Enid was free. The farmhouse stood empty, with the ivy hanging in festoons and long streamers about the windows, the grass growing rank and strong over the carriage drive, and a board at the gate offering this eligible modernised residence to be let on lease. Its sometime mistress had gone with her little daughter to the seaside for eight or ten months. After her stay at Eastbourne she would return to Mallingbridge, and take furnished apartments—or perhaps rent one of the tiny new villas on the Linkfield Road. She wished to be near her mother, and she apologized now for leaving Mrs. Marsden quite alone during so many months; but, as she explained, Jane needed sea air.

"Never mind about me," said Mrs. Marsden. "Only the child matters. Build up her health. Make her strong. I shall do very well—though of course I shall miss you both."

She was getting accustomed to solitude and silence. Truly she had never been so entirely isolated and lonely as now. In the far-off days when Enid used by her absence to produce a wide-spreading sense of loss, there had been the work and bustle of the thriving shop to counteract the void and quiet of the house. And there had been Yates. Now there was nobody but the plain-faced grim-mannered Eliza, who had become the one general-servant of the broken home.

Mr. Marsden still lunched and dined at the house, but he was never there for breakfast. He did not go upstairs to his bedroom and dressing-room once in a week. Sometimes for a fortnight he and his wife did not meet at meals. His voracious appetite manifested itself intermittently; there were days on which he gorged like a boa-constrictor, and others on which he felt disinclined to eat at all. Then he required Eliza to tempt him with savoury highly-spiced food, or to devise some dainty surprise which would stimulate his jaded fancy and woo him to a condescending patronage. He would toy with a bird—or a couple of dozen oysters—or a bit of pickled mackerel. Now and then, after he had been drinking more heavily than usual, he would himself inspire Eliza.

"Eliza, I can't touch all that muck;" and he pointed with a slightly tremulous hand at the dinner table. "But I believe I could do with just a simple hunk of bread and cheese, and a quart of stout. Run out and get some stout—get two or three bottles, with the screw tops. You know, the large bottles."

Then perhaps he would find eventually that this queer dinner-menu was a false inspiration. The bread and cheese were more than he could grapple with—and he asked for something else to assist the stout.

In a word, he was rather troublesome about his meals; and Mrs. Marsden fell into the habit of taking her scanty refreshment at irregular hours. He did not upbraid her for keeping out of his way. Eliza looked after him in a satisfactory manner; and he never upset or frightened Eliza. Grim Eliza ran no risk of receiving undesired attentions.

Everybody knew that Mr. Marsden often drank too much. One night when he failed to appear at dinner time, he was found—not by Eliza but by the Borough constabulary—in a state of total intoxication on the pavement outside the Dolphin.

After this regrettable incident the Dolphin dismissed him and his barmaid together. The attendance at the saloon had been dropping off. A siren cannot draw custom, when you have a great hulking bully who sits in the corner and threatens to punch the head of every inoffensive moderate-sized gentleman upon whom the siren begins to exert her spell. The Dolphin was very glad to see the backs of Miss Ingram and her friend.

Miss Ingram secured an engagement at the bar of the Red Cow, and Mr. Marsden faithfully followed her thither. The Red Cow was the disreputable betting public-house of which the town council were so much ashamed; people went there to bet, and it was likely to lose its license; but Marsden was content to make it his temporary club, and indeed seemed to settle down there comfortably enough.

He still occasionally came to the shop. All eyes were averted when he swung one of the street doors and slouched in. He seemed to know and almost to admit that he was a disgrace and an eyesore, and though he scowled at the shop-walker swiftly dodging away and diving into the next department, he did not bellow a reprimand. He hurried up the shop; and it was only when he got behind the glass that he attempted to display anything like the old swagger and bluster.

"Well, Mears, what's the best news with you?... You all look as if you were starting for a funeral—as black as a lot of mutes. How's business?" And he began to whistle, or to rattle the bunch of duplicate shop-keys that he carried in his trousers pocket. "I say, Mears, old pal—I'm run dry. Can't you and the missus do an advance—something on account—however small—to keep me going?"

A few shillings were generally produced, and the advance was solemnly entered in the books, to the governor's name.

Then he nearly always announced that he had come to the shop for the purpose of keeping a business appointment.

"Look here. I'm expecting a gentleman. Show him straight in."

These gentlemen were more dreadful to look at than the governor himself. He gave appointments to most terrific blacklegs—the unwashed rabble of the Red Cow, book-makers and their clerks, race-course touts,—inviting them to the shop in order to establish his credit, and prove to these seedy wretches that he was veritably the Marsden of Thompson & Marsden's.

For such interviews he used to turn his wife out of the room. At a word she meekly left the American desk and walked out.

"That you, Rooney? Come into my office. Here I am, you see. Sit down."

The Red Cow gentlemen were overcome by the grandeur of Mr. Marsden in his own office; the size and magnificence of the establishment filled them with awe and envy; it surpassed belief.

"Blow me, but it's true," they said afterwards. "Every word what he told us is the Gospel truth. He's the boss of the whole show. I witnessed it with my own eyes."

Yet if his visitors had possessed real business acumen, the shop would have impressed them with anything but confidence.

To a trade expert one glance would have sufficed. The forlorn aspect of the ruined shop told the gloomy facts with unmistakable clearness. So few assistants, so pitiably few customers, such a beggarly array of goods! Those shelves have all been dressed with dummies; those rolls of rich silk are composed of a wooden block, some paper, and half a yard of soiled material; within those huge presses you will find only darkness. Emptiness, desolation, death!

