She touched the girl gently on the shoulder, and only smiled when her
eyes opened, and waking with a start, she got up in sudden confusion. Mrs. Darnell went back to her room and dressed slowly while her husband
still slept, and it was only at the last moment, as she fastened her
cherry-coloured bodice, that she roused him, telling him that the bacon
would be overdone unless he hurried over his dressing. Over the breakfast they discussed the question of the spare room all
over again. Mrs. Darnell still admitted that the plan of furnishing it
attracted her, but she could not see how it could be done for the ten
pounds, and as they were prudent people they did not care to encroach on
their savings. Edward was highly paid, having (with allowances for extra
work in busy weeks) a hundred and forty pounds a year, and Mary had
inherited from an old uncle, her godfather, three hundred pounds, which
had been judiciously laid out in mortgage at 4-1/2 per cent. Their total
income, then, counting in Aunt Marian's present, was a hundred and
fifty-eight pounds a year, and they were clear of debt, since Darnell
had bought the furniture for the house out of money which he had saved
for five or six years before. In the first few years of his life in the
City his income had, of course, been smaller, and at first he had lived
very freely, without a thought of laying by. The theatres and
music-halls had attracted him, and scarcely a week passed without his
going (in the pit) to one or the other; and he had occasionally bought
photographs of actresses who pleased him. These he had solemnly burnt
when he became engaged to Mary; he remembered the evening well; his
heart had been so full of joy and wonder, and the landlady had
complained bitterly of the mess in the grate when he came home from the
City the next night. Still, the money was lost, as far as he could
recollect, ten or twelve shillings; and it annoyed him all the more to
reflect that if he had put it by, it would have gone far towards the
purchase of an 'Orient' carpet in brilliant colours. Then there had been
other expenses of his youth: he had purchased threepenny and even
fourpenny cigars, the latter rarely, but the former frequently,
sometimes singly, and sometimes in bundles of twelve for half-a-crown. Once a meerschaum pipe had haunted him for six weeks; the tobacconist
had drawn it out of a drawer with some air of secrecy as he was buying a
packet of 'Lone Star.' Here was another useless expense, these
American-manufactured tobaccos; his 'Lone Star,' 'Long Judge,' 'Old
Hank,' 'Sultry Clime,' and the rest of them cost from a shilling to one
and six the two-ounce packet; whereas now he got excellent loose
honeydew for threepence halfpenny an ounce. But the crafty tradesman,
who had marked him down as a buyer of expensive fancy goods, nodded with
his air of mystery, and, snapping open the case, displayed the
meerschaum before the dazzled eyes of Darnell. The bowl was carved in
the likeness of a female figure, showing the head and _torso_, and the
mouthpiece was of the very best amber--only twelve and six, the man
said, and the amber alone, he declared, was worth more than that. He
explained that he felt some delicacy about showing the pipe to any but a
regular customer, and was willing to take a little under cost price and
'cut the loss.' Darnell resisted for the time, but the pipe troubled
him, and at last he bought it. He was pleased to show it to the younger
men in the office for a while, but it never smoked very well, and he
gave it away just before his marriage, as from the nature of the carving
it would have been impossible to use it in his wife's presence. Once,
while he was taking his holidays at Hastings, he had purchased a malacca
cane--a useless thing that had cost seven shillings--and he reflected
with sorrow on the innumerable evenings on which he had rejected his
landlady's plain fried chop, and had gone out to _flaner_ among the
Italian restaurants in Upper Street, Islington (he lodged in Holloway),
pampering himself with expensive delicacies: cutlets and green peas,
braised beef with tomato sauce, fillet steak and chipped potatoes,
ending the banquet very often with a small wedge of Gruyère, which cost
twopence. One night, after receiving a rise in his salary, he had
actually drunk a quarter-flask of Chianti and had added the enormities
of Benedictine, coffee, and cigarettes to an expenditure already
disgraceful, and sixpence to the waiter made the bill amount to four
shillings instead of the shilling that would have provided him with a
wholesome and sufficient repast at home. Oh, there were many other items
in this account of extravagance, and Darnell had often regretted his way
of life, thinking that if he had been more careful, five or six pounds a
year might have been added to their income. And the question of the spare room brought back these regrets in an
exaggerated degree. He persuaded himself that the extra five pounds
would have given a sufficient margin for the outlay that he desired to
make; though this was, no doubt, a mistake on his part. But he saw
quite clearly that, under the present conditions, there must be no
levies made on the very small sum of money that they had saved. The rent
of the house was thirty-five, and rates and taxes added another ten
pounds--nearly a quarter of their income for house-room. Mary kept down
the housekeeping bills to the very best of her ability, but meat was
always dear, and she suspected the maid of cutting surreptitious slices
from the joint and eating them in her bedroom with bread and treacle in
the dead of night, for the girl had disordered and eccentric appetites. Mr. Darnell thought no more of restaurants, cheap or dear; he took his
lunch with him to the City, and joined his wife in the evening at high
tea--chops, a bit of steak, or cold meat from the Sunday's dinner. Mrs.
Darnell ate bread and jam and drank a little milk in the middle of the
day; but, with the utmost economy, the effort to live within their means
and to save for future contingencies was a very hard one. They had
determined to do without change of air for at least three years, as the
honeymoon at Walton-on-the-Naze had cost a good deal; and it was on this
ground that they had, somewhat illogically, reserved the ten pounds,
declaring that as they were not to have any holiday they would spend the
money on something useful. And it was this consideration of utility that was finally fatal to
Darnell's scheme. They had calculated and recalculated the expense of
the bed and bedding, the linoleum, and the ornaments, and by a great
deal of exertion the total expenditure had been made to assume the shape
of 'something very little over ten pounds,' when Mary said quite
suddenly--

'But, after all, Edward, we don't really _want_ to furnish the room at
all. I mean it isn't necessary. And if we did so it might lead to no end
of expense. People would hear of it and be sure to fish for invitations.