Page:In the year of jubilee (IA inyearofjubilee00giss).pdf/104

96 “Without loss of time. You shall be advised of progress. Of course I must debit you with exes.”

“All right. Mind you charge for all the penny stamps.”

“Every one—don’t you forget it.”

He stood up, tilted forward on his toes, and stretched himself

“I'll be trotting homewards. It’ll be time for by-by when I get to Kennington.”

III

Nancy was undisturbed by the promotion of Mary Woodruff. A short time ago it would have offended her; she would have thought her dignity, her social prospects, imperilled. She was now careless on that score, and felt it a relief to cast off the show of domestic authority. Henceforth her position would be like that of Horace. All she now desired was perfect freedom from responsibility,—to be, as it were, a mere lodger in the house, to come and go unquestioned and unrestrained by duties.

Thus, by aid of circumstance, had she put herself into complete accord with the spirit of her time. Abundant privilege; no obligation. A reference of all things to her sovereign will and pleasure. Withal, a defiant rather than a hopeful mood; resentment of the undisguisable fact that her will was sovereign only in a poor little sphere which she would gladly have transcended.

Now-a-days she never went in the direction of Champion Hill, formerly herfavourite walk. If Jessica Morgan spoke of her acquaintances there, she turned abruptly to another subject. She thought of the place as an abode of arrogance