lucy saw pamela gwatkin once only during the day, and that was at dinner. she only caught a far-off glimpse of her at the high table. pamela very often sat at the 'high' among the dons. the younger dons were very fond of her: her opinions kept pace with theirs—they were very advanced opinions—and sometimes they outran them. she would be a don herself some day, and she would be a pioneer in quite a new school of thought.
lucy watched her with a feeling of awe as she sat among those great minds eating gooseberry pie—lucy wouldn't have sat there for the world. the[pg 137] presence of so much learning would have taken away her appetite. the presence of the master of st. benedict's at the dinner-table never took away her appetite, but the dear old thing never talked above her head. he was very fond of recalling those old days, as he sat at meat, when dick—not lucy's father, but her great-grandfather—used to drive a team afield, and his good wife kept the stall in the butter market.
but the president and the dons of 'newe' never discussed such commonplace topics. they talked of literature, philosophy, science, with a fine breadth of handling which is peculiar to a woman's college. pamela gwatkin was in her right place among them.
there was the weekly political meeting held after hall—a little miniature house of commons—where the affairs of the nation were discussed, a foretaste of what will be by-and-by, when things are rearranged.
when the house took its seat at nine o'clock, lucy found herself in the opposition, and a long[pg 138] way off from the benches occupied by the government of the country.
lucy only represented an insignificant little borough that nobody else would stoop to represent. she had a little freehold in it—her only freehold—six feet of earth beneath the east window of her father's church at thorpe regis. most people have a freehold of this sort, but it does not always give them a voice in the affairs of the nation. lucy was returned unopposed on the strength of her little freehold, and as her views, if she had any, were not at all advanced, she found herself in the minority.
pamela gwatkin, or, as the girls called her, newnham assurance, was the leader of the house, and annabel crewe secretary for the colonies, and capability stubbs had been unanimously elected chancellor of the exchequer; every girl that was worth anything had a place in the cabinet.
lucy hadn't much interest in the business that was going on, and she took out her knitting and turned the heel of a sock while the great affairs of the state were being discussed.
[pg 139]
it was quite clear from what she did gather from the speeches on the ministerial side that the country had been misgoverned long enough by the feeble race of men. it was quite time there was a change. a great deal of time had been lost; ages had been lost in the history of the world. men had been first in the field; women took a longer time to ripen. they had ripened now; they were quite, quite ripe; they were ready for the change.
oh, it was beautiful to hear the girls speak! there is an idea among narrow-minded people that debating societies encourage volubility of speech. perhaps they do among men, and the practice of public speaking is apt to make them too loquacious, too apt to air their elementary knowledge and crude information in senseless verbiage. but garrulity is not the sin of the students of colleges for women. they not only know a great deal more than men know, but they have the delightful gift of ready and accurate language. they do not haggle and hesitate, and 'h'm' and 'ah,' and have[pg 140] that dreadful difficulty in finding words that even prevails in a real house of commons.
it was remarkable to see with what ease the newnham girls handled those topics which old-fashioned legislators have been puzzling over session after session. there was a certain fine breadth in their way of handling them that would have taken a conservative leader's (the leader of a real house of commons) breath away.
it didn't take anybody's breath away in the ladies' parliament. everybody knitted and listened unmoved, and when eleven o'clock came two very important bills that had been brought forward from last session were advanced a stage.
there was an exciting division before the house separated, that resulted in an overwhelming majority for the motion, 'that the legal profession and the church be thrown open to women.'
that foolish little lucy voted in the minority; there were not a dozen girls in newnham who showed such a poor spirit, and of these five, it was rumoured, were engaged to curates.
[pg 141]
the girls ran off to their rooms when the sitting of the house was ended in the highest possible spirits. some of them sang snatches of songs, and some caught each other round the waist and waltzed madly down corridors. the thing was practically settled. the bar and the church opened vistas, immense vistas, for every sort of talent, and especially for the kind of talent that newnham produced.
there would have to be more colleges for women—newnham and girton could not turn out nearly enough—there would have to be a great many newnhams. some girls, no doubt, sat down at once and began to prepare a sermon, and others took down blackstone and began seriously to study law.
lucy went back to her room alone. the chancellor of the exchequer, though she 'kept' next door, wouldn't take the slightest notice of her. she had lighted her lamp, and was just thinking what she would give for a cup of tea, when someone knocked at her door. it wasn't a girl with a cup of[pg 142] tea, as she hoped it might be—the chancellor of the exchequer, with all her fine airs, generally brought her in a cup of tea before she went to bed, and sometimes she condescended to sit down for five minutes and discuss the burning questions of the day. it was not the chancellor of the exchequer—it was a far greater person—it was the leader of the house.
