of a caryatid; the arm with which she props her head is as strong as a carter’s and magnificently moulded. The head itself looks immense with its pile of glossy hair.