Five Tales.............................................................................................................................................................1

John Galsworthy......................................................................................................................................1

It was a dark room at that hour of six in the evening, when just the single oil readinglamp under its green

shade let fall a dapple of light over the Turkey carpet; over the covers of books taken out of the bookshelves,

and the open pages of the one selected; over the deep blue and gold of the coffee service on the little old stool

with its Oriental embroidery. Very dark in the winter, with drawn curtains, many rows of leatherbound

volumes, oakpanelled walls and ceiling. So large, too, that the lighted spot before the fire where he sat was

just an oasis. But that was what Keith Darrant liked, after his day's workthe hard early morning study of

his "cases," the fret and strain of the day in court; it was his rest, these two hours before dinner, with books,

coffee, a pipe, and sometimes a nap. In red Turkish slippers and his old brown velvet coat, he was well suited

to that framing of glow and darkness. A painter would have seized avidly on his clearcut, yellowish face,

with its black eyebrows twisting up over eyesgrey or brown, one could hardly tell, and its dark grizzling

hair still plentiful, in spite of those daily hours of wig. He seldom thought of his work while he sat there,

throwing off with practised ease the strain of that long attention to the multiple threads of argument and

evidence to be disentangled work profoundly interesting, as a rule, to his clear intellect, trained to almost

instinctive rejection of all but the essential, to selection of what was legally vital out of the mass of confused

tactical and human detail presented to his scrutiny; yet sometimes tedious and wearing. As for instance

today, when he had suspected his client of perjury, and was almost convinced that he must throw up his

brief. He had disliked the weaklooking, whitefaced fellow from the first, and his nervous, shifty answers,

his prominent startled eyesa type too common in these days of canting tolerations and weak

Of the three books he had taken down, a Volume of Voltairecurious fascination that Frenchman had, for

all his destructive irony!a volume of Burton's travels, and Stevenson's "New Arabian Nights," he had

pitched upon the last. He felt, that evening, the want of something sedative, a desire to rest from thought of

any kind. The court had been crowded, stuffy; the air, as he walked home, soft, sou'westerly, charged with

coming moisture, no quality of vigour in it; he felt relaxed, tired, even nervy, and for once the loneliness of

Lowering the lamp, he turned his face towards the fire. Perhaps he would get a sleep before that boring dinner

at the Tellasson's. He wished it were vacation, and Maisie back from school. A widower for many years, he

had lost the habit of a woman about him; yet tonight he had a positive yearning for the society of his young

daughter, with her quick ways, and bright, dark eyes. Curious what perpetual need of a woman some men

had! His brother Laurencewastedall through womenatrophy of willpower! A man on the edge of

things; living from hand to mouth; his gifts all down at heel! One would have thought the Scottish strain

might have saved him; and yet, when a Scotsman did begin to go downhill, who could go faster? Curious that

their mother's blood should have worked so differently in her two sons. He himself had always felt he owed

His thoughts went off at a tangent to a certain issue troubling his legal conscience. He had not wavered in the

usual assumption of omniscience, but he was by no means sure that he had given right advice. Well! Without

that power to decide and hold to decision in spite of misgiving, one would never have been fit for one's

position at the Bar, never have been fit for anything. The longer he lived, the more certain he became of the

prime necessity of virile and decisive action in all the affairs of life. A word and a blowand the blow first!

Doubts, hesitations, sentiment the muling and puking of this twilight age! And there welled up on his

handsome face a smile that was almost devilishthe tricks of firelight are so many! It faded again in sheer

He woke with a start, having a feeling of something out beyond the light, and without turning his head said:

"What's that?" There came a sound as if somebody had caught his breath. He turned up the lamp.

Something in the tone, or perhaps just being startled out of sleep like this, made him shiver. He said:

It was noticeable that he did not get up, or even turn his head, now that he knew who it was, but waited, his

halfclosed eyes fixed on the fire, for his brother to come forward. A visit from Laurence was not an

unmixed blessing. He could hear him breathing, and became conscious of a scent of whisky. Why could not

the fellow at least abstain when he was coming here! It was so childish, so lacking in any sense of proportion

It was always something. He often wondered at the strength of that sense of trusteeship, which kept him still

tolerant of the troubles, amenable to the petitions of this brother of his; or was it just "blood" feeling, a

Highland sense of loyalty to kith and kin; an old time quality which judgment and half his instincts told him

was weakness but which, in spite of all, bound him to the distressful fellow? Was he drunk now, that he kept

He was coming now, avoiding the light, skirting along the walls just beyond the radiance of the lamp, his feet

and legs to the waist brightly lighted, but his face disintegrated in shadow, like the face of a dark ghost.

Still no answer, save a shake of that head, and the passing up of a hand, out of the light, to the ghostly

forehead under the dishevelled hair. The scent of whisky was stronger now; and Keith thought:

The figure against the wall heaved a sighso truly from an overburdened heart that Keith was conscious

with a certain dismay of not having yet fathomed the cause of this uncanny silence. He got up, and, back to

'What is it, man? Have you committed a murder, that you stand there dumb as a fish?"

The sense of unreality which so helps one at moments of disaster enabled Keith to say vigorously:

"What do you mean? Come here, where I can see you. What's the matter with you, Larry?"

With a sudden lurch and dive, his brother left the shelter of the shadow, and sank into a chair in the circle of

Keith stepped quickly forward, and stared down into his brother's face; and instantly he saw that it was true.

No one could have simulated the look in those eyesof horrified wonder, as if they would never again get

on terms with the face to which they belonged. To see them squeezed the heartonly real misery could look

But it was significant that he lowered his voice; went over to the door, too, to see if it were shut. Laurence

had drawn his chair forward, huddling over the firea thin figure, a worn, high cheekboned face with

deepsunk blue eyes, and wavy hair all ruffled, a face that still had a certain beauty. Putting a hand on that

The noisy violence of that outburst acted like a douche. What was the fellow aboutshouting out such

words! But suddenly Laurence lifted his hands and wrung them. The gesture was so utterly painful that it

Larry's face was really unearthly sometimes, such strange gleams passed up on to it!

"Whom else should I tell? I came to know what I'm to do, Keith? Give myself up, or what?"

At that sudden introduction of the practical Keith felt his heart twitch. Was it then as real as all that? But he

In Larry's face there wasthere had always beensomething childishly truthful. He would never stand a

"How? Where? You'd better tell me quietly from the beginning. Drink this coffee; it'll clear your head."

"Yes," he said. "It's like this, Keith. There's a girl I've known for some months now"

"Her father was a Pole who died over here when she was sixteen, and left her all alone. A man called Walenn,

a mongrel American, living in the same house, married her, or pretended toshe's very pretty, Keithhe

left her with a baby six months old, and another coming. That one died, and she did nearly. Then she starved

till another fellow took her on. She lived with him two years; then Walenn turned up again, and made her go

back to him. The brute used to beat her black and blue, all for nothing. Then he left her again. When I met her

"But I've never met a sweeter woman, nor ,a truer, that I swear. Woman! She's only twenty now! When I

went to her last night, that brutethat Walennhad found her out again; and when he came for me,

swaggering and bullyingLook!"he touched a dark mark on his forehead"I took his throat in my

"We sat by it a long time. Then I carried it on my back down the street, round a corner to an archway."

And seizing the journal that lay on his bureau, Keith read again that paragraph: "The body of a man was

found this morning under an archway in Glove Lane, Soho. From marks about the throat grave suspicions of

foul play are entertained. The body had apparently been robbed, and nothing was discovered leading to

It was an empty envelope with a South American postmark addressed: "Patrick Walenn, Simon's Hotel,

Then suddenly he stooped to pluck it out. By that commandhe had identified himself with thisthis

But he did not pluck it out. It blackened, writhed, and vanished. And once more he said:

"You know about these things. I didn't mean to kill him. I love the girl. What shall I do, Keith?

Think! Think out this accursed thingso beyond all thought, and all belief. But he could not think. Not a

"Is there anyone living in that house or street who would be likely to know her as his wife?"

"Now, listen, Larry. When you leave here go straight home, and don't go out till I come to you, tomorrow

"I've got a dinner engagement. I'll think this out. Don't drink. Don't talk! Pull yourself together."

That white face, those eyes, that shaking hand! With a twinge of pity in the midst of all the turbulence of his

revolt, and fear, and disgust Keith put his hand on his brother's shoulder, and said:

Laurence Darrant, leaving his brother's house in the Adelphi, walked northwards, rapidly, slowly, rapidly

again. For, if there are men who by force of will do one thing only at a time, there are men who from lack of

will do now one thing, now another; with equal intensity. To such natures, to be gripped by the Nemesis

which attends the lack of selfcontrol is no reason for being more self controlled. Rather does it foster their

pet feeling: "What matter? Tomorrow we die!" The effort of will required to go to Keith had relieved,

exhausted and exasperated him. In accordance with those three feelings was the progress of his walk. He

started from the door with the fixed resolve to go home and stay there quietly till Keith came. He was in

Keith's hands, Keith would know what was to be done. But he had not gone three hundred yards before he

felt so utterly weary, body and soul, that if he had but had a pistol in his pocket he would have shot himself in

the street. Not even the thought of the girlthis young unfortunate with her strange devotion, who had kept

him straight these last five months, who had roused in him a depth of feeling he had never known

beforewould have availed against that sudden black defection. Why go ona waif at the mercy of his own

nature, a straw blown here and there by every gust which rose in him? Why not have done with it for ever,

He was approaching the fatal street, where he and the girl, that early morning, had spent the hours clutched

together, trying in the refuge of love to forget for a moment their horror and fear. Should he go in? He had

promised Keith not to. Why had he promised? He caught sight of himself in a chemist's lighted window.

Miserable, shadowy brute! And he remembered suddenly a dog he had picked up once in the streets of Pera, a

blackandwhite creaturedifferent from the other dogs, not one of their breed, a pariah of pariahs, who

had strayed there somehow. He had taken it home to the house where he was staying, contrary to all custom

of the country; had got fond of it; had shot it himself, sooner than leave it behind again to the mercies of its

own kind in the streets. Twelve years ago! And those sleevelinks made of little Turkish coins he had brought

back for the girl at the hairdresser's in Chancery Lane where he used to get shavedpretty creature, like a

wild rose. He had asked of her a kiss for payment. What queer emotion when she put her face forward to his

lipsa sort of passionate tenderness and shame, at the softness and warmth of that flushed cheek, at her

beauty and trustful gratitude. She would soon have given herself to himthat one! He had never gone there

again! And to this day he did not know why he had abstained; to this day he did not know whether he were

glad or sorry not to have plucked that rose. He must surely have been very different then! Queer business,

lifequeer, queer business!to go through it never knowing what you would do next. Ah! to be like Keith,

steady, buttonedup in success; a brass pot, a pillar of society! Once, as a boy, he had been within an ace of

killing Keith, for sneering at him. Once in Southern Italy he had been near killing a driver who was flogging

his horse. And now, that darkfaced, swinish bully who had ruined the girl he had grown to lovehe had

He who did not want to hurt a fly. The chemist's window comforted him with the sudden thought that he had

at home that which made him safe, in case they should arrest him. He would never again go out without some

of those little white tablets sewn into the lining of his coat. Restful, even exhilarating thought! They said a

man should not take his own life. Let them taste horrorthose glib citizens! Let them live as that girl had

lived, as millions lived all the world over, under their canting dogmas! A man might rather even take his life

He went into the chemist's for a bromide; and, while the man was mixing it, stood resting one foot like a tired

horse. The "life" he had squeezed out of that fellow! After all, a billion living creatures gave up life each day,

had it squeezed out of them, mostly. And perhaps not one a day deserved death so much as that loathly

fellow. Life! a breathaflame! Nothing! Why, then, this icy clutching at his heart?

The man's eyes seemed to say: 'Yes! Burning the candle at both ends I know!' Odd life, a chemist's; pills

and powders all day long, to hold the machinery of men together! Devilish odd trade!

In going out he caught the reflection of his face in a mirror; it seemed too good altogether for a man who had

committed murder. There was a sort of brightness underneath, an amiability lurking about its shadows;

howhow could it be the face of a man who had done what he had done? His head felt lighter now, his feet

Curious feeling of relief and oppression all at once! Frightfulto long for company, for talk, for distraction;

andto be afraid of it! The girlthe girl and Keith were now the only persons who would not give him that

feeling of dread. And, of those twoKeith was not...! Who could consort with one who was never wrong, a

successful, righteous fellow; a chap built so that he knew nothing about himself, wanted to know nothing, a

chap all solid actions? To be a quicksand swallowing up one's own resolutions was bad enough! But to be

like Keithall willpower, marching along, treading down his own feelings and weaknesses! No! One could

not make a comrade of a man like Keith, even if he were one's brother? The only creature in all the world was

the girl. She alone knew and felt what he was feeling; would put up with him and love him whatever he did,

or was done to him. He stopped and took shelter in a doorway, to light a cigarette. He had suddenly a fearful

wish to pass the archway where he had placed the body; a fearful wish that had no sense, no end in view, no

anything; just an insensate craving to see the dark place again. He crossed Borrow Street to the little lane.

There was only one person visible, a man on the far side with his shoulders hunched against the wind; a short,

dark figure which crossed and came towards him in the flickering lamplight. What a face! Yellow, ravaged,

clothed almost to the eyes in a stubbly greyish growth of beard, with blackish teeth, and haunting bloodshot

eyes. And what a figure of ragsone shoulder higher than the other, one leg a little lame, and thin! A surge

of feeling came up in Laurence for this creature, more unfortunate than himself. There were lower depths

The smile which gleamed out on the man's face seemed as unlikely as a smile on a scarecrow.

"Prosperity doesn't come my way," he said in a rusty voice. "I'm a failurealways been a failure. And yet

"Keep your money," he said. "I've got more than you today, I daresay. But thank you for taking a little

"Yes," the rusty voice went on; "I'd as soon die as go on living as I do. And now I've lost my selfrespect.

Often wondered how long a starving man could go without losing his selfrespect. Not so very long. You

take my word for that." And without the slightest change in the monotony of that creaking voice he added:

The words: 'So have I!' leaped up to Laurence's lips; he choked them down with a sort of terror.

"I wish you better luck," he said. "Goodnight!" and hurried away. A sort of ghastly laughter was forcing its

way up in his throat. Was everyone talking of the murder he had committed? Even the very scarecrows?

There are some natures so constituted that, due to be hung at ten o'clock, they will play chess at eight. Such

men invariably rise. They make especially good bishops, editors, judges, impresarios, Prime ministers,

moneylenders, and generals; in fact, fill with exceptional credit any position of power over their

fellowmen. They have spiritual cold storage, in which are preserved their nervous systems. In such men

there is little or none of that fluid sense and continuity of feeling known under those vague terms,

speculation, poetry, philosophy. Men of facts and of decision switching imagination on and off at will,

subordinating sentiment to reason... one does not think of them when watching wind ripple over cornfields, or

Keith Darrant had need for being of that breed during his dinner at the Tellassons. It was just eleven when he

issued from the big house in Portland Place and refrained from taking a cab. He wanted to walk that he might

better think. What crude and wanton irony there was in his situation! To have been made fatherconfessor to

a murderer, he well on towards a judgeship! With his contempt for the kind of weakness which landed

men in such abysses, he felt it all so sordid, so "impossible," that he could hardly bring his mind to bear on it

at all. And yet he must, because of two powerful instinctsself preservation and bloodloyalty.

The wind had still the sapping softness of the afternoon, but rain had held off so far. It was warm, and he

unbuttoned his fur overcoat. The nature of his thoughts deepened the dark austerity of his face, whose thin,

wellcut lips were always pressing together, as if, by meeting, to dispose of each thought as it came up. He

moved along the crowded pavements glumly. That air of festive conspiracy which drops with the darkness on

This ghastly business! Convinced of its reality, he yet could not see it. The thing existed in his mind, not as a

picture, but as a piece of irrefutable evidence. Larry had not meant to do it, of course. But it was murder, all

the same. Men like Larryweak, impulsive, sentimental, introspective creaturesdid they ever mean what

they did? This man, this Walenn, was, by all accounts, better dead than alive; no need to waste a thought on

him! But, crimethe uglinessJustice unsatisfied! Crime concealedand his own share in the

concealment! And yetbrother to brother! Surely no one could demand action from him! It was only a

question of what he was going to advise Larry to do. To keep silent, and disappear? Had that a chance of

success? Perhaps if the answers to his questions had been correct. But this girl! Suppose the dead man's

relationship to her were ferreted out, could she be relied on not to endanger Larry? These women were all the

same, unstable as water, emotional, shiftless pests of society. Then, too, a crime untracked, dogging all his

brother's after life; a secret following him wherever he might vanish to; hanging over him, watching for some

drunken moment, to slip out of his lips. It was bad to think of. A clean breast of it? But his heart twitched

within him. "Brother of Mr. Keith Darrant, the wellknown King's Counsel"visiting a woman of the town,

strangling with his bare hands the woman's husband! No intention to murder, buta dead man! A dead man

carried out of the house, laid under a dark archway! Provocation! Recommended to mercypenal servitude

And he had a sudden vision of shaven men with claycoloured features, run, as it were, to seed, as he had

seen them once in Pentonville, when he had gone there to visit a prisoner. Larry! Whom, as a baby creature,

he had watched straddling; whom, as a little fellow, he had fagged; whom he had seen through scrapes at

college; to whom he had lent money time and again, and time and again admonished in his courses. Larry!

Five years younger than himself; and committed to his charge by their mother when she died. To become for

life one of those men with faces like diseased plants; with no hair but a bushy stubble; with arrows marked on

their yellow clothes! Larry! One of those men herded like sheep; at the beck and call of common men! A

gentleman, his own brother, to live that slave's life, to be ordered here and there, year after year, day in, day

out. Something snapped within him. He could not give that advice. Impossible! But if not, he must make sure

of his ground, must verify, must know. This Glove Lanethis arch way? It would not be far from where he

was that very moment. He looked for someone of whom to make enquiry. A policeman was standing at the

corner, his stolid face illumined by a lamp; capable and watchfulan excellent officer, no doubt; but, turning

his head away, Keith passed him without a word. Strange to feel that cold, uneasy feeling in presence of the

law! A grim little driving home of what it all meant! Then, suddenly, he saw that the turning to his left was

Borrow Street itself. He walked up one side, crossed over, and returned. He passed Number Fortytwo, a

small house with business names printed on the lifeless windows of the first and second floors; with dark

curtained windows on the ground floor, or was there just a slink of light in one corner? Which way had Larry

turned? Which way under that grisly burden? Fifty paces of this squalid streetnarrow, and dark, and empty,

thank heaven! Glove Lane! Here it was! A tiny runlet of a street. And here! He had run right on to the

"That's right, gov'nor! That's the place!" He needed all his self control to turn leisurely to the speaker. "'Ere's

where they found the bodyvery spot leanin' up 'ere. They ain't got 'im yet. Lytestme lord!"

It was a ragged boy holding out a tattered yellowish journal. His lynx eyes peered up from under lanky wisps

of hair, and his voice had the proprietary note of one making "a corner" in his news. Keith took the paper and

gave him twopence. He even found a sort of comfort in the young ghoul's hanging about there; it meant that

others besides himself had come morbidly to look. By the dim lamplight he read: "Glove Lane garrotting

mystery. Nothing has yet been discovered of the murdered man's identity; from the cut of his clothes he is

supposed to be a foreigner." The boy had vanished, and Keith saw the figure of a policeman coming slowly

down this gutter of a street. A second's hesitation, and he stood firm. Nothing obviously could have brought

him here save this "mystery," and he stayed quietly staring at the arch. The policeman moved up abreast.

Keith saw that he was the one whom he had passed just now. He noted the cold offensive question die out of

the man's eyes when they caught the gleam of white shirtfront under the opened fur collar. And holding up

"Well, we can't always go by the papers. But I don't fancy they do know much about it, yet."

The policeman nodded. "There's not an arch in London where we don't get 'em sometimes."

"Not a copper. Pockets inside out. There's some funny characters about this quarter. Greeks, Hitaliansall

He looked back from Borrow Street. The policeman was still standing there holding up his lantern, so that its

Now that he had seen this dark, deserted spot, the chances seemed to him much better. "Pockets inside out!"

Either Larry had had presence of mind to do a very clever thing, or someone had been at the body before the

police found it. That was the more likely. A dead backwater of a place. At three o'clockloneliest of all

hours Larry's five minutes' grim excursion to and fro might well have passed unseen! Now, it all depended

on the girl; on whether Laurence had been seen coming to her or going away; on whether, if the man's

relationship to her were discovered, she could be relied on to say nothing. There was not a soul in Borrow

Street now; hardly even a lighted window; and he took one of those rather desperate decisions only possible

to men daily accustomed to the instant taking of responsibility. He would go to her, and see for himself. He

came to the door of Fortytwo, obviously one of those which are only shut at night, and tried the larger key.

It fitted, and he was in a gas lighted passage, with an oilclothed floor, and a single door to his left. He

stood there undecided. She must be made to understand that he knew everything. She must not be told more

than that he was a friend of Larry's. She must not be frightened, yet must be forced to give her very soul

away. A hostile witnessnot to be treated as hostilea matter for delicate handling! But his knock was not

Should he give up this nerveracking, bizarre effort to come at a basis of judgment; go away, and just tell

Laurence that he could not advise him? And thenwhat? Something must be done. He knocked again. Still

no answer. And with that impatience of being thwarted, natural to him, and fostered to the full by the

conditions of his life, he tried the other key. It worked, and he opened the door. Inside all was dark, but a

voice from some way off, with a sort of breathless relief in its foreign tones, said:

"Oh! then it's you, Larry! Why did you knock? I was so frightened. Turn up the light, dear. Come in!"

Feeling by the door for a switch in the pitch blackness he was conscious of arms round his neck, a warm

thinly clad body pressed to his own; then withdrawn as quickly, with a gasp, and the most awful

There was such silence that he could hear a clock ticking, and the sound of his own hand passing over the

surface of the wall, trying to find the switch. He found it, and in the light which leaped up he saw, stiffened

against a dark curtain evidently screening off a bedroom, a girl standing, holding a long black coat together at

her throat, so that her face with its pale brown hair, short and square cut and curling up underneath, had an

uncanny look of being detached from any body. Her face was so alabaster pale that the staring, startled eyes,

dark blue or brown, and the faint rose of the parted lips, were like colour stainings on a white mask; and it

had a strange delicacy, truth, and pathos, such as only suffering brings. Though not susceptible to aesthetic

"You needn't be afraid. I haven't come to do you harmquite the contrary. May I sit down and talk?" And,

holding up the keys, he added: "Laurence wouldn't have given me these, would he, if he hadn't trusted me?"

