3/6 The Real Charlotte. 



just because he's in trouble, when you know he doesn't care 

 for you a tenth part as much as I do ? Do you mean to 

 tell me that you want me to go away, and say good-bye to 

 you for ever ? If you do, I'll go, and if you hear I've gone 

 to the devil, you'll know who sent me." 



The naive selfishness of this argument was not perceived 

 by either. Hawkins felt his position to be almost noble, 

 and did not in the least realise what he was asking Francie 

 to sacrifice for him. He had even forgotten the idea that 

 had occurred to him last night, that to go to New Zealand 

 would be a pleasanter way of escaping from his creditors 

 than marrying Miss Coppard. Certainly Francie had no 

 thought of his selfishness or of her own sacrifice. She was 

 giddy with struggle ; right and wrong had lost their meaning 

 and changed places elusively ; the only things that she saw 

 clearly were the beautiful future that had been offered to 

 her, and the look in Roddy's face when she had told him that 

 wherever he had to go she would go with him. 



The horses had moved staidly on, while these two lives 

 stood still and wrestled with their fate, and the summit was 

 slowly reached of the long hill on which Lambert had once 

 pointed out to her the hoof-prints of Hawkins' pony. The 

 white road and the grey rock country stretched out before 

 them, colourless and discouraging under the colourless sky, 

 and Hawkins still waited for his answer. Coming towards 

 them up the tedious slope was a string of half-a-dozen carts, 

 with a few people walking on either side ; an unremarkable 

 procession, that might have meant a wedding, or merely a 

 neighbourly return from market, but for a long, yellow coffin 

 that lay, hemmed in between old women, in the midmost 

 cart. Francie felt a superstitious thrill as she saw it ; a 

 country funeral, with its barbarous and yet fitting crudity, 

 always seemed to bring death nearer to her than the plumed 

 conventionalities of the hearses and mourning coaches that 

 she was accustomed to. She had once been to the funeral 

 of a fellow Sunday-school child in Dublin, and the first 

 verse of the hymn that they had sung then, came back, and 

 began to weave itself in with the beat of the mare's hoofs. 



** Brief life is here our portion, 

 Brief sorrow, short-lived care, 

 The life that knows no ending, 

 The tearless life is there." 



