



Produced by Daniel Fromont.  HTML version by Al Haines.








COLLECTION

OF

BRITISH AUTHORS


TAUCHNITZ EDITION.


VOL. 1811.

VIXEN BY M. E. BRADDON

IN THREE VOLUMES.

VOL. III.




VIXEN


A NOVEL


BY

M.  E. BRADDON,

AUTHOR OF "LADY AUDLEY'S SECRET," ETC. ETC.


_COPYRIGHT EDITION_.


IN THREE VOLUMES.

VOL. III.


LEIPZIG

BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ

1879.


_The Right of Translation is reserved_.



CONTENTS

OF VOLUME III.


CHAPTER I. Going into Exile

CHAPTER II. Chiefly Financial

CHAPTER III. "With weary Days thou shalt be clothed and fed"

CHAPTER IV. Love and AEsthetics

CHAPTER V. Crumpled Rose-Leaves

CHAPTER VI. A Fool's Paradise

CHAPTER VII. "It might have been"

CHAPTER VIII. Wedding Bells

CHAPTER IX. The nearest Way to Norway

CHAPTER X. "All the Rivers run into the Sea"

CHAPTER XI. The Bluebeard Chamber

Epilogue



VIXEN.



CHAPTER I.

Going into Exile.

After a long sleepless night of tossing to and fro, Vixen rose with the
first stir of life in the old house, and made herself ready to face the
bleak hard world. Her meditations of the night had brought no new light
to her mind. It was very clear to her that she must go away--as far as
possible--from her old home. Her banishment was necessary for
everybody's sake. For the sake of Rorie, who must behave like a man of
honour, and keep his engagement with Lady Mabel, and shut his old
playfellow out of his heart. For the sake of Mrs. Winstanley, who could
never be happy while there was discord in her home; and last of all,
for Violet herself, who felt that joy and peace had fled from the Abbey
House for ever, and that it would be better to be anywhere, in the
coldest strangest region of this wide earth, verily friendless and
alone among strange faces, than here among friends who were but friends
in name, and among scenes that were haunted with the ghosts of dead
joys.

She went round the gardens and shrubberies in the early morning,
looking sadly at everything, as if she were bidding the trees and
flowers a long farewell. The rhododendron thickets were shining with
dew, the grassy tracks in that wilderness of verdure were wet and cold
under Vixen's feet. She wandered in and out among the groups of wild
growing shrubs, rising one above another to the height of forest trees,
and then she went out by the old five-barred gate which Titmouse used
to jump so merrily, and rambled in the plantation till the sun was
high, and the pines began to breathe forth their incense as the day-god
warmed them into life.

It was half-past eight. Nine was the hour for breakfast, a meal at
which, during the Squire's time, the fragile Pamela had rarely
appeared, but which, under the present _regime_, she generally graced
with her presence. Captain Winstanley was an early riser, and was not
sparing in his contempt for sluggish habits.

Vixen had made up her mind never again to sit at meat with her
stepfather; so she went straight to her own den, and told Phoebe to
bring her a cup of tea.

"I don't want anything else," she said wearily when the girl suggested
a more substantial breakfast; "I should like to see mamma presently. Do
you know if she has gone down?"

"No, miss. Mrs. Winstanley is not very well this morning. Pauline has
taken her up a cup of tea."

Vixen sat idly by the open window, sipping her tea, and caressing
Argus's big head with a listless hand, waiting for the next stroke of
fate. She was sorry for her mother, but had no wish to see her. What
could they say to each other--they, whose thoughts and feelings were so
wide apart? Presently Phoebe came in with a little three-cornered note,
written in pencil.

"Pauline asked me to give you this from your ma, miss."

The note was brief, written in short gasps, with dashes between them.


"I feel too crushed and ill to see you--I have told Conrad what you
wish--he is all goodness--he will tell you what we have decided--try to
be worthier of his kindness--poor misguided child--he will see you in
his study, directly after breakfast--pray control your unhappy temper."


"His study, indeed!" ejaculated Vixen, tearing up the little note and
scattering its perfumed fragments on the breeze; "my father's room,
which he has usurped. I think I hate him just a little worse in that
room than anywhere else--though that would seem hardly possible, when I
hate him so cordially everywhere."