Still she did not move, and he had the impression that he was looking at a spirita spirit startled out of its

flesh. Nor at the moment did it seem in the least strange that he should conceive such an odd thought. He

stared round the roomclean and tawdry, with its tarnished gilt mirror, marbletopped sidetable, and

plushcovered sofa. Twenty years and more since he had been in such a place. And he said:

And, moved suddenly beyond the realm of caution by the terror in that whisper, he answered:

She uttered a little sigh of relief which went to Keith's heart, and, still holding the dark coat together at her

throat, came forward and sat down on the sofa. He could see that her feet, thrust into slippers, were bare; with

her short hair, and those candid startled eyes, she looked like a tall child. He drew up a chair and said:

"You must forgive me coming at such an hour; he's told me, you see." He expected her to flinch and gasp; but

And suddenly realising that the man must have fallen dead just where he was sitting, Keith became stock

How she said that! With what a strange gentle despair! In this girl of evil life, who had brought on them this

Impossible to mistake the tone of her voice, or the look in her eyes, true deep Slav eyes; dark brown, not blue

as he had thought at first. It was a very pretty faceeither her life had not eaten into it yet, or the suffering of

these last hours had purged away those marks; or perhaps this devotion of hers to Larry. He felt strangely at

sea, sitting there with this child of twenty; he, over forty, a man of the world, professionally used to every

"II have come to see how far you can save him. Listen, and just answer the questions I put to you."

"No. When I came here, after my little girl died, I came to live a bad life. Nobody knows me at all. I am quite

"I do not know. He did not let people think I was married to him. I was very young; he treated many, I think,

"No; I am very quiet. And since I knew your brother, I see no one. Nobody comes here but him for a long

It was said with a certain dreadful simplicity, and pressing her hands together, she went on:

"He is in danger, because of me. I am so afraid for him." Holding up his hand to check that emotion, he said:

She fixed those dark eyes on him, and in her bare throat, from which the coat had fallen back, he could see

"If the worst comes to the worst, and this man is traced to you, can you trust yourself not to give my brother

"Look! I have burned all the things he has given meeven his picture. Now I have nothing from him."

She shook her head, looking at him intently, with those mournfully true eyes. And he felt a sort of shame.

Her lips quivered; but she bowed her head. Suddenly he found her quite close to him, speaking almost in a

"Please do not take him from me altogether. I will be so careful. I will not do anything to hurt him; but if I

cannot see him sometimes, I shall die. Please do not take him from me." And catching his hand between her

He felt her lips kissing his hand. And the soft moist touch sent a queer feeling through him, protective, yet

just a little brutal, having in it a shiver of sensuality. He withdrew his hand. And as if warned that she had

been too pressing, she recoiled humbly. But suddenly she turned, and stood absolutely rigid; then almost

inaudibly whispered: "Listen! Someone outout there!" And darting past him she turned out the light.

Almost at once came a knock on the door. He could feelactually feel the terror of this girl beside him in the

dark. And he, too, felt terror. Who could it be? No one came but Larry, she had said. Who else then could it

be? Again came the knock, louder! He felt the breath of her whisper on his cheek: "If it is Larry! I must

open." He shrank back against the wall; heard her open the door and say faintly: "Yes. Please! Who?"

Light painted a thin moving line on the wall opposite, and a voice which Keith recognised answered:

"All right, miss. Your outer door's open here. You ought to keep it shut after dark."

God! That policeman! And it had been his own doing, not shutting the outer door behind him when he came

in. He heard her say timidly in her foreign voice: "Thank you, sir!" the policeman's retreating steps, the outer

door being shut, and felt her close to him again. That something in her youth and strange prettiness which had

touched and kept him gentle, no longer blunted the edge of his exasperation, now that he could not see her.

They were all the same, these women; could not speak the truth! And he said brusquely:

"I did not think they did, sir. It is so long I was not out in the town, not since I had Larry."

The repulsion which all the time seethed deep in Keith welled up at those words. His brotherson of his

mother, a gentlemanthe property of this girl, bound to her, body and soul, by this unspeakable event! But

she had turned up the light. Had she some intuition that darkness was against her? Yes, she was pretty with

that soft face, colourless save for its lips and dark eyes, with that face somehow so touchingly, so

"I am going now," he said. "Remember! He mustn't come here; you mustn't go to him. I shall see him

She sighed out, "Yes! oh, yes!" and Keith went to the door. She was standing with her back to the wall, and

to follow him she only moved her headthat dovelike face with all its life in eyes which seemed saying:

In the passage he paused before opening the outer door. He did not want to meet that policeman again; the

fellow's round should have taken him well out of the street by now, and turning the handle cautiously, he

looked out. No one in sight. He stood a moment, wondering if he should turn to right or left, then briskly

There in the shadow of a doorway the policeman was standing. The fellow must have seen him coming out!

Utterly unable to restrain a start, and muttering "Goodnight!" Keith walked on rapidly:

He went full quarter of a mile before he lost that startled and uneasy feeling in sardonic exasperation that he,

Keith Darrant, had been taken for a frequenter of a lady of the town. The whole thing the whole thing!a

vile and disgusting business! His very mind felt dirty and breathless; his spirit, drawn out of sheath, had

slowly to slide back before he could at all focus and readjust his reasoning faculty. Certainly, he had got the

knowledge he wanted. There was less danger than he thought. That girl's eyes! No mistaking her devotion.

She would not give Larry away. Yes! Larry must clear outSouth Americathe Eastit did not matter.

But he felt no relief. The cheap, tawdry room had wrapped itself round his fancy with its atmosphere of

murky love, with the feeling it inspired, of emotion caged within those yellowish walls and the red stuff of its

furniture. That girl's face! Devotion; truth, too, and beauty, rare and moving, in its setting of darkness and

horror, in that nest of vice and of disorder!... The dark archway; the street arab, with his gleeful: "They 'ain't

got 'im yet!"; the feel of those bare arms round his neck; that whisper of horror in the darkness; above all,

again, her child face looking into his, so truthful! And suddenly he stood quite still in the street. What in

God's name was he about? What grotesque juggling amongst shadows, what strange and ghastly eccentricity

was all this? The forces of order and routine, all the actualities of his daily life, marched on him at that

moment, and swept everything before them. It was a dream, a nightmare not real! It was ridiculous! That he

He had come by now to the Strand, that street down which every day he moved to the Law Courts, to his

daily work; his work so dignified and regular, so irreproachable, and solid. No! The thing was all a monstrous

nightmare! It would go, if he fixed his mind on the familiar objects around, read the names on the shops,

looked at the faces passing. Far down the thoroughfare he caught the outline of the old church, and beyond,

the loom of the Law Courts themselves. The bell of a fireengine sounded, and the horses came galloping by,

with the shining metal, rattle of hoofs and hoarse shouting. Here was a sensation, real and harmless, dignified

and customary! A woman flaunting round the corner looked up at him, and leered out: "Good night!" Even

that was customary, tolerable. Two policemen passed, supporting between them a man the worse for liquor,

full of fight and expletives; the sight was soothing, an ordinary thing which brought passing annoyance,

interest, disgust. It had begun to rain; he felt it on his face with pleasurean actual thing, not eccentric, a

He began to cross the street. Cabs were going at furious speed now that the last omnibus had ceased to run; it

distracted him to take this actual, ordinary risk run so often every day. During that crossing of the Strand,

with the rain in his face and the cabs shooting past, he regained for the first time his assurance, shook off this

unreal sense of being in the grip of something, and walked resolutely to the corner of his home turning. But

passing into that darker stretch, he again stood still. A policeman had also turned into that street on the other

side. Notsurely not! Absurd! They were all alike to look atthose fellows! Absurd! He walked on

sharply, and let himself into his house. But on his way upstairs he could not for the life of him help raising a

corner of a curtain and looking from the staircase window. The policeman was marching solemnly, about

Keith woke at five o'clock, his usual hour, without remembrance. But the grisly shadow started up when he

entered his study, where the lamp burned, and the fire shone, and the coffee was set ready, just as when

yesterday afternoon Larry had stood out there against the wall. For a moment he fought against realisation;

then, drinking off his coffee, sat down sullenly at the bureau to his customary three hours' study of the day's

Not one word of his brief could he take in. It was all jumbled with murky images and apprehensions, and for

full half an hour he suffered mental paralysis. Then the sheer necessity of knowing something of the case

which he had to open at halfpast ten that morning forced him to a concentration which never quite subdued

the malaise at the bottom of his heart. Nevertheless, when he rose at halfpast eight and went into the

bathroom, he had earned his grim satisfaction in this victory of willpower. By halfpast nine he must be at

Larry's. A boat left London for the Argentine tomorrow. If Larry was to get away at once, money must be

"Enquiry late last night established the fact that the Police have discovered the identity of the man found

strangled yesterday morning under an archway in Glove Lane. An arrest has been made."

By good fortune he had finished eating, for the words made him feel physically sick. At this very minute

Larry might be locked up, waiting to be chargedmight even have been arrested before his own visit to the

girl last night. If Larry were arrested, she must be implicated. What, then, would be his own position? Idiot to

go and look at that archway, to go and see the girl! Had that policeman really followed him home? Accessory

after the fact! Keith Darrant, King's Counsel, man of mark! He forced himself by an effort, which had

something of the heroic, to drop this panicky feeling. Panic never did good. He must face it, and see. He

refused even to hurry, calmly collected the papers wanted for the day, and attended to a letter or two, before

Waiting outside there in the grey morning for his ring to be answered, he looked the very picture of a man

who knew his mind, a man of resolution. But it needed all his willpower to ask without tremor: "Mr.

Darrant in?" to hear without sign of any kind the answer: "He's not up yet, sir."

On his way to Laurence's bedroom, in the midst of utter relief, he had the selfpossession to think: 'This

arrest is the best thing that could have happened. It'll keep their noses on a wrong scent till Larry's got away.

The girl must be sent off too, but not with him.' Panic had ended in quite hardening his resolution. He entered

the bedroom with a feeling of disgust. The fellow was lying there, his bare arms crossed behind his tousled

head, staring at the ceiling, and smoking one of many cigarettes whose ends littered a chair beside him,

whose sickly reek tainted the air. That pale face, with its jutting cheekbones and chin, its hollow cheeks and

He looked up at Keith through the haze of smoke and said quietly: "Well, brother, what's the sentence?

The flippancy revolted Keith. It was Larry all over! Last night horrified and humble, this morning, "Don't

"I had to see for myself. You must clear out at once, Larry. She can come out to you by the next boat; but you

"I can foot your expenses, and lend you a year's income in advance. But it must be a clean cut; after you get

"You're very good to me, Keith; you've always been very good. I don't know why."

"Nor I. There's a boat to the Argentine tomorrow. You're in luck; they've made an arrest. It's in the paper."

The cigarette end dropped, the thin pyjama'd figure writhed up and stood clutching at the bedrail.

The disturbing thought flitted through Keith's brain: 'I was a fool. He takes it queerly; what now?'

Keith stared. In his relief that the arrested man was not Laurence, this had not occurred to him. What folly!

"Why?" he said quickly; "an innocent man's in no danger. They always get the wrong man first. It's a piece of

How often had he not seen that expression on Larry's face, wistful, questioning, as if trying to see the thing

with hisKeith'seyes, trying to submit to better judgment? And he said, almost gently

"Now, look here, Larry; this is too serious to trifle with. Don't worry about that. Leave it to me. Just get ready

to be off'. I'll take your berth and make arrangements. Here's some money for kit. I can come round between

five and six, and let you know. Pull yourself together, man. As soon as the girl's joined you out there, you'd

better get across to Chile, the further the better. You must simply lose yourself: I must go now, if I'm to get to

the Bank before I go down to the courts." And looking very steadily at his brother, he added:

"Come! You've got to think of me in this matter as well as of yourself. No playing fast and loose with the

But still Larry gazed up at him with that wistful questioning, and not till he had repeated, "Understand?" did

Driving away, he thought: 'Queer fellow! I don't know him, shall never know him!' and at once began to

concentrate on the practical arrangements. At his bank he drew out L400; but waiting for the notes to be

counted he suffered qualms. A clumsy way of doing things! If there had been more time! The thought:

'Accessory after the fact!' now infected everything. Notes were traceable. No other way of getting him away

at once, though. One must take lesser risks to avoid greater. From the bank he drove to the office of the

steamship line. He had told Larry he would book his passage. But that would not do! He must only ask

anonymously if there were accommodation. Having discovered that there were vacant berths, he drove on to

the Law Courts. If he could have taken a morning off, he would have gone down to the police court and seen

them charge this man. But even that was not too safe, with a face so well known as his. What would come of

this arrest? Nothing, surely! The police always took somebody up, to keep the public quiet. Then, suddenly,

he had again the feeling that it was all a nightmare; Larry had never done it; the police had got the right man!

But instantly the memory of the girl's awestricken face, her figure huddling on the sofa, her words "I see

He felt he had never been more clearheaded and forcible than that morning in court. When he came out for

lunch he bought the most sensational of the evening papers. But it was yet too early for news, and he had to

go back into court no whit wiser concerning the arrest. When at last he threw off wig and gown, and had got

through a conference and other necessary work, he went out to Chancery Lane, buying a paper on the way.

Laurence had remained sitting on his bed for many minutes. An innocent man in no danger! Keith had said

itthe celebrated lawyer! Could he rely on that? Go out 8,000 miles, he and the girl, and leave a

In the past night he had touched bottom, as he thought: become ready to face anything. When Keith came in

he would without murmur have accepted the advice: "Give yourself up!" He was prepared to pitch away the

end of his life as he pitched from him the fagends of his cigarettes. And the long sigh he had heaved,

hearing of reprieve, had been only half relief. Then, with incredible swiftness there had rushed through him a

feeling of unutterable joy and hope. Clean awayinto a new country, a new life! The girl and he! Out there

he wouldn't care, would rejoice even to have squashed the life out of such a noisome beetle of a man. Out

there! Under a new sun, where blood ran quicker than in this foggy land, and people took justice into their

own hands. For it had been justice on that brute even though he had not meant to kill him. And then to hear of

this arrest! They would be charging the man today. He could go and see the poor creature accused of the

murder he himself had committed! And he laughed. Go and see how likely it was that they might hang a

fellowman in place of himself? He dressed, but too shaky to shave himself, went out to a barber's shop.

While there he read the news which Keith had seen. In this paper the name of the arrested man was given:

"John Evan, no address." To be brought up on the charge at Bow Street. Yes! He must go. Once, twice, three

times he walked past the entrance of the court before at last he entered and screwed himself away among the

The court was crowded; and from the murmurs round he could tell that it was his particular case which had

brought so many there. In a dazed way he watched charge after charge disposed of with lightning quickness.

But were they never going to reach his business? And then suddenly he saw the little scarecrow man of last

night advancing to the dock between two policemen, more ragged and miserable than ever by light of day,

A sort of satisfied purr was rising all round; and with horror Laurence perceived that thisthis was the man

accused of what he himself had donethis queer, battered unfortunate to whom he had shown a passing

friendliness. Then all feeling merged in the appalling interest of listening. The evidence was very short.

Testimony of the hotelkeeper where Walenn had been staying, the identification of his body, and of a

snakeshaped ring he had been wearing at dinner that evening. Testimony of a pawnbroker, that this same

ring was pawned with him the first thing yesterday morning by the prisoner. Testimony of a policeman that

he had noticed the man Evan several times in Glove Lane, and twice moved him on from sleeping under that

arch. Testimony of another policeman that, when arrested at midnight, Evan had said: "Yes; I took the ring

off his finger. I found him there dead .... I know I oughtn't to have done it.... I'm an educated man; it was

Fascinating and terrible to sit staring at the man in whose place he should have been; to wonder when those

small brightgrey bloodshot eyes would spy him out, and how he would meet that glance. Like a baited

raccoon the little man stood, screwed back into a corner, mournful, cynical, fierce, with his ridged, obtuse

yellow face, and his stubbly grey beard and hair, and his eyes wandering now and again amongst the crowd.

But with all his might Laurence kept his face unmoved. Then came the word "Remanded"; and, more like a

Laurence sat on, a cold perspiration thick on his forehead. Someone else, then, had come on the body and

turned the pockets inside out before John Evan took the ring. A man such as Walenn would not be out at

night without money. Besides, if Evan had found money on the body he would never have run the risk of

taking that ring. Yes, someone else had come on the body first. It was for that one to come forward, and

prove that the ring was still on the dead man's finger when he left him, and thus clear Evan. He clung to that

thought; it seemed to make him less responsible for the little man's position; to remove him and his own deed

one step further back. If they found the person who had taken the money, it would prove Evan's innocence.

He came out of the court in a sort of trance. And a craving to get drunk attacked him. One could not go on

like this without the relief of some oblivion. If he could only get drunk, keep drunk till this business was

decided and he knew whether he must give himself up or no. He had now no fear at all of people suspecting

him; only fear of himselffear that he might go and give himself up. Now he could see the girl; the danger

from that was as nothing compared with the danger from his own conscience. He had promised Keith not to

see her. Keith had been decent and loyal to himgood old Keith! But he would never understand that this

girl was now all he cared about in life; that he would rather be cut off from life itself than be cut off from her.

Instead of becoming less and less, she was becoming more and more to himexperience strange and

thrilling! Out of deep misery she had grown happythrough him; out of a sordid, shifting life recovered

coherence and bloom, through devotion to him him, of all people in the world! It was a miracle. She

demanded nothing of him, adored him, as no other woman ever hadit was this which had anchored his

drifting barque; thisand her truthful mild intelligence, and that burning warmth of a woman, who, long

And suddenly, mastering his craving to get drunk, he made towards Soho. He had been a fool to give those

keys to Keith. She must have been frightened by his visit; and, perhaps, doubly miserable since, knowing

nothing, imagining everything! Keith was sure to have terrified her. Poor little thing!

Down the street where he had stolen in the dark with the dead body on his back, he almost ran for the cover

of her house. The door was opened to him before he knocked, her arms were round his neck, her lips pressed

to his. The fire was out, as if she had been unable to remember to keep warm. A stool had been drawn to the

window, and there she had evidently been sitting, like a bird in a cage, looking out into the grey street.

Though she had been told that he was not to come, instinct had kept her there; or the pathetic, aching hope

Now that he was there, her first thoughts were for his comfort. The fire was lighted. He must eat, drink,

smoke. There was never in her doings any of the "I am doing this for you, but you ought to be doing that for

me" which belongs to so many marriages, and liaisons. She was like a devoted slave, so in love with the

chains that she never knew she wore them. And to Laurence, who had so little sense of property, this only

served to deepen tenderness, and the hold she had on him. He had resolved not to tell her of the new danger

he ran from his own conscience. But resolutions with him were but the opposites of what was sure to come;

>From her face he knew she had grasped the danger at once; had divined it, perhaps, before he spoke. But she

only twined her arms round him and kissed his lips. And he knew that she was begging him to put his love

for her above his conscience. Who would ever have thought that he could feel as he did to this girl who had

been in the arms of many! The stained and suffering past of a loved woman awakens in some men only

chivalry; in others, more respectable, it rouses a tigerish itch, a rancorous jealousy of what in the past was

given to others. Sometimes it will do both. When he had her in his arms he felt no remorse for killing the

coarse, handsome brute who had ruined her. He savagely rejoiced in it. But when she laid her head in the

hollow of his shoulder, turning to him her white face with the faint colourstaining on the parted lips, the

cheeks, the eyelids; when her dark, wideapart, brown eyes gazed up in the happiness of her

He left her at five o'clock, and had not gone two streets' length before the memory of the little grey vagabond,

screwed back in the far corner of the dock like a baited raccoon, of his dreary, creaking voice, took

possession of him again; and a kind of savagery mounted in his brain against a world where one could be so

At the door of his lodgings Keith was getting out of a cab. They went in together, but neither of them sat

down; Keith standing with his back to the carefully shut door, Laurence with his back to the table, as if they

knew there was a tug coming. And Keith said: "There's room on that boat. Go down and book your berth

"Now look here, Larry. I've read the police court proceedings. There's nothing in that. Out of prison, or in

prison for a few weeks, it's all the same to a nightbird of that sort. Dismiss it from your mindthere's not

nearly enough evidence to convict. This gives you your chance. Take it like a man, and make a new life for

Laurence smiled; but the smile had a touch of madness and a touch of malice. He took up the notes.

"Clear out, and save the honour of brother Keith. Put them back in your pocket, Keith, or I'll put them in the

fire. Come, take them!" And, crossing to the fire, he held them to the bars. "Take them, or in they go!"

"I've still got some kind of honour, Keith; if I clear out I shall have none, not the rag of any, left. It may be

worth more to me than thatI can't tell yetI can't tell." There was a long silence before Keith answered. "I

tell you you're mistaken; no jury will convict. If they did, a judge would never hang on it. A ghoul who can

rob a dead body ought to be in prison. What he did is worse than what you did, if you come to that!"

Laurence lifted his face. "Judge not, brother," he said; "the heart is a dark well." Keith's yellowish face grew

red and swollen, as though he were mastering the tickle of a bronchial cough. "What are you going to do,

then? I suppose I may ask you not to be entirely oblivious of our name; or is such a consideration unworthy

of your honour?" Laurence bent his head. The gesture said more clearly than words: 'Don't kick a man when

"I don't know what I'm going to donothing at present. I'm awfully sorry, Keith; awfully sorry."

To any, save philosophers, reputation may be threatened almost as much by disgrace to name and family as

by the disgrace of self. Keith's instinct was always to deal actively with danger. But this blow, whether it fell

on him by discovery or by confession, could not be countered. As blight falls on a rose from who knows

where, the scandalous murk would light on him. No repulse possible! Not even a wriggling from under!

Brother of a murderer hung or sent to penal servitude! His daughter niece to a murderer! His dead mothera

murderer's mother! And to wait day after day, week after week, not knowing whether the blow would fall,

was an extraordinarily atrocious penance, the injustice of which, to a man of rectitude, seemed daily the more

The remand had produced evidence that the murdered man had been drinking heavily on the night of his

death, and further evidence of the accused's professional vagabondage and destitution; it was shown, too, that

for some time the archway in Glove Lane had been his favourite night haunt. He had been committed for trial

in January. This time, despite misgivings, Keith had attended the police court. To his great relief Larry was

not there. But the policeman who had come up while he was looking at the archway, and given him

afterwards that scare in the girl's rooms, was chief witness to the way the accused man haunted Glove Lane.

Though Keith held his silk hat high, he still had the uncomfortable feeling that the man had recognised him.

His conscience suffered few, if any, twinges for letting this man rest under the shadow of the murder. He

genuinely believed that there was not evidence enough to convict; nor was it in him to appreciate the tortures

of a vagabond shut up. The scamp deserved what he had got, for robbing a dead body; and in any case such a

scarecrow was better off in prison than sleeping out under archways in December. Sentiment was foreign to

Keith's character, and his justice that of those who subordinate the fates of the weak and shiftless to the

His daughter came back from school for the Christmas holidays. It was hard to look up from her bright eyes

and rosy cheeks and see this shadow hanging above his calm and ordered life, as in a glowing room one's eye

may catch an impending patch of darkness drawn like a spider's web across a corner of the ceiling.

On the afternoon of Christmas Eve they went, by her desire, to a church in Soho, where the Christmas

Oratorio was being given; and coming away passed, by chance of a wrong turning, down Borrow Street.

Ugh! How that startled moment, when the girl had pressed herself against him in the dark, and her

terrorstricken whisper: "Oh! Who is it?" leaped out before him! Always that businessthat ghastly

business! After the trial he would have another try to get them both away. And he thrust his arm within his

young daughter's, hurrying her on, out of this street where shadows filled all the winter air.

But that evening when she had gone to bed he felt uncontrollably restless. He had not seen Larry for weeks.

What was he about? What desperations were hatching in his disorderly brain? Was he very miserable; had he

perhaps sunk into a stupor of debauchery? And the old feeling of protectiveness rose up in him; a warmth

born of long ago Christmas Eves, when they had stockings hung out in the night stuffed by a Santa Claus,

whose hand never failed to tuck them up, whose kiss was their nightly waft into sleep.

