Baring-Gould Sabine
Arminell, Vol. 3
CHAPTER XLVIII.
L’ALLEMANDE
“Why, blessings on me!” exclaimed Mrs. Saltren, on her return to the lodgings in Bloomsbury. “Whoever expected the pleasure! And – I am sorry that you should see us here, Captain Tubb; not settled into our West-End house. Me and my son are looking about for a suitable residence, genteel and commodious, and with a W. to the address; but there is that run on the West End, and it is almost impossible, without interest, to get a house. My brother, however, who is like to be an M.P., is using his influence. But, captain, you see that every house won’t suit me; I’m not going to be in the shade any more. Well, it is a pleasure to see an Orleigh face here; and, pray, what has brought you to town, Captain Tubb?”
The visitor was in a black suit, that obtained for his son’s funeral; he held his hat in one hand, with a broad black cloth band about it. With his disengaged hand he thrust up his beard and nibbled the ends.
Ladies play with their fans, coquette with them, talk with them, angle with them; and an uninitiated person looking on wonders what is the meaning of the many movements made with the fan – the unfurling, the snapping, the half-opening. Perhaps Captain Tubb may have been coquetting, talking with his hat, for he turned it about, then looked into it, then smoothed it where it was ruffled, then put it under his chair, then took it up and balanced it on his knee. I cannot tell. If he was not speaking with his hat, what else could he have meant by all the movements he went through with it?
“Well, ma’am,” said the captain; “seeing as how I was in London, I thought I’d come and inquire how you was getting along. How are you? And how is Mr. Jingles?”
“I, myself, am but middling,” answered Mrs. Saltren, with stateliness. “My son – Mr. Giles Inglett Saltren – is very well indeed. I have gone through a great deal of trouble, and that takes it out of one,” said Mrs. Saltren, “like spirits of nitre.”
“So it do, ma’am. There is a vale of misery; but the sale of Chillacot was an elevation in the same; and bank-notes are of that spongy nature that they sop up a lot o’ tears. How, if I may make so bold as to ask, is your son thinking of investing the money? You see, ma’am, poor Captain Saltren and I knowed each other that intimate, our lines o’ business running alongside of each other, that we was always a-hailing of each other. And now that he’s gone, it seems natural for me to come and consult with his relict.”
“You’re flattering, Mr. Tubb. I must say, it is a pity my poor Stephen did not oftener consult me. If he had – but there, I won’t say what I might. About Chillacot, he was that pig-headed that – but no, not another word. I’ve always heard say that the wife is the better half. What a mercy it is, and how it proves the wisdom of Providence, that the wusser half was took away first.”
“You don’t know, Mrs. Saltren, how dreadful you’re missed in Orleigh; the place don’t seem the same without you. And folks say such spiteful things too.”
“As what, captain?”
“As that, having sold Chillacot, you ought to spend the purchase money there, and not be throwing it about in town.”
“Do they now? But I’m not throwing it about; it is all in the bank.”
“I reckon Mr. Jingles – I mean your son, ma’am – has it there in his own name.”
“Not at all, cap’n. The money is mine.”
Captain Tubb whisked round the brim of his hat with both hands.
“There have been changes since you’ve gone,” he said. “For one, there is old Sam Ceely married.”
“Sam Ceely!” echoed Mrs. Saltren, and dropped her hands in her lap.
“It does seem almost wicked for a man at his time of life and crippled. But he and Joan Melhuish have been keeping company a long time, and now he has come in for some money. I hope,” said the captain, “that the childer, if there come any, mayn’t come into this world with half their fingers blowed off through poaching, and a bad life through drunkenness.”
Mrs. Saltren said nothing.
“There’s another thing,” pursued Captain Tubb. “The new quarry is running out, and we’re thinking of reopening the old one.”
“What – that which is full of water? It is worked out.”
“Oh, no! there is more lime if more head be taken off; but there can be nothing done till the water is pumped out.”
“You are thinking of pumping the quarry dry?”
“Yes, ma’am; with a water-wheel it could be cleared. I’ve talked the matter with Mr. Macduff and the trustees, and they are content to let me have the quarry rent free for five years, if I will put up the proper machinery to get out the water.”
“The expense will be very heavy.”
Captain Tubb stroked his beard, and put the ends into his mouth; then, after consideration, he admitted —
“Well, it will cost money.”