She went to the looking-glass, and surveyed herself proudly as she
smoothed her shining hair, resolved that he should see no indication of
trouble or contrition in her face. She was very pale, but her tears of
last night had left no traces. There was a steadiness in her look that
befitted an encounter with an enemy. A message came from the Captain,
while she was standing before her glass, tying a crimson ribbon under
the collar of her white morning-dress.

Would she please to go to Captain Winstanley in the study? She went
without an instant's delay, walked quietly into the room, and stood
before him silently as he sat at his desk writing.

"Good-morning, Miss Tempest," he said, looking up at her with his
blandest air; "sit down, if you please. I want to have a chat with you."

Vixen seated herself in her father's large crimson morocco chair. She
was looking round the room absently, dreamily, quite disregarding the
Captain. The dear old room was full of sadly sweet associations. For
the moment she forgot the existence of her foe. His cold level tones
recalled her thoughts from the lamented past to the bitter present.

"Your mother informs me that you wish to leave the Abbey House," he
began; "and she has empowered me to arrange a suitable home for you
elsewhere. I entirely concur in your opinion that your absence from
Hampshire for the next year or so will be advantageous to yourself and
others. You and Mr. Vawdrey have contrived to get yourselves
unpleasantly talked about in the neighbourhood. Any further scandal may
possibly be prevented by your departure."

"It is not on that account I wish to leave home," said Vixen proudly.
"I am not afraid of scandal. If the people hereabouts are so wicked
that they cannot see me riding by the side of an old friend for two or
three days running without thinking evil of him and me, I am sorry for
them, but I certainly should not regulate my life to please them. The
reason I wish to leave the Abbey House is that I am miserable here, and
have been ever since you entered it as its master. We may as well deal
frankly with each other in this matter. You confessed last night that
you hated me. I acknowledge to-day that I have hated you ever since I
first saw you. It was an instinct."

"We need not discuss that," answered the Captain calmly. He had let
passion master him last night, but he had himself well in hand to-day.
She might be as provoking as she pleased, but she should not provoke
him to betray himself as he had done last night. He detested himself
for that weak outbreak of passion.

"Have you arranged with my mother for my leaving home?" inquired Vixen.

"Yes, it is all settled."

"Then I'll write at once to Miss McCroke. I know she will leave the
people she is with to travel with me."

"Miss McCroke has nothing to do with the question. You roaming about
the world with a superannuated governess would be too preposterous. I
am going to take you to Jersey by this evening's boat. I have an aunt
living there who has a fine old manor house, and who will be happy to
take charge of you. She is a maiden lady, a woman of superior
cultivation, who devotes herself wholly to intellectual pursuits. Her
refining influence will be valuable to you. The island is lovely, the
climate delicious. You could not be better off than you will be at Les
Tourelles."

"I am not going to Jersey, and I am not going to your intellectual
aunt," said Vixen resolutely.

"I beg your pardon, you are going, and immediately. Your mother and I
have settled the matter between us. You have expressed a wish to leave
home, and you will be pleased to go where we think proper. You had
better tell Phoebe to pack your trunks. We shall leave here at ten
o'clock in the evening. The boat starts from Southampton at midnight."

Vixen felt herself conquered. She had stated her wish, and it was
granted; not in the mode and manner she had desired; but perhaps she
ought to be grateful for release from a home that had become loathsome
to her, and not take objection to details in the scheme of her exile.
To go away, quite away, and immediately, was the grand point. To fly
before she saw Rorie again.

"Heaven knows how weak I might be if he were to talk to me again as he
talked last night!" she said to herself. "I might not be able to bear
it a second time. Oh Rorie, if you knew what it cost me to counsel you
wisely, to bid you do your duty; when the vision of a happy life with
you was smiling at me all the time, when the warm grasp of your dear
hand made my heart thrill with joy, what a heroine you would think me!
And yet nobody will ever give me credit for heroism; and I shall be
remembered only as a self-willed young woman, who was troublesome to
her relations, and had to be sent away from home."

She was thinking this while she sat in her father's chair, deliberating
upon the Captain's last speech. She decided presently to yield, and
obey her mother and stepfather. After all, what did it matter where she
went? That scheme of being happy in Sweden with Miss McCroke was but an
idle fancy. In the depths of her inner consciousness Violet Tempest
knew that she could be happy nowhere away from Rorie and the Forest.
What did it matter, then, whether she went to Jersey or Kamtchatka, the
sandy desert of Gobi or the Mountains of the Moon? In either case exile
meant moral death, the complete renunciation of all that had been sweet
and precious in her uneventful young life--the shadowy beech-groves;
the wandering streams; the heathery upland plains; the deep ferny
hollows, where the footsteps of humanity were almost unknown; the
cluster of tall trees on the hill tops, where the herons came sailing
home from their flight across Southampton Water; her childhood's
companion; her horse; her old servants. Banishment meant a long
farewell to all these.

