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The Nature of Light 5

This chapter presents descriptions of the wave and particle models of light, the electromagnetic
spectrum, and blackbody radiation laws and temperature systems, as well as discussions of the principles
of spectral analysis and modern concepts of atomic structure. It concludes with an explanation of the
Doppler effect and stellar radial velocities.

5-1 Light travels through empty space at a speed of 300,000 km/s

The speed of light in a vacuum is a universal constant: It has the same value everywhere in the
cosmos.

5-2 Light is electromagnetic radiation and is characterized by its wavelength

Visible light, radio waves, and X rays are all the same type of wave: They differ only in their
wavelength.

5-3 A dense object emits electromagnetic radiation according to its temperature

As an object is heated, it glows more brightly and its peak color shifts to shorter wavelengths.

Box 5-1 Temperatures and Temperature Scales

The Celsius, Kelvin, and Fahrenheit temperature systems are contrasted, and the respective freezing
and boiling points of water are noted.

5-4 Wien’s law and the Stefan-Boltzmann law are useful tools for analyzing glowing objects
like stars
Two simple mathematical formulas describing blackbodies are essential tools for studying the
universe.

Box 5-2 Using the Laws of Blackbody Radiation

The concept of luminosity is introduced and the solar constant is defined. The Stefan-Boltzmann law
is used to compute the surface temperature for the Sun from luminosity and size measurements.

5-5 Light has properties of both waves and particles

The revolutionary photon concept is necessary to explain blackbody radiation and the photoelectric
effect.

Box 5-3 Photons at the Supermarket

The example of a laser bar-code reader is used to illustrate Planck’s law and the extreme smallness of
a single photon’s energy is emphasized.

5-6 Each chemical element produces its own unique set of spectral lines
Spectroscopy is the key to determining the chemical composition of planets and stars.

Box 5-4 Why the Sky is Blue

The wavelength dependence on particle size is used to explain why the sky is blue and sunsets are
red.
46 46

5-7 An atom consists of a small, dense nucleus surrounded by electrons

To decode the information in the light from immense objects like stars and galaxies, we must
understand the structure of atoms.

Box 5-5 Atoms, the Periodic Table, and Isotopes

The periodic table is explained in terms of atomic and nuclear structure.

5-8 Spectral lines are produced when an electron jumps from one energy level to another
within an atom
Niels Bohr explained spectral lines with a radical new model of the atom.

5-9 The wavelength of a spectral line is affected by the relative motion between the source and
the observer
The Doppler effect makes it possible to tell whether astronomical objects are moving toward us or
away from us.

Box 5-6 Applications of the Doppler Effect

The use of the Doppler Effect is illustrated using two examples.

Teaching Hints and Strategies

This chapter presents radiation laws, and principles of spectral analysis, and modern concepts of
atomic structure. It provides the necessary background for an understanding of modern astrophysics and
can be used to expand on the use of models in modern science.

The need for more than one model of light provides some insight into the limitations inherent in the
use of physical models to help us understand and explain unusual phenomena in science. The
quantitative aspects of the wave model of light (Section 5-2) should be noted at this point. A
demonstration of Young’s double-slit experiment or diffraction of a laser beam as it passes a human
hair is very useful in demonstrating the wave nature of light. It is helpful to describe constructive and
destructive interference of waves in some detail at this point.

The role of temperature (Section 5-3) in the blackbody radiation laws should be given special
emphasis here. These laws are the astronomer’s link to the temperatures of celestial objects. Many
students are poor at proportional reasoning and special attention should be paid to the T4 term in the
Stefan-Boltzmann law. Ask students to consider a 6″ personal pizza that sells for $1. Ask them what
the price of a 12″ pizza should be (assuming the amount of toppings per square inch stays constant).
Many students will guess $2, because the diameter has doubled. Calculate the two areas (9 in2 and
2
36 in ) to show that the area has increased by a factor of four.

It can be informative to illustrate the nature of the Stefan-Boltzmann law (Section 5-4) by comparing
the flux emitted by three stars having the same size but three different typical temperatures. Use 3000,
6000, and 30,000 K to represent low-, medium- (the Sun), and high-temperature stars. Use relative units
to eliminate the constants and keep the algebra simple. Be sure to point out that these laws work
reasonably well for planets also. You might compare the Earth (300 K) with the three stars above in
terms of total emitted flux.

Chapter 5 The Nature of Light

47 47

Since examples are also worked out in the textbook in Box 5-2, it is a good idea to use the same solution
format in the class examples. Students at this level are more comfortable if they have a set pattern to
follow. Have them work the problems at the end of the chapter using this format.

Chapter 5 The Nature of Light

48 48

The concept of the kinetic definition of temperature (Box 5-1) is important later in discussing gas
pressure and atmospheric retention. The need for an absolute temperature system is imperative when
attempting to compare two temperatures or when making calculations involving temperature. Stress
that, although all temperature systems are equally accurate, only an absolute temperature system can
be used for calculations without modification for zero point differences. Students may need to be told
that the size of a Celsius degree and the size of a Kelvin are the same.

The temperature and luminosity of the Sun (Box 5-2) can lead to a discussion of the effects of
different temperatures for stars on their planetary systems. What would happen to the energy reaching
the Earth if the Sun were to become 10% hotter or cooler? A mere 0.35% (20 K) increase in the solar
surface temperature causes a 1.4% increase in the solar power received at Earth.

Most students find it confusing that neither the wave nor the particle model of light (Section 5-5) is
“correct.” Be sure to point out that our conceptual models are just analogies to permit easier, but limited,
understanding. Light possesses both wavelike and particlelike properties, so both models are correct but
neither is complete. Light will manifest itself as particles or waves depending on which one is revealed
by the particular apparatus being used. In other words, light knows how to behave, but we have trouble
describing it. The general concept of the photoelectric effect can be illustrated with a photocell, a
galvanometer, and a flashlight. Numerous Web sites provide simulations of these classic experiments
(phet.colorado.edu/en/simulations/category/physics).

The use of energy units for photons (Box 5-3) and the relationships among wavelength, frequency
and energy per photon are important in the education of every student interested in astronomy.
Remind the students that while optical astronomers typically refer to wavelengths, radio astronomers
prefer frequencies, and X-ray and gamma-ray astronomers usually indicate the energy per photon. It
is helpful to use hc = 1240 eV·nm when working with photon energies in eV and wavelengths in nm.
Note: The Greek letter  (“nu”) is often used for frequency. Students often confuse this with v, used
for velocity.

Kirchoff’s laws of spectral analysis (Section 5-6) are empirical in origin. The observation of a
continuous spectrum indicates the presence of a luminous or incandescent solid, liquid, or dense gas.
Note that the radiation laws describe quantitatively the radiation from an ideal object of this type. A
few moments should be spent in clarifying what a dense gas is and contrast it with a low-density or
rarefied gas. Some mention should be made about the relationship between density and pressure as well.
Be certain that students understand that spectral lines can be produced only in low density or rarefied
gases.

Many students think that spectral lines are images of something on the light source. They should be
reminded that the lines are in fact images of the slit in the spectrograph at wavelengths that are more
or less intense than the continuum. The lines in spectra are unique for each ionization state of each
type of atom and therefore can be used to identify the types of atoms in low-density gases. Always
remind students that the absence of lines of a certain element does not necessarily indicate that the
element is not there, because different physical conditions can also affect the line intensities.

