ible ways of
making money. In another two or three years Sally might have earned
more; but she was not now much above sixteen, and at sixteen, in the
dressmaking, one does not earn a living. And while at first they thought
that Mrs. Minto might get needlework to do, with which Sally could help,
they found this out of the question. Mrs. Minto's eyes were weak, and
she could not keep her seams straight. The machine they had was
ricketty. Sewing, for her, was impossible. For a few days she was
stunned with the new demand for which she was unprepared. She was
nerveless. It made Sally sick to watch her mother and to realise from
the vacancy which so soon appeared upon her face that memory and a kind
of futile pondering had robbed her brains of activity. With a bitter
sense of grudge against life, a tightening of lips already thin, and a
narrowing of eyes already discomfitingly merciless, Sally savagely told
herself that she had to do everything alone. It was she who must save
the situation. The arrogant grasp of this fact made a great impression
upon her mind and her character. Henceforward she no longer dreamed
about men, but was alert in her intention to make everything her tool,
and everybody. From a young girl she had been converted into an
unscrupulous taker from all. The death of her father was a blow which
had suddenly drawn together all those vague determinations which had
lain concealed. There was nothing except dangerous theft from which her
mind shrank. Looking afresh at her mother, she felt stirred by a new
impatience, and a succeeding indifferent contempt. Love had been killed,
and from now onwards she would play for her own hand. Small teeth met
with a snap. Her thin lips were drawn back. Mrs. Minto shrank from the
strange venomous snarl which she saw disfiguring Sally's face.

It was as though Sally felt trapped. Everything had been spoilt by this
unexpected happening, and Sally's unconscious helplessness revealed. It
was a blow to her vanity, a douche to her crude romanticism. She had
felt cramped and irritable before; but now she was made to realise how
little she had with which to fight against calamity and the
encroachments of others. Compared with this new danger, of starvation or
slavery, all old discomforts were shown to have been trivial, because
they had been accidents in a life which, however rough and ugly had been
at least absorbed in plans for enjoyment. Now plans for enjoyment gave
place to exped