"I suppose I may take my dog with me?" she asked, after a long pause,
during which she had wavered between submission and revolt, "and my
maid?"

"I see no objection to your taking your dog; though I doubt whether my
aunt will care to have a dog of that size prowling about her house. He
can have a kennel somewhere, I daresay. You must learn to do without a
maid. Feminine helplessness is going out of fashion; and one would
expect an Amazon like you to be independent of lady's-maids and
milliners."

"Why don't you state the case in plain English?" cried Vixen
scornfully. "If I took Phoebe with me she would cost money. There would
be her wages and maintenance to be provided. If I leave her behind, you
can dismiss her. You have a fancy for dismissing old servants."

"Had you not better see to the packing of your trunks?" asked Captain
Winstanley, ignoring this shaft.

"What is to become of my horse?"

"I think you must resign yourself to leave him to fate and me," replied
the Captain coolly; "my aunt may submit to the infliction of your dog,
but that she should tolerate a young lady's roaming about the island on
a thoroughbred horse would be rather too much to expect from her
old-fashioned notions of propriety."

"Besides, even Arion would cost something to keep," retorted Vixen,
"and strict economy is the rule of your life. If you sell him--and, of
course, you will do so--please let Lord Mallow have the refusal of him.
I think he would buy him and treat him kindly, for my sake."

"Wouldn't you rather Mr. Vawdrey had him?"

"Yes, if I were free to give him away; but I suppose you would deny my
right of property even in the horse my father gave me."

"Well, as the horse was not specified in your father's will, and as all
his horses and carriages were left to your mother, I think there cannot
be any doubt that Arion is my wife's property."

"Why not say your property? Why give unnatural prominence to a cipher?
Do you think I hold my poor mother to blame for any wrong that is done
to me, or to others, in this house? No, Captain Winstanley, I have no
resentment against my mother. She is a blameless nullity, dressed in
the latest fashion."

"Go and pack your boxes!" cried the Captain angrily. "Do you want to
raise the devil that was raised last night? Do you want another
conflagration? It might be a worse one this time. I have had a night of
fever and unrest."

"Am I to blame for that?'

"Yes--you beautiful fury. It was your image kept me awake. I shall
sleep sounder when you are out of this house."

"I shall be ready to start at ten o'clock," said Vixen, in a
business-like tone which curiously contrasted this sudden gust of
passion on the part of her foe, and humiliated him to the dust. He
loathed himself for having let her see her power to hurt him.

She left him, and went straight upstairs to her room, and gave Phoebe
directions about the packing of her portmanteaux, with no more outward
semblance of emotion than she might have shown had she been starting on
a round of pleasant visits under the happiest circumstances. The
faithful Phoebe began to cry when she heard that Miss Tempest was going
away for a long time, and that she was not to go with her; and poor
Vixen had to console her maid instead of brooding upon her own griefs.

"Never mind, Phoebe," she said; "it is as hard for me to lose you as it
is for you to lose me. I shall never forget what a devoted little thing
you have been, and all the muddy habits you have brushed without a
murmur. A few years hence I shall be my own mistress, and have plenty
of money, and then, wherever I may be, you shall come to me. If you are
married you shall be my housekeeper, and your husband shall be my
butler, and your children shall run wild about the place, and be made
as much of as the litter of young foxes Bates reared in a corner of the
stable-yard, when Mr. Vawdrey was at Eton."

"Oh, miss, I don't want no husband nor no children, I only want you for
my missus. And when you come of age, will you live here, miss?"

"No, Phoebe. The Abbey House will belong to mamma all her life. Poor
mamma! may it be long before the dear old house comes to me. But when I
am of age, and my own mistress I shall find a place somewhere in the
Forest, you may be sure of that, Phoebe."

Phoebe dried her honest tears, and made haste with the packing,
believing that Miss Tempest was leaving home for her own pleasure, and
that she, Phoebe, was the only victim of adverse fate.