A classroom demonstration is very useful at this point. Inexpensive diffraction gratings and spectrum
tubes along with a power supply can be obtained from any of several vendors of laboratory
equipment. Hand out the gratings and then hold in view an incandescent lightbulb followed by several

Chapter 5 The Nature of Light

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days to come, and I've got that rehearsal with Stanford to-morrow; my
God, it's too awful!"
She paused to try her voice once more, but with the same result.
"Where's my inhaler?" she demanded of the room in general.
Milly winked at Cassy as she went into Harriet's bedroom. "Here it is,
on your washstand," she called.
Harriet began feverishly to boil up the kettle; she appeared to have
completely forgotten Joan and Elizabeth; she spoke in whispers now,
addressing all her stifled remarks to Cassy. Milly brought in the inhaler
and a bottle of drops; they filled it from the kettle and proceeded to count
out the tincture. Harriet sat down heavily with her knees apart; she
gripped the ridiculous china bottle in both hands and, applying her lips to
the fat glass mouthpiece, proceeded to evoke a series of bubbling,
gurgling noises.
Milly drew her sister aside. "You two had better go," she whispered.
"Don't try to say good-bye to her; she's in one of her panics, she won't
notice your going."
Cassy smiled across at Elizabeth with a finger on her lips; her eyes
were full of amusement as she glanced in the direction of her friend.
Years afterwards when the names of Cassy Ryan and Harriet Nelson had
become famous, when these two old friends and fellow students would
be billed together on the huge sheets advertising oratorio or opera, Joan,
seeing an announcement of the performance in the papers, would have a
sudden vision of that little crowded sitting-room, with Harriet hunched
fatly in the wicker arm-chair, the rotund inhaler clasped to her bosom.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

T HE transition from Seabourne to London had been accomplished so

quietly and easily that the first morning Joan woke up on the divan in
the sitting-room of Elizabeth's flat she could hardly believe that she
was there. She thumped the mattress to reassure herself, and then looked
round the study which, by its very strangeness, testified to the glorious
truth.
The idea had originated with Elizabeth. "Let's run up to London for a
fortnight," she had said, and Joan had acquiesced as though such a thing
were an everyday occurrence. And, strangest of all, Mrs. Ogden had
taken it resignedly. Perhaps there had been a certain new quality in Joan's
voice when she had announced her intention. Perhaps somewhere at the
back of her mind Mrs. Ogden was beginning to realize that her daughter
was now of an age when maternal commands could be disregarded. Be
that as it may, she consented to Joan's cashing a tiny cheque, and beyond
engineering a severe migraine on the morning of their departure, offered
no greater obstacle to the jaunt than an injured expression and a rather
faint voice.
Elizabeth had arranged it all. She had persuaded her tenant to take
them in as "paying guests," and had overcome Joan's pride with regard to
finances. "You can pay me back in time," she had remarked, and Joan
had given in.
The little flat was all that Elizabeth had said, and more. Miss Lesway
had put in a small quantity of furniture to tide her over; she was only
there until March, when she would move into a flat of her own. But the
things that she had brought with her were good, quiet and unobtrusive
relics of a bygone country house; they suggested a grandfather, even a
great-grandfather for that matter. From the windows of the flat you saw
the romantic chimney-pots and roofs that Elizabeth loved, and to your
right the topmost branches of the larger trees of the Bloomsbury square.
Yes, it was all there and adorable. Miss Lesway had welcomed them as
old friends. Tea had been ready on their arrival and flowers on
Elizabeth's dressing-table.

Beatrice Lesway was a Cambridge woman. She was a pleasant,

somewhat squat, practical creature; contented enough, it seemed, with
her lot, which was that of a teacher in a High School. Her father had
been a hunting Devonshire squire, a rough-and-tumble sort of man
having more in common with his beasts than with his family. A kindly
man but a mighty spendthrift, a paralysing kind of spendthrift; one who,
having no vices on which you could lay your hand, was well-nigh
impossible to check. But that was a long time ago, and beyond the
dignified Sheraton bookcase and a few similar reminders of the past,
Miss Lesway allowed her origin to go unnoticed. Her eyes were so
observant and her sense of humour so keen, that she managed to extract a
good deal of fun from her drab existence. The pupils interested her; their
foibles, their follies, their rather splendid qualities and their less
admirable meannesses. She attributed these latter to their up-bringing,
blaming home environment for most of the more serious faults in her
girls. She liked talking about her work, and had an old-fashioned trick of
dropping her "g's" when speaking emphatically, especially when
referring to sport. Possibly Squire Lesway had said: "Huntin', racin',
fishin', shootin';" in any case his daughter did so very markedly on those
rare occasions when she gave rein to her inherited instincts.
"Some of the girls would be all the better for a good day's huntin' on
Exmoor, gettin' wet to the skin and havin' their arms tugged out by a
half-mouthed Devonshire cob; that's the stuff to make men of 'em, that's
the life that knocks the affectation and side out of young females."
Once she said quite seriously: "The trouble is I can't give that girl a
sound lickin'; I told her mother it was the only way to cure a liar; but of
course she's a liar herself, so she didn't agree with me."
She liked Elizabeth, hence her acceptance of this invasion, and she
liked Joan too, after she got used to her, though she looked askance at
her hair.
"No good dotting the 'i's,' my dear," had been her comment.
Miss Lesway herself wore Liberty serges of a most unpleasing green,
and a string of turgid beads which clinked unhappily on her flat bosom.
Her sandy hair was chronically untidy, and what holding together it
submitted to was done by celluloid pins that more or less matched her
dresses. Her hands and wrists were small and elegant, but although she
manicured her shapely nails with immense care, and would soak them in
the soap dish while she talked to friends in the evenings, she disdained
all stain or polish. On the third finger of her left hand she wore a heavy
signet ring that had once belonged to her father. Her feet matched her
hands in slimness and breeding, but these she ignored, dooming them
perpetually to woollen stockings and wide square-toed shoes, heelless at
that.
"Can't afford pneumonia," she had said once when remonstrated with.
The thick-soled, flat shoes permitted full play to the clumping stride
which was her natural walk. Her whole appearance left you bewildered;
it was a mixed metaphor, a contradiction in style, certainly a little
grotesque, and yet you did not laugh.
It was impossible to know what Beatrice Lesway thought of herself,
much less to discover what cravings, if any, tore her unfeminine bosom.
She managed to give the impression of great frankness, while rarely
betraying her private emotions. At times she spoke and acted very much
like a man, but at others became the quintessence of old maidishness. If
she did not long for the privileges denied to her sex she took them none
the less; you gathered that she thought these privileges should be hers by
right of some hidden virtue in her own make-up, but that her opinion of
women as a whole was low. The feminist movement was going through a
period of rest, having temporarily subsided since the days, not so very
long ago, when Lady Loo had donned her knickerbockers. But the lull
was only the forerunner of a storm which was to break with great
violence less than twenty years later. Even now there were debates,
discussions, threats, but at these Miss Lesway laughed rudely.
"Bless their little hearts," she chuckled, "they must learn to stop
squabbling about their frocks before they sit in Parliament."
"But surely," Elizabeth protested, putting down the evening paper, "a
woman's brain is as good as a man's? I cannot see why women should be
debarred from a degree, or why they should get lower salaries when they
work for the same hours, and I don't see why they should be expected to
do nothing more intellectual than darn socks and have babies."
Miss Lesway made a sound of impatience. "And who's to do it if they
don't, pray?"
Elizabeth was silent, and Joan, who had not joined in this discussion,
was suddenly impressed with what she felt might be the truth about Miss
Lesway. Miss Lesway had the brain of a masterful man and the soul of a
mother. Probably that untidy, art-serged body of hers was a perpetual
battle-ground; no wonder it looked so dishevelled, trampled under as it
must be by these two violent rival forces.
 "Well, I shall never marry!" Joan announced suddenly.
Miss Lesway looked at her. Joan had expected an outburst, or at least
a severe reproof, but, instead, the eyes that met hers were tired,
compassionate and almost tender.
Miss Lesway said: "No, I don't think you ever will. God help you!"