“And are you really going to sink money in pumping out water?”
“Consider, Mrs. Saltren, that I shall have the working of the quarry for no rent at all during five years.”
“And you think it worth the outlay?”
“Seven per cent. guaranteed.”
“My son says that all I can expect to get for my capital if invested is five per cent.”
“I dare say, in town. At Orleigh, seven.”
Neither spoke for some time; Captain Tubb continued to play alternately with his beard and his hat; and Mrs. Saltren looked on the floor, then furtively at her visitor.
Presently the widow asked, “What will you take? Bottled stout or spirits and water?”
“Thank you, whichever you drink.”
“I drink neither,” answered Mrs. Saltren, drawing herself up. “I taste nothing but tea and water; but when an old friend comes and sees me, I make an exception. I have some whisky in the sideboard – Giles suffers in his inside, and I’m obliged to keep it by me against his attacks. If you will allow me, I will get it out.”
She rang for water and tumblers, and produced the spirits and sugar.
“Now tell me some further news of Orleigh,” she said, as she stirred a glass.
“There has been the cottage of Patience Kite done up again,” said he, “and she has gone back into it, which is unfortunate, for it would have suited me if I work the old quarry.”
“But surely it would not be large enough for you, cap’n?”
He shook his head. He had finished his glass, and now abstractedly he half filled it with water.
“Since poor Arkie died, I’m very lonely. It is fifteen years since I buried my wife. I feel as lonely as does this drop o’ water in the tumbler, without spirits to qualify it.”
Mrs. Saltren pushed the whisky bottle towards him.
“Mix to your liking, captain,” she said.
In old English country dances there is a figure known by the name of l’allemande, which consists of a couple dancing round each other, back to back, after which they join hands and dance down the middle. The allemande lingers on in Sir Roger de Coverley, but is never performed in polite society. It survives in full force in country courtships.
We who live in the midst of artificiality of all kinds in our time of roses sigh for the unchecked liberty of the rustic swain and his milkmaid, and kick at the little etiquettes which restrain us within the limits of decorum. But, as a matter of fact, the love-making below stairs is oblique, prosaic, and of a back-to-back description, full of restraints and shynesses, of setting to partners, and allemanding about them. From the contemplation of pastoral pictures in red crayon on our Queen Anne walls, we carry away the notion that country love-making is direct, idyllic, and flowery. It is nothing of the sort. Come, follow the allemanding of this mature pair.
“I’ve not yet been to Brighton and seen the Aquarium,” said Mrs. Saltren. “Have you, Captain Tubb?”
“Can’t say I have, ma’am. It’s lone work going by oneself to see fishes.”
“So have I thought,” said the widow. “And for that reason I’ve not been.”
“It is a wonderful consideration,” said the captain, “how fond cats are of fish; and how ill the skin and bones of a salt herring do make a cat! For myself, I like trout.”
“Well, so do I!” said the widow. “They’re fresher than salt-water fish, as stands to reason.”
“The old lord put trout into the quarry-pond,” said Tubb.
“So I’ve heard; and Saltren told me they were monstrous fat and large.”
“There is no catching them,” observed the captain; “the water is clear, and they are wary. If ever I pump the pond dry, ma’am, you shall have a dish.”
“Trout should be eaten when they are just out of the water,” said Mrs. Saltren; “they lose their flavour when a day old. I suppose it will not be possible for me to have them trout you so kindly offer the same day they are ketched.”
“Not possible if you are in London,” answered the captain. “Perhaps you’d best come to Orleigh to eat ’em.”
Then ensued a silence, broken at last by Mrs. Saltren, who remarked, with a sigh —
“There’ll be no eating of them trout till the pump is got.”
“That is true,” sighed Tubb. “But then the money is sure to be raised wherewith to put up the water-wheel and pump. Just consider, ma’am, seven per cent. You’ve not thought of investing, have you, what you got by the sale of Chillacot?”
This was a direct question, and the captain was scared at his temerity in putting it. He ate a whole mouthful of his beard.
“‘A fool and her money are soon parted,’ says the proverb,” answered Mrs. Saltren. “Consequently, I don’t think I’ll let my money go anywhere without me.”
Captain Tubb drew his chair closer; and, instead of settling the matter at once, began a fresh allemand.
“What do you think of mutton here in London?”