The day wore on quickly, though it was laden with sorrow. Vixen had a
great deal to do in her den; papers to look over, old letters,
pen-and-ink sketches, and scribblings of all kinds to destroy, books
and photographs to pack. There were certain things she could not leave
behind her. Then there was a melancholy hour to spend in the stable,
feeding, caressing, and weeping over Arion, who snorted his tenderest
snorts, and licked her hands with abject devotion--almost as if he knew
they were going to part, Vixen thought.

Last of all came the parting with her mother. Vixen had postponed this
with an aching dread of a scene, in which she might perchance lose her
temper, and be betrayed into bitter utterances that she would
afterwards repent with useless tears. She had spoken the truth to her
stepfather when she told him that she held her mother blameless; yet
the fact that she had but the smallest share in that mother's heart was
cruelly patent to her.

It was nearly four o'clock in the afternoon when Pauline came to
Violet's room with a message from Mrs. Winstanley. She had been very
ill all the morning, Pauline informed Miss Tempest, suffering severely
from nervous headache, and obliged to lie in a darkened room. Even now
she was barely equal to seeing anyone.

"Then she had better not see me," said Vixen icily; "I can write her a
little note to say good-bye. Perhaps it would be just as well. Tell
mamma that I will write, Pauline."

Pauline departed with this message, and returned in five minutes with a
distressed visage.

"Oh, miss!" she exclaimed, "your message quite upset your poor mamma.
She said, 'How could she?' and began to get almost hysterical. And
those hysterical fits end in such fearful headaches."

"I will come at once," said Vixen.

Mrs. Winstanley was lying on a sofa near an open window, the Spanish
blinds lowered to exclude the afternoon sunshine, the perfume of the
gardens floating in upon the soft summer air. A tiny teapot and cup and
saucer on a Japanese tray showed that the invalid had been luxuriating
in her favourite stimulant. There were vases of flowers about the room,
and an all-pervading perfume and coolness--a charm half sensuous, half
aesthetic.

"Violet, how could you send me such a message?" remonstrated the
invalid fretfully.

"Dear mamma, I did not want to trouble you. I know how you shrink from
all painful things; and you and I could hardly part without pain, as we
are parting to-day. Would it not have been better to avoid any
farewell?"

"If you had any natural affection, you would never have suggested such
a thing."

"Then perhaps I have never had any natural affection," answered Vixen,
with subdued bitterness; "or only so small a stock that it ran out
early in my life, and left me cold and hard and unloving. I am sorry we
are parting like this, mamma. I am still more sorry that you could not
spare me a little of the regard which you have bestowed so lavishly
upon a stranger."

"Violet, how can you?" sobbed her mother. "To accuse me of withholding
my affection from you, when I have taken such pains with you from your
very cradle! I am sure your frocks, from the day you were short-coated,
were my constant care; and when you grew a big, lanky girl, who would
have looked odious in commonplace clothes, it was my delight to invent
picturesque and becoming costumes for you. I have spent hours poring
over books of prints, studying Vandyke and Sir Peter Lely, and I have
let you wear some of my most valuable lace; and as for indulgence of
your whims! Pray when have I ever thwarted you in anything?"

"Forgive me, mamma!" cried Vixen penitently. She divined dimly--even in
the midst of that flood of bitter feeling in which her young soul was
overwhelmed--that Mrs. Winstanley had been a good mother, according to
her lights. The tree had borne such fruit as was natural to its kind.
"Pray forgive me! You have been good and kind and indulgent, and we
should have gone on happily together to the end of the chapter, if fate
had been kinder."

"It's no use your talking of fate in that way, Violet," retorted her
mother captiously. "I know you mean Conrad."

"Perhaps I do, mamma; but don't let us talk of him any more. We should
never agree about him. You and he can be quite happy when I am gone.
Poor, dear, trusting, innocent-minded mamma!" cried Vixen, kneeling by
her mother's chair, and putting her arms round her ever so tenderly.
"May your path of life be smooth and strewn with flowers when I am
gone. If Captain Winstanley does not always treat you kindly, he will
be a greater scoundrel than I think him. But he has always been kind to
you, has he not, mamma? You are not hiding any sorrow of yours from
me?' asked Vixen, fixing her great brown eyes on her mother's face with
earnest inquiry. She had assumed the maternal part. She seemed an
anxious mother questioning her daughter.

"Kind to me," echoed Mrs. Winstanley. "He has been all goodness. We
have never had a difference of opinion since we were married."

"No, mamma, because you always defer to his opinion."

"Is not that my duty, when I know how clever and far-seeing he is?"