Everything was new and interesting and altogether delightful to Joan

and Elizabeth during this visit. They played with the zest of truant
schoolboys. No weather, however diabolical, could daunt them; they put
on their mackintoshes and sallied forth in rain, sleet and mud. They got
lost in a fog and found themselves in Kensington instead of Bloomsbury.
They struggled furiously for overcrowded buses, or filled their lungs
with sulphur in the Underground. They stood for hours at the pit doors of
theatres, and walked in the British Museum until their feet ached. Joan
developed a love of pictures, which she found she shared with Elizabeth,
and the mornings that they spent in the galleries were some of their
happiest. To Joan, beauty as portrayed by fine art came as a heavenly
revelation; she knew for the first time the thrill of looking at someone
else's inspired thoughts.
"After all, everything is just thought," she said wisely. "They think,
and then they clothe what they've thought in something; this happens to
be paint and canvas, but it's all the same thing; thought must be clothed
in something so that we can see it."
Elizabeth watched her delightedly. She told herself that it was like
putting a geranium cutting in the window; at first it was just all green,
then came the little coloured buds and then the bloom. She felt that Joan
was growing more in this fortnight than she had done in all her years at
Seabourne; growing, expanding, coming nearer to her kingdom, day by
day.
 4

The fortnight passed all too quickly; it was going and then it was
gone. They sat side by side in an empty third-class compartment, rushing
back to Seabourne. Everything had changed suddenly for the worse.
Their clothes struck them as shabby, now that it no longer mattered. In
London, where it really had mattered, they had been quite contented with
their appearance. Their bags, on the luggage rack opposite them, looked
very worn and battered. How had they ever dared to go up to London at
all? They and their possessions belonged so obviously to Seabourne.
Joan took Elizabeth's hand. "Rotten, it's being over!"
"Yes, it's been a good time, but we'll have lots more, Joan."
"Yes—oh, yes!" Why was she so doubtful? Of course they would
have lots more, they were going to live together.
She realized now how necessary, how vitally necessary it was that
they should live together. Their two weeks in London had emphasized
that fact, if it needed emphasizing. In the past she had known two
Elizabeths, but now she knew a third; there had been Elizabeth the
teacher and Elizabeth the friend. But now there was Elizabeth the perfect
companion. There was the Elizabeth who knew so much and was able to
make things so clear to you, and so interesting. The Elizabeth who
thought only of you, of how to please you and make you happy; the
Elizabeth who entered in, who liked what you liked, enjoying all sorts of
little things, finding fun at the identical moment when you were wanting
to laugh; in fact who thought your own thoughts. This was a wonderful
person who could descend with grace to your level or unobtrusively drag
you up to hers; an altogether darling, humorous and understanding
creature.
The train slowed down. Joan said: "Oh, not already?"
They shared the fly as far as the Rodneys' house, and then Joan drove
on alone.
Mrs. Ogden opened the front door herself.
"She's gone!" were her words of greeting.
"Who has? You don't mean Ethel?"
 Mrs. Ogden sank on to the rim of the elephant pad umbrella stand.
"She walked out this morning after the greatest impertinence. Of course I
refused to pay her. I'm worn out by all I've been through since you left; I
nearly telegraphed for you to come back."
"Wait a minute, Mother dear; I must get my trunk in. Yes, please,
cabby—upstairs, if you don't mind; the back room."
"She kept the kitchen filthy; I've been down there since she left and
the sink made me feel quite sick! I've thought for some time she was
dishonest and brought men in the evenings, and now I'm sure of it;
there's hardly a grain of coffee left and I can't find the pound of bacon I
bought only the day before yesterday."
"Oh! I do wish we hadn't lost her!" said Joan inconsequently. "Have
you been to the registry office?"
"No, of course not; what time have I had? You'll have to do that to-
morrow."
Joan went upstairs and began unstrapping her trunk. She did not
attempt to analyse her feelings; they were too confused and she was very
tired. She wanted to sit down and gloat over the past two weeks, to
recapture some of their fun and freedom and companionship; above all
she did not want to think of registry offices.
Mrs. Ogden came into her room. "You haven't kissed me yet, darling."
Joan longed to say: "You didn't give me a chance, did you?" But
something in the small, thin figure that stood rather wistfully before her,
as if uncertain of its welcome, made her kiss her mother in silence.
"Have you had any tea?" she asked, patting Mrs. Ogden's arm.
"No, I felt too tired to get it, but it might do my head good if you
could make some really strong tea, darling."
Joan left her trunk untouched, and turned to the door. "All right, I'll
have it ready in a quarter of an hour," she said.
Mrs. Ogden looked at her with love in her eyes. "Oh, Joan, it's so
good to have you home again; I've missed you terribly."
Joan was silent.
 CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

T HAT Christmas Mrs. Benson invited them to dinner, and, being

cookless, Mrs. Ogden accepted. Milly was delighted to escape from
the dreaded ordeal of Christmas dinner at home. Her holidays were
becoming increasingly distasteful. For one thing she missed the convivial
student life, the companionship of people who shared her own interests
and ambitions, their free and easy talk, their illicit sprees, their love
affairs and the combined atmosphere of animal passion and spiritual
uplift which they managed to create. She dearly loved the ceaseless
activity of the College, the hurrying figures on the stairs, the muffled
thud of the swing-doors. The intent, preoccupied faces of the students
inspired and fascinated her; their hands seemed always to be clutching
something, a violin case, a music roll. Their hands were never empty.
She felt less toleration than ever for her home, now that she had left it;
the fact that she was practically free failed to soften her judgment of
Seabourne; as she had felt about it in the past, so she felt now, with the
added irritation that it reminded her of Mr. Thompson.
Milly was not introspective and she was not morbid. A wider
experience of life had not tended to raise her standard of morality, and if
she was ashamed of the episode with Mr. Thompson, it was because of
the partner she had chosen rather than because of the episode itself. She
was humiliated that it should have been Mr. Thompson of the circulating
library, a vulgar youth without ambition, talent, or brain. The memory of
those hours spent in the sand-pit lowered her self-esteem, the more so as
the side of her that had rejoiced in them was in abeyance for the moment,
kept in subjection by her passion for her art. She watched the students'
turbulent love affairs with critical and amused eyes. Some day, perhaps,
she would have another affair of her own, but for the present she was too
busy.
In her mind she divided the two elements in her nature by a well-
defined gulf. Both were highly important, but different. Both were good
in themselves, inasmuch as they were stimulating and pleasurable, but
she felt that they could not combine in her as they so often did in her
fellow students, and of this she was glad.
Her work was the thing that really counted, as she had always known;
but if the day should come when her work needed the stimulus of her
passions, she was calmly determined that it should have it. She knew that
she would be capable of deliberately indulging all that was least
desirable in her nature, if thereby a jot or tittle could be gained for her
music.
Her opinion of her sister was becoming unstable, viewed in the light
of wider experience; she was beginning to feel that she did not
understand Joan. In London Joan had seemed free, emancipated even;
but back at Leaside she was dull, irritable and apparently quite hopeless,
like someone suffering from a strong reaction.
It was true enough that the home-coming had been a shock to Joan;
why, it is impossible to say. She had known so many similar incidents;
servants had left abruptly before, especially of late years, so that
familiarity should have softened the effect produced by her arrival at
Leaside. But a condition of spirit, a degree of physical elation or fatigue,
perhaps a mere passing mood, will sometimes predispose the mind to
receive impressions disproportionately deep to their importance, and this
was what had happened in Joan's case. She had felt suddenly
overwhelmed by the hopelessness of it all, and as the days passed her
fighting spirit weakened. It was not that she longed any less to get away
with Elizabeth, but rather that the atmosphere of the house sapped her
initiative as never before. All the fine, brave plans for the future, that had
seemed so accessible with Elizabeth in London, became nebulous and
difficult to seize. The worries that flourished like brambles around Mrs.
Ogden closed in around Joan too, seeming almost insurmountable when
viewed in the perspective of Leaside.
Milly watched her sister curiously: "You look like the morning after
the night before! What's the matter, Joan?"
"Nothing," said Joan irritably. "Do let me alone!"
"Your jaunt with Elizabeth doesn't seem to have cheered you up
much."
"Oh, I'm all right."
"Are you really going to Cambridge, do you think, after all?"
 "Will you shut up, Milly! I've told you a hundred times I don't know."
Milly laughed provokingly, but the laugh brought on a paroxysm of
coughing; and she gasped, clinging to a chair.
Joan eyed her with resentment. Milly's cough made her unaccountably
angry sometimes; it had begun to take on abnormal proportions, to loom
as a menace. Her tense nerves throbbed painfully now whenever she
heard it.
"Oh, do stop coughing!" she said, and her voice sounded exasperated.
What was the matter with her? She was growing positively brutal!
She fled from the room, leaving Milly to cough and choke alone.

