eakness. What had made her carry this experience through against the
finest influence upon her life? Well, it was done; but the knowledge of
it must be kept from her mother. Regrets were foolish; yet she would
make some reparation. She would go and live at home again and, before
anything, please her mother for a long time to come. She would be extra
nice to May. She would be--in parental terminology--a really good girl.

Whatever agony Maurice's love had caused her to bear, this sacrifice of
her youth upon a tawdry altar had finally and effectually deadened. She
could meet without a tremor now the cause of all the miserable business.
Things might have been different, were fidelity an imaginable virtue.
But it was all over now; she had consummated the aspirations of youth.
There should be an end of love henceforth. For what it was worth of
bitter and sweet, she had known it. No longer was the viceroy of human
destiny a riddle. He had lost his wings and lay like a foundling in the
gutter. No more of such a sorry draggled god for her. Jenny's ambition
now was in reconciliation with her mother to be reestablished in the
well-beloved house in Hagworth Street, and in affection for old familiar
things to forget the wild adventures of passion.

The taxi swept on down the Hampstead Road until it turned off on the
right to Camden Town, whose curious rococo squares mildewed and queerly
ornamented seemed the abode of a fantastic depression. For all the
sunlight of St. Valentine, the snowdrops looked like very foolish
virgins as they shivered in the wind about the blackened grass, good
sport for idle sparrows. The impression of faded wickedness made on
Jenny's mind by Stacpole Terrace that morning suited her disgust. Every
window in the row of houses was askew, cocking a sinister eye at her
reappearance. Every house looked impure with a smear of green damp over
the stucco. Stacpole Terrace wore an air of battered gayety fit only for
sly entrances at twilight and furtive escapes in the dawn; while in one
of the front gardens a stone Cupid with broken nose smirked perpetually
at whatever shady intrigue came under his patronage.

It was nearly eleven o'clock when Jenny, entering the sitting-room,
found Irene bunched sloppily over the fire. Mrs. Dale and her youngest
daughter were busy in the kitchen. Winnie was not yet out of bed, and
the head of the family was studying in the dust of his small apartment
the bargains advertised in yes