Exhausted, Jenny sat down again; but she could not keep still.  Her feet would not remain quietly in the place she, as the governing intelligence, commanded.  They too were rebels, nervous rebels, controlled by forces still stronger than the governing intelligence.  She felt trapped, impotent, as though her hands were tied; as though only her whirling thoughts were unfettered.  Again she took up the hat, but her hands so trembled that she could not hold the needle steady.  It made fierce jabs into the hat.  Stormily unhappy, she once more threw the work down.  Her lips trembled.  She burst into bitter tears, sobbing as though her heart were breaking.  Her whole body was shaken with the deep and passionate sobs that echoed her despair.

iv

Presently, when she grew calmer, Jenny wiped her eyes, her face quite pale and her hands still convulsively trembling.  She was worn out by the stress of the evening, by the vehemence of her rebellious feelings.  When she again spoke to herself it was in a shamed, giggling way that nobody but Emmy had heard from her since the days of childhood.  She gave a long sigh, looking through the blur at that clear glow from beneath the iron door of the kitchen grate.  Miserably she refused to think again.  She was half sick of thoughts that tore at her nerves and lacerated her heart.  To herself Jenny felt that it was no good—­crying was no good, thinking was no good, loving and sympathising and giving kindness—­all these things were in this mood as useless as one another.  There was nothing in life but the endless sacrifice of human spirit.

“Oh!” she groaned passionately.  “If only something would happen.  I don’t care what! But something ... something new ... exciting.  Something with a bite in it!”

She stared at the kicking clock, which every now and again seemed to have a spasm of distaste for its steady record of the fleeting seconds.  “Wound up to go all day!” she thought, comparing the clock with herself in an angry impatience.

And then, as if it came in answer to her poignant wish for some untoward happening, there was a quick double knock at the front door of the Blanchard’s dwelling, and a sharp whirring ring at the push-bell below the knocker.  The sounds seemed to go violently through and through the little house in rapid waves of vibrant noise.

PART TWO

NIGHT

CHAPTER V:  THE ADVENTURE

i

So unexpected was this interruption of her loneliness that Jenny was for an instant stupefied.  She took one step, and then paused, dread firmly in her mind, paralysing her.  What could it be?  She could not have been more frightened if the sound had been the turning of a key in the lock.  Were they back already?  Had her hope been spoiled by some accident?  Surely not.  It was twenty minutes to nine.  They were safe in the theatre by now.  Oh, she was afraid!  She was alone in the house—­worse than alone!  Jenny cowered.  She felt she could not answer the summons.  Tick-tick-tick said the clock, striking across the silences.  Again Jenny made a step forward.  Then, terrifying her, the noise began once more—­the thunderous knock, the ping-ping-ping-whir of the bell....