For a while, however, nothing had come of it. Joanna was far too much absorbed in her love, and her energies were too completely engaged in withstanding her lover’s strange, recurrent exhaustions, to have anything to spare for her brother.

Yet it was through Louis that in due time the fleeting friendship was brought to flower.

They had been lovers a year, and Joanna was suffering from one of Louis’s long absences, when she began with all the vigour of her awakened faculties, to handle a situation which till now had found her quite at its mercy. Of late something different from endurance (either of the stoical or the Christian variety) had stiffened itself in her. She knew that if she could not bring about a change between Louis and herself misery must ensue for both. And all that was most robust in her nature rose in a sudden demand for happiness, for happiness and fair play.

At the moment she was certainly miserable. It was the seventh time that Louis by his going had left her to an empty existence in Glasgow. That was what it had come to. Existence without him was a mere shell, a semblance, a waiting. Yet it appeared from his letters, that he all the while was contriving to lead a full enough, real enough life away from her. He spoke torturingly of his boys and their doings, of pleasant hours passed with friends, of successful parties in the newly decorated studio at Campden Hill. True, he wrote that things were only endurable because of her being there in the background, that they would be intolerable were it not for the thought of their next meeting. And Joanna was happy in knowing that he meant what he said. But it was not enough. Besides, if she in return were to write of her hideous loneliness, he would be sure to reply in the distressed and powerless tone which she most dreaded. His only suggestion – made for the hundredth time – would be that she should come to London to live, as there he thought things would be easier for them both. As if she herself were not working towards London incessantly! But it would take time as he knew. He knew she had promised her mother to stay at home for at least another year until some satisfactory household arrangement could be come by. Meanwhile she needed other comfort than that they should take things as they came, remain cheerful in absence, make the best of hours together.

It wasn’t fair! Joanna had accepted it, borne with it, even hugged it for twelve months and more. But it wasn’t fair! With a single irrevocable movement her characteristic sense of balance righted her.