Stars were sparkling out there over the river; the sky frostyclear, and black. Bells had not begun to ring as

yet. And obeying an obscure, deep impulse, Keith wrapped himself once more into his fur coat, pulled a

motoring cap over his eyes, and sallied forth. In the Strand he took a cab to Fitzroy Street. There was no light

in Larry's windows, and on a card he saw the words "To Let." Gone! Had he after all cleared out for good?

But howwithout money? And the girl? Bells were ringing now in the silent frostiness. Christmas Eve! And

Keith thought: 'If only this wretched business were off my mind! Monstrous that one should suffer for the

faults of others!' He took a route which led him past Borrow Street. Solitude brooded there, and he walked

resolutely down on the far side, looking hard at the girl's window. There was a light. The curtains just failed

to meet, so that a thin gleam shone through. He crossed; and after glancing swiftly up and down, deliberately

He only stood there perhaps twenty seconds, but visual records gleaned in a moment sometimes outlast the

visions of hours and days. The electric light was not burning; but, in the centre of the room the girl was

kneeling in her nightgown before a little table on which were four lighted candles. Her arms were crossed on

her breast; the candlelight shone on her fair cropped hair, on the profile of cheek and chin, on her bowed

white neck. For a moment he thought her alone; then behind her saw his brother in a sleeping suit, leaning

against the wall, with arms crossed, watching. It was the expression on his face which burned the whole thing

in, so that always afterwards he was able to see that little scenesuch an expression as could never have

been on the face of one even faintly conscious that he was watched by any living thing on earth. The whole of

Larry's heart and feeling seemed to have come up out of him. Yearning, mockery, love, despair! The depth of

his feeling for this girl, his stress of mind, fears, hopes; the flotsam good and evil of his soul, all transfigured

there, exposed and unforgettable. The candlelight shone upward on to his face, twisted by the strangest

smile; his eyes, darker and more wistful than mortal eyes should be, seemed to beseech and mock the

whiteclad girl, who, all unconscious, knelt without movement, like a carved figure of devotion. The words

seemed coming from his lips: "Pray for us! Bravo! Yes! Pray for us!" And suddenly Keith saw her stretch out

her arms, and lift her face with a look of ecstasy, and Laurence starting forward. What had she seen beyond

the candle flames? It is the unexpected which invests visions with poignancy. Nothing more strange could

Keith have seen in this nest of the murky and illicit. But in sheer panic lest he might be caught thus spying he

drew back and hurried on. So Larry was living there with her! When the moment came he could still find

Before going in, he stood full five minutes leaning on the terrace parapet before his house, gazing at the

starfrosted sky, and the river cut by the trees into black pools, oiled over by gleams from the Embankment

lamps. And, deep down, behind his mere thoughts, he achedsomehow, somewhere ached. Beyond the cage

of all that he saw and heard and thought, he had perceived something he could not reach. But the night was

cold, the bells silent, for it had struck twelve. Entering his house, he stole upstairs.

If for Keith those six weeks before the Glove Lane murder trial came on were fraught with uneasiness and

gloom, they were for Laurence almost the happiest since his youth. From the moment when he left his rooms

and went to the girl's to live, a kind of peace and exaltation took possession of him. Not by any effort of will

did he throw off the nightmare hanging over him. Nor was he drugged by love. He was in a sort of spiritual

catalepsy. In face of fate too powerful for his will, his turmoil, anxiety, and even restlessness had ceased; his

life floated in the ether of "what must come, will." Out of this catalepsy, his spirit sometimes fell headlong

into black waters. In one such whirlpool he was struggling on the night of Christmas Eve. When the girl rose

Pressing close to him, she drew him down on to the floor before the fire; and they sat, knees drawn up, hands

"It was the Virgin I saw. She stood against the wall and smiled. We shall be happy soon."

"When we die, Wanda," he said, suddenly, "let it be together. We shall keep each other warm, out there."

Huddling to him she whispered: "Yes, oh, yes! If you die, I could not go on living."

It was this utter dependence on him, the feeling that he had rescued something, which gave him sense of

anchorage. That, and his buried life in the retreat of these two rooms. Just for an hour in the morning, from

nine to ten, the charwoman would come, but not another soul all day. They never went out together. He

would stay in bed late, while Wanda bought what they needed for the day's meals; lying on his back, hands

clasped behind his head, recalling her face, the movements of her slim, rounded, supple figure, robing itself

before his gaze; feeling again the kiss she had left on his lips, the gleam of her soft eyes, so strangely dark in

so fair a face. In a sort of trance he would lie till she came back. Then get up to breakfast about noon off

things which she had cooked, drinking coffee. In the afternoon he would go out alone and walk for hours, any

where, so long as it was East. To the East there was always suffering to be seen, always that which soothed

him with the feeling that he and his troubles were only a tiny part of trouble; that while so many other

sorrowing and shadowy creatures lived he was not cut off. To go West was to encourage dejection. In the

West all was like Keith, successful, immaculate, ordered, resolute. He would come back tired out, and sit

watching her cook their little dinner. The evenings were given up to love. Queer trance of an existence, which

both were afraid to break. No sign from her of wanting those excitements which girls who have lived her life,

even for a few months, are supposed to need. She never asked him to take her anywhere; never, in word,

deed, look, seemed anything but almost rapturously content. And yet he knew, and she knew, that they were

only waiting to see whether Fate would turn her thumb down on them. In these days he did not drink. Out of

his quarter's money, when it came in, he had paid his debtstheir expenses were very small. He never went

to see Keith, never wrote to him, hardly thought of him. And from those dread apparitionsWalenn lying

with the breath choked out of him, and the little grey, driven animal in the dockhe hid, as only a man can

who must hide or be destroyed. But daily he bought a newspaper, and feverishly, furtively scanned its

Coming out of the Law Courts on the afternoon of January 28th, at the triumphant end of a desperately fought

will case, Keith saw on a poster the words: "Glove Lane Murder: Trial and Verdict"; and with a rush of

dismay he thought: 'Good God! I never looked at the paper this morning!' The elation which had filled him a

second before, the absorption he had felt for two days now in the case so hardly won, seemed suddenly quite

sickeningly trivial. What on earth had he been doing to forget that horrible business even for an instant? He

stood quite still on the crowded pavement, unable, really unable, to buy a paper. But his face was like a piece

of iron when he did step forward and hold his penny out. There it was in the Stop Press! "Glove Lane

His first sensation was simple irritation. How had they come to commit such an imbecility? Monstrous! The

evidence! Then the futility of even reading the report, of even considering how they had come to record

such a verdict struck him with savage suddenness. There it was, and nothing he could do or say would alter it;

no condemnation of this idiotic verdict would help reverse it. The situation was desperate, indeed! That five

minutes' walk from the Law Courts to his chambers was the longest he had ever taken.

Men of decided character little know beforehand what they will do in certain contingencies. For the

imaginations of decided people do not endow mere contingencies with sufficient actuality. Keith had never

really settled what he was going to do if this man were condemned. Often in those past weeks he had said to

himself: "Of course, if they bring him in guilty, that's another thing!" But, now that they had, he was beset by

exactly the same old arguments and feelings, the same instincts of loyalty and protection towards Laurence

and himself, intensified by the fearful imminence of the danger. And yet, here was this man about to be hung

for a thing he had not done! Nothing could get over that! But then he was such a worthless vagabond, a ghoul

who had robbed a dead body. If Larry were condemned in his stead, would there be any less miscarriage of

justice? To strangle a brute who had struck you, by the accident of keeping your hands on his throat a few

seconds too long, was there any more guilt in that was there even as much, as in deliberate theft from a

dead man? Reverence for order, for justice, and established fact, will, often march shoulder to shoulder with

In the narrow stone passage leading to his staircase, a friend had called out: "Bravo, Darrant! That was a

squeak! Congratulations!" And with a bitter little smile Keith thought: 'Congratulations! I!'

At the first possible moment the hurried back to the Strand, and hailing a cab, he told the man to put him

It was the girl who opened to his knock. Startled, clasping her hands, she looked strange to Keith in her black

skirt and blouse of some soft velvety stuff the colour of faded roses. Her round, rather long throat was bare;

and Keith noticed fretfully that she wore gold earrings. Her eyes, so pitch dark against her white face, and the

short fair hair, which curled into her neck, seemed both to search and to plead.

With a movement, as though she despaired of words, she clasped her hands over her heart. And he said:

He had the same strange feeling as on his first visit to her, and when through the chink in the curtains he had

watched her kneeling of pity mingled with some faint sexual emotion. And crossing to the fire he asked:

"I don't want him taken from you. I want to help you keep him. Are you ready to go away, at any time?"

"That poor man is a graveyard thief; a hyena; a ghoulnot worth consideration." And the rasp in his own

"Ah!" she sighed. "But I am sorry for him. Perhaps he was hungry. I have been hungryyou do things then

that you would not. And perhaps he has no one to love; if you have no one to love you can be very bad. I

"The trial! Oh! He was strange last night. This morning, too, he got up early. Is itis it over?"

For a moment Keith thought she was going to faint. She had closed her eyes, and swayed so that he took a

"Listen!" he said. "Help me; don't let Laurence out of your sight. We must have time. I must see what they

intend to do. They can't be going to hang this man. I must have time, I tell you. You must prevent his giving

She stood, staring in his face, while he still held her arms, gripping into her soft flesh through the velvety

Keith felt the shiver which ran through her. And the thought rushed into his mind: 'My God! Suppose the

police come round while I'm here!' If Larry had indeed gone to them! If that Policeman who had seen him

here the night after the murder should find him here again just after the verdict! He said almost fiercely:

"If he hasn't already done this, watch him like a lynx! Don't let him go out without you. I'll come tomorrow

morning early. You're a Catholic, aren't you? Swear to me that you won't let him do anything till he's seen me

She did not answer, looking past him at the door; and Keith heard a key in the latch. There was Laurence

himself, holding in his hand a great bunch of pink lilies and white narcissi. His face was pale and haggard. He

The girl's eyes were fastened on Larry's face; and Keith, looking from one to the other, knew that he had

Laurence nodded. His expression, as a rule so telltale of his emotions, baffled Keith utterly.

"The thing can't standthat's certain. But I must have time to look into the report. I must have time to see

what I can do. D'you understand me, LarryI must have time." He knew he was talking at random. The only

thing was to get them away at once out of reach of confession; but he dared not say so.

"Promise me that you'll do nothing, that you won't go out even till I've seen you tomorrow morning."

Again Laurence nodded. And Keith looked at the girl. Would she see that he did not break that promise? Her

eyes were still fixed immovably on Larry's face. And with the feeling that he could get no further, Keith

He was smiling. Keith could make nothing of that smile, nor of the expression in the girl's eyes. And saying:

To keep from any woman who loves, knowledge of her lover's mood, is as hard as to keep music from

moving the heart. But when that woman has lived in suffering, and for the first time knows the comfort of

love, then let the lover try as he may to disguise his heartno use! Yet by virtue of subtler abnegation she

When Keith was gone the girl made no outcry, asked no questions, managed that Larry should not suspect her

intuition; all that evening she acted as if she knew of nothing preparing within him, and through him, within

His words, caresses, the very zest with which he helped her to prepare the feast, the flowers he had brought,

the wine he made her drink, the avoidance of any word which could spoil their happiness, allall told her.

He was too inexorably gay and loving. Not for herto whom every word and every kiss had uncannily the

desperate value of a last word and kissnot for her to deprive herself of these by any sign or gesture which

might betray her prescience. Poor soulshe took all, and would have taken more, a hundredfold. She did not

want to drink the wine he kept tilting into her glass, but, with the acceptance learned by women who have

lived her life, she did not refuse. She had never refused him anything. So much had been required of her by

Laurence drank deeply; but he had never felt clearer, never seen things more clearly. The wine gave him what

he wanted, an edge to these few hours of pleasure, an exaltation of energy. It dulled his sense of pity, too. It

was pity he was afraid offor himself, and for this girl. To make even this tawdry room look beautiful, with

firelight and candlelight, dark amber wine in the glasses, tall pink lilies spilling their saffron, exuding their

hot perfume he and even himself must look their best. And with a weight as of lead on her heart, she managed

that for him, letting him strew her with flowers and crush them together with herself. Not even music was

lacking to their feast. Someone was playing a pianola across the street, and the sound, very faint, came

stealing when they were silentswelling, sinking, festive, mournful; having a faroff life of its own, like the

flickering fireflames before which they lay embraced, or the lilies delicate between the candles. Listening to

that music, tracing with his finger the tiny veins on her breast, he lay like one recovering from a swoon. No

parting. None! But sleep, as the firelight sleeps when flames die; as music sleeps on its deserted strings.

It was nearly ten when he bade her go to bed. And after she had gone obedient into the bedroom, he brought

ink and paper down by the fire. The drifter, the unstable, the goodfornothingdid not falter. He had

thought, when it came to the point, he would fail himself; but a sort of rage bore him forward. If he lived on,

and confessed, they would shut him up, take from him the one thing he loved, cut him off from her; sand up

his only well in the desert. Curse them! And he wrote by firelight which mellowed the white sheets of paper;

while, against the dark curtain, the girl, in her nightgown, unconscious of the cold, stood watching.

Men, when they drown, remember their pasts. Like the lost poet he had "gone with the wind." Now it was for

him to be true in his fashion. A man may falter for weeks and weeks, consciously, subconsciously, even in his

dreams, till there comes that moment when the only thing impossible is to go on faltering. The black cap, the

little driven grey man looking up at it with a sort of wonder faltering had ceased!

"No more, no more, the moon is dead, And all the people in it; The poppy maidens strew the bed, We'll come

Why did doggerel start up in the mind like that? Wanda! The weed flower become so rare he would not be

parted from her! The fire, the candles, and the fireno more the flame and flicker!

Keith went, not home, but to his club; and in the room devoted to the reception of guests, empty at this hour,

he sat down and read the report of the trial. The fools had made out a case that looked black enough. And for

a long time, on the thick soft carpet which let out no sound of footfall, he paced up and down, thinking. He

might see the defending counsel, might surely do that as an expert who thought there had been miscarriage of

justice. They must appeal; a petition too might be started in the last event. The thing couldmust be put

He had no appetite, but the custom of dining is too strong. And while he ate, he glanced with irritation at his

fellowmembers. They looked so at their ease. Unjustthat this black cloud should hang over one blameless

as any of them! Friends, connoisseurs of such thingsa judge among themcame specially to his table to

express their admiration of his conduct of that will case. Tonight he had real excuse for pride, but he felt

none. Yet, in this wellwarmed quietly glowing room, filled with decorously eating, decorously talking men,

he gained insensibly some comfort. This surely was reality; that shadowy business out there only the drear

sound of a wind one must and did keep outlike the poverty and grime which had no real existence for the

secure and prosperous. He drank champagne. It helped to fortify reality, to make shadows seem more

shadowy. And down in the smokingroom he sat before the fire, in one of those chairs which embalm

afterdinner dreams. He grew sleepy there, and at eleven o'clock rose to go home. But when he had once

passed down the shallow marble steps, out through the revolving door which let in no draughts, he was

visited by fear, as if he had drawn it in with the breath of the January wind. Larry's face; and the girl watching

it! Why had she watched like that? Larry's smile; and the flowers in his hand? Buying flowers at such a

moment! The girl was his slavewhatever he told her, she would do. But she would never be able to stop

His hand, thrust deep into the pocket of his fur coat, came in contact suddenly with something cold. The keys

Larry had given him all that time ago. There they had lain forgotten ever since. The chance touch decided

him. He turned off towards Borrow Street, walking at full speed. He could but go again and see. He would

sleep better if he knew that he had left no stone unturned. At the corner of that dismal street he had to wait for

solitude before he made for the house which he now loathed with a deadly loathing. He opened the outer door

and shut it to behind him. He knocked, but no one came. Perhaps they had gone to bed. Again and again he

knocked, then opened the door, stepped in, and closed it carefully. Candles lighted, the fire burning; cushions

thrown on the floor in front of it and strewn with flowers! The table, too, covered with flowers and with the

remnants of a meal. Through the halfdrawn curtain he could see that the inner room was also lighted. Had

they gone out, leaving everything like this? Gone out! His heart beat. Bottles! Larry had been drinking!

Had it really come? Must he go back home with this murk on him; knowing that his brother was a confessed

and branded murderer? He went quickly, to the halfdrawn curtains and looked in. Against the wall he saw a

bed, and those two in it. He recoiled in sheer amazement and relief. Asleep with curtains undrawn, lights left

on? Asleep through all his knocking! They must both be drunk. The blood rushed up in his neck. Asleep!

And rushing forward again, he called out: "Larry!" Then, with a gasp he went towards the bed. "Larry!" No

answer! No movement! Seizing his brother's shoulder, he shook it violently. It felt cold. They were lying in

each other's arms, breast to breast, lips to lips, their faces white in the light shining above the dressingtable.

And such a shudder shook Keith that he had to grasp the brass rail above their heads. Then he bent down, and

wetting his finger, placed it close to their joined lips. No two could ever swoon so utterly as that; not even a

drunken sleep could be so fast. His wet finger felt not the faintest stir of air, nor was there any movement in

the pulses of their hands. No breath! No life! The eyes of the girl were closed. How strangely innocent she

looked! Larry's open eyes seemed to be gazing at her shut eyes; but Keith saw that they were sightless. With

a sort of sob he drew down the lids. Then, by an impulse that he could never have explained, he laid a hand

on his brother's head, and a hand on the girl's fair hair. The clothes had fallen down a little from her bare

shoulder; he pulled them up, as if to keep her warm, and caught the glint of metal; a tiny gilt crucifix no

longer than a thumbnail, on a thread of steel chain, had slipped down from her breast into the hollow of the

arm which lay round Larry's neck. Keith buried it beneath the clothes and noticed an envelope pinned to the

coverlet; bending down, he read: "Please give this at once to the police. LAURENCE DARRANT." He

thrust it into his pocket. Like elastic stretched beyond its uttermost, his reason, will, faculties of calculation

and resolve snapped to within him. He thought with incredible swiftness: 'I must know nothing of this. I must

go!' And, almost before he knew that he had moved, he was out again in the street.

He could never have told of what he thought while he was walking home. He did not really come to himself

till he was in his study. There, with a trembling hand, he poured himself out whisky and drank it off. If he had

not chanced to go there, the charwoman would have found them when she came in the morning, and given

that envelope to the police! He took it out. He had a righta right to know what was in it! He broke it open.

"I, Laurence Darrant, about to die by my own hand, declare that this is a solemn and true confession. I

committed what is known as the Glove Lane Murder on the night of November the 27th last in the following

way"on and on to the last words"We didn't want to die; but we could not bear separation, and I couldn't

face letting an innocent man be hung for me. I do not see any other way. I beg that there may be no

postmortem on our bodies. The stuff we have taken is some of that which will be found on the

Full five minutes Keith stood with those sheets of paper in his hand, while the clock ticked, the wind moaned

a little in the trees outside, the flames licked the logs with the quiet click and ruffle of their intense faraway

life down there on the hearth. Then he roused himself, and sat down to read the whole again.

There it was, just as Larry had told it to himnothing left out, very clear; even to the addresses of people who

could identify the girl as having once been Walenn's wife or mistress. It would convince. Yes! It would

The sheets dropped from his hand. Very slowly he was grasping the appalling fact that on the floor beside his

chair lay the life or death of yet another man; that by taking this confession he had taken into his own hands

the fate of the vagabond lying under sentence of death; that he could not give him back his life without

incurring the smirch of this disgrace, without even endangering himself. If he let this confession reach the

authorities, he could never escape the gravest suspicion that he had known of the whole affair during these

two months. He would have to attend the inquest, be recognised by that policeman as having come to the

archway to see where the body had lain, as having visited the girl the very evening after the murder. Who

would believe in the mere coincidence of such visits on the part of the murderer's brother. But apart from that

suspicion, the fearful scandal which so sensational an affair must make would mar his career, his life, his

young daughter's life! Larry's suicide with this girl would make sensation enough as it was; but nothing to

that other. Such a death had its romance; involved him in no way save as a mourner, could perhaps even be

hushed up! The other nothing could hush that up, nothing prevent its ringing to the house tops. He got up

from his chair, and for many minutes roamed the room unable to get his mind to bear on the issue. Images

kept starting up before him. The face of the man who handed him wig and gown each morning, puffy and

curious, with a leer on it he had never noticed before; his young daughter's lifted eyebrows, mouth drooping,

eyes troubled; the tiny gilt crucifix glinting in the hollow of the dead girl's arm; the sightless look in Larry's

unclosed eyes; even his own thumb and finger pulling the lids down. And then he saw a street and endless

people passing, turning to stare at him. And, stopping in his tramp, he said aloud: "Let them go to hell! Seven

days' wonder!" Was he not trustee to that confession! Trustee! After all he had done nothing to be ashamed

of, even if he had kept knowledge dark. A brother! Who could blame him? And he picked up those sheets of

paper. But, like a great murky hand, the scandal spread itself about him; its coarse malignant voice seemed

shouting: "Paiper!... Paiper!... Glove Lane Murder!... Suicide and confession of brother of wellknown

K.C.... Wellknown K.C.'s brother.... Murder and suicide.... Paiper!" Was he to let loose that flood of

foulness? Was he, who had done nothing, to smirch his own little daughter's life; to smirch his dead brother,

their dead motherhimself, his own valuable, important future? And all for a sewer rat! Let him hang, let

the fellow hang if he must! And that was not certain. Appeal! Petition! He mighthe should be saved! To

With a sudden darting movement he thrust the confession in among the burning coals. And a smile licked at

the folds in his dark face, like those flames licking the sheets of paper, till they writhed and blackened. With

the toe of his boot he dispersed their scorched and crumbling wafer. Stamp them in! Stamp in that man's life!

Burnt! No more doubts, no more of this gnawing fear! Burnt? A manan innocentsewer rat! Recoiling

from the fire he grasped his forehead. It was burning hot and seemed to be going round.

Well, it was done! Only fools without will or purpose regretted. And suddenly he laughed. So Larry had died

for nothing! He had no will, no purpose, and was dead! He and that girl might now have been living, loving

each other in the warm night, away at the other end of the world, instead of lying dead in the cold night here!

Fools and weaklings regretted, suffered from conscience and remorse. A man trod firmly, held to his purpose,

He went to the window and drew back the curtain. What was that? A gibbet in the air, a body hanging? Ah!

Only the treesthe dark treesthe winter skeleton trees! Recoiling, he returned to his armchair and sat

down before the fire. It had been shining like that, the lamp turned low, his chair drawn up, when Larry came

in that afternoon two months ago. Bah! He had never come at all! It was a nightmare. He had been asleep.

How his head burned! And leaping up, he looked at the calendar on his bureau. "January the 28th!" No

In the City of Liverpool, on a January day of 1905, the Boardroom of "The Island Navigation Company"

rested, as it were, after the labours of the afternoon. The long table was still littered with the ink, pens,

blottingpaper, and abandoned documents of six personsa deserted battlefield of the brain. And, lonely, in

his chairman's seat at the top end old Sylvanus Heythorp sat, with closed eyes, still and heavy as an image.