"Frankly, dear mother, are you as happy with this new husband of
yours--so wise and far-seeing, and determined to have his own way in
everything--as you were with my dear, indulgent, easy-tempered father?"

Pamela Winstanley burst into a passion of tears.

"How can you be so cruel?" she exclaimed. "Who can give back the past,
or the freshness and brightness of one's youth? Of course I was happier
with your dear father than I can ever be again. It is not in nature
that it should be otherwise. How could you be so heartless as to ask me
such a question?"

She dried her tears slowly, and was not easily comforted. It seemed as
if that speech of Violet's had touched a spring that opened a fountain
of grief.

"This means that mamma is not happy with her second husband, in spite
of her praises of him," thought Vixen.

She remained kneeling by her mother's side comforting her as best she
could, until Mrs. Winstanley had recovered from the wound her
daughter's heedless words had inflicted, and then Violet began to say
good-bye.

"You will write to me sometimes, won't you, mamma, and tell me how the
dear old place is going on, and about the old people who die--dear
familiar white heads that I shall never see again--and the young people
who get married, and the babies that are born? You will write often,
won't you, mamma?"

"Yes, dear, as often as my strength will allow."

"You might even get Pauline to write to me sometimes, to tell me how
you are and what you are doing; that would be better than nothing."

"Pauline shall write when I am not equal to holding a pen," sighed Mrs.
Winstanley.

"And, dear mamma, if you can prevent it, don't let any more of the old
servants be sent away. If they drop off one by one home will seem like
a strange place at last. Remember how they loved my dear father, how
attached and faithful they have been to us. They are like our own flesh
and blood."

"I should never willingly part with servants who know my ways, Violet.
But as to Bates's dismissal--there are some things I had rather not
discuss with you--I am sure that Conrad acted for the best, and from
the highest motives."

"Do you know anything about this place to which I am going, mamma?"
asked Vixen, letting her mother's last speech pass without comment; "or
the lady who is to be my duenna?"

"Your future has been fully discussed between Conrad and me, Violet. He
tells me that the old Jersey manor house--Les Tourelles it is
called--is a delightful place, one of the oldest seats in Jersey, and
Miss Skipwith, to whom it belongs, is a well-informed conscientious old
lady, very religious, I believe, so you will have to guard against your
sad habit of speaking lightly about sacred things, my dear Violet."

"Do you intend me to live there for ever, mamma?"

"For ever! What a foolish question. In six years you will be of age,
and your own mistress."

"Six years--six years in a Jersey manor house--with a pious old lady.
Don't you think that would seem very much like for ever, mamma?" asked
Vixen gravely.

"My dear Violet, neither Conrad nor I want to banish you from your
natural home. We only want you to learn wisdom. When Mr. Vawdrey is
married, and when you have learnt to think more kindly of my dear
husband----"

"That last change will never happen to me, mamma. I should have to die
and be born again first, and, even then, I think my dislike of Captain
Winstanley is so strong that purgatorial fires would hardly burn it
out. No, mamma, we had better say good-bye without any forecast of the
future. Let us forget all that is sad in our parting, and think we are
only going to part for a little while."

Many a time in after days did Violet Tempest remember those last
serious words of hers. The rest of her conversation with her mother was
about trifles, the trunks and bonnet-boxes she was to carry with
her--the dresses she was to wear in her exile.

"Of course in a retired old house in Jersey, with an elderly maiden
lady, you will not see much society," said Mrs. Winstanley; "but Miss
Skipwith must know people--no doubt the best people in the island--and
I should not like you to be shabby. Are you really positive that you
have dresses enough to carry you over next winter?"

This last question was asked with deepest solemnity.

"More than enough, mamma."

"And do you think your last winter's jacket will do?"

"Excellently."

"I'm very glad of that," said her mother, with a sigh of relief, "for I
have an awful bill of Theodore's hanging over my head. I have been
paying her sums on account ever since your poor papa's death; and you
know that is never quite satisfactory. All that one has paid hardly
seems to make any difference in the amount due at the end."

"Don't worry yourself about your bill, mamma. Let it stand over till I
come of age, and then I can help you to pay it."

"You are very generous, dear; but Theodore would not wait so long, even
for me. Be sure you take plenty of wraps for the steamer. Summer nights
are often chilly."

Vixen thought of last night, and the long straight ride through the
pine wood, the soft scented air, the young moon shining down at her,
and Rorie by her side. Ah, when should she ever know such a summer
night as that again?

