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Eveline
（伊芙林）
She
sat
at
the
window
watching
the
evening
invade
the
avenue.
Her
head
was
leaned
against the window curtains and in her
nostrils was the odour of dusty cretonne.
She was tired.
Few people passed. The man out of the
last house passed on his way
home
；
she
heard
his footsteps clacking along the concrete pavement
and afterwards crunching
on
the
cinder
path
before
the
new
red
houses.
One
time
there
used
to
be
a
field
there
in
which they used to play every evening with other
people's children. Then a man
from
Belfast
bought
the
field
and
built
houses
in
it
——
not
like
their
little
brown
houses
but bright brick
houses
with
shining roofs. The children of the
avenue used
to
play
together
in
that
field
——
the
Devines
，
the
Waters
，
the
Dunns
，
little
Keogh
the
cripple
，
she and her
brothers and sisters.
Ernest
，
however
，
never
played
：
he was
too grown up. Her father used often to hunt them
in out of the field with
his blackthorn
stick
；
but usually
little Keogh used to
keep
nix and call out when
he
saw
her
father
coming.
Still
they
seemed
to
have
been
rather
happy
then.
Her
father
was not so bad
then
；
and
besides
，
her mother was
alive. That was a long time
ago
；
she
and
her
brothers
and
sisters
were
all
grown
up
her
mother
was
dead.
Tizzie
Dunn
was <
/p>
dead
，
too
，
and
the
Waters
had
gone
back
to
England.
Everything
changes.
Now
she
was going
to go away like the
others
，
to leave her home.
Home
！
She
looked
round
the
room
，
reviewing
all
its
familiar
objects
which
she
had
dusted
once
a
week
for
so
many
years
，
wondering
where
on
earth
all
the
dust
came
from. Perhaps she would
never see again those familiar objects from which
she had
never dreamed of being divided.
And yet during all those years she had never found
out the name of the priest whose
yellowing photograph hung on the wall above the
broken
harmonium
beside
the
coloured
print
of
the
promises
made
to
Blessed
Margaret
Mary Alacoque. He
had been a school friend of her father. Whenever
he showed the
photograph to a visitor
her father used to pass it with a casual
word
：
“
He is in Melbourne
now.
”
She had consented to go
away
，
to leave her home. Was
that wise
？
She tried to
weigh each side of the question. In her
home anyway she had shelter and
food
；
she
had
those whom she had known all her life about her.
Of course she had to work
hard,both in
the house and at business. What would they say of
her in the Stores
when
they
found
out
that
she
had
run
away
with
a
fellow?
Say
she
was
a
fool
，
perhaps
；
and
her place would be filled up by advertisement.
Miss Gavan would be glad. She
had
always had an edge on
her
，
especially whenever
there were people listening.
“
Miss
Hill
，
don't you see these
ladies are waiting
？”
“
Look
lively
，
Miss
Hill
，
please.
”
She would not cry many
tears at leaving the Stores.
But in her new
home
，
in a distant unknown
country
，
it would not be like
that.
Then she would be married
——
she
，
Eveline. People would
treat her with respect
then.
She
would
not
be
treated
as
her
mother
had
been.
Even
now
，
though
she
was
over
nineteen
，
she
sometimes felt herself in danger of her father's
violence. She knew
it was that that had
given her the palpitations. When they were growing
up he had
never gone for her like he
used to go for Harry and
Ernest
，
because she was a
girl
but latterly he had begun to
threaten her and say what he would do to her only
for
her dead mother's sake. And no she
had nobody to protect her. Ernest was dead and
Harry
，
who
was
in
the
church
decorating
business
，
was
nearly
always
down
somewhere
in
the country. Besides
，
the
invariable squabble for money on Saturday nights
had
begun
to
weary
her
unspeakably.
She
always
gave
her
entire
wages
——
seven
shillings
——
and
Harry always sent up what he could but the trouble
was to get any money
from her father.
He said she used to squander the
money
，
that she had no
head
，
that he wasn't going to
give her his hard-earned money to throw about the
streets
，
and
much
more
，
for
he
was
usually
fairly
bad
on
Saturday
night.
In
the
end
he
would
give
her
the
money
and
ask
her
had
she
any
intention
of
buying
Sunday's
dinner.
Then
she
had
to
rush
out
as
quickly
as
she
could
and
do
her
marketing
，
holding
her
black
leather
purse tightly in her hand as she elbowed her way
through the crowds and
returning
home
late
under
her
load
of
provisions.
She
had
hard
work
to
keep
the
house
together
and
to
see
that
the
two
young
children
who
had
been
left
to
hr
charge
went
to
school
regularly
and
got
their
meals
regularly.
It
was
hard
work
——
a
hard
life
——
but
now
that
she
was
about
to
leave
it
she
did
not
find
it
a
wholly
undesirable
life.
She was about
to explore another life with Frank. Frank was very
kind
，
manly
，
open-hearted. She was to go away
with him by the night-boat to be his wife and to
live with him in Buenos Ayres where he
had a home waiting for her. How well she
remembered the first time she had seen
him
；
he was lodging in a
house on the main
road
where
she
used
to
visit.
It
seemed
a
few
weeks
ago.
He
was
standing
at
the
gate
，
his peaked
cap pushed back on his head and his hair tumbled
forward over a face of
bronze.
Then
they
had
come
to
know
each
other.
He
used
to
meet
her
outside
the
Stores
every evening and see
her home. He took her to see The Bohemian Girl and
she felt
elated as she sat in an
unaccustomed part of the theatre with him. He was
awfully
fond of music and sang a
little. People knew that they were courting
and
，
when he
sang
about the lass that loves a
sailor
，
she always felt
pleasantly confused. He
used
to call
her
Poppens out
of fun.
First of all it
had
been an
excitement for her
to
have
a
fellow
and
then
she
had
begun
to
like
him.
He
had
tales
of
distant
countries.
He had started as
a deck boy at a pound a month on a ship of the
Allan Line going
out to Canada. He told
her the names of the ships he had been on and the
names of
the different services. He had
sailed through the Straits of Magellan and he told
her
stories
of
the
terrible
Patagonians.
He
had
fallen
on
his
feet
in
Buenos
Ayres
，
he
said
，
and had come over to
the old country just for a holiday. Of
course
，
her
father
had found out the affair and had forbidden her to
have anything to say to
him.
“
I
know these sailor
chaps
，
”
he said.
One day he had
quarrelled with Frank and after that she had to
meet her lover
secretly.
The evening deepened in the
avenue. The white of two letters in her lap grew
indistinct. One was to
Harry
；
the other was to her
father. Ernest had been her
favourite
but
she
liked
Harry
too.
Her
father
was
becoming
old
lately
，
she
noticed
；
he would
miss her. Sometimes he could be very nice. Not
long before
，
when she had
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