One puffy, feeble hand, whose fingers quivered, rested on the arm of his chair; the thick white hair on his

massive head glistened in the light from a greenshaded lamp. He was not asleep, for every now and then his

sanguine cheeks filled, and a sound, half sigh, half grunt, escaped his thick lips between a white moustache

and the tiny tuft of white hairs above his cleft chin. Sunk in the chair, that square thick trunk of a body in

Young Gilbert Farney, secretary of "The Island Navigation Company," entering his hushed Boardroom,

stepped briskly to the table, gathered some papers, and stood looking at his chairman. Not more than

thirtyfive, with the bright hues of the optimist in his hair, beard, cheeks, and eyes, he had a nose and lips

which curled ironically. For, in his view, he was the Company; and its Board did but exist to chequer his

importance. Five days in the week for seven hours a day he wrote, and thought, and wove the threads of its

business, and this lot came down once a week for two or three hours, and taught their grandmother to suck

eggs. But watching that red cheeked, whitehaired, somnolent figure, his smile was not so contemptuous as

might have been expected. For after all, the chairman was a wonderful old boy. A man of go and insight

could not but respect him. Eighty! Half paralysed, over head and ears in debt, having gone the pace all his

lifeor so they said!till at last that mine in Ecuador had done for himbefore the secretary's day, of

course, but he had heard of it. The old chap had bought it up on spec'"de l'audace, toujours de l'audace," as

he was so fond of sayingpaid for it half in cash and half in promises, and then the thing had turned out

empty, and left him with L20,000 worth of the old shares unredeemed. The old boy had weathered it out

without a bankruptcy so far. Indomitable old buffer; and never fussy like the rest of them! Young Farney,

though a secretary, was capable of attachment; and his eyes expressed a pitying affection. The Board meeting

had been long and "snadgy"a final settling of that Pillin business. Rum go the chairman forcing it on them

like this! And with quiet satisfaction the secretary thought 'And he never would have got it through if I hadn't

made up my mind that it really is good business!' For to expand the company was to expand himself. Still, to

buy four ships with the freight market so depressed was a bit startling, and there would be opposition at the

general meeting. Never mind! He and the chairman could put it throughput it through. And suddenly he

Only from those eyes could one appreciate the strength of life yet flowing underground in that wellnigh

"Yes, sir. I've put them in the transfer office; said you'd be with them in a minute; but I wasn't going to wake

Grasping the edge of the table with his trembling hands, the old man pulled, and, with Farney heaving him

behind, attained his feet. He stood about five feet ten, and weighed fully fourteen stone; not corpulent, but

very thick all through; his round and massive head alone would have outweighed a baby. With eyes shut, he

seemed to be trying to get the better of his own weight, then he moved with the slowness of a barnacle

towards the door. The secretary, watching him, thought: 'Marvellous old chap! How he gets about by himself

But the chairman was through the green baize door. At his tortoise gait he traversed the inner office, where

the youthful clerks suspended their figuringto grin behind his backand entered the transfer office, where

eight gentlemen were sitting. Seven rose, and one did not. Old Heythorp raised a saluting hand to the level of

"Mr. Heythorp, we've appointed Mr. Brownbee to voice our views. Mr. Brownbee!" And down he sat.

Mr. Brownbee rose a stoutish man some seventy years of age, with little grey side whiskers, and one of those

utterly steady faces only to be seen in England, faces which convey the sense of business from father to son

for generations; faces which make wars, and passion, and free thought seem equally incredible; faces which

inspire confidence, and awaken in one a desire to get up and leave the room. Mr. Brownbee rose, and said in

"Mr. Heythorp, we here represent about L14,000. When we had the pleasure of meeting you last July, you

will recollect that you held out a prospect of some more satisfactory arrangement by Christmas. We are now

>From the depths of old Heythorp a preliminary rumble came travelling, reached the surface, and

The eight gentlemen looked at him. Was he going to try and put them off again? Mr. Brownbee said with

"I'm sure we're very glad to hear it. But to come to the point. We have felt, Mr. Heythorp, and I'm sure you

won't think it unreasonable, thaterbankruptcy would be the most satisfactory solution. We have waited a

long time, and we want to know definitely where we stand; for, to be quite frank, we don't see any prospect of

This plumping out of what was at the back of their minds produced in Mr. Brownbee and his colleagues a sort

of chemical disturbance. They coughed, moved their feet, and turned away their eyes, till the one who had not

"My grandfather lived to be a hundred; my father ninetysixboth of them rips. I'm only eighty, gentlemen;

"Indeed," Mr. Brownbee said, "we hope you have many years of this life before you."

"More of this than of another." And a silence fell, till old Heythorp added: "You're getting a thousand a year

out of my fees. Mistake to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. I'll make it twelve hundred. If you force

"We think, Mr. Heythorp, you should make it at least fifteen hundred. In that case we might perhaps

"We can hardly accept your assertion that we should get nothing in the event of bankruptcy. We fancy you

greatly underrate the possibilities. Fifteen hundred a year is the least you can do for us."

Old Heythorp nodded. "Come again this day month, and I'll see what I can do for you;" and he shut his eyes.

Round Mr. Brownbee six of the gentlemen gathered, speaking in low voices; Mr. Ventnor nursed a leg and

glowered at old Heythorp, who sat with his eyes closed. Mr. Brownbee went over and conferred with Mr.

"Well, sir, we have considered your proposal; we agree to accept it for the moment. We will come again, as

We hope that you will by then have seen your way to something more substantial, with a view to avoiding

Old Heythorp nodded. The eight gentlemen took their hats, and went out one by one, Mr. Brownbee

The old man, who could not get up without assistance, stayed musing in his chair. He had diddled 'em for the

moment into giving him another month, and when that month was uphe would diddle 'em again! A month

ought to make the Pillin business safe, with all that hung on it. That poor funkey chap Joe Pillin! A gurgling

chuckle escaped his red lips. What a shadow the fellow had looked, trotting in that evening just a month ago,

What a parchmenty, precise, threadpaper of a chap, with his bird's claw of a hand, and his muffledup

You've a monstrous constitution, Sylvanus. If I drank port and smoked cigars and sat up till one o'clock, I

should be in my grave tomorrow. I'm not the man I was. The fact is, I've come to see if you can help me. I'm

"Well, my nature's not like yours. To come to the point, I want to sell my ships and retire. I need rest.

A pause, a twinkle, a puff of smoke. "Make it worth my while!" He had said it in jest; and then, in a flash, the

idea had come to him. Rosamund and her youngsters! What a chance to put something between them and

destitution when he had joined the majority! And so he said:" We don't want your silly ships."

That claw of a hand waved in deprecation. "They're very good ships doing quite well. It's only my

"What d'you want for'em?" Good Lord! how he jumped if you asked him a plain question. The chap was as

"Here are the figuresfor the last four years. I think you'll agree that I couldn't ask less than seventy

Through the smoke of his cigar old Heythorp had digested those figures slowly, Joe Pillin feeling his teeth

"Sixty thousand! And out of that you pay me ten per cent., if I get it through for you. Take it or leave it."

"Arrange that all right. Think it over. Freights'll go lower yet. Have some port."

"Yes, yes. Goodbye. I can't imagine how you still go on smoking those things and drinking port.

"See you in your grave yet, Joe." What a feeble smile the poor fellow had! Laughhe couldn't! And, alone

Though, to dwell in the heart of shipping, Sylvanus Heythorp had lived at Liverpool twenty years, he was

from the Eastern Counties, of a family so old that it professed to despise the Conquest. Each of its

generations occupied nearly twice as long as those of less tenacious men. Traditionally of Danish origin, its

men folk had as a rule bright reddishbrown hair, red cheeks, large round heads, excellent teeth and poor

morals. They had done their best for the population of any county in which they had settled; their offshoots

swarmed. Born in the early twenties of the nineteenth century, Sylvanus Heythorp, after an education broken

by escapades both at school and college, had fetched up in that simple London of the late forties, where

claret, opera, and eight per cent. for your money ruled a cheery roost. Made partner in his shipping firm well

before he was thirty, he had sailed with a wet sheet and a flowing tide; dancers, claret, Cliquot, and piquet; a

cab with a tiger; some travelall that delicious earlyVictorian consciousness of nothing save a golden time.

It was all so full and mellow that he was forty before he had his only love affair of any depthwith the

daughter of one of his own clerks, a liaison so awkward as to necessitate a sedulous concealment. The death

of that girl, after three years, leaving him a, natural son, had been the chief, perhaps the only real, sorrow of

his life. Five years later he married. What for? God only knew! as he was in the habit of remarking. His wife

had been a hard, worldly, wellconnected woman, who presented him with two unnatural children, a girl and

a boy, and grew harder, more worldly, less handsome, in the process. The migration to Liverpool, which took

place when he was sixty and she fortytwo, broke what she still had of heart, but she lingered on twelve

years, finding solace in bridge, and being haughty towards Liverpool. Old Heythorp saw her to her rest

without regret. He had felt no love for her whatever, and practically none for her two childrenthey were in

his view colourless, pragmatical, very unexpected characters. His son Ernest in the Admiraltyhe thought

a poor, careful stick. His daughter Adela, an excellent manager, delighting in spiritual conversation and the

society of tame men, rarely failed to show him that she considered him a hopeless heathen. They saw as little

as need be of each other. She was provided for under that settlement he had made on her mother fifteen years

ago, well before the not altogether unexpected crisis in his affairs. Very different was the feeling he had

bestowed on that son of his "under the rose." The boy, who had always gone by his mother's name of Larne,

had on her death been sent to some relations of hers in Ireland, and there brought up. He had been called to

the Dublin bar, and married, young, a girl half Cornish and ,half Irish; presently, having cost old Heythorp in

all a pretty penny, he had died impecunious, leaving his fair Rosamund at thirty with a girl of eight and a boy

of five. She had not spent six months of widowhood before coming over from Dublin to claim the old man's

guardianship. A remarkably pretty woman, like a fullblown rose, with greenish hazel eyes, she had turned

up one morning at the offices of "The Island Navigation Company," accompanied by her two childrenfor

he had never divulged to them his private address. And since then they had always been more or less on his

hands, occupying a small house in a suburb of Liverpool. He visited them there, but never asked them to the

house in Sefton Park, which was in fact his daughter's; so that his proper family and friends were unaware of

Rosamund Larne was one of those precarious ladies who make uncertain incomes by writing fullbodied

storyettes. In the most dismal circumstances she enjoyed a buoyancy bordering on the indecent; which always

amused old Heythorp's cynicism. But of his grandchildren Phyllis and Jock (wild as colts) he had become

fond. And this chance of getting six thousand pounds settled on them at a stroke had seemed to him nothing

but heavensent. As things were, if he "went off" and, of course, he might at any moment, there wouldn't

be a penny for them; for he would "cut up" a good fifteen thousand to the bad. He was now giving them some

three hundred a year out of his fees; and dead directors unfortunately earned no fees! Six thousand pounds at

four and a half per cent., settled so that their mother couldn't "blue it," would give them a certain two hundred

and fifty pounds a yearbetter than beggary. And the more he thought the better he liked it, if only that shaky

Four evenings later, the "shaky chap" had again appeared at his house in Sefton Park.

"It's a sacrifice. Fiftyfour thousand for four shipsit means a considerable reduction in my income."

"Well, there is that; but you know, I really can't be party to a secret commission. If it came out, think of my

"All you've got to do's to execute a settlement on some third parties that I'll name. I'm not going to take a

penny of it myself. Get your own lawyer to draw it up and make him trustee. You can sign it when the

purchase has gone through. I'll trust you, Joe. What stock have you got that gives four and a half per cent.?"

"Woman and her children I want to do a good turn to." What a face the fellow had made! "Afraid of being

"Yes, you may laughI am afraid of being connected with someone else's woman. I don't like itI don't

"Lucky for you; you'd have been dead long ago. Tell your lawyer it's an old flame of yoursyou old dog!"

"Yes. Sell stock in London, bank the proceeds there, and bring me six thousand pounds in notes. I'll hold 'em

till after the general meeting. If the thing doesn't go through, I'll hand 'em back to you."

"There's no law to prevent you doing what you like with your money. What I do's nothing to you. And mind

you, I'm taking nothing from itnot a mag. You assist the widowed and the fatherlessjust your line, Joe!"

"What a fellow you are, Sylvanus; you don't seem capable of taking anything seriously."

And the beggar had. That settlement was drawn and only awaited signature. The Board today had decided

on the purchase; and all that remained was to get it ratified at the general meeting. Let him but get that over,

and this provision for his grandchildren made, and he would snap his fingers at Brownbee and his crewthe

canting humbugs! "Hope you have many years of this life before you!" As if they cared for anything but his

moneytheir money rather! And becoming conscious of the length of his reverie, he grasped the arms of his

chair, heaved at his own bulk, in an effort to rise, growing redder and redder in face and neck. It was one of

the hundred things his doctor had told him not to do for fear of apoplexy, the humbug! Why didn't Farney or

one of those young fellows come and help him up? To call out was undignified. But was he to sit there all

night? Three times he failed, and after each failure sat motionless again, crimson and exhausted; the fourth

time he succeeded, and slowly made for the office. Passing through, he stopped and said in his extinct voice:

"Tell Mr. Farney to come and see me tomorrow at noon, about my speech for the general meeting."

At his tortoise gait he passed between the office stools to the door, opened it feebly, and slowly vanished.

Issuing from the offices of "The Island Navigation Company," Sylvanus Heythorp moved towards the corner

whence he always took tram to Sefton Park. The crowded street had all that prosperous air of catching or

missing something which characterises the town where London and New York and Dublin meet. Old

Heythorp had to cross to the far side, and he sallied forth without regard to traffic. That snaillike passage

had in it a touch of the sublime; the old man seemed saying: "Knock me down and be dd to youI'm not

going to hurry." His life was saved perhaps ten times a day by the British character at large, compounded of

phlegm and a liking to take something under its protection. The tram conductors on that line were especially

used to him, never failing to catch him under the arms and heave him like a sack of coals, while with

He moved into the body of the tram, where somebody would always get up from kindness and the fear that he

might sit down on them; and there he stayed motionless, his little eyes tight closed. With his red face, tuft of

white hairs above his square cleft block of shaven chin, and his big highcrowned bowler hat, which yet

seemed too petty for his head with its thick hairhe looked like some kind of an idol dug up and decked out

One of those voices of young men from public schools and exchanges where things are bought and sold, said:

Old Heythorp opened his eyes. That sleek cub, Joe Pillin's son! What a young pupwith his round eyes, and

his round cheeks, and his little moustache, his fur coat, his spats, his diamond pin!

"Thanks, rather below par, worryin' about his ships. Suppose you haven't any news for him, sir?"

Old Heythorp nodded. The young man was one of his pet abominations, embodying all the complacent,

littleheaded mediocrity of this new generation; natty fellows all turned out of the same mould, sippers and

tasters, chaps without drive or capacity, without even vices; and he did not intend to gratify the cub's

The old man! Cheeky brat! And closing his eyes he relapsed into immobility. The tram wound and ground its

upward way, and he mused. When he was that cub's agetwentyeight or whatever it might behe had

done most things; been up Vesuvius, driven fourinhand, lost his last penny on the Derby and won it back

on the Oaks, known all the dancers and operatic stars of the day, fought a duel with a Yankee at Dieppe and

winged him for saying through his confounded nose that Old England was played out; been a controlling

voice already in his shipping firm; drunk five other of the best men in London under the table; broken his

neck steeplechasing; shot a burglar in the legs; been nearly drowned, for a bet; killed snipe in Chelsea; been

to Court for his sins; stared a ghost out of countenance; and travelled with a lady of Spain. If this young pup

had done the last, it would be all he had; and yet, no doubt, he would call himself a "spark."

He lowered himself to the ground, and moved in the bluish darkness towards the gate of his daughter's house.

Bob Pillin walked beside him, thinking: 'Poor old josser, he is gettin' a back number!' And he said: "I should

have thought you ought to drive, sir. My old guv'nor would knock up at once if he went about at night like

Bob Pillin gave vent to one of those fat cackles which come so readily from a certain type of man; and old

A woman with dark hair and a thin, straight face and figure was arranging some flowers in the hall. She

"You really ought not to be so late, Father! It's wicked at this time of year. Who is itoh! Mr. Pillin, how do

you do? Have you had tea? Won't you come to the drawingroom; or do you want to see my father?"

"Thaanks! I believe your father" And he thought: 'By Jove! the old chap is a caution!' For old Heythorp

was crossing the hall without having paid the faintest attention to his daughter. Murmuring again:

"Thaanks awfully; he wants to give me something," he followed. Miss Heythorp was not his style at all; he

had a kind of dread of that thin woman who looked as if she could never be unbuttoned. They said she was a

In his sanctum old Heythorp had moved to his writingtable, and was evidently anxious to sit down.

Receiving a shake of the head, Bob Pillin stood by the fire and watched. The old "sport" liked to paddle his

own canoe. Fancy having to lower yourself into a chair like that! When an old Johnny got to such a state it

was really a mercy when he snuffed out, and made way for younger men. How his Companies could go on

putting up with such a fossil for chairman was a marvel! The fossil rumbled and said in that almost inaudible

"Dibs and no responsibility. Tell him from me to drink portadd five years to his life."

To this unwarranted attack Bob Pillin made no answer save a laugh; he perceived that a manservant had

At this announcement the old man seemed to try and start; then he nodded, and held out the note he had

written. Bob Pillin received it together with the impression of a murmur which sounded like: "Scratch a poll,

Poll!" and passing the fine figure of a woman in a fur coat, who seemed to warm the air as she went by, he

A young and pretty girl was standing on the bearskin before the fire, looking at him with roundeyed

innocence. He thought: 'This is better; I mustn't disturb them for my hat'; and approaching the fire, said:

He noticed that she had a large bunch of violets at her breast, a lot of fair hair, a short straight nose, and round

Bob Pillin saw her white round throat, and thought: 'She is a ripper!' And he said with a certain desperation:

That rumbling whisper like "Scratch a Poll, Poll!" recurring to Bob Pillin, he said with reservation:

Bob Pillin thought: 'This bit is something new. I wonder what her Christian name is.' And he said:

Could he say: "Is my only joy"? Better keep it! Butfor what? He wouldn't see her again if he didn't look out!

"Oh! a long way23, Millicent Villas. It's a poky little house. I hate it. We have awful larks, though."

"Mother, and myself, and Jockhe's an awful boy. You can't conceive what an awful boy he is. He's got

nearly red hair; I think he'll be just like Guardy when he gets old. He's awful!"

"Would you? I'll ask mother if you can. You won't want to again; he goes off all the time like a squib." She

threw back her head, and again Bob Pillin felt a little giddy. He collected himself, and drawled:

"No. Mother's got something special to say. We've never been here before, you see. Isn't he fun, though?"

"I think he's the greatest lark; but he's awfully nice to me. Jock calls him the last of the Stoic'uns."

"Phyllis!" It had a particular ring, that voice, as if coming from beautifully formed red lips, of which the

lower one must curve the least bit over; it had, too, a caressing vitality, and a kind of warm falsity.

The girl threw a laughing look back over her shoulder, and vanished through the door into the room.

Bob Pillin remained with his back to the fire and his puppy round eyes fixed on the air that her figure had last

occupied. He was experiencing a sensation never felt before. Those travels with a lady of Spain, charitably

conceded him by old Heythorp, had so far satisfied the emotional side of this young man; they had stopped

short at Brighton and Scarborough, and been preserved from even the slightest intrusion of love. A calculated

and hygienic career had caused no anxiety either to himself or his father; and this sudden swoop of something

more than admiration gave him an uncomfortable choky feeling just above his high round collar, and in the

temples a sort of buzzingthose first symptoms of chivalry. A man of the world does not, however,

succumb without a struggle; and if his hat had not been out of reach, who knows whether he would not have

left the house hurriedly, saying to himself: "No, no, my boy; Millicent Villas is hardly your form, when your

intentions are honourable"? For somehow that round and laughing face, bob of glistening hair, those

wideopened grey eyes refused to awaken the beginnings of other intentionssuch is the effect of youth and

innocence on even the steadiest young men. With a kind of moral stammer, he was thinking: 'Can Idare I

offer to see them to their tram? Couldn't I even nip out and get the car round and send them home in it? No, I

might miss thembetter stick it out here! What a jolly laugh! What a tipping facestrawberries and cream,

The door was opening; he heard that warm vibrating voice: "Come along, Phyllis!"the girl's laugh so high

and fresh: "Righto! Coming!" And with, perhaps, the first real tremor he had ever known, he crossed to the

front door. All the more chivalrous to escort them to the tram without a hat! And suddenly he heard: " I've got

your hat, young man!" And her mother's voice, warm, and simulating shock: "Phyllis, you awful gairl! Did

And thenhe did not quite know howinsulated from the January air by laughter and the scent of fur and

violets, he was between them walking to their tram. It was like an experience out of the "Arabian Nights," or

something of that sort, an intoxication which made one say one was going their way, though one would have

to come all the way back in the same beastly tram. Nothing so warming had ever happened to him as sitting

between them on that drive, so that he forgot the note in his pocket, and his desire to relieve the anxiety of the

"old man," his father. At the tram's terminus they all got out. There issued a purr of invitation to come and see

them some time; a clear: "Jock'll love to see you!" A low laugh: "You awful gairl!" And a flash of cunning

"Thanks awfully; rather!" and put his foot back on the step of the tram. Thus did he delicately expose the

"Oh! you said you were going our way! What oneers you do tell! Oh!" The words were as music; the sight

of those eyes growing rounder, the most perfect he had ever seen; and Mrs. Larne's low laugh, so warm yet so

preoccupied, and the tips of the girl's fingers waving back above her head. He heaved a sigh, and knew no

more till he was seated at his club before a bottle of champagne. Home! Not he! He wished to drink and

The words: "A Mrs. Larne to see you, sir," had been of a nature to astonish weaker nerves. What had brought

her here? She knew she mustn't come! Old Heythorp had watched her entrance with cynical amusement. The

way she whiffed herself at that young pup in passing, the way her eyes slid round! He had a very just

appreciation of his son's widow; and a smile settled deep between his chin tuft and his moustache. She lifted

"I really had to come and see you, Guardy; we haven't had a sight of you for such an age. And in this awful

"How dreadful of you to think I came for that! But I am in an awful fix, Guardy."

"Just let me tell you, dear; it'll be some relief. I'm having the most terrible time."

She sank into a low chair, disengaging an overpowering scent of violets, while melancholy struggled to

"The most awful fix. I expect to be sold up any moment. We may be on the streets tomorrow. I daren't tell

the children; they're so happy, poor darlings. I shall be obliged to take Jock away from school. And Phyllis

will have to stop her piano and dancing; it's an absolute crisis. And all due to those Midland Syndicate

people. I've been counting on at least two hundred for my new story, and the wretches have refused it."

With a tiny handkerchief she removed one tear from the corner of one eye. "It is hard, Guardy; I worked my

Heaving a sigh, which conveyed nothing but the generosity of her breathing apparatus, Mrs. Larne went on:

She sighed again, her eyes slid round the room; then in her warm voice she murmured:

"Guardy, you were my dear Philip's father, weren't you? I've never said anything; but of course you were. He

Nothing moved in old Heythorp's face. No pagan image consulted with flowers and song and sacrifice could

have returned less answer. Her dear Philip! She had led him the devil of a life, or he was a Dutchman! And

what the deuce made her suddenly trot out the skeleton like this? But Mrs. Larne's eyes were still wandering.