Christmas dinner at the Bensons' was a pleasant enough festivity. Mrs.

Benson was delighted that the Ogdens had come, for Richard was at
home. His stolid determination not to seek Joan out, coupled with his
evident melancholy, had begun to alarm his mother. She tried to lead him
on to talk about the girl, but he was not to be drawn. The situation was
beyond her. If Richard was in love with Joan, why didn't he marry her?
His father couldn't very well refuse to make him a decent allowance if he
married; it was all so ridiculous, this moping about, this pandering to
Joan's fancies.
"Marry her, my son, and discuss things afterwards," had been Mrs.
Benson's advice.
But Richard had laughed angrily. "She won't marry me,
unfortunately."
"Then make her, for of course she's in love with you."
No good; Mrs. Benson could not cope with the psychology of these
two. She felt that her only hope lay in propinquity, so if Richard would
not go to Joan the roles must be reversed and Joan must be brought to
Richard. She watched their meeting with scarcely veiled eagerness.
 They shook hands without a tremor; a short, matter-of-fact clasp.
Curious creatures! Mrs. Benson felt baffled, and angry with Richard;
what was he thinking about? He treated Joan like another boy. No
wonder the love affair was not prospering!
Elizabeth was already there when the Ogdens arrived, and she, too,
watched the little comedy with some interest. She would rather have
liked to talk to Richard about Cambridge, it was so long since she herself
had been there, but Lawrence Benson was for ever at her elbow, quietly
obtrusive. He had taken to wearing pince-nez lately. Elizabeth wished
that he had not chosen the new American rimless glasses; she felt that
any effort to render pince-nez decorative only accentuated their
hideousness. She found herself looking at Lawrence, comparing the
shine on his evening shirt front with the disconcerting shine of his
glasses. He was very immaculate, with violets in his buttonhole, but he
had aged. The responsibility of partnership and riches appeared to have
thinned his sleek hair. Perhaps it made you old before your time to be a
member of one of the largest banking firms in England—old and prim
and tidy. Elizabeth wondered.
Lawrence reminded her of an expensive mahogany filing cabinet in
which reposed bundles of papers tied with red tape. Everything about
him was perfectly correct, from the small, expensive pearl that clasped
his stiff shirt, to his black silk socks and patent leather shoes. His cuff-
links were handsome but restrained, his watch-chain was platinum and
gold, not too thick, his watch was an expensive repeater in the plainest of
plain gold cases.
Elizabeth felt his thin, dry fingers touch her arm as he stooped over
her chair. "You look beautiful to-night," he murmured.
She believed him, for she knew that her simple black dress suited her
because of its severity. The fashion that year was for a thousand little
bows and ruches, but Elizabeth had not followed it; she had draped
herself in long, plain folds, from which her fine neck and shoulders
emerged triumphantly white. She was the statuesque type of woman,
who would always look her best in the evening, for then the primness
that crept into her everyday clothes was perforce absent. She smiled
across at Joan, as though in some way Lawrence's compliment concerned
her.
They went in to dinner formally. Mr. Benson gave his arm to Mrs.
Ogden, Lawrence to Elizabeth, and Richard to Joan. Milly was provided
with a Cambridge friend of Richard's, and Mrs. Benson was pompously
escorted by the local vicar.
Something of Mrs. Ogden's habit of melancholy fell away during
dinner. She noticed Lawrence looking in her direction, and remembered
with a faint thrill of satisfaction that although now he was obviously in
love with Elizabeth, some years ago he had admired her. Joan, watching
her mother, was struck afresh by her elusive prettiness that almost
amounted to beauty. It had been absent of late, washed away by tears and
ill-health, but to-night it seemed to be born anew, a pathetic thing, like a
venturesome late rosebud that colours in the frost.
Joan's mind went back to that long past Anniversary Day when her
mother had worn a dress of soft grey that had made her look like a little
dove. How long ago it seemed! It had been the last of many. It had
ceased to exist owing to her father's failing health, and now there was no
money to start it again. As she watched her mother she wished that it
could be re-established, for it had given Mrs. Ogden such intense
pleasure, filled her with such a harmless, if foolish, sense of importance.
On Anniversary Day she had been able to rise above all her petty
worries; it had been her Day, one out of the three hundred and sixty-five.
Perhaps, after all, it had done much to obliterate for the time being the
humiliations of her married life. Joan had never thought of this
possibility before, but now she felt that hidden away under the bushel of
affectations, social ambitions and snobbishness that The Day had stood
for, there might well have burnt a small and feeble candle—the flame of
a lost virginity.
The same diaphanous prettiness hung about her mother now, and Joan
noticed that her brown hair was scarcely greyer than it had been all those
years ago. She felt a sudden, sharp tenderness, a passionate sense of
regret. Regret for what? She asked herself, surprised at the violence of
her own emotion; but the only answer she could find was too vague and
vast to be satisfactory. "Oh, for everything! for everything," she
murmured half aloud.
Richard looked at her. "Did you speak, Joan?"
"No—at least I don't know. Did I?"
Her eyes were on her mother's face, watchful, tender, admiring. Mrs.
Ogden looked up and met those protecting, possessive eyes, full upon
her. She flushed deeply like a young girl.
 Richard touched Joan's arm. "Have you forgotten how to talk?" he
demanded.
She laughed. "You never approve of anything I say, so perhaps silence
is a blessing in disguise."
"Oh, rot! Joan, look at my brother making an ass of himself over
Elizabeth. Shall I start looking at you like that? I'm much more in love
than he is, you know."
"Richard dear, you're not going to propose again in the middle of
dinner, are you?"
"No; but it's only putting off the evil day, I warn you."
He was not going to lecture her any more, he decided. Elizabeth had
written him a letter which was almost triumphant in tone; Joan was
making up her mind, it seemed; perhaps after all she would show some
spirit. In any case he found her adorable, with her black, cropped hair,
her beautiful mouth, and her queer, gruff voice. Her flanks were lean and
strong like a boy's; they suggested splendid, unfettered movement. She
looked all wrong in evening dress, almost grotesque; but to Richard she
appeared beautiful because symbolic of some future state—a forerunner.
As he looked at her he seemed to see a vast army of women like herself,
fine, splendid and fiercely virginal; strong, too, capable of gripping life
and holding it against odds—the women of the future. They fascinated
him, these as yet unborn women, stimulating his imagination,
challenging his intellect, demanding of him an explanation of
themselves.
He dropped his hand on Joan's where it lay in her lap. "Have you
prayed over your sword?" he asked gravely.
She knew what he meant. "No," she said. "I haven't had the courage to
unsheathe it yet."
"Then unsheathe it now and put it on the altar rails, and then get down
on your knees and pray over it all night."
Their eyes met, young, frank and curious, and in hers there was a faint
antagonism.
 CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

