hought was the same as the act, how much
more was her behaviour equivalent to a whole committal? She wished
she were wholly committed. She wished she had gone the whole length.

But sophistry and wishing did her no good. There she was, still
isolate. And still there was that in her which would preserve her
intact, sophistry and deliberate intention notwithstanding. Her time
was up. She was returning to Woodhouse virgin as she had left it. In
a measure she felt herself beaten. Why? Who knows. But so it was,
she felt herself beaten, condemned to go back to what she was
before. Fate had been too strong for her and her desires: fate which
was not an external association of forces, but which was integral in
her own nature. Her own inscrutable nature was her fate: sore
against her will.

It was August when she came home, in her nurse's uniform. She was
beaten by fate, as far as chastity and virginity went. But she came
home with high material hopes. Here was James Houghton's own
daughter. She had an affluent future ahead of her. A fully-qualified
maternity nurse, she was going to bring all the babies of the
district easily and triumphantly into the world. She was going to
charge the regulation fee of two guineas a case: and even on a
modest estimate of ten babies a month, she would have twenty
guineas. For well-to-do mothers she would charge from three to five
guineas. At this calculation she would make an easy three hundred a
year, without slaving either. She would be independent, she could
laugh every one in the face.

She bounced back into Woodhouse to make her fortune.

CHAPTER IV

TWO WOMEN DIE

It goes without saying that Alvina Houghton did not make her fortune
as a maternity nurse. Being her father's daughter, we might almost
expect that she did not make a penny. But she did--just a few pence.
She had exactly four cases--and then no more.

The reason is obvious. Who in Woodhouse was going to afford a
two-guinea nurse, for a confinement? And who who was going to engage
Alvina Houghton, even if they were ready to stretch their
purse-strings? After all, they all knew her as _Miss_ Houghton, with
a stress on the _Miss_, and they could not conceive of her as Nurse
Houghton. Besides, there seemed something positively indecent in
technically engaging one who was so much part of themselves. They
all preferred either a simple mid-wife, or a nurse procured out of
the unknown by the doctor.

If Alvina wanted