Her heart shook her breast with its beating, and for a moment she wondered whether her pain were beginning again.  Then the thought of Anne and Jerrold and herself and of their threefold undivided misery came upon her, annihilating every other thought.  As if all that was physical in Maisie were subdued by the intensity of her suffering, with the coming of the supreme emotion her body had no pain.

XX

MAISIE, JERROLD, AND ANNE

i

She got up and dressed for dinner as if nothing had happened, or, rather, as if everything were about to happen and she were going through with it magnificently, with no sign that she was beaten.  She didn’t know yet what she would do; she didn’t see clearly what there was to be done.  She might not have to do anything; and yet again, vaguely, half-fascinated, half-frightened, she foresaw that she might be called on to do something, something that was hard and terrible and at the same time beautiful and supreme.

And downstairs in the hall, she found Eliot.

He told her that he had come down to see Anne and that he had done his best to keep her from going away and that it was all no good.

“We can’t stop her.  She’s got an unbreakable will.”

“Unbreakable,” she said.  “And yet she’s broken.”

“I know,” he said.

In her nervous exaltation she felt that Eliot had been sent, that Eliot knew.  Eliot was wise.  He would help her.

“Eliot——­” she said.  “Will you see me in the library after dinner?  I want to ask you something.”

“If it’s about Anne, I don’t know that there’s anything I can say.”

“It’s about Jerrold,” she said.

After dinner he came to her in the library.

“Where’s Jerrold?”

“In the drawing-room with Colin.  He won’t come in.”

“Eliot, there’s something awfully wrong with him.  He can’t sleep.  He can’t eat.  He’s sick if he tries.”

“He looks pretty ghastly.”

“Do you know what’s the matter with him?”

“How can I know?  He doesn’t tell me anything.”

“It’s ever since he heard that Anne’s going.”  “He’s worried about her.  So am I. So are you.”

“He isn’t worrying.  He’s fretting....  Eliot—­do you think he cares for her?”

Eliot didn’t answer her.  He looked at her gravely, searchingly, as if he were measuring her strength before he answered.

“Don’t be afraid to tell me.  I’m not a coward.”

“I haven’t anything to tell you.  It isn’t altogether this affair of Anne’s.  Jerrold hasn’t been fit for a long time.”

“It’s been going on for a long time.”

“What makes you think so?”

“Oh,” said Maisie, “everything.”

“Then why don’t you ask him?”

“But—­if it is so—­would he tell me?”

“I don’t know.  Perhaps he wants to tell you, only he’s afraid.  Anyhow, if it isn’t so he’ll tell you and you’ll be happy.”