§12

The weeks went by, and Ellen still persevered. But she was disappointed in results. She had thought that Alce's subjection would not take very long, she had not expected the matter to drag. It was the fault of his crass stupidity—he was unable to see what she was after, he looked upon her just as a little girl, Joanna's little sister, and was good to her for Joanna's sake.

This was humiliating, and Ellen fretted and chafed at her inability to make him see. She was no siren, and was without either the parts or the experience for a definite attack on his senses. She worked as an amateur and a schoolgirl, with only a certain fundamental shrewdness to guide her; she was doubtless becoming closer friends with Alce—he liked to sit and talk to her after tea, and often gave her lifts in his trap—but he used their intimacy chiefly to confide in her his love and admiration for her sister, which was not what Ellen wanted.

The first person to see what was happening was Joanna herself. She had been glad for some time of Ellen's increased friendliness with Alce, but had pat it down to nothing more than the comradeship of that happy day at Lord John Sanger's show. Then something in Ellen's looks as she spoke to Arthur, in her manner as she spoke of him, made her suspicious—and one Sunday evening, walking home from church, she became sure. The service had been at Pedlinge, in the queer barn-like church whose walls inside were painted crimson; and directly it was over Ellen had taken charge of Alce, who was coming back to supper with them. Alce usually went to his parish church at Old Romney, but had accepted Ellen's invitation to accompany the Goddens that day, and now Ellen seemed anxious that he should not walk with her and Joanna, but had taken him on ahead, leaving Joanna to walk with the Southlands.

The elder sister watched them—Alce a little oafish in his Sunday blacks, Ellen wearing her new spring hat with the daisies. As she spoke to him she lifted her face on her graceful neck like a swan, and her voice was eager and rather secret. Joanna lost the thread of Mrs. Southland's reminiscences of her last dairy-girl, and she watched Ellen, watched her hands, watched the shrug of her shoulders under her gown—the girl's whole body seemed to be moving, not restlessly or jerkily, but with a queer soft ripple.

Then Joanna suddenly said to herself—"She loves him. Ellen wants Arthur Alce." Her first emotion was of anger, a resolve to stop this impudence; but the next minute she pitied instead—Ellen, with her fragile beauty, her little die-away airs, would never be able to get Arthur Alce from Joanna, to whom he belonged. He was hers, both by choice and habit, and Ellen would never get him. Then from pity, she passed into tenderness—she was sorry Ellen could not get Arthur, could not have him when she wanted him, while Joanna, who could have him, did not want him. It would be a good thing for her, too. Alce was steady and well-established—he was not like those mucky young Vines and Southlands. Ellen would be safe to marry him. It was a pity she hadn't a chance.

Joanna looked almost sentimentally at the couple ahead—then she suddenly made up her mind. "If I spoke to Arthur Alce, I believe I could make him do it." She could make Arthur do most things, and she did not see why he should stop at this. Of course she did not want Ellen to marry him or anybody, but now she had once come to think of it she could see plainly, in spite of herself, that marriage would be a good thing for her sister. She was being forced up against the fact that her schemes for Ellen had failed—school-life had spoiled her, home-life was making both her and home miserable. The best thing she could do would be to marry, but she must marry a good man and true—Alce was both good and true, and moreover his marriage would set Joanna free from his hang-dog devotion, of which she was beginning to grow heartily tired. She appreciated his friendship and his usefulness, but they could both survive, and she would at the same time be free of his sentimental lapses, the constant danger of a declaration. Yes, Ellen should have him—she would make a present of him to Ellen.