“I don’t relish it; and it is awfully dear, so is beef. Elevenpence and a shilling for what at Orleigh cost eightpence and ninepence. What fortunes them butchers must be making!”
“It seems a sin to encourage them,” said Tubb.
“It does go against my conscience,” agreed Mrs. Saltren.
“Then,” argued the captain, “I wouldn’t encourage them. Twopence and threepence in the pound is too much.”
“I’ve a mind to return to the country,” said Mrs. Saltren; “I don’t want to encourage such wickedness.”
“And then, ma’am, you can eat the trout fresh.”
“Ah, captain! but the capital for pumping?”
Then Captain Tubb cautiously slid one arm round Mrs. Saltren’s waist, and said —
“Come, Marianne, with your capital, away from the mutton of town to the trout of the country.”
“I should like ’em fresh,” said the widow. “We’ll pump together for them.”
The youthful romance-reader exacts of a novel some love-making, and, to satisfy this reader, I have given this pathetic and romantic scene in full. To this sort of reader, style is nothing, characterisation is nothing, the grammar is nothing – indeed the whole story is nothing if there be in it no love-making.
That is the spice which flavours the dish, and without it the dish is rejected as unpalatable.
To encourage this reader, accordingly, at the outset a chapter was devoted to love-making in tandem, and another to love-making abreast. Only one of those love-affairs has come to a happy conclusion; one was broken off by the breaking-down of Patience Kite’s chimney. To make up to the reader for her disappointment, I have inserted this other love scene, and have introduced it near the end of my book to stimulate the jaded appetite to finish it.
Is it false to nature? Only those will say so who are ignorant of country courtships. Oh, for a Dionysian ear through which to listen to – not the sighs of prisoners, but the coo of turtle-doves! Now it so fell out that the writer of these lines was himself, on one occasion, an eye-and-ear witness to the wooing of a rustic couple – involuntarily. It came about in this way.
When I was a boy, on a Sunday, I had set a trap to catch rats that scared the scullery-maid in the back kitchen, and caused her to drop my mother’s best china. But as rat-catching was not considered by my parents a Sabbatical amusement, I set my traps on the sly when they were at church on Sunday afternoon, and I was at home with a cold. The house-maid was left in charge, and naturally admitted her lover to assist her in watching after the safety of the house. Both seated themselves in the kitchen, one in the settle, the other in a chair before the fire. When I, in the back kitchen, heard them enter, I was afraid to stir lest my parents should be informed of my proceedings, and the sanctity of the Sabbath be impressed tinglingly on me, across my father’s knee, with the back of a hair-brush, a paper-knife, or a slipper. Accordingly I kept still.
Twenty minutes had elapsed, and no words having passed I stole to the kitchen door and peeped through. The maid sat on the settle, the swain on the chair, unctuously ogling each other in silence.
After the lapse of twenty minutes by the clock, the youth lifted up his voice and said solemnly, “Mary, what be that there thing for?” and he pointed to a button above the kitchen range.
“That, Joshua, is the damper.”
Again silence fell over the kitchen, only broken by the ticking of the clock. After the expiration of twenty minutes more, the youth further inquired, “And what be the damper for, Mary?”
“For to make the fire go a smother-like, Joshua,” she replied.
Again twenty minutes elapsed: then I heard a long-drawn sigh, and Joshua said in a grave, emotionless voice, “Mary, there be no damper in my buzzom.”
“There come master and mistress from church,” exclaimed Mary; “Joshua, you must go.”
“Lord!” said the swain, slowly rising, “how I have enjoyed myself, Mary.”
Next Sunday the banns were called.
This was slow allemanding indeed, quite at the cinque-pace, but then it was the love-making of an inexperienced youthful couple. Marianne Saltren and Captain Tubb had gone through the process at least once previously, so that there was not the same shyness and stiffness in their courtship. Nevertheless they conformed to the rule of country courtship, and allemanded about each other, though, I grant you, at a sprightlier pace than that of Joshua and Mary, before they joined hands and went down the middle.
CHAPTER XLIX.
TWO ORLEIGH GIRLS
Mrs. Welsh burst in on Arminell one evening just before dinner with a face of dismay, and both her hands uplifted.
“Mercy on us! What do you think?” Arminell stood up. “What has happened, Mrs. Welsh?” she asked in some alarm.