I N the following February Milly was sent home They wrote from
Alexandra House to say that for the present, at all events, she was too
ill to continue her studies. She had had a touch of pneumonia shortly
after her return, with the result that her lungs were weak. The matron
wrote what was meant to be a kind and tactful letter. It was full of veiled
sentences; the sort of letter that distracted Joan by reason of its merciful
vagueness. The letter said that Milly was not strong, that she was losing
weight and was apt to run a little temperature night and morning;
according to the doctor, her lungs required care and she must be given
time to recover, and plenty of open air.
Joan looked across at Mrs. Ogden as she finished reading.
"It's tubercle," she said briefly.
Her voice sounded calm and cold. "I might be saying 'It's Monday to-
day,'" she thought. She felt stupid with pity for Milly and for herself.
Mrs. Ogden tightened her lips; she assumed her stubborn expression.
"What nonsense, Joan! We've never had such a thing in our family."
"But, good heavens, Mother!—your father and your brother died of
galloping consumption."
"Nothing of the kind. Henry died of bronchial pneumonia; you don't
know what you're talking about, my dear."
Joan thought. "She's going to refuse to face it, she's going to play
ostrich; what on earth am I to do!" Aloud she said: "Well, I'd better go up
and fetch her; we can't let her travel alone."
"Ah! there I agree with you; certainly go up and bring her home. But
whatever you do, don't frighten the life out of the poor child with any
ridiculous talk about consumption."
Joan left her gently embroidering a handkerchief. "I must see
Elizabeth at once," she told herself.
 2

It was already half-past nine in the evening, but Joan rushed round to
the Rodneys' house, to find that Elizabeth had gone to bed with a
headache.
"I expect she's asleep," said Ralph doubtfully.
He was wearing an old Norfolk jacket and carpet slippers; his grey
hair was ruffled, and an end-of-the-day grey stubble clung like mould to
his chin. His eyes looked heavy and a little pink; he had probably been
asleep himself, or dozing in the arm-chair, under the picture of old Uncle
John. He was certainly too sleepy to be polite, and looked reproachfully
at Joan, as though she had done him some wrong.
Oh! the gloom of it all! Of this seaside house with its plush study, of
old Uncle John and his ageing descendant, of the lowered gas-jet in its
hideous globe, that was yet not dim enough to hide the shabby stair-
carpet and the bloodthirsty Landseer engraving on the landing.
It was misty outside, and some of the mist had followed Joan into the
house; it made a slight, melancholy blur over everything, including
herself and Ralph. She left him abruptly, climbing the stairs two at a
time.
She opened the bedroom door without knocking. The gas had been
turned down to the merest speck, but by its light Joan could see that
Elizabeth was asleep. She turned the gas up full, but still Elizabeth did
not stir. She was lying on her side with her cheek pressed hard into the
pillow; her hair was loosely plaited, thick, beautiful hair that shone as the
light fell across it. One of her scarred hands lay on the white bedspread,
pathetically unconscious of its blemish.
Joan stood and looked at her, looked at Elizabeth as she was now, off
her guard. What she saw made her look away and then back again, as if
drawn by some miserable attraction. Elizabeth's lips were closed, gently
enough, but from their drooping corners a few fine lines ran down into
the chin; and the closed eyelids were ever so slightly puckered. Joan bent
nearer. Yes, those were grey hairs close to the forehead; Elizabeth had a
good many grey hairs. Strange that she had never noticed them before.
She flushed with a kind of shame. She was discovering secret things
about Elizabeth; things that hid themselves by day to look up grimacing
out of the night-time and Elizabeth's sleep. Elizabeth would hate it if she
knew! And there lay her beautiful hand, all scarred and spoilt; a brave
hand, but spoilt none the less. Was it only the scars, or had the texture of
the skin changed a little too, grown a little less firm and smooth? She
stared at it hopelessly.
She found that she was whispering to herself: "Elizabeth's not so
young any more. Oh, God! Elizabeth is almost growing old."
She felt that her sorrow must choke her; pity, sorrow, and still more,
shame. Elizabeth's youth was slipping, slipping; it would soon have
slipped out of sight. Joan stooped on a sudden impulse and kissed the
scarred hand.
"Joan! Are you here? You woke me; you were kissing my hand!"
"Yes, I was kissing the scars."
Elizabeth twitched her hand away. "Don't be a fool!" she said roughly.
Joan looked at her, and something, perhaps the pity in her eyes made
Elizabeth recover herself.
"Tell me what's the matter," she asked quietly. "Has anything new
happened?"
Joan sat down beside her on the bed. "Come here," she said.
Elizabeth moved nearer, and Joan's arm went round her with a quiet,
strong movement. She kissed her on the forehead where the grey hairs
showed, and then on the eyelids, one after the other. Elizabeth lay very
still.
Joan said: "They're sending Milly home; I'm afraid she's in
consumption."
Elizabeth freed herself with a quick twist of her body. "What?"
"Read this letter."
Elizabeth blinked at the gas-jet. "It's my eyes," she complained almost
fretfully. "Light the candle, will you, Joan? Then we can put the gas out."
Joan did as she wished, and returning to the bed leant over the foot-
rail, watching Elizabeth as she read. Elizabeth had gone white to the lips;
she laid down the letter and they stared at each other in silence.
At last Elizabeth spoke. "She's coming home soon," she said in a flat
voice.
 "Yes; I must go and fetch her the day after to-morrow."
"She'll need—nursing—if she lives."
"Yes—if she lives——"
"It's February already, Joan."
"Yes, next month is March. We called it our March, didn't we,
Elizabeth?"
"There are places—sanatoriums, but they cost money."
"We haven't got the money, Elizabeth. And in any case, Mother's
decided that Milly can't be seriously ill."
"I have some money, as you know, Joan, but I was saving it for you;
still——" Her voice shook.
Joan sat down on the bed again and took Elizabeth's hand. "It's no
good," she said gently.
And then Elizabeth cried. She did it with disconcerting suddenness
and complete lack of restraint. It was terrible to Joan to see her thrown
right off her guard like this; to feel her shoulders shake with sobs while
the tears dripped through her fingers on to the bedspread.
She said: "Don't, oh, don't!"
But Elizabeth took no notice, she was launched on a veritable torrent
of self-indulgence which she had no will to stem. The pent-up
unhappiness of years gushed out at this moment. All the ambitions, the
longings, the tenderness sternly repressed, the maternal instinct, the lover
instinct, all the frustrations, they were all there, finding despairing
expression as she sobbed. She rocked herself from side to side and
backwards and forwards. She lost her breath with little gasps, but found
it again immediately, and went on crying. She murmured in a kind of
ecstatic anguish: "Oh! oh!—Oh! oh!" And then, "Joan, Joan, Joan!" But
not for an instant did her tears cease.
Ralph heard the sound of sobbing as he passed on his way to bed, and
a quiet, unhappy voice speaking very low, breaking off and then
speaking again. He hesitated a moment, wondering if he should go in,
but shook his head, and sighing, went on to his own room, closing the
door noiselessly after him.
 3