"What a lovely house! You know, I think you ought to help me, Guardy. Just imagine if your grandchildren

The old man grinned. He was not going to deny his relationshipit was her lookout, not his. But neither

"And they will be; you couldn't look on and see it. Do come to my rescue this once. You really might do

Mrs. Larne heaved one of her most buoyant sighs. She certainly did not believe him.

"Well!" she said; "you'll be sorry when we come round one night and sing for pennies under your window.

Wouldn't you like to see Phyllis? I left her in the hall. She's growing such a sweet gairl. Guardy just fifty!"

Mrs. Larne threw up her hands. "Well! You'll repent it. I'm at my last gasp." She sighed profoundly, and the

perfume of violets escaped in a cloud; Then, getting up, she went to the door and called: "Phyllis!"

When the girl entered old Heythorp felt the nearest approach to a flutter of the heart for many years. She had

put her hair up! She was like a spring day in January; such a relief from that scented humbug, her mother.

Pleasant the touch of her lips on his forehead, the sound of her clear voice, the sight of her slim movements,

the feeling that she did him creditcleanrun stock, she and that young scamp Jockbetter than the holy

woman, his daughter Adela, would produce if anyone were ever fool enough to marry her, or that pragmatical

And when they were gone he reflected with added zest on the six thousand pounds he was getting for them

out of Joe Pillin and his ships. He would have to pitch it strong in his speech at the general meeting. With

freights so low, there was bound to be opposition. No dash nowadays; nothing but gabby caution! They were

a scrimshanking lot on the Boardhe had had to pull them round one by onethe deuce of a tug getting

this thing through! And yet, the business was sound enough. Those ships would earn money, properly

His valet, coming in to prepare him for dinner, found him asleep. He had for the old man as much admiration

as may be felt for one who cannot put his own trousers on. He would say to the housemaid Molly: "He's a

game old blightermust have been a rare one in his day. Cocks his hat at you, even now, I see!" To which

the girl, Irish and pretty, would reply: "Well, an' sure I don't mind, if it gives um a pleasure. 'Tis better

At dinner, old Heythorp always sat at one end of the rosewood table and his daughter at the other. It was the

eminent moment of the day. With napkin tucked high into his waistcoat, he gave himself to the meal with

passion. His palate was undimmed, his digestion unimpaired. He could still eat as much as two men, and

drink more than one. And while he savoured each mouthful he never spoke if he could help it. The holy

woman had nothing to say that he cared to hear, and he nothing to say that she cared to listen to. She had a

horror, too, of what she called "the pleasures of the table"those lusts of the flesh! She was always longing

to dock his grub, he knew. Would see her further first! What other pleasures were there at his age? Let her

Trust her for nosing anything out! Fixing his little blue eyes on her, he mumbled with a very full mouth:

He had a longing to say: 'Part of one of my families under the rose.' As a fact it was the best part of the only

one, but the temptation to multiply exceedingly was almost overpowering. He checked himself, however, and

went on eating partridge, his secret irritation crimsoning his cheeks; and he watched her eyes, those cold

precise and round grey eyes, noting it, and knew she was thinking: 'He eats too much.'

She said: "Sorry I'm not considered fit to be told. You ought not to be drinking hock."

Old Heythorp took up the long green glass, drained it, and repressing fumes and emotion went on with his

"I know their name is Larne, but it conveyed nothing to me; perhaps it's just as well."

"Then do you mean to say, Father, that you were married before you married my mother?"

She said with a sort of disgust: "Not married! I see. I suppose those people are hanging round your neck,

Again the old man suppressed that spasm, and the veins in his neck and forehead swelled alarmingly. If he

had spoken he would infallibly have choked. He ceased eating, and putting his hands on the table tried to

raise himself. He could not and subsiding in his chair sat glaring at the stiff, quiet figure of his daughter.

He did not answer. He was not going to sit there to be dragooned and insulted! His helplessness had never so

weighed on him before. It was like a revelation. A logthat had to put up with anything! A log! And,

"I suppose you don't realise that it's a shock to me. I don't know what Ernest will think"

Old Heythorp's rage found vent in a sort of rumble. How the devil had he gone on all these years in the same

house with that woman, dining with her day after day! But the servant had come back now, and putting down

The man paused, thunderstruck, with the souffle balanced. To leave dinner unfinishedit was a portent!

Raised to his feet, he walked slowly out; but in his sanctum he did not sit down, obsessed by this first

overwhelming realisation of his helplessness. He stood swaying a little, holding on to the table, till the

He shook his head. Hang it, he could do that for himself, anyway. He must think of something to fortify his

Old Heythorp filled his glass, drank, and filled again. He took a cigar from the box and lighted it. The girl

came in, a greyeyed, darkhaired damsel, and stood with her hands folded, her head a little to one side, her

"Then put your nose in here every now and then, to see if I want anything. Meller goes out sometimes. Don't

He nodded, and when she had gone lowered himself into his chair with a sense of appeasement. Pretty girl!

Comfort to see a pretty face not a pale, peeky thing like Adela's. His anger burned up anew. So she counted

on his helplessness, had begun to count on that, had she? She should see that there was life in the old dog yet!

And his sacrifice of the uneaten souffle, the still less eaten mushrooms, the peppermint sweet with which he

usually concluded dinner, seemed to consecrate that purpose. They all thought he was a hulk, without a shot

left in the locker! He had seen a couple of them at the Board that afternoon shrugging at each other, as though

saying: 'Look at him!' And young Farney pitying him. Pity, forsooth! And that coarsegrained solicitor chap

at the creditors' meeting curling his lip as much as to say: 'One foot in the grave!' He had seen the clerks

dowsing the glim of their grins; and that young pup Bob Pillin screwing up his supercilious mug over his

dogcollar. He knew that scented humbug Rosamund was getting scared that he'd drop off before she'd

squeezed him dry. And his valet was always looking him up and down queerly. As to that holy woman!

Not quite so fast! Not quite so fast! And filling his glass for the fourth time, he slowly sucked down the dark

red fluid, with the "old boots" flavour which his soul loved, and, drawing deep at his cigar, closed his eyes.

The room in the hotel where the general meetings of "The Island Navigation Company" were held was nearly

full when the secretary came through the door which as yet divided the shareholders from their directors.

Having surveyed their empty chairs, their ink and papers, and nodded to a shareholder or two, he stood,

watch in hand, contemplating the congregation. A thicker attendance than he had ever seen! Due, no doubt, to

the lower dividend, and this Pillin business. And his tongue curled. For if he had a natural contempt for his

Board, with the exception of the chairman, he had a still more natural contempt for his shareholders.

Amusing spectacle when you came to think of it, a general meeting! Unique! Eighty or a hundred men, and

five women, assembled through sheer devotion to their money. Was any other function in the world so

singlehearted. Church was nothing to itso many motives were mingled there with devotion to one's soul.

A welleducated young manreader of Anatole France, and other writershe enjoyed ironic speculation.

What earthly good did they think they got by coming here? Halfpast two! He put his watch back into his

There, the fumes of lunch and of a short preliminary meeting made cosy the February atmosphere. By the fire

four directors were conversing rather restlessly; the fifth was combing his beard; the chairman sat with eyes

closed and red lips moving rhythmically in the sucking of a lozenge, the slips of his speech ready in his hand.

Old Heythorp swallowed, lifted his arms, rose with help, and walked through to his place at the centre of the

table. The five directors followed. And, standing at the chairman's right, the secretary read the minutes,

forming the words precisely with his curling tongue. Then, assisting the chairman to his feet, he watched

those rows of faces, and thought: 'Mistake to let them see he can't get up without help. He ought to have let

"It is my duty and my pleasure,' ladies and gentlemen, for the nineteenth consecutive year to present to you

the directors' report and the accounts for the past twelve months. You will all have had special notice of a

measure of policy on which your Board has decided, and to which you will be asked today to give your

The chairman went on, undisturbed. But several shareholders now rose, and the same speaker said testily:

"We might as well go home. If the chairman's got no voice, can't somebody read for him?"

The chairman took a sip of water, and resumed. Almost all in the last six rows were now on their feet, and

amid a hubbub of murmurs the chairman held out to the secretary the slips of his speech, and fell heavily

The secretary reread from the beginning; and as each sentence fell from his tongue, he thought: 'How good

that is!' 'That's very clear!' 'A neat touch!' 'This is getting them.' It seemed to him a pity they could not know

it was all his composition. When at last he came to the Pillin sale he paused for a second.

"I come now to the measure of policy to which I made allusion at the beginning of my speech. Your Board

has decided to expand your enterprise by purchasing the entire fleet of Pillin Co., Ltd. By this transaction we

become the owners of the four steamships Smyrna, Damascus, Tyre, and Sidon, vessels in prime condition

with a total freightcarrying capacity of fifteen thousand tons, at the low inclusive price of sixty thousand

pounds. Gentlemen, de l'audace, toujours de l'audace!"it was the chairman's phrase, his bit of the speech,

and the secretary did it more than justice. "Times are bad, but your Board is emphatically of the opinion that

they are touching bottom; and this, in their view, is the psychological moment for a forward stroke. They

confidently recommend your adoption of their policy and the ratification of this purchase, which they believe

will, in the not far distant future, substantially increase the profits of the Company." The secretary sat down

with reluctance. The speech should have continued with a number of appealing sentences which he had

carefully prepared, but the chairman had cut them out with the simple comment: "They ought to be glad of

The director who had combed his beard now rosea man of presence, who might be trusted to say nothing

long and suavely. While he was speaking the secretary was busy noting whence opposition was likely to

come. The majority were sitting owllikea good sign; but some dozen were studying their copies of the

report, and three at least were making notesWestgate, for, instance, who wanted to get on the Board, and

was sure to make himself unpleasantthe timehonoured method of vinegar; and Batterson, who also

desired to come on, and might be trusted to support the Boardthe timehonoured method of oil; while, if

one knew anything of human nature, the fellow who had complained that he might as well go home would

have something uncomfortable to say. The director finished his remarks, combed his beard with his fingers,

A momentary pause ensued. Then Messieurs Westgate and Batterson rose together. Seeing the chairman nod

towards the latter, the secretary thought: 'Mistake! He should have humoured Westgate by giving him

precedence.' But that was the worst of the old man, he had no notion of the suaviter in modo! Mr. Batterson

thus unchainedwould like, if he might be so allowed, to congratulate the Board on having piloted their ship

so smoothly through the troublous waters of the past year. With their worthy chairman still at the helm, he

had no doubt that in spite of the still lowhe would not say falling barometer, and theerunseasonable

climacteric, they might rely on weathering theerhe would not say storm. He would confess that the

present dividend of four per cent. was not one which satisfied every aspiration (Hear, hear!), but speaking for

himself, and he hoped for othersand here Mr. Batterson looked roundhe recognised that in all the

circumstances it was as much as they had the right erto expect. But following the bold but to his mind

prudent development which the Board proposed to make, he thought that they might reasonably, if not

sanguinely, anticipate a more golden future. ("No, no!") A shareholder said, 'No, no!' That might seem to

indicate a certain lack of confidence in the special proposal before the meeting. ("Yes!") From that lack of

confidence he would like at once to dissociate himself. Their chairman, a man of foresight and acumen, and

valour proved on many a field andersea, would not have committed himself to this policy without good

reason. In his opinion they were in safe hands, and he was glad to register his support of the measure

proposed. The chairman had well said in his speech: 'de l'audace, toujours de l'audace!' Shareholders would

Mr. Batterson sat down. And Mr. Westgate rose: He wantedhe said to know more, much more, about

this proposition, which to his mind was of a very dubious wisdom.... 'Ah!' thought the secretary, 'I told the old

boy he must tell them more'.... To whom, for instance, had the proposal first been made? To him!the

chairman said. Good! But why were Pillins selling, if freights were to go up, as they were told?

"Quite so; and in my opinion they are going lower, and Pillins were right to sell. It follows that we are wrong

to buy." ("Hear, hear!" "No, no!") "Pillins are shrewd people. What does the chairman say? Nerves! Does he

"That appears to me a somewhat fantastic theory; but I will leave that and confine myself to asking the

grounds on which the chairman bases his confidence; in fact, what it is which is actuating the Board in

pressing on us at such a time what I have no hesitation in stigmatising as a rash proposal. In a word, I want

What would the chairman do now? The situation was distinctly awkwardseeing his helplessness and the

lukewarmness of the Board behind him. And the secretary felt more strongly than ever the absurdity of his

being an underling, he who in a few wellchosen words could so easily have twisted the meeting round his

thumb. Suddenly he heard the long, rumbling sigh which preluded the chairman's speeches.

"Has any other gentleman anything to say before I move the adoption of the report?"

Phew! That would put their backs up. Yes, sure enough it had brought that fellow, who had said he might as

"Mr. Westgate requires answering. I don't like this business. I don't impute anything to anybody; but it looks

to me as if there were something behind it which the shareholders ought to be told. Not only that; but, to

speak frankly, I'm not satisfied to be ridden over roughshod in this fashion by one who, whatever he may

He heard again the rumbling beside him. The chairman had gone crimson, his mouth was pursed, his little

The chairman took a sip of water, and his voice, unexpectedly loud, broke an ominous hush:

"Never been so insulted in my life. My best services have been at your disposal for nineteen years; you know

what measure of success this Company has attained. I am the oldest man here, and my experience of shipping

is, I hope, a little greater than that of the two gentlemen who spoke last. I have done my best for you, ladies

and gentlemen, and we shall see whether you are going to endorse an indictment of my judgment and of my

honour, if I am to take the last speaker seriously. This purchase is for your good. 'There is a tide in the affairs

of men'and I for one am not content, never have been, to stagnate. If that is what you want, however, by all

means give your support to these gentlemen and have done with it. I tell you freights will go up before the

end of the year; the purchase is a sound one, more than a sound oneI, at any rate, stand or fall by it. Refuse

He sank back into his seat. The secretary, stealing a glance, thought with a sort of enthusiasm: 'Bravo! Who'd

have thought he could rally his voice like that? A good touch, too, that about his honour! I believe he's

It's still dicky, though, if that fellow at the back gets up again; the old chap can't work that stop a second time.

"I do not hesitate to say that I am an old friend of the chairman; we are, many of us, old friends of the

chairman, and it has been painful to me, and I doubt not to others, to hear an attack made on him. If he is old

in body, he is young in mental vigour and courage. I wish we were all as young. We ought to stand by him; I

say, we ought to stand by him." ("Hear, hear! Hear, hear!") And the secretary thought: 'That's done it!' And he

felt a sudden odd emotion, watching the chairman bobbing his body, like a wooden toy, at old Appleby; and

old Appleby bobbing back. Then, seeing a shareholder close to the door get up, thought: 'Who's that? I know

his faceAh! yes; Ventnor, the solicitorhe's one of the chairman's creditors that are coming again this

"I can't agree that we ought to let sentiment interfere with our judgment in this matter. The question is

simply: How are our pockets going to be affected? I came here with some misgivings, but the attitude of the

chairman has been such as to remove them; and I shall support the proposition." The secretary thought:

"Those in favour signify the same in the usual way. Contrary? Carried." The secretary noted the dissentients,

A quarter of an hour later he stood in the body of the emptying room supplying names to one of the

gentlemen of the Press. The passionless fellow said: "Haythorp, with an 'a'; oh! an 'e'; he seems an old man.

Thank you. I may have the slips? Would you like to see a proof? With an 'a' you saidoh! an 'e.' Good

afternoon!" And the secretary thought: 'Those fellows, what does go on inside them? Fancy not knowing the

Back in the proper office of "The Island Navigation Company" old Heythorp sat smoking a cigar and smiling

like a purring cat. He was dreaming a little of his triumph, sifting with his old brain, still subtle, the wheat

from the chaff of the demurrers: Westgatenothing in thatprofessional discontent till they silenced him

with a place on the boardbut not while be held the reins! That chap at the backan illconditioned

fellow! "Something behind!" Suspicious brute! There was somethingbuthang it! they might think

themselves lucky to get four ships at that price, and all due to him! It was on the last speaker that his mind

dwelt with a doubt. That fellow Ventnor, to whom he owed moneythere had been something just a little

queer about his toneas much as to say, "I smell a rat." Well! one would see that at the creditors' meeting in

In a fur coat which seemed to extinguish his thin form, Joe Pillin entered. It was snowing, and the cold had

nipped and yellowed his meagre face between its slight grey whiskering. He said thinly:

"Oh! I should be lost without it. You must have a fire inside you. Soso it's gone through?"

Old Heythorp nodded; and Joe Pillin, wandering like a spirit, scrutinised the shut door. He came back to the

Producing a parchment from his pocket Joe Pillin unfolded it with caution to disclose his signature, and said:

"I can't bear irrevocable things. I consider you stampeded me, playing on my nerves."

Joe Pillin replaced the deed within his coat, emitting a queer thin noise. He simply could not bear joking on

"Well," he said, "you've got your way; you always do. Who is this Mrs. Larne? You oughtn't to keep me in

the dark. It seems my boy met her at your house. You told me she didn't come there."

"Her husband was my son by a woman I was fond of before I married; her children are my grandchildren.

"I don't knowI don't know. I'm sorry you told me. It makes it all the more doubtful. As soon as the

transfer's complete, I shall get away abroad. This cold's killing me. I wish you'd give me your recipe for

Joe Pillin regarded his old friend with a sort of yearning. "And yet," he said, "I suppose, with your

"Well, goodbye, Sylvanus. You're a Job's comforter; I must be getting home." He put on his hat, and, lost in

his fur coat, passed out into the corridor. On the stairs he met a man who said:

"How do you do, Mr. Pillin? I know your son. Been' seeing the chairman? I see your sale's gone through all

"Mr. Ventnor, I think? Thank you! It's very cold, isn't it?" And, with that cautious remark, he passed on

Alone again, old Heythorp thought: 'By George! What a wavering, quavering, thread paper of a fellow! What

misery life must be to a chap like that! He walks in fearhe wallows in it. Poor devil!' And a curious feeling

swelled his heart, of elation, of lightness such as he had not known for years. Those two young things were

safe now from penurysafe! After dealing with those infernal creditors of his he would go round and have a

look at the children. With a hundred and twenty a year the boy could go into the Armybest place for a

young scamp like that. The girl would go off like hot cakes, of course, but she needn't take the first calf that

came along. As for their mother, she must look after herself; nothing under two thousand a year would keep

her out of debt. But trust her for wheedling and bluffing her way out of any scrape! Watching his

cigarsmoke curl and disperse he was conscious of the strain he had been under these last six weeks, aware

suddenly of how greatly he had baulked at thought of today's general meeting. Yes! It might have turned out

nasty. He knew well enough the forces on the Board, and off, who would be only too glad to shelve him. If he

were shelved here his other two Companies would be sure to follow suit, and bang would go every penny of

his incomehe would be a pauper dependant on that holy woman. Well! Safe now for another year if he

could stave off these sharks once more. It might be a harder job this time, but he was in luckin luck, and it

"Bring 'em in here, Mr. Farney. And let me have a cup of China tea as strong as you can make it."

"Yes, sir. Will you see the proof of the press report, or will you leave it to me?"

"Wonderful how your voice came back just at the right moment. I was afraid things were going to be

difficult. The insult did it, I think. It was a monstrous thing to say. I could have punched his head."

Again old Heythorp nodded; and, looking into the secretary's fine blue eyes, he repeated: "Bring 'em in."

The lonely minute before the entrance of his creditors passed in the thought: 'So that's how it struck him!

The gentlemen, who numbered ten this time, bowed to their debtor, evidently wondering why the deuce they

troubled to be polite to an old man who kept them out of their money. Then, the secretary reappearing with a

cup of China tea, they watched while their debtor drank it. The feat was tremulous. Would he get through

without spilling it all down his front, or choking? To those unaccustomed to his private life it was slightly

miraculous. He put the cup down empty, tremblingly removed some yellow drops from the little white tuft

"No use beating about the bush, gentlemen; I can offer you fourteen hundred a year so long as I live and hold

my directorships, and not a penny more. If you can't accept that, you must make me bankrupt and get about

sixpence in the pound. My qualifying shares will fetch a couple of thousand at market price. I own nothing

else. The house I live in, and everything in it, barring my clothes, my wine, and my cigars, belong to my

daughter under a settlement fifteen years old. My solicitors and bankers will give you every information.

In spite of business habits the surprise of the ten gentlemen was only partially concealed. A man who owed

them so much would naturally say he owned nothing, but would he refer them to his solicitors and bankers

"No, but I'll authorise my bankers to give you a full statement of my receipts for the last five yearslonger,

The strategic stroke of placing the ten gentlemen round the Board table had made it impossible for them to

consult freely without being overheard, but the lowvoiced transference of thought travelling round was

"We think, Mr. Heythorp, that your fees and dividends should enable you to set aside for us a larger sum.

Sixteen hundred, in fact, is what we think you should give us yearly. Representing, as we do, sixteen

thousand pounds, the prospect is not cheering, but we hope you have some good years before you yet. We

Old Heythorp shook his head. "Nineteen hundred and thirty pounds in a good year. Must eat and drink; must

have a man to look after me not as active as I was. Can't do on less than five hundred pounds. Fourteen

hundred's all I can give you, gentlemen; it's an advance of two hundred pounds. That's my last word."

"And it's my last word that I'm not satisfied. If these other gentlemen accept your proposition I shall be forced

The others had risen and were gathered in a knot at the end of the table; old Heythorp and Mr. Ventnor alone

remained seated. The old man's lower lip projected till the white hairs below stood out like bristles. 'You ugly

dog,' he was thinking, 'you think you've got something up your sleeve. Well, do your worst!' The "ugly dog"

rose abruptly and joined the others. And old Heythorp closed his eyes, sitting perfectly still, with his cigar,

which had gone out, sticking up between his teeth. Mr. Brownbee turning to voice the decision come to,

"Mr. Heythorp," he said, "if your bankers and solicitors bear out your statements, we shall accept your offer

faute de mieux, in consideration of your" but meeting the old man's eyes, which said so very plainly:

"Blow your consideration!" he ended with a stammer: "Perhaps you will kindly furnish us with the

Old Heythorp nodded, and Mr. Brownbee, with a little bow, clasped his hat to his breast and moved towards

the door. The nine gentlemen followed. Mr. Ventnor, bringing up the rear, turned and looked back. But the

After visiting his bank and his solicitors he struggled once more into his cab and caused it to be driven

towards Millicent Villas. A kind of sleepy triumph permeated his whole being, bumped and shaken by the

cab's rapid progress. So! He was free of those sharks now so long as he could hold on to his Companies; and

he would still have a hundred a year or more to spare for Rosamund and her youngsters. He could live on

four hundred, or even threefifty, without losing his independence, for there would be no standing life in that

holy woman's house unless he could pay his own scot! A good day's work! The best for many a long month!

