The Triumph of Jill — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
The Triumph of Jill
John Stuart Mill · en
Jill crouched by the window for the rest of the morning hugging this new
trouble which had dwarfed all the others into insignificance. At first
she was too dazed to feel anything much, then gradually the anguish of
mind grew keener until it seemed unbearable, and finally exhausted
itself by its own violence. After that came a lull, and then followed
resentment, fierce, active, healthy resentment that left absolutely no
room for any other emotion; resentment against her recent visitor,
angry, contemptuous, indignant; resentment against Miss Bolton of the
fiercely jealous order; but keenest of all resentment against St. John,
the cold, inflexible, heartsore resentment of wounded love. He ought to
have told her of his engagement; if not actually dishonourable it was
mean of him to have suppressed the fact when he must have seen that he
was becoming necessary to her, when he knew, too, that she was more
than, under the circumstances, she should have been to him; for that he
did care for her she did not doubt--infatuation his father had called
it, and it might be that he was right. At any rate St. John should have
left the Art School before it had grown too late. This feeling of anger
acted as a tonic to Jill; it braced her nerves and put her on her
mettle, so that she determined to face her trouble and conquer it, and
if possible show St. John what a poor opinion she had of him. But then
came the remembrance of her small debts and her poverty. It had been a
bad thing for her this acquaintance with St. John; she had not relied
sufficiently on herself. When he was gone the fee would cease, and she
had not sold any work for weeks. The last canvas that she had been
engaged upon before her illness, painting from a model St. John had
employed, stood against the wall unfinished and there were others ready
for sale but nowhere to dispose of them. In the afternoon she went
out--there was no time for holidays now--in search of a market, and
returned in the evening weary, footsore, miserable, having had no luck
at all with her canvasses, but--oh! the degradation to Jill's
artist-soul--having been obliged to accept as the only thing going an
order for half-a-dozen nightdress sachets--`pyjama bags' as the oily,
leering, facetious individual who had given her the commission called
them.
"There was a run on 'em," he had added, "the swells like painted satin
things to keep their night-gear in."
Jill had agreed to do the work, but she looked far from happy over it,
and very nearly cried as she turned to leave the shop. The facetious
individual had chucked her under the chin, and told her to `buck up,'
and he would look round and see if there wasn't something else he could
find her to `daub.' Then he winked at her, and Jill had broken away in
haste fearing that these overtures would lead to an embrace. And so she
reached home, and that night went early to bed, and Thursday ended
unhappily even as it had begun.