Two days later Joan was waiting in the matron's sitting-room at

Alexandra House. Someone had told her that Miss Jackson wished to
speak to her before she went up to her sister. She remembered that Miss
Jackson was Milly's "Old Scout," and smiled in spite of herself.
The door opened and Miss Jackson came in. She held out her hand
with an exaggeratedly bright smile. "Miss Ogden?"
Joan thought: "She's terribly nervous of what she has to tell me."
"Do sit down, Miss Ogden, please. I hope you had a good journey?"
"Yes, thank you."
The matron looked at her watch. "Your train must have been
unusually punctual; I always think the trains are so very bad on that line.
However, you've been fortunate."
"Yes, we were only five minutes late."
"You don't find it stuffy in here, do you? I cannot persuade the maids
to leave the window open."
"No, I don't feel hot—I think you wanted to speak to me about Milly."
"Milly; oh, yes—I thought—the doctor wanted me to tell you——"
"That my sister is in consumption? I was afraid it was so, from your
letter."
Miss Jackson moistened her lips. "Oh, my dear, I hope my letter was
not too abrupt! You mustn't run ahead of trouble; our doctor is nervous
about future possibilities if great care is not used—but your sister's lungs
are sound so far, he thinks."
"Then I disagree with him," said Joan.
Miss Jackson felt a little shocked. Evidently this was a very sensible
young woman, not to say almost heartless; still it was better than if she
had broken down. "We all hope, we all believe, that Milly will soon be
quite well again," she said, "but, as you know, I expect, she's rather frail.
I should think that she must always have been delicate; and yet what a
student! A wonderful student; they're all heart-broken at the College."
There was real feeling in her voice as she continued: "I can't tell you
what an admiration I have for your sister; her pluck is phenomenal; she's
worked steadily, overworked in fact, up to the last."
Joan got up; she felt a little giddy and put her hand on the back of the
chair to steady herself.
"My dear, wait, I must get you some sal-volatile!"
"Oh, no, no, please not; I really don't feel ill. I should like to go to
Milly now and help her to collect her luggage, if I may."
"Of course; come with me."
They mounted interminable stairs to the rooms that Milly shared with
Harriet. A sound of laughing reached them through the half-open door. It
was Milly's laugh.
"She's very brave and cheerful, poor child," Miss Jackson whispered.
Joan followed her into the study.
"Here's your sister, Milly dear."
Milly looked up from the strap of her violin case. "Hullo, Joan! This
is jolly, isn't it?"
Joan kissed her and shook hands with Harriet.
"I'll leave you now," said Miss Jackson, obviously anxious to get
away.
Harriet raised her eyebrows. "Vieille grue!" she remarked, scarcely
below her breath.
Milly laughed again, she seemed easily amused, and Joan scrutinized
her closely. She was painfully thin and the laugh was a little husky;
otherwise she looked much as usual at that moment. Joan's heart beat
more freely; supposing it were a false alarm after all? Suppose it should
be only a matter of a month or two, at most, before Milly would be quite
well again and she herself free?
"How do you feel?" she inquired with ill-concealed anxiety.
"Oh, pretty fit, thank you. I think it's all rot myself. I suppose Old
Scout informed you that I was going into a decline, but I beg to differ. A
few weeks at Seabourne will cure me all right. Good Lord! I should just
think so!" and she made a grimace.
Harriet began humming a sort of vocal five-finger exercise; Joan
glared at her. Damn the woman! Couldn't she keep quiet?
Harriet laughed. "Don't slay me with a glance, my dear!"
Joan forced herself to smile. "I was thinking we'd be late for the
train."
"Oh, no, you weren't; but never mind. You amuse me, Joan. May I call
you Joan? Well, in any case, you amuse me. Oh! But you are too funny
and young and gauche, a regular boor, and your grey-green coloured
eyes go quite black when you're angry. I should never be able to resist
making you angry just for the pleasure of seeing your eyes change
colour; do you think you could manage to get really angry with me some
day?"
Joan felt hot with embarrassment. What was the matter with this
woman; didn't she know that she was in the room with a perfectly awful
tragedy, didn't she realize that here was something that would probably
ruin three people's lives? She wondered if this was Harriet's way of
keeping the situation in hand, of trying to carry the thing off lightly.
Perhaps, after all, she was only making an effort to fall in with Milly's
mood; that must be it, of course.
Harriet's decided voice went on persistently. "Come up and see me
sometimes; don't stop away because Milly isn't here, though I expect
she'll be back soon. But in the meantime come up and see me; I shall like
to see you quite often, if you'll come."
"Thank you," said Joan, "but I'm never in London."
Harriet smiled complacently. "We'll see," she murmured.
Joan turned to Milly. "Come on, Milly, we ought to go; it's getting
late."

4
 In the train Milly talked incessantly; she was flushed now, and the
hand that she laid on Joan's from time to time felt unnaturally hot and
dry. She assured Joan eagerly that the doctor was a fool and an alarmist;
that he had sent a girl home only last year for what he called "pernicious
anæmia," whereas she had been back at College in less than four months
as well as ever. Milly said that if they supposed she was going to waste
much time, they were mistaken; a few weeks perhaps, just to get over
that infernal pneumonia, but no longer at Leaside—no, thank you! If she
stayed at Leaside she was sure she would die, but not of consumption, of
boredom! Her lungs were all right, she never spat blood, and you always
spat blood if your lungs were going. It was quite bad enough as it was
though; jolly hard lines having a set-back at this critical time in her
training. Never mind, she would have to work all the harder later on to
make up for it.
She talked and coughed and coughed and talked all the way from
London to Seabourne. She was like a thing wound up, a mechanical toy.
Joan's heart sank.
Elizabeth was at the station and so was Mrs. Ogden. They had come
quite independently of each other. As a rule Elizabeth kept away if she
knew that Mrs. Ogden was meeting one of the girls, anxious these days
not to feed the flame of the older woman's jealousy; but to-day her
anxiety had outweighed her discretion.
Mrs. Ogden kissed Milly affectionately. "Why, she looks splendid!"
she remarked to the world in general.
Elizabeth assumed an air of gaiety that she was very far from feeling.
It seemed to her that Milly looked like death, and her eyes sought Joan's
with a frightened, questioning glance. For answer, Joan shook her head
ever so slightly.
They all went home to Leaside together. Elizabeth had offered to help
with the unpacking. She was not going to torment herself with any
unnecessary suspense, and she cared less than nothing whether Mrs.
Ogden wanted her or not. She had got beyond that sort of nonsense now,
she told herself. She pressed Joan's hand quite openly in the fly. Why
not? Mrs. Ogden was jealous of any demonstrations of affection towards
Joan other than her own; Elizabeth knew this, but pressed the hand again.
She and Joan had no opportunity of being alone together that evening.
They longed to talk the situation over. They were taut with nervous
anxiety; even a quarrel would have been a relief. But Mrs. Ogden was in
a hovering mood, they could not get rid of her; even after Milly had gone
to bed she continued to haunt them. Frail, unobtrusive, but always there.
She seemed to be feeling affable, for she had pressed Elizabeth to stop to
supper and had even thanked her for helping with the unpacking. It was
remarkable; one would have expected tears or at least depression or
irritability over this fresh disaster, for disaster it was, even though Mrs.
Ogden chose to take a cheerful view of Milly's condition. It was
impossible that she should contemplate with equanimity more doctor's
bills, and the mounting tradesmen's accounts for luxuries. Whatever the
outcome, Milly would require milk, beef-tea and other expensive things;
and there was little or no money, as even Mrs. Ogden must know. And
yet she was cheerful; it made Elizabeth feel afraid.
She became a prey to a horrible idea that Mrs. Ogden was happy, yes,
positively happy over Milly's illness, because she saw in it a new fetter
wherewith to bind Joan. Perhaps she had suspected all along that Joan
had determined to break away soon. Perhaps she had begun to realize
that her influence over her daughter was waning. And now came Milly's
collapse, with all that it entailed of responsibility, of diminished finances,
of appeal to every generous and unselfish instinct. Elizabeth shuddered.
She did not accuse Mrs. Ogden of consciously visualizing the cause of
her satisfaction; but she knew that no greater self-deceiver had ever
lived, and that although she was probably telling herself that she was
being cheerful and brave in the face of sorrow, and acting with unselfish
courage, she was subconsciously rejoicing in the misfortune that must
bind Joan closer to her than ever.
They could hear Milly coughing fitfully upstairs; a melancholy sound,
for it was a young cough. Mrs. Ogden remarked that they must get some
syrup of camphor, which in her experience never failed to clear up a
chest cold. She told Joan to write to London for it next day.
Elizabeth got up; she felt that she must walk and walk, no matter
where. Her legs and feet seemed terribly alive, they tormented her with
their twitching.
"I must go," she said suddenly.
Joan followed her into the hall. Their eyes met for an instant in a look
of sympathy and dismay; but Mrs. Ogden was standing in the open
doorway of the drawing-room, watching them, and they parted with a
brief good night.
 CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

