She told herself stories of the times when Jeremy would have to depend entirely upon the splendour of her brains for his delivery from some horror--death, torture or disgrace. At present those times were, she was bound to confess to herself, very distant. He depended upon no one for anything; he could not be said to need Mary's assistance in any particular. And with this burning desire of hers came, of course, jealousy. There are some happy, easy natures to whom jealousy is, through life, unknown. They are to be envied. Jealousy in a grown-up human being is bad; in a child it is terrible. Had you told Mrs. Cole--good mother though she was--that her daughter Mary, aged seven, suffered tortures through jealousy, she would have assured you that it was not, in reality, jealousy, but rather indigestion, and that a little medicine would put it right.
Mary was quite helpless. What is a child to do if she is jealous? Other children do not understand her, her elders laugh at her. Mary, with a wisdom greatly beyond her years, realised very quickly that this was some sort of horrible disease, with which she must wrestle alone. Above all, she must never allow Jeremy to know anything about it. He was, of course, sublimely unaware of the matter; he knew that Mary was silly sometimes, but he attributed that to her sex; he went on his way, happily indifferent whether anyone cared for him or no...
Mary suffered agonies when, as sometimes happened, Jeremy sat with his arm round Helen's neck and his cheek up against hers. She suffered when, in a mood of tempestuous affection to the whole world, he kissed Miss Jones. She even suffered when he sat at his mother's feet whilst she read “The Dove in the Eagle's Nest,” or “Engel the Fearless.”
Most of all, however, she suffered over Hamlet. She knew that at this present time Hamlet was the one creature for whom Jeremy passionately cared. He loved his mother, but with the love that custom and habit has tamed and modified, although since Mrs. Cole's illness in the early summer he had cared for her in a manner more demonstrative and openly affectionate. Nevertheless, it was Hamlet who commanded Jeremy's heart, and Mary knew it. Matters were made worse by the undoubted truth that Hamlet did not care very much for Mary--that is, he never gave any signs of caring, and very often walked out of the room when she came into it. Mary could have cared for the dog as enthusiastically as Jeremy--she was always sentimental about animals--but now she was shut out from their alliance, and she knew that when she came up to them and began to pat or stroke Hamlet, Jeremy was annoyed and Hamlet's skin wriggled in a kind of retreating fashion under her fingers. Wise people will say that it is impossible for this to be a serious trouble to a child. It was increasingly serious to Mary.