And what could not be seen could readily be guessed. Behind the glass only two people—a man laboriously muddling with unfilled ledgers, a girl at a type-writing machine—only one type-writer, a sadly feeble clicking in the midst of vast unoccupied space; not a sound in the covered yard; no horses, no carts; no purchased goods to be handled in the immense packing rooms; no stock, no cash, no credit, no nothing!

When a customer appeared, the shop seemed to stir uneasily in the sleep that was so like death; a faint vibration disturbed the heavy atmosphere; shop-walkers flitted to and fro; assistants yawned and stretched themselves. What is it? Yes, it is another customer.

"What can we show madam?"

"Well, I wanted—but really I think I've made a mistake—" and the stranger looked about her, and seemed perplexed. "My friends said it was in High Street—but I see this isn't it. Yes, I've made a mistake. Good morning."

"Good morning, madam."

The bright spring sunshine pouring in at the windows lit up the threadbare, colourless matting, showed the dust that danced above the parquet after each footfall; but it could not reach the great mirror on the stairs. The mirrors were growing dimmer and dimmer. As the black figure passed and repassed, the first reflected Mrs. Marsden was scarcely less vague and unsubstantial than the line of Mrs. Marsdens walking by her side.

Mr. Mears and Miss Woolfrey, disconsolately pacing the lower and the upper floor, seemed like captains of a ship becalmed—like honest captains of a water-logged ship, feeling it tremble and shiver as it settled down beneath their feet, knowing that it was soon to sink, and thinking that they were ready to go down with it. When they paused in their rounds of inspection, it was because really there was nothing to inspect. They turned their heads and looked, from behind the dusty piles of carpets or the trays of fly-blown china, at the establishment over the way—looked from death to life; and for a few minutes watched the jostling crowd and the brilliant range of colours on the other side of the road.

No dust there. Here, it was impossible to prevent the dust. The dust-sheets were in tatters; the brooms and sprinklers were worn out; there were not enough hands to sweep and rub. Mears himself looked dusty.

And when the sunlight fell upon him, he looked very old, very grey, and rather shaky. He never blew out his cheeks or swished his coat-tails now. The voluminous frock-coat seemed several sizes too large for him; it was greasy at the elbows, and frayed at the cuffs. The salary of Mears was hopelessly in arrear. For a long time Mears, like the governor, had found himself obliged to crave for something on account—just to keep going with.

One sunny April day Marsden entered the shop about noon, went into the office; and, not discovering his wife there, ordered the type-writing girl to fetch her immediately.

"What is it, Richard?" said Mrs. Marsden, presently appearing.

"Oh, there you are—at last. You never seem to be in your right place when you're wanted. I've been waiting here five minutes—and not a soul on the lookout to receive people."

"I am sorry."

"Anybody could walk in from the street and march slap into this room, without being asked who he was and what his business was. And a nice idea it would give a stranger of our management."

"I am sorry. But was that all you had to say to me?"

"No. Look here," he went on grumblingly. "Bence, if you please, has asked me for an appointment."

"Will you see him?"

"Yes—I think so."

"Very good."

"Yes, I've told the little bounder I'll see him."

"Do you wish me to be present at the interview?"

"No—better not."

A quarter of an hour afterwards Mr. Archibald Bence was coming up the empty shop. It was years since he had crossed the threshold; and certainly his eyes were expert enough to see now, if he cared to look about him, the dire results of his implacable rivalry. But he showed nothing in his face: smugly self-possessed, smilingly imperturbable, he followed the shop-walker straight to the counting-house.

The shop-walker announced him at the door of the inner room, and he marched in. He bowed low, as Mrs. Marsden, with a slight inclination of the head, passed out. Then Marsden shut the door.

But upstairs and downstairs the dull air vibrated as if electric discharges were passing through it in all directions; the whole shop stirred and throbbed; the whispering assistants quivered. "Did you see him?" "I couldn't get a peep at him." "I just saw the top of his hat." Bence had come to call upon the governor. Bence was in the shop. That great man was behind their glass.

Soon they heard sounds of the noisy interview—at least, Marsden was making a lot of noise. The minutes seemed long; but there were only five or six of them before the counting-house doors opened and Bence reappeared. He was perfectly calm, talking quietly and politely, though the governor bellowed.

"All right, Mr. Marsden, don't excite yourself. I only asked a question."

"Yes, a blasted impertinent one."

"Well, no bones broken, anyhow," and Bence smiled.

"If you should ever change your mind—come over the road, and let me know."

"I'll see you damned first."

Nothing, however, could ruffle Bence.

"Just so. But, as I was saying, if you ever should care to do business—well, I'm not far off. Good morning to you."

Mrs. Marsden, when she returned to the inner room, found her husband standing near the desk, sullenly scowling at the floor.

"I was a fool to swear at him. I ought to have kicked him down the shop.... Can you guess what he came about?"

"I'm not clever at guessing. I'll wait till you tell me."

"He wanted us to close more than half the shop, and sublet it to him for the remainder of the lease." And Marsden sullenly and growlingly described the details of this impudent proposal. Bence suggested that the yard and the new packing rooms could be used by him as a warehouse; that all departments to the west of the silk counter might be transferred to the eastern side; that he would build a party wall at his own expense, and use all this western block "for one thing or another." Bence's question in plain words therefore was, Would they now confess to the universe that their premises were about four times too big for their trade?

"Not to be thought of," said Mrs. Marsden.

"No. I suppose not;" and Marsden glanced at her furtively, and then rattled the keys in his pocket. "We won't think of it."

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