“My dear! You might have knocked me down with a feather. I thought that the girl would be sure to know how to do boiled rabbit with onion sauce.”
“Does she not?”
“And there was to be a Swiss pudding.”
“That, probably, she would not know how to make, but she can read, and has Mrs. Warne to fly to for light.”
“I put out the currant jelly for the pudding, and she has spread it over the rabbit on top of the onion sauce.”
Arminell was unable to restrain a laugh.
“I went down to see her dish up, and that is what she has done. Poured the onion sauce over the rabbit and heaped the currant jelly a top of that. Whatever shall we do? The last cook was bad enough, but she did not spoil good food.”
“What induced her to do this?”
“She says that she has been told to put currant jelly with hare, and so she has put it with rabbit, as she saw the jelly-pot set out on the kitchen table for the pudding.”
“And the pudding?”
“Is without anything. We cannot eat the rabbit. That is spoiled; and the pudding is nothing without red currant jelly. Whatever will Mr. Welsh do for his dinner?”
“But the girl had Mrs. Warne’s Cookery Book on the table for reference?”
“Yes, but she also had a sensational novel.”
Arminell laughed again. “I am afraid the education she has received has garnished her head much in the same fashion as she has garnished the rabbit, several good things jumbled together, making an unpalatable whole. I will go and see what can be done.”
“I have given the girl notice.”
“Surely not, Mrs. Welsh. She has but just come to town.”
“I spoke sharply to her, and girls now-a-days will not bear a word. She flew out at me and said she would not remain another hour in the house. Girls give themselves such airs. She knows my extremity, how long I have been without a cook.”
Arminell descended to the kitchen, but Thomasine was not there. The boiled rabbit stood on the table crowned with onion sauce and crimson jelly. Near it lay, wide open, a book, not so thick as Mrs. Warne’s Cookery Manual, and Arminell stooped to look at it. The book was Gaboriau’s “Gilded Clique,” much stained and cockled, as if it had been wet through, and then dried. Arminell turned it over; it was her own copy, which she had flung from her when in the Owl’s Nest, to arouse and arrest the attention of Captain Saltren. She could not doubt that it was the identical book, for her name was pencilled on it, and the water had not effaced the pencil scrawl. She did not know, what was the fact, that the book had undergone two immersions, and had twice been recovered by Patience, and that on the last occasion she had passed it on to her daughter.
Arminell stood turning over the disfigured volume, speculating on how it had come into Thomasine’s hands, and thinking of the occasion when she had last read it; and so thinking, for a moment she forgot the rabbit with its incongruous garnishment, and why she had descended to the kitchen. She was roused from her reverie by the maid-of-all-work coming in excitedly.
“Oh my, miss! What do you think? Thomasine has flown out at missus, and packed up her things in a bundle, and gone.”
“Thomasine gone!”
“Lawk, miss! She wouldn’t stand no nonsense, she said; and if the missus didn’t like her cooking she might cook for herself. She wouldn’t stay. Thomasine had a flaming temper; it’s the way of them red-headed girls.”
“Thomasine gone!”
“Gone in a tantrum, her cheeks as red as her head. I can’t think what folks find to admire in her hair. It is thick and red. I don’t fancy carrots.”
“But whither is she gone? She is a stranger in London, and has no friends.”
“I don’t suppose, miss, she knows herself.”
“Has she gone back to Mrs. Saltren?”
“I don’t fancy so. She was in such a rage, she thought of nothing but going, and never even asked for her wage.”
“Do you know in which direction she went?”
“No, I was not on the look-out. She came flaring on me to give me good-bye, and away she went. She said that as the missus had insulted her, go she would to where she would be valued.”
“Have you no idea where she is gone?”
“I don’t know.” The girl hesitated, then said, “Thomasine said as how there was a gentleman at the hotel where Mrs. Saltren first was, who admired her and said she ought never to demean herself to go into service – I can’t say, she has spoken of him once or twice, and I fancy he came to look for her when she was at the lodgings with Mrs. Saltren – she may have gone to ask his advice what to do and where to go.”
“That is enough,” said Arminell, and ran upstairs, put on her bonnet, and hastened into the street. She was doubtful in which direction to turn, but seeing the postman coming with the letters, she asked him if he had observed a girl with red hair.