'well?' she said, when she came in and had shut the door after her—'well?'
she had come in so suddenly, and lucy's mind was so full of the motion of the evening—this parliamentary business was quite a new thing to her, and she had taken it au serieux—that she could not collect herself sufficiently to think what pamela meant. her mind was so full of the lady curates and the female barristers that she looked up at the leader of the house in bewilderment.
'well,' said pamela impatiently, 'how is he? i saw by your face at hall that he was not dead. is he going to get well?'
then lucy remembered all about it.
[pg 143]
'oh dear!' she said, 'how could i have forgotten! yes, he is going to get well, i think. he will owe his life if he does to eric. oh, eric has been lovely!'
'eric has done no more than anyone else would have done,' pamela said coldly; 'no more than a woman would have done if a woman had been in his place.'
'i don't think a woman could have done what eric has done,' lucy said.
she was thinking of those stitches he had put in, and how he had struggled with the poor fellow all night, and how he had been watching and praying beside him for two whole nights and days.
nurse brannan would have done as much as most women, but she would not have done all this.
'oh, you don't know what women can do!' pamela said, with a little curl of her lip. her lips were so thin and so hard—such crisp lips that they couldn't help curling. 'you are only a fresher; when you have been here three years[pg 144] you will have found out what a woman can do. he would never have cut his throat if a woman had been near him.'
'no,' said lucy eagerly, 'i am sure he wouldn't—not if a woman he loved had been near. oh dear! you should have seen the wistfulness in his poor eyes when i put the wet bandage on his head! it was enough to melt one's heart. eric says he will be sure to do it again—at least, that we must never leave off praying for him. i am sure that there is only one thing that can save him from doing it again.'
'only one thing?' pamela repeated, with just an inflection of scorn in her voice. 'and what is this panacea for his wickedness and folly? what is this fine thing that is to save him from himself?'
'don't speak of it so lightly; it is not a little thing!'
there were tears in lucy's voice as she spoke, and in her eyes. she had the picture before her of the strong man, with his beautiful bare chest, and his splendid frame, and those wistful eyes, and the[pg 145] loathing and the dread with which he shrank from the creature on his pillow. the pity of it was strong upon her, and she was deeply moved.
'a great love would save him—the love of a good woman. he would do a great thing for a woman he loved; he would make any sacrifice. i don't think anything else would save him.'
the leader of the house of commons turned from white to pink. lucy might have been talking about her. she wore a very pretty white gown of some soft silky stuff, and it was folded across the bosom, and the folds heaved up and down as lucy spoke, as if she were breathing heavily.
'perhaps he has done this for a woman's sake,' she said bitterly. 'men are such fools! they will do anything for a woman's sake—not always a worthy woman.'
'i am sure he has not!' said lucy hotly. 'he has been working too hard, and he has broken down. i heard at the lodge that he was working ten hours a day; that he was certain to come out first. oh, you don't know how they are building[pg 146] upon him at st. benedict's! it isn't a woman—it's overwork.'
pamela smiled.
'you are a capital champion, my dear, only don't suffer yourself to get too much interested in this foolish young man; it will interfere with your work. you must not make a mistake and let pity drift into—love.'
she made a little pause before the word, and the colour came again into her cheeks. she looked ever so much prettier talking about pity—and love—than she did speaking on those troublesome bills that had already occupied the time of two sessions.
'oh, he is never likely to love me!' said lucy. 'he could only love his equal; no one else would have any influence over him. he would only love a queen among women.'
'perhaps he has found his queen already. most men have before they are twenty-three.'
the colour went out of the girl's face, and the cold light came back into her eyes, and her lips,[pg 147] that a moment before were tremulous and tender, were hard and firm.
'i wouldn't go too often to mr. edgell's rooms, if i were you, dear,' she said when she went away. 'the authorities would make a fuss if they heard of it. we are not supposed, you know, to visit a man's room without a chaperon. i don't think it would do to take a chaperon there. if you have any more interest in him, i will find out for you how he is going on from eric.'
'thank you,' said lucy warmly; 'i can find out for myself. i can hear all about the st. benedict's men at the lodge.'
she was quite frightened at herself for speaking in that way to the prime minister. she had got into the way now, since she had been at newnham, of taking her own part; she was beginning to have no respect for dignities.
