utes later, through the adroitness of her special
engineer and his handymen, would be able quite seriously to demonstrate
a victory to herself.

Defeat? Never! How Alf and Emmy shrank now before her increasing skill
in argument. How were they shattered! How inept were their feebleness!
How splendid Jenny had been, in act, in motive, in speech, in
performance!

"Er, yes!" Jenny said, beginning to ridicule her own highly coloured
picture. "Well, it was _something_ like that!" She had too much sense of
the ridiculous to maintain for long unquestioned the heroic vein as
natural to her own actions. More justly, she resumed her consideration
of the scenes, pondering over them in their nakedness and their
meanings, trying to see how all these stupid little feelings had burst
their way from overcharged hearts, and how each word counted as part of
the mosaic of misunderstanding that had been composed.

"Oh, blow!" Jenny impatiently ejaculated, with a sinking heart at the
thought of any sequel. A sequel there was bound to be--however muffled.
It did not rest with her. There were Emmy and Alf, both alike burning
with the wish to avenge themselves--upon her! If only she could
disappear--just drop out altogether, like a man overboard at night in a
storm; and leave Emmy and Alf to settle together their own trouble. She
couldn't drop out; nobody could, without dying, though they might often
wish to do so; and even then their bodies were the only things that were
gone, because for a long time they stubbornly survived in memory. No:
she couldn't drop out. There was no chance of it. She was caught in the
web of life; not alone, but a single small thing caught in the general
mix-up of actions and inter-actions. She had just to go on as she was
doing, waking up each morning after the events and taking her old place
in the world; and in this instance she would have, somehow, to smooth
matters over when the excitements and agitations of the evening were
past. It would be terribly difficult. She could not yet see a clear
course. If only Emmy didn't live in the same house! If only, by throwing
Alf over as far as concerned herself, she could at the same time throw
him into Emmy's waiting arms. Why couldn't everybody be sensible? If
only they could all be sensible for half-an-hour everything could be
arranged and happiness could be made real for each of them. No:
misunderstandings were bound to come, angers and jealousies, conflicting
desires