“What, the new cook at Mrs. Welsh’s, miss? Oh, yes, she has gone by with a bundle. Very ’ansome girl, that.”
Arminell went down the Avenue, and at the corner encountered a policeman on duty. She asked him the same question. He also had noticed Thomasine. Indeed he knew her. Her splendid build, her profusion of glowing hair, and beautiful complexion were a phenomenon in Shepherd’s Bush, and all milkmen, butchers’ boys, postmen, police, knew and admired her, though she had been in the house of Mrs. Welsh but a fortnight.
“Yes, miss, she’s gone down that way – has a bundle in her hand. I asked her whither she was going and she said she was leaving her situation because her mistress was impudent to her. Wery ’ansome gall, that.”
Arminell went on to a cabstand; she was near the Hammersmith Station. As a disengaged flyman hailed her, she asked him if he had seen a young woman go by carrying a bundle.
“A ’ansome gal with red hair? To be sure. ’Ailed her, but she said she’d take a ’bus.”
Take a ’bus! – she had gone on to that great centre of radiating streets and roads a few steps ahead. Arminell quickened her pace, almost ran, and reached the main artery of traffic between the City and Hammersmith through Kensington. She had a sharp eye, and in a moment saw Thomasine, who was mounting an omnibus. She ran, as the horses started – ran, regardless of what any one might think, but could not overtake the ’bus. She signed to the driver of a passing empty cab.
“Keep up with the Hammersmith omnibus,” she said, panting. “When it stops, set me down. Here is a shilling.” She sprang in, and speedily caught up the scarlet-bodied conveyance, descended from the cab, entered the omnibus, and seated herself beside Thomasine.
She was out of breath, the perspiration ran off her brow, and her heart beat fast. She could not speak, but she laid her hand on that of the girl which rested on the bundle, and the action said, “I have taken you in charge.”
She was beside Thomasine, and could not see her face; she did not attempt to look at her, but kept her hand where she had laid it, till the omnibus halted at Broad Walk in front of Kensington Palace; by this time she had recovered her breath sufficiently to bid the conductor let her out. She rose hastily, still holding Thomasine, who did not stir.
“Come,” said Arminell, “come with me,” and looked the girl straight in the eyes.
Thomasine’s hand quivered under that of Arminell, and her face flushed. She dropped her eyes and rose. In another moment they were together on the pavement.
“We will walk together,” said Miss Inglett, “up the broad avenue. I want to speak to you. I want to know why you are running away, and whither you are going?”
“Please, miss,” answered the girl, “I ain’t going to be spoken to by Mrs. Welsh. Her’s nothing, nor old Welsh neither. He is the brother of Marianne Saltren, and no better than me or my mother. They may set up to be gentlefolk and give themselves airs, but they are only common people like myself.”
“You have made a mistake, Thomasine. You should not have put the currant jelly over the boiled rabbit. Those who make mistakes must have them corrected. How would you like to have your pretty velvet bonnet spoiled by Mrs. Welsh spilling ink over it?”
“I should be angry.”
“Well, it is the same case. You have spoiled the nice dinner she had provided for Mr. Welsh.”
“Welsh is nothing. His father was an old Methody shopkeeper, who ran away, having cheated a lot of folk out of their money. I know all about the Welshes. I’m not going to stand cheek from them.”
“But you will listen to a word from me?”
“Oh, miss, you are different. I wouldn’t be impudent to you for anything. But it is other with them stuck-ups as are no better than myself.”
“You will not try to twist yourself away from me?”
“No, miss.”
“I want you to tell me, Thomasine, whither you were running? Were you going to Mrs. Saltren?”
“Mrs. Saltren!” scoffed the girl. “She is nothing. Marianne Saltren, the daughter of the canting old cheat, and widow of a mining captain. I won’t be servant to her. Not I.”
“Whither were you going, then?”
Thomasine was silent.
Arminell walked at her side; she had let go the girl’s hand.
“I ran after you,” said Arminell.
“Was that what made you so hot and out of breath, miss?”
“Yes, I was frightened when I heard that you had gone away.”
“What was there to frighten you? I had not taken any spoons.”
“I never supposed that for a moment. I was alarmed about yourself.”
“I can take care of myself. I am old enough.”
“I am not sure that you can take care of yourself, Thomasine; you and I come from the same place, dear Orleigh, and it is such a pleasure to me to see you, and hear you talk. When I found that you were gone, I thought what shall I do without my dear Tamsine to talk with about the old place I love so much?”