There are rooms which refuse to give away their owners, and rooms which seem to say: 'They really are like

this.' Of such was Rosamund Larne'sa sort of permanent confession, seeming to remark to anyone who

entered: 'Her taste? Well, you can seecheerful and exuberant; her habitsyes, she sits here all the morning

in a dressinggown, smoking cigarettes and dropping ink; kindly observe my carpet. Notice the pianoit has

a look of coming and going, according to the exchequer. This very deepcushioned sofa is permanent,

however; the watercolours on the walls are safe, toothey're by herself. Mark the scent of mimosashe

likes flowers, and likes them strong. No clock, of course. Examine the bureaushe is obviously always

ringing for "the drumstick," and saying: "Where's this, Ellen, and where's that? You naughty gairl, you've

been tidying." Cast an eye on that pile of manuscriptshe has evidently a genius for composition; it flows

off her penlike Shakespeare, she never blots a line. See how she's had the electric light put in, instead of

that horrid gas; but try and turn either of them onyou can't; last quarter isn't paid, of course; and she uses

an oil lamp, you can tell that by the ceiling: The dog over there, who will not answer to the name of 'Carmen,'

a Pekinese spaniel like a little Djin, all prominent eyes rolling their blacks, and no nose betweenyes,

Carmen looks as if she didn't know what was coming next; she's rightit's a petandslapagain life!

Consider, too, the fittings of the tea tray, rather soiled, though not quite tin, but I say unto you that no

When old Heythorp entered this room, which extended from back to front of the little house, preceded by the

announcement "Mr. Aesop," it was resonant with a very clatterbodandigo of noises, from Phyllis playing the

Machiche; from the boy Jock on the hearthrug, emitting at short intervals the most piercing notes from an

ocarina; from Mrs. Larne on the sofa, talking with her trailing volubility to Bob Pillin; from Bob Pillin

muttering: "Yees! Quiite! Yees!" and gazing at Phyllis over his collar. And, on the windowsill, as far as

she could get from all this noise, the little dog Carmen was rolling her eyes. At sight of their visitor Jock blew

one rending screech, and bolting behind the sofa, placed his chin on its top, so that nothing but his round pink

Encircled from behind by the arms of Phyllis, and preceded by the gracious perfumed bulk of Mrs. Larne, old

Heythorp was escorted to the sofa. It was low, and when he had plumped down into it, the boy Jock emitted a

Old Heythorp nodded. His eyes were fixed on the liqueur, and Mrs. Larne murmured:

"Guardy, you must try our new liqueur. Jock, you awful boy, get up and bring Guardy a glass."

The boy Jock approached the teatable, took up a glass, put it to his eye and filled it rapidly.

"All right, Mother; I'll get rid of it," and rapidly swallowing the yellow liquor, took up another glass.

A loud shriek prevented a response. Phyllis, who had taken her brother by the ear to lead him to the door, let

Bob Pillin went hastening towards her; and following the young man with her chin, Mrs. Larne said, smiling:

"Aren't those children awful? He's such a nice fellow. We like him so much, Guardy."

The old man grinned. So she was making up to that young pup! Rosamund Larne, watching him, murmured:

"Oh! Guardy, you're as bad as Jock. He takes after you terribly. Look at the shape of his head. Jock, come

here!" The innocent boy approached; with his girlish complexion, his flowery blue eyes, his perfect mouth,

he stood before his mother like a large cherub. And suddenly he blew his ocarina in a dreadful manner. Mrs.

"That's the way he behaves. Be off with you, you awful boy. I want to talk to Guardy."

The boy withdrew on his stomach, and sat against the wall cross legged, fixing his innocent round eyes on

"Things are worse and worse, Guardy. I'm at my wits' end to tide over this quarter. You wouldn't advance me

"I've done something for you and the children," he said. "You'll get notice of it in a day or two; ask no

"Oh! Guardy! Oh! you dear!" And her gaze rested on Bob Pillin, leaning over the piano, where Phyllis again

Old Heythorp snorted. "What are you cultivating that young gaby for? She mustn't be grabbed up by any fool

"Of course, the dear gairl is much too young. Phyllis, come and talk to Guardy!"

When the girl was installed beside him on the sofa, and he had felt that little thrill of warmth the proximity of

Hearing his name, the boy Jock blew his ocarina till Mrs. Larne drove him from the room, and Phyllis went

"He's more awful than anything you can think of. Was my dad at all like him, Guardy? Mother's always so

"Oh! your day must have been jolly. Did you wear pegtop trousers, and dundreary's?"

"What larks! And I suppose you had lots of adventures with opera dancers and gambling. The young men are

all so good now." Her eyes rested on Bob Pillin. "That young man's a perfect stick of goodness."

"You wouldn't know how good he was," Phyllis went on musingly, "unless you'd sat next him in a tunnel.

The other day he had his waist squeezed and he simply sat still and did nothing. And then when the tunnel

ended, it was Jock after all, not me. His face was Oh! ah! ha! ha! Ah! ha!" She threw back her head,

"He likes to pretend, of course, that he's fearfully lively. He's promised to take mother and me to the theatre

A scent of hair, like hay, enveloped him, her lips bobbed against his nose,and there came a feeling in his

heart as when he rolled the first sip of a special wine against his palate. This little house was a rumtytoo

affair, her mother was a humbug, the boy a cheeky young rascal, but there was a warmth here he never felt in

that big house which had been his wife's and was now his holy daughter's. And once more he rejoiced at his

day's work, and the success of his breach of trust, which put some little ground beneath these young feet, in a

"Guardy, do look; he will stare at me like that. Isn't it awful like a boiled rabbit?"

Bob Pillin, attentive to Mrs. Larne, was gazing with all his might over her shoulder at the girl. The young

man was moonstruck, that was clear! There was something almost touching in the stare of those puppy dog's

eyes. And he thought 'Young beggarwish I were his age!' The utter injustice of having an old and helpless

body, when your desire for enjoyment was as great as ever! They said a man was as old as he felt! Fools! A

man was as old as his legs and arms, and not a day younger. He heard the girl beside him utter a

discomfortable sound, and saw her face cloud as if tears were not far off; she jumped up, and going to the

window, lifted the little dog and buried her face in its brown and white fur. Old Heythorp thought: 'She sees

that her humbugging mother is using her as a decoy.' But she had come back, and the little dog, rolling its

eyes horribly at the strange figure on the sofa, in a desperate effort to escape succeeded in reaching her

shoulder, where it stayed perched like a cat, held by one paw and trying to back away into space. Old

"H'm! Listen to me. When you come of age or marry, you'll have a hundred and twenty a year of your own

that you can't get rid of. Don't ever be persuaded into doing what you don't want. And remember: Your

mother's a sieve, no good giving her money; keep what you'll get for yourselfit's only a pittance, and you'll

Phyllis's eyes had opened very wide; so that he wondered if she had taken in his words.

"No, it's beastly altogether. If only we were like birds. Or if one could put out a plate overnight, and have just

"There's only one thing in life that mattersindependence. Lose that, and you lose everything. That's the

Phyllis stretched out her hands, and the little dog, running down her back, resumed its perch on the

The young man, giving Phyllis one appealing look, answered dully: "Thaanks!" and they went out together

to the taxi. In that draughtless vehicle they sat, full of who knows what contempt of age for youth; and youth

for age; the old man resenting this young pup's aspiration to his granddaughter; the young man annoyed that

this old image had dragged him away before he wished to go. Old Heythorp said at last:

"Your grandmother!" he said; then, with his habitual instinct of attack, added: "You make the most of your

At this rude assault Bob Pillin's redcheeked face assumed a certain dignity. "I don't know what you mean,

Thoroughly upset, Bob Pillin preserved a dogged silence. This fortnight, since he had first met Phyllis in old

Heythorp's hall, had been the most singular of his existence up to now. He would never have believed that a

fellow could be so quickly and completely bowled, could succumb without a kick, without even wanting to

kick. To one with his philosophy of having a good time and never committing himself too far, it was in the

nature of "a fair knockout," and yet so pleasurable, except for the wear and tear about one's chances. If only

he knew how far the old boy really counted in the matter! To say: "My intentions are strictly honourable"

would be oldfashioned; besidesthe old fellow might have no right to hear it. They called him Guardy, but

without knowing more he did not want to admit the old curmudgeon's right to interfere.

The old man turned his head so far as he was able; a grim smile bristled the hairs about his lips, and twinkled

in his eyes. What did he object to? Whyeverything! Object to! That sleek head, those puppydog eyes,

fattish red cheeks, high collars, pearl pin, spats, and drawlpah! the imbecility, the smugness of his mug; no

go, no devil in any of his sort, in any of these fishveined, coddledup young bloods, nothing but playing for

It was almost too much for the composure even of a man of the world. That this paralytic old fellow should

express contempt for his virility was really the last thing in jests. Luckily he could not take it seriously. But

suddenly he thought: 'What if he really has the power to stop my going there, and means to turn them against

"Awfully sorry, sir," he said, "if you don't think I'm wild enough. Anything I can do for you in that line"

The old man grunted; and realising that he had been quite witty, Bob Pillin went on:

"I know I'm not in debt, no entanglements, got a decent income, pretty good expectations and all that; but I

It was perhaps his first attempt at irony, and he could not help thinking how good it was.

But old Heythorp preserved a deadly silence. He looked like a stuffed man, a regular Aunt Sally sitting there,

with the fixed red in his cheeks, his stivered hair, square block of a body, and no neck that you could

seeonly wanting the pipe in his mouth! Could there really be danger from such an old idol? The idol spoke:

"I'll give you a word of advice. Don't hang round there, or you'll burn your fingers. Remember me to your

The taxi had stopped before the house in Sefton Park. An insensate impulse to remain seated and argue the

point fought in Bob Pillin with an impulse to leap out, shake his fist in at the window, and walk off. He

Old Heythorp, waiting for the driver to help him up, thought 'Fatter, but no more guts than his father!'

In his sanctum he sank at once into his chair. It was wonderfully still there every day at this hour; just the

click of the coals, just the faintest ruffle from the wind in the trees of the park. And it was cosily warm, only

the fire lightening the darkness. A drowsy beatitude pervaded the old man. A good day's work! A

triumphthat young pup had said. Yes! Something of a triumph! He had held on, and won. And dinner to

look forward to, yet. A napa nap! And soon, rhythmic, soft, sonorous, his breathing rose, with now and

When Bob Pillin emerged from the little front garden of 23, Millicent Villas ten days later, his sentiments

were ravelled, and he could not get hold of an end to pull straight the stuff of his mind.

He had found Mrs. Larne and Phyllis in the sittingroom, and Phyllis had been crying; he was sure she had

been crying; and that memory still infected the sentiments evoked by later happenings. Old Heythorp had

said: "You'll burn your fingers." The process had begun. Having sent her daughter away on a pretext really a

bit too thin, Mrs. Larne had installed him beside her scented bulk on the sofa, and poured into his ear such a

tale of monetary woe and entanglement, such a mass of present difficulties and rosy prospects, that his brain

still whirled, and only one thing emerged clearlythat she wanted fifty pounds, which she would repay him

on quarterday; for their Guardy had made a settlement by which, until the dear children came of age, she

would have sixty pounds every quarter. It was only a question of a few weeks; he might ask Messrs. Scriven

and Coles; they would tell him the security was quite safe. He certainly might ask Messrs. Scriven and

Colesthey happened to be his father's solicitors; but it hardly seemed to touch the point. Bob Pillin had a

certain shrewd caution, and the point was whether he was going to begin to lend money to a woman who, he

could see, might borrow up to seventy times seven on the strength of his infatuation for her daughter. That

was rather too strong! Yet, if he didn't she might take a sudden dislike to him, and where would he be then?

Besides, would not a loan make his position stronger? And thensuch is the effect of love even on the

younger generationthat thought seemed to him unworthy. If he lent at all, it should be from

chivalryulterior motives might go hang! And the memory of the tearmarks on Phyllis's pretty palepink

cheeks; and her petulantly mournful: "Oh! young man, isn't money beastly!" scraped his heart, and ravished

his judgment. All the same, fifty pounds was fifty pounds, and goodness knew how much more; and what did

he know of Mrs. Larne, after all, except that she was a relative of old Heythorp's and wrote storiestold

them too, if he was not mistaken? Perhaps it would be better to see Scrivens'. But again that absurd nobility

assaulted him. Phyllis! Phyllis! Besides, were not settlements always drawn so that they refused to form

security for anything? Thus, hampered and troubled, he hailed a cab. He was dining with the Ventnors on the

Driving, whitetiedand waistcoated, in his father's car, he thought with a certain contumely of the

younger Ventnor girl, whom he had been wont to consider pretty before he knew Phyllis. And seated next her

at dinner, he quite enjoyed his new sense of superiority to her charms, and the ease with which he could chaff

and be agreeable. And all the time he suffered from the suppressed longing which scarcely ever left him now,

to think and talk of Phyllis. Ventnor's fizz was good and plentiful, his old Madeira absolutely first chop, and

the only other man present a teetotal curate, who withdrew with the ladies to talk his parish shop. Favoured

by these circumstances, and the perception that Ventnor was an agreeable fellow, Bob Pillin yielded to his

"Do you happen," he said airily, "to know a Mrs. Larnerelative of old Heythorp'srather a handsome

Mr. Ventnor shook his head. A closer scrutiny than Bob Pillin's would have seen that he also moved his ears.

"Of old Heythorp's? Didn't know he had any, except his daughter, and that son of his in the Admiralty."

"She is, thoughlives rather out of town; got a son and daughter. I thought you might know her

Mr. Ventnor smiled. "Ah!" he said enigmatically, "these lady novelists! Does she make any money by them?"

Bob Pillin knew that to make money by writing meant success, but that not to make money by writing was

artistic, and implied that you had private means, which perhaps was even more distinguished. And he said:

"So she's a relative of old Heythorp's," he said. "He's a very old friend of your father's. He ought to go

To Bob Pillin, glowing with passion and Madeira, the idea of bankruptcy seemed discreditable in connection

with a relative of Phyllis. Besides, the old boy was far from that! Had he not just made this settlement on

Mr. Ventnor passed his hand over his whiskered face. "Don't you believe it; he hasn't a mag to his name. Fill

"Well, I happen to know he's just made a settlement of five or six thousand pounds. Don't know if you call

Confused, uncertain whether he had said something derogatory or indiscreet, or something which added

"Scrivensbut they're not" then, staring rather hard, he added: "I won't bet. You may be right. Scrivens

are your father's solicitors too, aren't they? Always been sorry he didn't come to me. Shall we join the

ladies?" And to the drawingroom he preceded a young man more uncertain in his mind than on his feet....

Charles Ventnor was not one to let you see that more was going on within than met the eye. But there was a

good deal going on that evening, and after his conversation with young Bob he had occasion more than once

to turn away and rub his hands together. When, after that second creditors' meeting, he had walked down the

stairway which led to the offices of "The Island Navigation Company," he had been deep in thought. Short,

squarely built, rather stout, with moustache and large muttonchop whiskers of a red brown, and a faint

floridity in face and dress, he impressed at first sight only by a certain truly British vulgarity. One felt that

here was a hailfellowwell met man who liked lunch and dinner, went to Scarborough for his summer

holidays, sat on his wife, took his daughters out in a boat and was never sick. One felt that he went to church

every Sunday morning, looked upwards as he moved through life, disliked the unsuccessful, and expanded

with his second glass of wine. But then a clear look into his wellclothed face and redbrown eyes would

give the feeling: 'There's something fulvous here; he might be a bit too foxy.' A third look brought the

thought: 'He's certainly a bully.' He was not a large creditor of old Heythorp. With interest on the original, he

calculated his claim at three hundred poundsunredeemed shares in that old Ecuador mine. But he had

waited for his money eight years, and could never imagine how it came about that he had been induced to

wait so long. There had been, of course, for one who liked "big pots," a certain glamour about the personality

of old Heythorp, still a bit of a swell in shipping circles, and a bit of an aristocrat in Liverpool. But during the

last year Charles Ventnor had realised that the old chap's star had definitely setwhen that happens, of

course, there is no more glamour, and the time has come to get your money. Weakness in oneself and others

is despicable! Besides, he had food for thought, and descending the stairs he chewed it: He smelt a

ratcreatures for which both by nature and profession he had a nose. Through Bob Pillin, on whom he

sometimes dwelt in connection with his younger daughter, he knew that old Pillin and old Heythorp had been

friends for thirty years and more. That, to an astute mind, suggested something behind this sale. The thought

had already occurred to him when he read his copy of the report. A commission would be a breach of trust, of

course, but there were ways of doing things; the old chap was devilish hard pressed, and human nature was

human nature! His lawyerish mind habitually put two and two together. The old fellow had deliberately

appointed to meet his creditors again just after the general meeting which would decide the purchasehad

In these circumstances Charles Ventnor had come to the meeting with eyes wide open and mouth tight

closed. And he had watched. It was certainly remarkable that such an old and feeble man, with no neck at all,

who looked indeed as if he might go off with apoplexy any moment, should actually say that he "stood or

fell" by this purchase, knowing that if he fell he would be a beggar. Why should the old chap be so keen on

getting it through? It would do him personally no good, unlessExactly! He had left the meeting, therefore,

secretly confident that old Heythorp had got something out of this transaction which would enable him to

make a substantial proposal to his creditors. So that when the old man had declared that he was going to make

none, something had turned sour in his heart, and he had said to himself: "All right, you old rascal! You don't

know C. V." The cavalier manner of that beggarly old rip, the defiant look of his deep little eyes, had put a

polish on the rancour of one who prided himself on letting no man get the better of him. All that evening,

seated on one side of the fire, while Mrs. Ventnor sat on the other, and the younger daughter played Gounod's

Serenade on the violinhe cogitated. And now and again he smiled, but not too much. He did not see his

way as yet, but had little doubt that before long he would. It would not be hard to knock that chipped old idol

off his perch. There was already a healthy feeling among the shareholders that he was past work and should

be scrapped. The old chap should find that Charles V. was not to be defied; that when he got his teeth into a

thing, he did not let it go. By hook or crook he would have the old man off his Boards, or his debt out of him

as the price of leaving him alone. His life or his moneyand the old fellow should determine which. With

the memory of that defiance fresh within him, he almost hoped it might come to be the first, and turning to

"Have a little dinner Friday week, and ask young Pillin and the curate." He specified the curate, a teetotaller,

because he had two daughters, and males and females must be paired, but he intended to pack him off after

dinner to the drawingroom to discuss parish matters while he and Bob Pillin sat over their wine. What he

On the day of the dinner, before departing for the office, he had gone to his cellar. Would three bottles of

Perrier Jouet do the trick, or must he add one of the old Madeira? He decided to be on the safe side. A bottle

or so of champagne went very little way with him personally, and young Pillin might be another.

The Madeira having done its work by turning the conversation into such an admirable channel, he had cut it

short for fear young Pillin might drink the lot or get wind of the rat. And when his guests were gone, and his

family had retired, he stood staring into the fire, putting together the pieces of the puzzle. Five or six

thousand poundssix would be ten per cent. on sixty! Exactly! Scrivens young Pillin had said! But Crow

Donkin, not Scriven Coles, were old Heythorp's solicitors. What could that mean, save that the old man

wanted to cover the tracks of a secret commission, and had handled the matter through solicitors who did not

know the state of his affairs! But why Pillin's solicitors? With this sale just going through, it must look

deuced fishy to them too. Was it all a mare's nest, after all? In such circumstances he himself would have

taken the matter to a London firm who knew nothing of anybody. Puzzled, therefore, and rather disheartened,

feeling too that touch of liver which was wont to follow his old Madeira, he went up to bed and woke his wife

Next day he continued to brood over his puzzle, and no fresh light came; but having a matter on which his

firm and Scrivens' were in touch, he decided to go over in person, and see if he could surprise something out

of them. Feeling, from experience, that any really delicate matter would only be entrusted to the most

responsible member of the firm, he had asked to see Scriven himself, and just as he had taken his hat to go, he

Scriven, raising his eyebrows a little, murmured: "Erno," in exactly the tone Mr. Ventnor himself used

when he wished to imply that though he didn't as a fact do business, he probably soon would. He knew

This time he had certainly drawn blood of sorts, for down came Scriven's eyebrows, and he said:

"Young Pillin? Why, it's his!" A little pause, and then: "Old Mr. Heythorp's solicitors are Crow Donkin, I

Mr. Ventnor held out his hand. "Yes, yes," he said; "goodbye. Glad to have got that matter settled up," and

out he went, and down the street, important, smiling. By George! He had got it! "It's his father"Scriven had

been going to say. What a plant! Exactly! Oh! neat! Old Pillin had made the settlement direct; and the

solicitors were in the dark; that disposed of his difficulty about them. No money had passed between old

Pillin and old Heythorp not a penny. Oh! neat! But not neat enough for Charles Ventnor, who had that nose

for rats. Then his smile died, and with a little chill he perceived that it was all based on suppositionnot

quite good enough to go on! What then? Somehow he must see this Mrs. Larne, or betterold Pillin himself.

The point to ascertain was whether she had any connection of her own with Pillin. Clearly young Pillin didn't

know of it; for, according to him, old Heythorp had made the settlement. By Jove! That old rascal was

deepall the more satisfaction in proving that he was not as deep as C. V. To unmask the old cheat was

already beginning to seem in the nature of a public service. But on what pretext could he visit Pillin? A

subscription to the Windeatt almshouses! That would make him talk in selfdefence and he would take care

not to press the request to the actual point of getting a subscription. He caused himself to be driven to the

Pillin residence in Sefton Park. Ushered into a room on the ground floor, heated in American fashion, Mr.

Ventnor unbuttoned his coat. A man of sanguine constitution, he found this hothouse atmosphere a little

trying. And having sympathetically obtained Joe Pillin's reluctant refusalQuite so! One could not

indefinitely extend one's subscriptions even for the best of causes!he said gently:

The effect of that simple shot surpassed his highest hopes. Joe Pillin's face, never highly coloured, turned a

sort of grey; he opened his thin lips, shut them quickly, as birds do, and something seemed to pass with

difficulty down his scraggy throat. The hollows, which nerve exhaustion delves in the cheeks of men whose

cheekbones are not high, increased alarmingly. For a moment he looked deathly; then, moistening his lips, he

"Oh! I thoughtyour son knows her; a relation of old Heythorp's," and he looked up.

Joe Pillin had his handkerchief to his mouth; he coughed feebly, then with more and more vigour:

"I'm in very poor health," he said, at last. "I'm getting abroad at once. This cold's killing me. What name did

"Ali! H'm! NoIno! My son knows all sorts of people. I shall have to try Mentone. Are you going?

