As we were talking, there was a tap on the door and Mrs Jago came in. She said: ‘I’ve been up to Roy’s rooms. I had to find someone—’ and burst out crying. I led her to a chair by the fireplace, tears streaming down her face: there she cried aloud, noisily, with abject and abandoned misery: she laid her head on the arm of the chair, but did not try to hide her face: her heavy body shook with tearing sobs.
Roy and I met each other’s glance. Without speaking, we agreed to leave her alone. When the weeping became quieter, when the convulsions no longer tore her, it was I who stroked her hand.
‘Tell us,’ I said.
She tried to summon up her dignity. ‘Mr Eliot, I must apologize for this exhibition,’ she began, with her imitation of Lady Muriel — then she began to cry again.
‘What is the matter?’ I said.
She tried again to be grand, and then broke down.
‘They’re all saying — they’re all saying that I’m not fit to go into the Lodge.’
‘Alice, what do you mean?’ said Roy.
‘They all hate me. Everyone here hates me. Even you’ — she straightened herself in the chair, her cheeks glistening with tears, and looked at Roy — ‘hate me sometimes.’
‘Don’t be foolish.’
‘I’m not always as foolish as you think.’ She put a hand to the breast of her frock, and drew out a note. I looked at it and so did Roy over my shoulder. It was Nightingale’s flysheet.
‘What else does it mean?’ she cried. ‘I know I’m an ugly hysterical woman. I know I’m no use to anyone. But I’m not as foolish as you think. Tell me the truth. If you don’t hate me tell me the truth.’
‘We don’t hate you,’ said Roy. ‘We’re very fond of you. So will you stop hurting yourself? Then I’ll tell you the truth.’
His tone was affectionate, scolding, intimate. She dried her eyes and sat quiet.
‘That paper means what you think,’ said Roy. ‘One or two men mean to keep Paul out at any cost. They’re aiming at him through you. They’ve done the same through me.’
She stared at him, and he added gently: ‘You’re not to worry.’
‘How can I help worrying?’ she said. The cry was full of pain, but there was nothing hysterical in it.
‘I should like to know how you saw this paper,’ I said. ‘Did Paul leave it about?’
‘He’d never be careless about anything that might upset me — don’t you realize he’s always taken too much care of me?’ she said. ‘No, this one was sent so that I could see it for myself.’
‘Poor thing,’ said Roy.
‘That must be Nightingale himself,’ I said. ‘What in God’s name does he hope for?’
‘He hopes,’ said Alice Jago, with a flash of shrewdness, ‘that it will make me do something silly.’
‘It might be just malice,’ said Roy.
‘No, it’s their one chance to keep Paul out. I’m his only weakness, you know I am,’ she said. ‘I suppose they know Paul is bound to be elected unless they shout the place down.’ (Neither Roy nor I realized till then that she was still ignorant of the latest news.) ‘I’m their best chance, aren’t I? I’ve heard another whisper — I expect I was meant to hear it — that they’re not going to leave me alone. They think I’m a coward. They’re saying that this note is only a beginning. They believe that I shall want Paul to withdraw.’
‘You couldn’t help being frightened,’ said Roy.
‘I could hear them all talking about me,’ she cried. ‘I was hysterical. I didn’t know what to do. I ran out of the house, I don’t know why I came to you—’
I could not be certain what had happened. She had received the flysheet: but had it actually been sent by Nightingale? I could not think of any other explanation. Had there really been other rumours? Was she imagining it all? Now she was speaking, quietly, unhappily, and with simple feeling.
‘I’m so frightened, Roy. I’m terribly frightened still,’ she said. ‘I’ve not been a good wife to Paul. I’ve been a drag on him all these years. I’ve tried sometimes, but I’ve never been any good. I know I’m horrible, but I can’t prevent myself getting worse. But I’ve never done him so much harm as this. I never thought they’d use me to prevent him being Master. How can I stand it, how can I stay here if they do?’
‘Think of Paul,’ said Roy.
‘I can’t help thinking of myself too,’ she cried. ‘How can I stand seeing someone else moving into that drawing-room? And I know you think I oughtn’t to worry about myself, but how can I stand the things they’ll say about me?’
‘It may not happen,’ I said.
‘It will happen.’
‘If it does, you’ll have to harden yourself.’
‘Do you know what they’ll say?’ she asked me wildly. ‘They’ll say I wasn’t good enough for Paul. And instead of doing my best for him, I couldn’t resist making a fool of myself with other men. It’s perfectly true. Though none of them wanted anyone like me.’ She gave a smile, wan, innocent, and flirtatious. ‘Roy, you know that I could have made a fool of myself with you.’
‘You’ve always tried to make Paul love you more,’ said Roy. ‘You’ve never believed that he really loves you, have you? Yet he does.’
‘How can he?’
Roy smiled: ‘And you love him very much.’
‘I’ve never been good enough for him,’ she cried.
She was wretched beyond anything we could say to her: disappointment pierced her, then shame, then self-disgust. She had looked forward so naively, so snobbishly to the Lodge; she had boasted of it, she had planned her parties, she had written to her family. Could it still be taken away? We guessed that Jago had shielded her from all the doubts so far. Could it be taken away through her follies? She was sickened by shame; she had ‘made a fool of herself’ and now they might bring it against her. She did not feel guilty remorse, she was too deeply innocent at heart for that. She felt instead shame and self-hatred, because men spoke ill of her. She had never believed that she could be loved — that was the pain which twisted her nature. Now she felt persecuted, unloved, lost, alone. Had Paul always pretended to love her out of pity? She believed even that — despite the devotion, despite the proofs.
No one could love her, she knew ever since she was a girl, she never had the faintest confidence of being loved. If she could have had a little confidence, she thought, she might have given Paul some comfort; she would not have been driven to inflict on him the woes of a hypochondriac, the venom of a shrew, the faithlessness of one who had to find attention. He would never know how abjectly she worshipped him. All she had done was damage him (she saw the letter in her hand) so much that she could never make it up.
It was long past the time when Roy and I had planned to start for Gay’s, and we had to give up our project for that day. Nothing we said was any help, but it was unthinkable to leave her alone. At last she invited us back to her house for tea. She walked between us through the courts. On our way, we were confronted by Nightingale, walking out of college. His hand moved up to his hat, but she looked away, with a fixed stare. We heard his footsteps dying away. She said almost triumphantly: ‘They’ve cut me often enough.’
In their drawing-room Jago was standing, and the moment we entered he put his arm round her shoulders.
‘I’ve been looking everywhere for you,’ he said. ‘Why didn’t you leave word where you’d gone? You mustn’t disappear without trace What is the trouble?’