“Why don’t you go back to it, miss, if you like it?” asked the girl.
“Because I cannot. Come closer to me.” Arminell caught the girl’s hand again. “I also ran away. I ran away, as you are running away now. That has brought upon me great sorrow and bitter self-reproach, and I would save you from doing the same thing that I have done, and from the repentance that comes too late.”
“They said at Orleigh, miss, that you were dead.”
“I am dead to Orleigh and all I love there. Why did you come to town with Mrs. Saltren, if you do not care to be with her?”
“Because I wanted to see the world, but I had no intention of remaining with her.”
“Then what did you intend?”
Thomasine shrugged her shoulders. “I wanted to see life, and have some fun, and know what London was like. I don’t want to slave here as I slaved in a farm.”
“You came to town restless and discontented, so did I; and now I would give everything I have to be set back where I was. You came in the same spirit, and I have stopped you on the threshold of a grave disaster, and perhaps saved you from unutterable misery. Thomasine, dear Thomasine, tell me the truth. Were you going to that hotel where some one flattered your vanity and held out to you prospects of idleness? You were leaving hard work and the duties that fell to your lot where God placed you, because impatient of restraint. You had learned the one lesson that is taught in all schools to boys and girls alike – hatred of honest work. Tamsine, you must return with me.”
The girl pouted. Arminell, looking round, saw the curl in her lip.
“I don’t care to be under the Welshes,” said the girl; “nor Marianne Saltren, neither. They ain’t better than me, and why shouldn’t I be as stylish as they?”
“If you resent being with them, be with me. Be my maid. I am not going to remain in Shepherd’s Bush. I intend to take a house somewhere in the country – somewhere where I can be useful, and, Tamsine, find work, hard work that I can do for others. That is what I seek now for myself. Will you come with me? Then we two Orleigh girls will be together, that will be charming.”
Thomasine turned and looked wonderingly at Miss Inglett. We two Orleigh girls! We – the baron’s daughter and the wise woman’s bastard.
“I’d like my frolic first,” said Thomasine.
“After that – I could not receive you,” answered Arminell gravely.
“I don’t see,” said Thomasine, still pouting, but uneasy and undecided, with the colour flying in flakes over her face and showing through the transparent complexion. “I don’t see why we are to be always kept at work, and not be allowed to amuse ourselves. We aren’t young for long.”
“Tamsine,” said Arminell, “poor Arkie Tubb sat by you when your mother’s cottage was being pulled down, and when you thought that she was in danger, and you could not run to her aid yourself, because you had turned your ankle, you sent him. You sent him to his death. The chimney fell and buried him. If he had considered himself he would not have risked his life for your mother. We all honour him for what he did. He never was clever and sharp in life, he failed in everything he undertook, he even failed then, for he did not bring your mother out of the ruin, he was buried in it himself. But he was a hero in his death because he sacrificed himself for others – for you, because he loved you, and for your mother.”
Thomasine said nothing, but her hand twitched in that of Arminell.
“You must be worthy of him, remain worthy of him. Thomasine, if you follow your own self-will and passion for pleasure, people will say it was well that Arkie Tubb died, she was not deserving of him.”
They had reached the head of the Broad Walk, and issued from Kensington Park into Uxbridge Road. The stream of traffic flowed east and west, east to the City, west to Shepherd’s Bush, past them, and they stood watching the two currents. Thomasine withdrew her hand.
Arminell was certain that this was a critical moment in the girl’s heart. She said nothing more. She had said enough, she waited. Thomasine turned her face east, and took a step in that direction with a red flush in her cheek. Then the red flush rose to her brow and deserted her cheek, and she turned back.
Presently she said, “May I take your hand again, miss?”
Arminell readily gave it.
Then Thomasine strode to the west, holding Arminell. She seemed fearful of herself if left to herself, but confident whilst holding the hand of Arminell. The good angel had conquered, and that good angel was the thought of poor, blundering, kindly, stupid Arkie Tubb.
Is ever a life utterly thrown away? It had seemed so when the stones crushed the soul out of that lad. A profitless life had ended unprofitably. But see! Here at the end of Broad Walk, Kensington, that cast-away life was the saving of the girl whom he had loved unprofitably.