Goodbye! Goodbye! I'm sorry; ah! ha! My coughah! ha h'h'm! Very distressing. Yehes! My

Out in the drive Mr. Ventnor took a deep breath of the frosty air. Not much doubt now! The two names had

worked like charms. This weakly old fellow would make a pretty witness, would simply crumple under

crossexamination. What a contrast to that hoary old sinner Heythorp, whose brazenness nothing could

affect. The rat was as large as life! And the only point was how to make the best use of it. Thenfor his

experience was widethe possibility dawned on him, that after all, this Mrs. Larne might only have been old

Pillin's mistressor be his natural daughter, or have some other blackmailing hold on him. Any such

connection would account for his agitation, for his denying her, for his son's ignorance. Only it wouldn't

account for young Pillin's saying that old Heythorp had made the settlement. He could only have got that

from the woman herself. Still, to make absolutely sure, he had better try and see her. But how? It would never

do to ask Bob Pillin for an introduction, after this interview with his father. He would have to go on his own

and chance it. Wrote stories did she? Perhaps a newspaper would know her address; or the Directory would

give itnot a common name! And, hot on the scent, he drove to a post office. Yes, there it was, right

enough! "Larne, Mrs. R., 23, Millicent Villas." And thinking to himself: 'No time like the present,' he turned

in that direction. The job was delicate. He must be careful not to do anything which might compromise his

power of making public use of his knowledge. Yesticklish! What he did now must have a proper legal

bottom. Still, anyway you looked at it, he had a right to investigate a fraud on himself as a shareholder of

"The Island Navigation Company," and a fraud on himself as a creditor of old Heythorp. Quite! But suppose

this Mrs. Larne was really entangled with old Pillin, and the settlement a mere reward of virtue, easy or

otherwise. Well! in that case there'd be no secret commission to make public, and he needn't go further. So

that, in either event, he would be all right. Only how to introduce himself? He might pretend he was a

newspaper man wanting a story. No, that wouldn't do! He must not represent that he was what he was not, in

case he had afterwards to justify his actions publicly, always a difficult thing, if you were not careful! At that

moment there came into his mind a question Bob Pillin had asked the other night. "By the way, you can't

borrow on a settlement, can you? Isn't there generally some clause against it?" Had this woman been trying to

borrow from him on that settlement? But at this moment he reached the house, and got out of his cab still

undecided as to how he was going to work the oracle. Impudence, constitutional and professional, sustained

His quick brown eyes took in the apparel of the passage which served for hallthe deep blue paper on the

walls, lilacpatterned curtains over the doors, the wellknown print of a nude young woman looking over her

shoulder, and he thought: 'H'm! Distinctly tasty!' They noted, too, a small brownandwhite dog cowering in

terror at the very end of the passage, and he murmured affably: "Fluffy! Come here, Fluffy!" till Carmen's

Mr. Ventnor ran his hand over his whiskers, and, entering a room, was impressed at once by its air of

domesticity. On a sofa a handsome woman and a pretty young girl were surrounded by sewing apparatus and

The lady, whose bulk and bloom struck him to the point of admiration, murmured in a full, sweet drawl:

"Ernot exactly. I am a solicitor though; came just to ask about a certain settlement that Mr. Pillin tells me

Seeing the girl about to rise from underneath the white stuff, Mr. Ventnor said quickly:

"Pray don't disturb yourself just a formality!" It had struck him at once that the lady would have to speak the

truth in the presence of this third party, and he went on: "Quite recent, I think. This'll be your first intereston

six thousand pounds? Is that right?" And at the limpid assent of that rich, sweet voice, he thought: 'Fine

"Thank you; that's quite enough. I can go to Scrivens for any detail. Nice young fellow, Bob Pillin, isn't he?"

"Oh! no. How long, Phyllis, since we met him at Guardy's? About a month. But he's so unaffectedquite at

Mr. Ventnor rubbed his hands: "Yees," he said, "just giving upa warm man. Young Pillin's a lucky

fellowonly son. So you met him at old Mr. Heythorp's. I know him toorelation of yours, I believe."

"Oh! but he's so kind!" Mrs. Larne lifted the white stuff: "Look what he's given this naughty gairl!"

Mr. Ventnor murmured: "Charming! Charming! Bob Pillin said, I think, that Mr. Heythorp was your settlor."

One of those little clouds which visit the brows of women who have owed money in their time passed swiftly

athwart Mrs. Larne's eyes. For a moment they seemed saying: 'Don't you want to know too much?' Then they

"Thank you; I must be getting on. Then Messrs. Scriven cana mere formality! Goodbye! Goodbye, Miss

And with memories of a too clear look from the girl's eyes, of a warm firm pressure from the woman's hand,

Mr. Ventnor backed towards the door and passed away just in time to avoid hearing in two voices:

Back in his cab, he continued to rub his hands. No, she didn't know old Pillin! That was certain; not from her

words, but from her face. She wanted to know him, or about him, anyway. She was trying to hook young Bob

for that sprig of a girlit was clear as mud. H'm! it would astonish his young friend to hear that he had

called. Well, let it! And a curious mixture of emotions beset Mr. Ventnor. He saw the whole thing now so

plainly, and really could not refrain from a certain admiration. The law had been properly diddled! There was

nothing to prevent a man from settling money on a woman he had never seen; and so old Pillin's settlement

could probably not be upset. But old Heythorp could. It was neat, though, oh! neat! And that was a fine

womanremarkably! He had a sort of feeling that if only the settlement had been in danger, it might have

been worth while to have made a bargaina woman like that could have made it worth while! And he

believed her quite capable of entertaining the proposition! Her eye! Pityquite a pity! Mrs. Ventnor was not

a wife who satisfied every aspiration. But alas! the settlement was safe. This baulking of the sentiment of

love, whipped up, if anything, the longing for justice in Mr. Ventnor. That old chap should feel his teeth now.

As a piece of investigation it was not so badnot so bad at all! He had had a bit of luck, of course,no, not

luckjust that knack of doing the right thing at the right moment which marks a real genius for affairs.

But getting into his train to return to Mrs. Ventnor, he thought: 'A woman like that would have been!' And

With a neatly written cheque for fifty pounds in his pocket Bob Pillin turned in at 23, Millicent Villas on the

afternoon after Mr. Ventnor's visit. Chivalry had won the day. And he rang the bell with an elation which

Bob Pillin stood stock still beneath the young woman on the wall. He could scarcely breathe. If her hair were

not dryhow awful! Suddenly he heard floating down a clear but smothered "Oh! Gefoozleme!" and other

"Miss Phyllis says, sir, she'll be with you in a jiffy. And I was to tell you that Master Jock is loose, sir."

Bob Pillin answered "Thaanks," and passed into the drawingroom. He went to the bureau, took an

envelope, enclosed the cheque, and addressing it: "Mrs. Larne," replaced it in his pocket. Then he crossed

over to the mirror. Never till this last month had he really doubted his own face; but now he wanted for it

things he had never wanted. It had too much flesh and colour. It did not reflect his passion. This was a

handicap. With a narrow white piping round his waistcoat opening, and a buttonhole of tuberoses, he had

tried to repair its deficiencies. But do what he would, he was never easy about himself nowadays, never up to

that pitch which could make him confident in her presence. And until this month to lack confidence had never

And spinning round he saw Phyllis in the doorway. Her light brown hair was fluffed out on her shoulders, so

Balanced between fear and daring, conscious of a scent of hay and verbena and camomile, Bob Pillin

And he thought desperately: 'Dare Ioughtn't Icouldn't I somehow take'her hand or put my arm round

her, or something?' Instead, he sat very rigid at his end of the sofa, while she sat lax and lissom at the other,

and one of those crises of paralysis which beset would be lovers fixed him to the soul.

Sometimes during this last month memories of a past existence, when chaff and even kisses came readily to

the lips, and girls were fair game, would make him think: 'Is she really such an innocent? Doesn't she really

want me to kiss her?' Alas! such intrusions lasted but a moment before a blast of awe and chivalry withered

them, and a strange and tragic delicacylike nothing he had ever knownresumed its sway. And suddenly

"Whiskers?" His soul revolted in disclaimer. "I believe I only know one man with whiskersa lawyer."

"Yesthat was him; a perfectly horrid man. Mother didn't mind him, but I thought he was a beast."

"He did; about some business of yours, too." Her face had clouded over. Bob Pillin had of late been harassed

It never grew longer, and was prompted by the feeling that her face was like an April day. The cloud which

came on it now was like an April cloud, as if a bright shower of rain must follow. Brushing aside the two

She shook her head, and her hair quivered; the scent of camomile, verbena, hay was wafted; then looking at

"I wish you wouldn'tI wish mother wouldn'tI hate it. Oh! Money! Beastlybeastly!" and a tearful sigh

Phyllis looked up at him. "Don't tell fibs; you know mother's borrowing money from you, and it's hateful!"

A desire to lie roundly, a sense of the cheque in his pocket, a feeling of injustice, the emotion of pity, and a

'Well, I'm dd!" and to miss the look which Phyllis gave him through her lashesa look saying:

"I am dd! Look here! D'you mean to say that Ventnor came here about my lending money? I never said a

"Not by the roots! Oh! you do look funny. I've never seen you with your hair untidy. Oh! oh!"

Bob Pillin rose and paced the room. In the midst of his emotion he could not help seeing himself sidelong in

the mirror; and on pretext of holding his head in both his hands, tried earnestly to restore his hair. Then

"Suppose I am lending money to your mother, what does it matter? It's only till quarterday. Anybody might

She wrenched them free; and with the emotion of despair, Bob Pillin took out the envelope.

"If you like," he said, "I'll tear this up. I don't want to lend it, if you don't want me to; but I thoughtI

So she thought she was being used as a decoy! That was awful especially since it was true. He knew well

enough that Mrs. Larne was working his admiration for her daughter for all that it was worth. And he said

"What rot!" It produced no effect, and at his wits' end, he almost shouted: "Look, Phyllis! If you don't want

me tohere goes!" Phyllis turned. Tearing the envelope across he threw the bits into the fire. "There it is,"

Bob Pillin's mouth fell afar; he secretly agreed, but the idea of sacrificing a moment alone with her was

"My hair isn't a bit dry," and she sat down on the fender with her back to the fire.

A certain spirituality had come into Bob Pillin's face. If only he could get that wheeze off: "Phyllis is my only

He had walked three steps towards the door, before he thought: 'What does it matter? I can stand anything

"I see." He did not, but it was of no consequence. Then the thought of Ventnor again ousted all others. What

on earthhow on earth! He searched his mind for what he could possibly have said the other night. Surely he

had not asked him to do anything; certainly not given him their address. There was something very odd about

"It must be him. Jolly good cheek; I simply can't understand. I shall go and see him. How on earth did he

Phyllis jumped up. "Oh! Lawks! Here's mother!" Mrs. Larne was coming up the garden. Bob Pillin made for

the door. "Goodbye," he said; "I'm going." But Mrs. Larne was already in the hall. Enveloping him in fur

and her rich personality, she drew him with her into the drawingroom, where the back window was open

"I hope," she said, "those naughty children have been making you comfortable. That nice lawyer of yours

Mrs. Larne smiled. "My dear boy, it's all right. You needn't be so squeamish. I want it to be quite on a

Restraining a fearful inclination to blurt out: "It's not going to be on any footing!" Bob Pillin mumbled: "I

"Oh! I'llI'll sendI'll write. Goodbye!" And suddenly he found that Mrs. Larne had him by the lapel of

his coat. The scent of violets and fur was overpowering, and the thought flashed through him: 'I believe she

only wanted to take money off old Joseph in the Bible. I can't leave my coat in her hands! What shall I do?'

"It would be se sweet of you if you could manage it today"; and her hand slid over his chest. "Oh! You have

Bob Pillin took it out in desperation, and, sitting down at the bureau, wrote a cheque similar to that which he

had torn and burned. A warm kiss lighted on his eyebrow, his head was pressed for a moment to a furry

bosom; a hand took the cheque; a voice said: "How delightful!" and a sigh immersed him in a bath of

Once through the garden gate, he thought: 'By gum! I've done it now. That Phyllis should know about it at

Mr. Ventnor had not left his office when his young friend's card was brought to him. Tempted for a moment

to deny his own presence, he thought: 'No! What's the good? Bound to see him some time!' If he had not

exactly courage, he had that peculiar blend of self confidence and insensibility which must needs distinguish

He would be quite bland, but young Pillin might whistle for an explanation; he was still tormented, too, by

the memory of rich curves and moving lips, and the possibilities of better acquaintanceship.

While shaking the young man's hand his quick and fulvous eye detected at once the discomposure behind that

mask of cheek and collar, and relapsing into one of those swivel chairs which give one an advantage over

"Ah! Nice woman; pretty daughter, too!" And into those words he put a certain meaning. He never waited to

Every man has his illusions, and no man likes them disturbed. The gingery tint underlying Mr. Ventnor's

"Mr. Ventnor leaned forward"you'd better hold your tongue, and not exasperate me. I'm a goodtempered

Clenching his bowler hat, and only kept in his seat by that sense of something behind, Bob Pillin ejaculated:

"Impudence! That's goodafter what you did! Look here, why did you? It's so extraordinary!"

And at the smile which spread between Mr. Ventnor's whiskers, he jumped up, crying:

"It's not the thing, and you're not going to put me off. I insist on an explanation."

Mr. Ventnor leaned back, crossing his stout legs, joining the tips of his thick fingers. In this attitude he was

"I'll give you a piece of advice, young cock, and charge you nothing for it, too: Ask no questions, and you'll

The natural stolidity of Bob Pilings face was only just proof against this speech. He said thickly:

"If you go there again and use my name, I'll Well, it's lucky for you you're not my age. Anyway I'll relieve

you of my acquaintanceship in future. Goodevening!" and he went to the door. Mr. Ventnor had risen.

"Very well," he said loudly. "Good riddance! You wait and see which boot the leg is on!"

But Bob Pillin was gone, leaving the lawyer with a very red face, a very angry heart, and a vague sense of

disorder in his speech. Not only Bob Pillin, but his tender aspirations had all left him; he no longer dallied

with the memory of Mrs. Larne, but like a man and a Briton thought only of how to get his own back, and

punish evildoers. The atrocious words of his young friend, "It's not the conduct of a gentleman," festered in

the heart of one who was made gentle not merely by nature but by Act of Parliament, and he registered a

solemn vow to wipe the insult out, if not with blood, with verjuice. It was his duty, and they should dd

Sylvanus Heythorp seldom went to bed before one or rose before eleven. The latter habit alone kept his valet

from handing in the resignation which the former habit prompted almost every night.

Propped on his pillows in a crimson dressinggown, and freshly shaved, he looked more Roman than he ever

did, except in his bath. Having disposed of coffee, he was wont to read his letters, and The Morning Post, for

he had always been a Tory, and could not stomach paying a halfpenny for his news. Not that there were many

letters when a man has reached the age of eighty, who should write to him, except to ask for money?

It was Valentine's Day. Through his bedroom window he could see the trees of the park, where the birds were

in song, though he could not hear them. He had never been interested in Naturefullblooded men with

This morning indeed there were two letters, and he opened that which smelt of something. Inside was a thing

like a Christmas card, save that the naked babe had in his hands a bow and arrow, and words coming out of

his mouth: "To be your Valentine." There was also a little pink note with one blue forgetmenot printed at

"DEAREST GUARDY,I'm sorry this is such a mangy little valentine; I couldn't go out to get it because I've

got a beastly cold, so I asked Jock, and the pig bought this. The satin is simply scrumptious. If you don't

come and see me in it some time soon, I shall come and show it to you. I wish I had a moustache, because my

top lip feels just like a matchbox, but it's rather ripping having breakfast in bed. Mr. Pillin's taking us to the

theatre the day after tomorrow evening. Isn't it nummy! I'm going to have rum and honey for my cold.

So this that quivered in his thick fingers, too insensitive to feel it, was a valentine for him!

Forty years ago that young thing's grandmother had given him his last. It made him out a very old chap! Forty

years ago! Had that been himself living then? And himself, who, as a youth came on the town in 'fortyfive?

Not a thought, not a feeling the same! They said you changed your body every seven years. The mind with it,

too, perhaps! Well, he had come to the last of his bodies, now! And that holy woman had been urging him to

take it to Bath, with her face as long as a teatray, and some gammon from that doctor of his. Too full a

habitdock his portno alcoholmight go off in a coma any night! Knock off not he! Rather die any day

than turn teetotaller! When a man had nothing left in life except his dinner, his bottle, his cigar, and the

dreams they gave himthese doctors forsooth must want to cut them off! No, no! Carpe diem! while you

lived, get something out of it. And now that he had made all the provision he could for those youngsters, his

life was no good to any one but himself; and the sooner he went off the better, if he ceased to enjoy what

there was left, or lost the power to say: "I'll do this and that, and you be jiggered!" Keep a stiff lip until you

crashed, and then go clean! He sounded the bell beside him twicefor Molly, not his man. And when the girl

came in, and stood, pretty in her print frock, her fluffy overfine dark hair escaping from under her cap, he

The girl took the card and scrutinised it reverently; she said in a detached voice:

She took it, and came back, her hands clasping the sovereign and the valentine, in an attitude as of prayer.

When she had gone he took up the other lettersome lawyer's writing, and opening it with the usual

"SIR,Certain facts having come to my knowledge, I deem it my duty to call a special meeting of the

shareholders of 'The Island Navigation Coy.,' to consider circumstances in connection with the purchase of

Mr. Joseph Pillin's fleet. And I give you notice that at this meeting your conduct will be called in question.

Having read this missive, old Heythorp remained some minutes without stirring. Ventnor! That solicitor chap

There are men whom a really bad bit of news at once stampedes out of all power of coherent thought and

action, and men who at first simply do not take it in. Old Heythorp took it in fast enough; coming from a

lawyer it was about as nasty as it could be. But, at once, with stoic wariness his old brain began casting

round. What did this fellow really know? And what exactly could he do? One thing was certain; even if he

knew everything, he couldn't upset that settlement. The youngsters were all right. The old man grasped the

fact that only his own position was at stake. But this was enough in all conscience; a name which had been

before the public fifty odd yearsincome, independence, more perhaps. It would take little, seeing his age

and feebleness, to make his Companies throw him over. But what had the fellow got hold of? How decide

whether or no to take notice; to let him do his worst, or try and get into touch with him? And what was the

fellow's motive? He held ten shares! That would never make a man take all this trouble, and over a purchase

which was really firstrate business for the Company. Yes! His conscience was quite clean. He had not

betrayed his Companyon the contrary, had done it a good turn, got them four sound ships at a low

priceagainst much opposition. That he might have done the Company a better turn, and got the ships at

fiftyfour thousand, did not trouble himthe six thousand was a deuced sight better employed; and he had

not pocketed a penny piece himself! But the fellow's motive? Spite? Looked like it. Spite, because he had

been disappointed of his money, and defied into the bargain! H'm! If that were so, he might still be got to

blow cold again. His eyes lighted on the pink note with the blue forgetmenot. It marked as it were the high

water mark of what was left to him of life; and this other letter in his handby Jove! Low water mark! And

with a deep and rumbling sigh he thought: 'No, I'm not going to be beaten by this fellow.'

An hour later, when the secretary entered, his chairman was sitting by the fire perusing the articles of

association. And, waiting for him to look up, watching the articles shaking in that thick, feeble hand, the

secretary had one of those moments of philosophy not too frequent with his kind. Some said the only happy

time of life was when you had no passions, nothing to hope and live for. But did you really ever reach such a

stage? The old chairman, for instance, still had his passion for getting his own way, still had his prestige, and

"Good morning, sir; I hope you're all right in this east wind. The purchase is completed."

"Best thing the company ever did. Have you heard from a shareholder called Ventnor. You know the man I

"Well! You may get a letter that'll make you open your eyes. An impudent scoundrel! Just write at my

"SIR,I have your letter of yesterday's date, the contents of which I am at a loss to understand. My solicitors

When the secretary had gone the old man thought: 'So! The ruffian hasn't called the meeting yet. That'll bring

"Mr. Pillin, sir; and will you wait lunch, or will you have it in the diningroom?"

At sight of that death'shead of a fellow, old Heythorp felt a sort of pity. He looked bad enough

alreadyand this news would make him look worse. Joe Pillin glanced round at the two closed doors.

"How are you, Sylvanus ? I'm very poorly." He came closer, and lowered his voice: "Why did you get me to

make that settlement? I must have been mad. I've had a man called VentnorI didn't like his manner. He

"Pull yourself together, Joe; they can't touch you, and they can't upset either the purchase or the settlement.

"How you can sit there, and look the same as ever! Are you sure they can't touch me?"

"They talk of an Act, but they haven't passed it yet. They might prove a breach of trust against me. But I'll

"Yes, yes. I must. I'm very bad. I was going tomorrow. But I don't know, I'm sure, with this hanging over

me. My son knowing her makes it worse. He picks up with everybody. He knows this man Ventnor too. And

I daren't say anything to Bob. What are you thinking of, Sylvanus? You look very funny!"

"Lunch! I don't know when I shall eat again. What are you going to do, Sylvanus?"

Joe Pillin stared at him afresh. "You always had such nerve," he said yearningly. "Do you ever wake up

"Yes; I sometimes wish I was less temperate. But I couldn't stand it. I'm told your doctor forbids you

Joe Pillin, brooding over the fire, said: "This meetingd'you think they mean to have it? D'you think this

man really knows? If my name gets into the newspapers" but encountering his old friend's deep little eyes,

"Well, goodbye, Sylvanusgoodbye! I don't suppose I shall be back till the summer, if I ever come back!"

Old Heythorp lifted his hand, and Joe Pillin put into that swollen shaking paw his pale and spindly fingers. "I

wish I had your pluck," he said sadly. "Goodbye, Sylvanus," and turning, he passed out.

Old Heythorp thought: 'Poor shaky chap. All to pieces at the first shot!' And, going to his lunch, ate more

Mr. Ventnor, on reaching his office and opening his letters, found, as he had anticipated, one from "that old

rascal." Its contents excited in him the need to know his own mind. Fortunately this was not complicated by a

sense of dignityhe only had to consider the position with an eye on not being made to look a fool. The

point was simply whether he set more store by his money than by his desire for erJustice. If not, he had

merely to convene the special meeting, and lay before it the plain fact that Mr. Joseph Pillin, selling his ships

for sixty thousand pounds, had just made a settlement of six thousand pounds on a lady whom he did not

know, a daughter, ward, or whatnotof the purchasing company's chairman, who had said, moreover, at

the general meeting, that he stood or fell by the transaction; he had merely to do this, and demand that an

explanation be required from the old man of such a startling coincidence. Convinced that no explanation

would hold water, he felt sure that his action would be at once followed by the collapse, if nothing more, of

that old image, and the infliction of a nasty slur on old Pillin and his hopeful son. On the other hand, three

hundred pounds was money; and, if old Heythorp were to say to him: "What do you want to make this fuss

forhere's what I owe you!" could a man of business and the world let his sense of justicehowever he

might itch to have it satisfiedstand in the way of what was after all also his sense of Justice?for this

money had been owing to him for the deuce of along time. In this dilemma, the words:

"My solicitors will be instructed" were of notable service in helping him to form a decision, for he had a

certain dislike of other solicitors, and an intimate knowledge of the law of libel and slander; if by any remote

chance there should be a slip between the cup and the lip, Charles Ventnor might be in the soupa position

which he deprecated both by nature and profession. High thinking, therefore, decided him at last to answer

"SIR,I have received your note. I think it may be fair, before taking further steps in this matter, to ask you

for a personal explanation of the circumstances to which I alluded. I therefore propose with your permission

Having sent this missive, and arranged in his mind the damning, if circumstantial, evidence he had

accumulated, he awaited the hour with confidence, for his nature was not lacking in the cocksurety of a

Briton. All the same, he dressed himself particularly well that morning, putting on a blue and white striped

waistcoat which, with a creamcoloured tie, set off his fulvous whiskers and full blue eyes; and he lunched, if

anything, more fully than his wont, eating a stronger cheese and taking a glass of special Club ale. He took

care to be late, too, to show the old fellow that his coming at all was in the nature of an act of grace. A strong

scent of hyacinths greeted him in the hall; and Mr. Ventnor, who was an amateur of flowers, stopped to put

his nose into a fine bloom and think uncontrollably of Mrs. Larne. Pity! The things one had to give up in

lifefine womenone thing and another. Pity! The thought inspired in him a timely anger; and he followed

The room he entered was lighted by a bright fire, and a single electric lamp with an orange shade on a table

covered by a black satin cloth. There were heavily gleaming oil paintings on the walls, a heavy old brass

chandelier without candles, heavy dark red curtains, and an indefinable scent of burnt acorns, coffee, cigars,

and old man. He became conscious of a candescent spot on the far side of the hearth, where the light fell on

Mr. Ventnor sat in an armchair on the opposite side of the fire; and, finding a kind of somnolence creeping

The old man was speaking in that extinct voice of his, and Mr. Ventnor said rather pettishly:

Mr. Ventnor passed through a moment of indecision. Should he lay his cards on the table? It was not his

habit, and the proceeding was sometimes attended with risk. The knowledge, however, that he could always

take them up again, seeing there was no third person here to testify that he had laid them down, decided him,

"Well, Mr. Heythorp, the long and short of the matter is this: Our friend Mr. Pillin paid you a commission of

ten per cent. on the sale of his ships. Oh! yes. He settled the money, not on you, but on your relative Mrs.