T WO weeks elapsed before Mrs. Ogden would consent to any further

examination of Milly's lungs. At first she refused on the ground that
Milly was only in need of rest, and when Joan persisted, made other
excuses, all equally futile. She seemed determined to prevent Doctor
Thomas's visit, and it struck Joan that her mother was secretly afraid.
Doctor Thomas was getting old. He had attended the Ogdens as long
as Joan could remember. He attended most of the residents of Seabourne,
though it was said that the summer visitors preferred a younger man,
who had recently made his appearance. Joan herself would have
preferred the younger man, but on this point Mrs. Ogden was obdurate;
she would not hear of a stranger being called in, protesting that Doctor
Thomas would be deeply hurt.
Doctor Thomas came, and rubbed his cold hands briskly together; he
smiled at the assembled family as he had smiled on all serious occasions
throughout his career. A wooden stethoscope protruded from his tail-
pocket; he took it out and balanced it playfully between finger and
thumb.
"Let me explain," said Joan peremptorily, as Mrs. Ogden opened her
lips to speak.
She had to raise her voice somewhat, for the doctor was a little hard
of hearing.
"Eh, what? What was that?" he inquired from time to time.
Milly's lip curled. She shrugged her shoulders and complied with an
ill grace when told to remove her blouse.
"Take a deep breath."
Doctor Thomas pressed his stethoscope to her chest and back; he
pressed so hard with his large, purplish ear that the stethoscope dug into
her bones.
 "Ow! That hurts," she protested peevishly.
"Say 'ninety-nine'!"
"Ninety-nine."
"Again, please."
"Ninety-nine."
"Again."
"Oh! Ninety-nine, ninety-nine, ninety-nine!"
For a young woman about to be twenty-one years old, Milly was
behaving in an extraordinarily childish manner. The doctor looked at her
reproachfully and began tapping on her back and chest with his notched
and bony fingers. Tap, tap, tap, tap: Milly glanced down at his hand
distastefully.
"And now say 'ninety-nine' again," he suggested.
Milly flushed with irritation and coughed. "Ninety-nine," she
exclaimed in an exasperated voice.
The old doctor straightened himself and looked round complacently.
"Just as I thought, there's nothing seriously wrong here."
"Then you don't think——?" began Joan, but her mother interrupted.
"That's just what I thought you'd say, Doctor Thomas; I felt sure there
could be nothing radically wrong with Milly's lungs. Thank God, she
comes from very healthy stock! I suppose a good long rest is all that she
needs?"
"Exactly, Mrs. Ogden. A good rest, good food, and plenty of air; and
no more practising for a bit, Miss Milly. You must keep your shoulders
back and your chest well out, and just take things easy."
"But for how long?" Milly asked, with a catch in her voice.
"How long? Oh, for a few months at least."
Milly looked despairingly at Joan, but, try as she would, Joan could
not answer that look with the reassuring smile that it was obviously
asking for. She turned away and began straightening some music on the
piano.
 "I must be off," said the doctor, shaking hands. "I shall come in from
time to time, just to see that Miss Milly is obeying orders; oh, and I think
cod liver oil would prove beneficial."
"No; that I will not!" said Milly firmly.
"Nonsense! You'll do as the doctor tells you," Mrs. Ogden retorted.
"I will not take cod liver oil; it makes me sick!"
Joan left them arguing, and followed Doctor Thomas to the front door.
"Look here," she said in a low voice, "surely you'll examine for
tubercle?"
He looked at her whimsically through his spectacles. "My dear young
lady, you've been stuffing your head up with a lot of half-digested
medical knowledge," and he patted her shoulder as though to soften his
words. "Be assured," he told her, "that I shall do everything I think
necessary for your sister, and nothing that I think unnecessary."