"Sit down in this low chair by me, and have a cup of tea, dear," said
Mrs. Winstanley, growing more affectionate as the hour of parting drew
nearer. "Let us have kettledrum together for the last time, till you
come back to us."

"For the last time, mamma!" echoed Violet sadly.

She could not imagine any possible phase of circumstances that would
favour her return. Could she come back to see Roderick Vawdrey happy
with his wife? Assuredly not. Could she school herself to endure life
under the roof that sheltered Conrad Winstanley? A thousand times no.
Coming home was something to be dreamt about when she lay asleep in a
distant land; but it was a dream that never could be realised. She must
make herself a new life, somehow, among new people. The old life died
to-day.

She sat and sipped her tea, and listened while her mother talked
cheerfully of the future, and even pretended to agree; but her heart
was heavy as lead.

An hour was dawdled away thus, and then, when Mrs. Winstanley began to
think about dressing for dinner, Vixen went off to finish her packing.
She excused herself from going down to dinner on the plea or having so
much to do.

"You could send me up something, please, mamma," she said. "I am sure
you and Captain Winstanley will dine more pleasantly without me. I
shall see you for a minute in the hall, before I start."

"You must do as you please, dear," replied her mother. "I hardly feel
equal to going down to dinner myself; but it would not be fair to let
Conrad eat a second meal in solitude, especially when we are to be
parted for two or three days and he is going across the sea. I shall
not have a minute's rest to-night, thinking of you both."

"Sleep happily, dear mother, and leave us to Providence. The voyage
cannot be perilous in such weather as this," said Vixen, with assumed
cheerfulness.

Two hours later the carriage was at the door, and Violet Tempest was
ready to start. Her trunks were on the roof of the brougham, her
dressing-bag, and travelling-desk, and wraps were stowed away inside;
Argus was by her side, his collar provided with a leather strap, by
which she could hold him when necessary. Captain Winstanley was smoking
a cigar on the porch.

Mrs. Winstanley came weeping out of the drawing-room, and hugged her
daughter silently. Violet returned the embrace, but said not a word
till just at the last.

"Dear mother," she whispered earnestly, "never be unhappy about me. Let
me bear the blame of all that has gone amiss between us."

"You had better be quick, Miss Tempest, if you want to be in time for
the boat," said the Captain from the porch.

"I am quite ready," answered Vixen calmly.

Phoebe was at the carriage-door, tearful, and in everybody's way, but
pretending to help. Argus was sent up to the box, where he sat beside
the coachman with much gravity of demeanour, having first assured
himself that his mistress was inside the carriage. Mrs. Winstanley
stood in the porch, kissing her hand; and so the strong big horses bore
the carriage away, through the dark shrubberies, between banks of
shadowy foliage, out into the forest-road, which was full of ghosts at
this late hour, and would have struck terror to the hearts of any
horses unaccustomed to its sylvan mysteries.

They drove through Lyndhurst, where the twinkling little lights in the
shop-windows were being extinguished by envious shutters, and where the
shop-keepers paused in their work of extinction to stare amazedly at
the passing carriage; not that a carriage was a strange apparition in
Lyndhurst, but because the inhabitants had so little to do except stare.

Anon they came to Bolton's Bench, beneath a cluster of pine-trees on a
hilly bit of common, and then the long straight road to Southampton lay
before them in the faint moonshine, with boggy levels, black
furze-bushes, and a background of wood on either side. Violet sat
looking steadily out of the window, watching every bit of the road. How
could she tell when she would see it again--or if ever, save in sad
regretful dreams?

They mounted the hill, from whose crest Vixen took one last backwards
look at the wide wild land that lay behind them--a look of ineffable
love and longing. And then she threw herself back in the carriage, and
gave herself up to gloomy thought. There was nothing more that she
cared to see. They had entered the tame dull world of civilisation.
They drove through the village of Eling, where lights burned dimly here
and there in upper windows; they crossed the slow meandering river at
Redbridge. Already the low line of lights in Southampton city began to
shine faintly in the distance. Violet shut her eyes and let the
landscape go by. Suburban villas, suburban gardens on a straight road
beside a broad river with very little water in it. There was nothing
here to regret.

It was past eleven when they drove under the old bar, and through the
high street of Southampton. The town seemed strange to Vixen at this
unusual hour. The church clocks were striking the quarter. Down by the
d