Joan went back to the drawing-room. The argument about the cod
liver oil had ceased, and Milly was crying quietly, all by herself, in the
window. She looked up with tearful eyes as her sister took her hand and
pressed it.
"Cheer up, old girl!" Joan whispered, her own heart heavy with
forebodings.
Mrs. Ogden said nothing; her face seemed expressionless when Joan
glanced at her. Ethel's successor brought in the tea and Milly dried her
eyes. It was a silent meal; from time to time Milly's gaze dwelt
despairingly on her violin case where it lay on the sofa, and Joan knew
that she was grieving as a lover for a lost beloved.
"It's only for so short a time," she said, answering the unspoken
thought.
Milly shook her head and her eyes overflowed again, the tears dripped
into the tea-cup that she held tremulously to her lips.
 Mrs. Ogden pretended not to notice. "More tea, Joan?" she inquired.
Joan looked at her and hated her; and before the hate had time to root,
began to love her again, for the weak thing that she was. There she sat,
quiet and soft and utterly incapable. She was not facing this situation, not
even trying to realize what it meant to her two daughters.
"But I could crush her to pulp!" Joan thought angrily. "I could make
her scream with pain if I chose, if I told her that I saw through her,
despised her, hated her; if I told her that I was going to leave her and that
she would never see me again. I could make her cry like Milly's crying,
only worse; oh, how I could make her cry!" But her own thought hurt her
somewhere very deep down, and at that moment Mrs. Ogden looked up
and their eyes met.
Joan stared at her coldly. "Milly is fretting," she said. Mrs. Ogden's
glance wavered. "She mustn't do that, after what the doctor has told us.
Milly, dearest, there's nothing to cry about."
Milly hid her face.
"It's all my life, Mother," she sobbed.
"What is, my dear?"
"My fiddle!"
"But, my dear child, you're not giving up your violin; he only wants
you to rest for a time."
Milly sobbed more loudly, she was growing hysterical. "I want to go
back to the College," she wailed. "I hate, hate, hate being here! I hate
Seabourne and all the people in it, and I hate this house! It stifles me, and
I'm not ill and I shan't stop practising and I shan't take cod liver oil!" She
wrenched herself free from Joan's restraining arm. "Let me go upstairs,"
she spluttered. "I want to go upstairs!"
Joan released her. Alone together, the mother and daughter looked at
each other defiantly.
"She ought to see a specialist," Joan said; "Doctor Thomas is an old
fool!"
Mrs. Ogden's soft eyes grew bright with rising temper. "Never!" she
exclaimed, raising her voice. "I hate the whole brood; it was a specialist
who killed your father. James would be alive now if it hadn't been for a
so-called specialist!"
 Joan made a sound of impatience. "Don't be ridiculous, Mother; you
don't know what you're talking about. You're taking a terrible
responsibility in refusing to have a first-class opinion."
"I consider Doctor Thomas first-class."
"He is not; he's antediluvian and deaf into the bargain! I tell you,
Milly is very ill."
Mrs. Ogden's remaining calm deserted her. "You tell me, you tell me!
And what do you know about it? It seems that you pretend to know more
than the doctor himself. You and your ridiculous medical books! You'll
be asking me to consult your fellow-student Elizabeth next."
"I wish to God you would!"
"Ah! I thought so; well then, send for your clever friend, your
unsexed blue-stocking, and put her opinion above that of your own
mother. How many children has she borne, I'd like to know? What
knowledge can she have that I as a mother haven't got by natural instinct,
about my own child? How dare you put Elizabeth Rodney above me!"
Joan lost her temper suddenly and violently. "Because she is above
you, because she's everything that you're not."
Mrs. Ogden gave a stifled cry and sank back in her chair.
"Oh! my head, it's swimming, I feel sinking, I feel as if I were dying.
Oh! oh! my head!"
"Sit up!" commanded Joan. "You're not dying, but I think Milly is."
Mrs. Ogden began to cry weakly as Joan turned away. "Cruel, cruel!"
she murmured.
Joan went up to her and shook her slightly. "Behave yourself, Mother;
I've no time for this sort of thing."
"To tell me that a child of mine is dying! You say that to frighten me;
I shall tell the doctor."
Joan shrugged her shoulders. "You may tell him what you please. I'm
going up to Milly, now."
 3

Richard had been gone for some weeks and Mr. and Mrs. Benson had
moved back to London when Milly came home. Joan would have given
much to have had Richard to talk to just now, but she could only write
and tell him her fears, which his brief answers did little to dispel. He
advised an immediate consultation and mentioned a first-class specialist;
at the same time he managed to drop a word here and there anent Joan's
own prospects, which he pointed out were becoming more gloomy with
every month of delay. No, Richard was not in a consoling mood these
days.
Lawrence, on the other had, was full of kindness. He had taken to
coming down to Conway House for the weekends, and he seldom came
without a jar of turtle soup or some other expensive luxury for the
invalid. His constant visits to Leaside might have suggested an interest in
one of its inmates; in fact Mrs. Ogden began to wonder whether
Lawrence was falling out of love with Elizabeth and into love with
Milly. But Joan was not deceived; she felt certain that he only came there
in the hopes of catching a glimpse of Elizabeth if, as sometimes
happened, he found her out when he called at her brother's house; she
was amused and yet vaguely annoyed.
"Your admirer's in the drawing-room, Elizabeth."
Elizabeth smiled. "Well, let him stay there with your mother; we'll
sneak out by the back door, for a walk."
But Lawrence invariably saw them escaping; it was uncanny how he
always seemed to be standing at the window on such occasions. On a
blustery day in March he hurried after them and caught them at the
corner of the street, as he had already done several times. He always said
the same thing:
"Ripping afternoon for a walk, you two; may I join you?" He threw
out his chest and took off his hat.
"Jolly good for the hair, Elizabeth!"
Elizabeth's own hat, blown slightly askew, was causing her agony by
reason of the straining hat-pins; and in any case she always suffered from
neuralgia when the wind was in the east. She managed to turn her head
slightly in his direction, but before she had time to snub him, a gust
removed her hat altogether and blew her hair down into her eyes.
 The hat bowled happily along the esplanade, and after it went Joan,
with Lawrence at her heels. She could hear him pattering persistently
behind her. For some reason the sound of his awkward running infuriated
her; his steps were short for a man's, as though he were wearing tight
boots. She felt suddenly that she must reach the hat first or die; must be
the one to restore it to its owner. She strained her lanky legs to their
limit; her skirts flew, her breath came fast, she was flushed with temper
and endeavour. Now she had almost reached it. No, there it went again,
carried along by a fresh and more spiteful gust. Several people stood still
to laugh.
"Two to one on Miss Joan!" cried General Brooke, halting in his strut.
Ah! At last! Her hand flew out to capture the hat, which was poised,
rocking slightly for a moment, like a seagull on a wave. She stooped
forward, grabbed the air, tripped and fell flat. Lawrence, who was close
behind her, nearly fell over her, but saved himself just in time. He
pursued the hat a few steps farther, seized it and then returned to help
Joan up; but she had already sprung to her feet with an exclamation of
annoyance.
"I've won!" laughed Lawrence provokingly. "You're not hurt, are
you?"
She was, having slightly twisted her ankle, but she lied sulkily.
"No, of course not."
It seemed to her that he was smiling all over, not only with his mouth,
but with his eyes and his glasses and the little brass buttons on his
knitted waistcoat. His very shoes twinkled with amusement all over their
highly polished toe-caps. Instinctively she stretched out her hand to take
the hat from him.
"Oh, no!" he taunted. "No, you don't; that's not fair!"
Elizabeth was standing still watching them, with her hands pressed
against her hair. "Thank you," she said, as Lawrence restored her hat to
her; but she looked at Joan and smiled.
Joan turned her face away to hide a sudden rush of tears. How
ridiculous and childish she was! Fancy a woman of twenty-three wanting
to cry over losing the game! They walked on in silence, Joan trying not
to limp too obviously, but Elizabeth was observant.
"You're hurt," she said, and stood still. Joan denied it.
 "It's nothing at all; I just twisted my ankle a bit." And she limped on.
"Hadn't you better turn back?" suggested Lawrence a little too
hopefully. "Look here, Joan, I'll get you a fly."
"I don't want a fly, thank you; I'm all right."
"No, you're not; do let me call that cab for you; it's awfully unwise to
walk on a strained ankle."
"Oh, for goodness' sake," snapped Joan, "do let me know for myself
whether I'm hurt or not!"
She realized that she was behaving badly; she could hear the irritation
in her own voice. Moreover, she knew that she was spoiling the walk by
limping along and refusing to go home; but some spirit of perverseness
was dominating her. She felt that she disliked Lawrence quite
enormously, and at that moment she almost disliked Elizabeth. Why had
Elizabeth accepted her hat from Lawrence's hand? She should have said
something like this: "Give it to Joan, please; I would rather Joan gave me
my hat." Ridiculous! She laughed aloud.
"What are you laughing at?" inquired Lawrence.
"Oh, nothing, only my thoughts."
"Can't we share the joke?"
"No, it wouldn't amuse you."
"Oh, do go back, Joan," said Elizabeth irritably. "You're hardly able to
walk."
"Do you want me to go back, then?"
"Yes, of course I do; and put on a cold water bandage as soon as you
get home."
Joan looked at her with darkening eyes, and left them abruptly.

"What on earth's upset her?" asked Lawrence, genuinely concerned.