The old man's voice: "Where did you get hold of that cockandbull story?" brought him to his feet before

"It won't do, Mr. Heythorp. My witnesses are Mr. Pillin, Mrs. Larne, and Mr. Scriven."

Mr. Ventnor straightened his waistcoat; a rush of conscious virtue had dyed his face.

"Oh! you take that tone," he said, "do you? You think you can ride roughshod over everything? Well, you're

very much mistaken. I advise you to keep a civil tongue and consider your position, or I'll make a beggar of

"Neither gammon nor spinach. You owe me three hundred pounds, you've owed it me for years, and you have

the impudence to take this attitude with me, have you? Now, I never bluster; I say what I mean. You just

listen to me. Either you pay me what you owe me at once, or I call this meeting and make what I know

public. You'll very soon find out where you are. And a good thing, too, for a more

Occupied with his own emotion, he had not observed the change in old Heythorp's face. The imperial on that

lower lip was bristling, the crimson of those cheeks had spread to the roots of his white hair. He grasped the

arms of his chair, trying to rise; his swollen hands trembled; a little saliva escaped one corner of his lips. And

Conscious that the interview had suddenly passed from the phase of negotiation, Mr. Ventnor looked hard at

his opponent. He saw nothing but a decrepit, passionate, crimsonfaced old man at bay, and all the instincts

of one with everything on his side boiled up in him. The miserable old turkeycockthe apoplectic image!

"And you'll do no good for yourself by getting into a passion. At your age, and in your condition, I

recommend a little prudence. Now just take my terms quietly, or you know what'll happen. I'm not to be

intimidated by any of your airs." And seeing that the old man's rage was such that he simply could not speak,

he took the opportunity of going on: "I don't care two straws which you doI'm out to show you who's

master. If you think in your dotage you can domineer any longerwell, you'll find two can play at that

The old man had sunk back in his chair, and only his little deepblue eyes seemed living. Then he moved one

hand, and Mr. Ventnor saw that he was fumbling to reach the button of an electric bell at the end of a cord.

Thus frustrated, the old man remainedmotionless, staring up. The word "blackmail" resumed its buzzing in

Mr. Ventnor's ears. The impudence the consummate impudence of it from this fraudulent old ruffian with one

"Yes," he said, "it's never too late to learn; and for once you've come up against someone a leetle bit too

Then, in the deathly silence of the room, the moral force of his position, and the collapse as it seemed of his

opponent, awakening a faint compunction, he took a turn over the Turkey carpet to readjust his mind.

"You're an old man, and I don't want to be too hard on you. I'm only showing you that you can't play fast and

loose as if you were God Almighty any longer. You've had your own way too many years. And now you can't

have it, see!" Then, as the old man again moved forward in his chair, he added: "Now, don't get into a passion

again; calm yourself, because I warn youthis is your last chance. I'm a man of my word; and what I say, I

By a violent and unsuspected effort the old man jerked himself up and reached the bell. Mr. Ventnor heard it

"Mind you, it's nothing to me which you do. I came for your own good. Please yourself. Well?"

Mr. Ventnor had presence of mind enough not to shake his fist. Muttering: "Very well, Mr. Heythorp! Ah!

Very well!" he moved with dignity to the door. The careful shepherding of the servant renewed the fire of his

After seeing Mr. Ventnor off the premises the man Meller returned to his master, whose face looked very

odd"all patchylike," as he put it in the servants' hall, as though the blood driven to his head had mottled

Lying in that steaming brown fragrant liquid, old Heythorp heaved a stertorous sigh. By losing his temper

with that illconditioned cur he had cooked his goose. It was done to a turn; and he was a ruined man. If

onlyoh! if only he could have seized the fellow by the neck and pitched him out of the room! To have

lived to be so spoken to; to have been unable to lift hand or foot, hardly even his voice he would sooner

have been dead! Yessooner have been dead! A dumb and measureless commotion was still at work in the

recesses of that thick old body, silverbrown in the dark water, whose steam he drew deep into his wheezing

lungs, as though for spiritual relief. To be beaten by a cur like that! To have that common cad of a

pettifogging lawyer drag him down and kick him about; tumble a name which had stood high, in the dust!

The fellow had the power to make him a byword and a beggar! It was incredible! But it was a fact. And to

morrow he would begin to do itperhaps had begun already. His tree had come down with a crash! Eighty

yearseighty good years! He regretted none of themregretted nothing; least of all this breach of trust which

had provided for his grandchildrenone of the best things he had ever done. The fellow was a cowardly

hound, too! The way he had snatched the bellpull out of his reachdespicable cur! And a chap like that was

to put "paid" to the account of Sylvanus Heythorp, to "scratch" him out of lifeso near the end of

everything, the very end! His hand raised above the surface fell back on his stomach through the dark water,

and a bubble or two rose. Not so fastnot so fast! He had but to slip down a foot, let the water close over his

head, and "Goodbye" to Master Ventnor's triumph Dead men could not be kicked off the Boards of

Companies. Dead men could not be beggared, deprived of their independence. He smiled and stirred a little in

the bath till the water reached the white hairs on his lower lip. It smelt nice! And he took a long sniff: He had

had a good life, a good life! And with the thought that he had it in his power at any moment to put Master

Ventnor's nose out of jointto beat the beggar after all, a sense of assuagement and wellbeing crept over

him. His blood ran more evenly again. He closed his eyes. They talked about an afterlifepeople like that

holy woman. Gammon! You went to sleepa long sleep; no dreams. A nap after dinner! Dinner! His tongue

sought his palate! Yes! he could eat a good dinner! That dog hadn't put him off his stroke! The best dinner he

had ever eaten was the one he gave to Jack Herring, Chichester, Thornworthy, Nick Treffry and Jolyon

Forsyte at Pole's. Good Lord! In 'sixtyyes'sixtyfive? Just before he fell in love with Alice Larneten

years before he came to Liverpool. That was a dinner! Cost twentyfour pounds for the six of themand

Forsyte an absurdly moderate fellow. Only Nick Treff'ry and himself had been threebottle men! Dead!

Every jack man of them. And suddenly he thought: 'My name's a good oneI was never down

And Meller, taking out dress suit and shirt, thought: 'Now, what does the old bloomer want dressin' up again

for; why can't he go to bed and have his dinner there? When a man's like a baby, the cradle's the place for

An hour later, at the scene of his encounter with Mr. Ventnor, where the table was already laid for dinner, old

Heythorp stood and gazed. The curtains had been drawn back, the window thrown open to air the room, and

he could see out there the shapes of the dark trees and a sky grapecoloured, in the mild, moist night. It smelt

good. A sensuous feeling stirred in him, warm from his bath, clothed from head to foot in fresh garments.

Deuce of a time since he had dined in full fig! He would have liked a woman dining oppositebut not the

holy woman; no, by George!would have liked to see light falling on a woman's shoulders once again, and

a pair of bright eyes! He crossed, snaillike, towards the fire. There that bullying fellow had stood with his

back to itconfound his impudence!as if the place belonged to him. And suddenly he had a vision of his

three secretaries' facesespecially young Farney's as they would look, when the pack got him by the throat

and pulled him down. His co directors, too! Old Heythorp! How are the mighty fallen! And that hound

His valet passed across the room to shut the window and draw the curtains. This chap too! The day he could

no longer pay his wages, and had lost the power to say "Shan't want your services any more" when he

could no longer even pay his doctor for doing his best to kill him off! Power, interest, independence,

allgone! To be dressed and undressed, given pap, like a baby in arms, served as they chose to serve him,

By money alone an old man had his being! Meat, drink, movement, breath! When all his money was gone the

holy woman would let him know it fast enough. They would all let him know it; or if they didn't, it would be

When the man had gone, he thought: 'I should have liked an oyster too late now!' and going over to his

bureau, he fumblingly pulled out the top drawer. There was little in itJust a few papers, business papers on

his Companies, and a schedule of his debts; not even a copy of his willhe had not made one, nothing to

leave! Letters he had never kept. Half a dozen bills, a few receipts, and the little pink note with the blue

forgetmenot. That was the lot! An old tree gives up bearing leaves, and its roots dry up, before it comes

down in a wind; an old man's world slowly falls away from him till he stands alone in the night. Looking at

the pink note, he thought: 'Suppose I'd married Alicea man never had a better mistress!' He fumbled the

drawer to; but still he strayed feebly about the room, with a curious shrinking from sitting down, legacy from

the quarter of an hour he had been compelled to sit while that hound worried at his throat. He was opposite

one of the pictures now. It gleamed, dark and oily, limning a Scots Grey who had mounted a wounded

Russian on his horse, and was bringing him back prisoner from the Balaclava charge. A very old

friendbought in 'fiftynine. It had hung in his chambers in the Albanyhung with him ever since. With

whom would it hang when he was gone? For that holy woman would scrap it, to a certainty, and stick up

some Crucifixion or other, some new fangled high art thing! She could even do that now if she likedfor

she owned it, owned every mortal stick in the room, to the very glass he would drink his champagne from; all

made over under the settlement fifteen years ago, before his last big gamble went wrong. "De l'audace,

toujours de l'audace!" The gamble which had brought him down till his throat at last was at the mercy of a

bullying hound. The pitcher and the well! At the mercy! The sound of a popping cork dragged him from

reverie. He moved to his seat, back to the window, and sat down to his dinner. By George! They had got him

While the man was gone for them, he swallowed the oysters, methodically touching them one by one with

cayenne, Chili vinegar, and lemon. Ummm! Not quite what they used to be at Pimm's in the best days, but not

badnot bad! Then seeing the little blue bowl lying before him, he looked up and said:

"My compliments to cook on the oysters. Give me the champagne." And he lifted his trembling teeth. Thank

God, he could still put 'em in for himself! The creaming goldenish fluid from the napkined bottle slowly

reached the brim of his glass, which had a hollow stem; raising it to his lips, very red between the white hairs

above and below, he drank with a gurgling noise, and put the glass downempty. Nectar! And just cold

"It's from those 'yacinths on the sideboard, sir. They come from Mrs. Larne, this afternoon."

"Poor old man, let um have his pleasure." And, in the hall, with the soup tureen against her bosom, she

hummed above the steam, and thought of the ribbons on her new chemises, bought out of the sovereign he

And old Heythorp, digesting his osyters, snuffed the scent of the hyacinths, and thought of the St. Germain,

his favourite soup. It would n't be firstrate, at this time of yearshould be made with little young

homegrown peas. Paris was the place for it. Ah! The French were the fellows for eating, andlooking

The soup came in. He sipped it, bending forward as far as he could, his napkin tucked in over his shirtfront

like a bib. He got the bouquet of that sherry to a This sense of smell was very keen to night; rare old stuff

it wasmore than a year since he had tasted itbut no one drank sherry nowadays, hadn't the constitution

for it! The fish came up, and went down; and with the sweetbread he took his second glass of champagne.

Always the best, that second glassthe stomach well warmed, and the palate not yet dulled. Umm! So that

"The fur coat in the wardrobe, I've no use for it. You can take it away tonight."

"Thank you, sir; much obliged, I'm sure." So the old buffer had found out there was moth in it!

"Afraid I have. Very sorrycan't help it. You'll find that, when you get like me."

Alone again, old Heythorp sat unmoving, his brain just narcotically touched. "The flag flyin'the flag

flyin'!" He raised his glass and sucked. He had an appetite now, and finished the three cutlets, and all the

sauce and spinach. Pity! he could have managed a snipe fresh shot! A desire to delay, to lengthen dinner, was

strong upon him; there were but the souffle' and the savoury to come. He would have enjoyed, too, someone

to talk to. He had always been fond of good companybeen good company himself, or so they saidnot

that he had had a chance of late. Even at the Boards they avoided talking to him, he had noticed for a long

time. Well! that wouldn't trouble him againhe had sat through his last Board, no doubt. They shouldn't kick

him off, though; he wouldn't give them that pleasure had seen the beggars hankering after his chairman's

Old Heythorp drank, and put the glass down empty with a sigh. He had been ,faithful to his principles,

finished the bottle before touching the sweeta good bottleof a good brand! And now for the souffle!

Delicious, flipped down with the old sherry! So that holy woman was going to a ball, was she! How deuced

funny! Who would dance with a dry stick like that, all eaten up with a piety which was just sexual

disappointment? Ah! yes, lots of women like thathad often noticed 'empitied 'em too, until you had to

do with them and they made you as unhappy as themselves, and were tyrants into the bargain. And he asked:

"I'll have my port with itthe 'sixtyeight." The man stood gazing with evident stupefaction. He had not

expected this. The old man's face was very flushed, but that might be the bath. He said feebly:

And the old man sat quietly staring at the hyacinths. He felt happy, his whole being lined and warmed and

drowsedand there was more to come! What had the holy folk to give you compared with the comfort of a

good dinner? Could they make you dream, and see life rosy for a little? No, they could only give you

promissory notes which never would be cashed. A man had nothing but his pluckthey only tried to

undermine it, and make him squeal for help. He could see his precious doctor throwing up his hands: "Port

after a bottle of champagneyou'll die of it!" And a very good death toonone better. A sound broke the

silence of the closedup room. Music? His daughter playing the piano overhead. Singing too! What a trickle

of a voice! Jenny Lind! The Swedish nightingalehe had never missed the nights when she was

He ate it slowly, savouring each mouthful; had never tasted a better. With cheeseport! He drank one glass,

And settled there before the fire with decanter and glass and hand bell on the little low table by his side, he

Tonight he would do justice to his wine, not smoking till he had finished. As old Horace said:

And, raising his glass, he sipped slowly, spilling a drop or two, shutting his eyes.

The faint silvery squealing of the holy woman in the room above, the scent of hyacinths, the drowse of the

fire, on which a cedar log had just been laid, the feeling of the port soaking down into the crannies of his

being, made up a momentary Paradise. Then the music stopped; and no sound rose but the tiny groans of the

log trying to resist the fire. Dreamily he thought: 'Life wears you outwears you out. Logs on a fire!' And he

filled his glass again. That fellow had been careless; there were dregs at the bottom of the decanter and he had

got down to them! Then, as the last drop from his tilted glass trickled into the white hairs on his chin, he

heard the coffee tray put down, and taking his cigar he put it to his ear, rolling it in his thick fingers. In prime

A minute of silence, then the man went hastily to the sideboard, took out the bottle, and drew the cork. The

The unfortunate valet placed the bottle on the little table. 'I'll have to tell her,' he thought; 'but if I take away

the port decanter and the glass, it won't look so bad.' And, carrying them, he left the room.

Slowly the old man drank his coffee, and the liqueur of brandy. The whole gamut! And watching his

cigarsmoke wreathing blue in the orange glow, he smiled. The last night to call his soul his own, the last

night of his independence. Send in his resignations tomorrow not wait to be kicked off! Not give that

"Father! You're drinking brandy! How can youyou know it's simple poison to you!" A figure in white,

scarcely actual, loomed up close. He took the bottle to fill up his liqueur glass, in defiance; but a hand in a

long white glove, with another dangling from its wrist, pulled it away, shook it at him, and replaced it in the

sideboard. And, just as when Mr. Ventnor stood there accusing him, a swelling and churning in his throat

His daughter had approached again. She stood quite close, in white satin, thinfaced, sallow, with eyebrows

raised, and her dark hair frizzedyes! frizzedthe holy woman! With all his might he tried to say: 'So you

bully me, do youyou bully me tonight!' but only the word "so" and a sort of whispering came forth. He

heard her speaking. "It's no good your getting angry, Father. After champagneit's wicked!" Then her form

receded in a sort of rustling white mist; she was gone; and he heard the sputtering and growling of her taxi,

bearing her to the ball. So! She tyrannised and bullied, even before she had him at her mercy, did she? She

should see! Anger had brightened his eyes; the room came clear again. And slowly raising himself he

sounded the bell twice, for the girl, not for that fellow Meller, who was in the plot. As soon as her pretty

Twice her soft pulling was not enough, and he sank back. The third time he struggled to his feet.

"Thank you; that'll do." Then, waiting till she was gone, he crossed the room, fumbled open the sideboard

door, and took out the bottle. Reaching over the polished oak, he grasped a sherry glass; and holding the

bottle with both hands, tipped the liquor into it, put it to his lips and sucked. Drop by drop it passed over his

palate mild, very old, old as himself, coloured like sunlight, fragrant. To the last drop he drank it, then

hugging the bottle to his shirtfront, he moved snaillike to his chair, and fell back into its depths. For some

minutes he remained there motionless, the bottle clasped to his chest, thinking: 'This is not the attitude of a

gentleman. I must put it down on the tableon the table;' but a thick cloud was between him and everything.

It was with his hands he would have to put the bottle on the table! But he could not find his hands, could not

feel them. His mind seesawed in strophe and antistrophe: "You can't move!""I will move!" "You're

beaten""I'm not beat." "Give up" "I won't." That struggle to find his hands seemed to last for ever he

must find them! After thatgo downall standingafter that! Everything round him was red. Then the red

cloud cleared just a little, and he could hear the clock"tickticktick"; a faint sensation spread from his

shoulders down to his wrists, down his palms; and yeshe could feel the bottle! He redoubled his struggle to

get forward in his chair; to get forward and put the bottle down. It was not dignified like this! One arm he

could move now; but he could not grip the bottle nearly tight enough to put it down. Working his whole body

forward, inch by inch, he shifted himself up in the chair till he could lean sideways, and the bottle, slipping

down his chest, dropped slanting to the edge of the low stooltable. Then with all his might he screwed his

trunk and arms an inch further, and the bottle stood. He had done itdone it! His lips twitched into a smile;

his body sagged back to its old position. He had done it! And he closed his eyes ....

At halfpast eleven the girl Molly, opening the door, looked at him and said softly: "Sirr! there's some ladies,

and a gentleman!" But he did not answer. And, still holding the door, she whispered out into the hall:

"Oh! Just let me go in, I won't wake him unless he does. But I do want to show him my dress."

The girl moved aside; and on tiptoe Phyllis passed in. She walked to where, between the lampglow and the

fireglow, she was lighted up. White satinher first lowcut dressthe flush of her first supper partya

gardenia at her breast, another in her fingers! Oh! what a pity he was asleep! How red he looked! How

No answer! And pouting, she stood twiddling the gardenia. Then suddenly she thought: 'I'll put it in his

And stealing close, she bent and slipped it in. Two faces looked at her from round the door; she heard Bob

Pillin's smothered chuckle; her mother's rich and feathery laugh. Oh! How red his forehead was! She touched

it with her lips; skipped back, twirled round, danced silently a second, blew a kiss, and like quicksilver was

And the whispering, the chuckling, and one little outpealing laugh rose in the hall.

But the old man slept. Nor until Meller came at his usual hour of halfpast twelve, was it known that he

In their silverwedding day Ashurst and his wife were motoring along the outskirts of the moor, intending to

crown the festival by stopping the night at Torquay, where they had first met. This was the idea of Stella

Ashurst, whose character contained a streak of sentiment. If she had long lost the blueeyed, flowerlike

charm, the cool slim purity of face and form, the appleblossom colouring, which had so swiftly and so oddly

affected Ashurst twentysix years ago, she was still at fortythree a comely and faithful companion, whose

cheeks were faintly mottled, and whose greyblue eyes had acquired a certain fullness.

It was she who had stopped the car where the common rose steeply to the left, and a narrow strip of larch and

beech, with here and there a pine, stretched out towards the valley between the road and the first long high

hill of the full moor. She was looking for a place where they might lunch, for Ashurst never looked for

anything; and this, between the golden furze and the feathery green larches smelling of lemons in the last sun

of Aprilthis, with a view into the deep valley and up to the long moor heights, seemed fitting to the

decisive nature of one who sketched in watercolours, and loved romantic spots. Grasping her paint box, she

Ashurst, rather like a bearded Schiller, grey in the wings, tall, longlegged, with large remote grey eyes

which sometimes filled with meaning and became almost beautiful, with nose a little to one side, and bearded

lips just openAshurst, fortyeight, and silent, grasped the luncheon basket, and got out too.

By the side of the road, where the track from the top of the common crossed it at right angles and ran through

a gate past the narrow wood, was a thin mound of turf, six feet by one, with a moorstone to the west, and on it

someone had thrown a blackthorn spray and a handful of bluebells. Ashurst looked, and the poet in him

moved. At crossroadsa suicide's grave! Poor mortals with their superstitions! Whoever lay there, though,

had the best of it, no clammy sepulchre among other hideous graves carved with futilities just a rough

stone, the wide sky, and wayside blessings! And, without comment, for he had learned not to be a

philosopher in the bosom of his family, he strode away up on to the common, dropped the luncheon basket

under a wall, spread a rug for his wife to sit on she would turn up from her sketching when she was

hungryand took from his pocket Murray's translation of the "Hippolytus." He had soon finished reading of

"The Cyprian" and her revenge, and looked at the sky instead. And watching the white clouds so bright

against the intense blue, Ashurst, on his silverwedding day, longed forhe knew not what. Maladjusted to

lifeman's organism! One's mode of life might be high and scrupulous, but there was always an,

undercurrent of greediness, a hankering, and sense of waste. Did women have it too? Who could tell? And

yet, men who gave vent to their appetites for novelty, their riotous longings for new adventures, new risks,

new pleasures, these suffered, no doubt, from the reverse side of starvation, from surfeit. No getting out of

ita maladjusted animal, civilised man! There could be no garden of his choosing, of "the Appletree, the

singing, and the gold," in the words of that lovely Greek chorus, no achievable elysium in life, or lasting

haven of happiness for any man with a sense of beautynothing which could compare with the captured

loveliness in a work of art, set down for ever, so that to look on it or read was always to have the same

precious sense of exaltation and restful inebriety. Life no doubt had moments with that quality of beauty, of

unbidden flying rapture, but the trouble was, they lasted no longer than the span of a cloud's flight over the

sun; impossible to keep them with you, as Art caught beauty and held it fast. They were fleeting as one of the

glimmering or golden visions one had of the soul in nature, glimpses of its remote and brooding spirit. Here,

with the sun hot on his face, a cuckoo calling from a thorn tree, and in the air the honey savour of

gorsehere among the little fronds of the young fern, the starry blackthorn, while the bright clouds drifted

by high above the hills and dreamy valleys here and now was such a glimpse. But in a moment it would

passas the face of Pan, which looks round the corner of a rock, vanishes at your stare. And suddenly he sat

up. Surely there was something familiar about this view, this bit of common, that ribbon of road, the old wall

behind him. While they were driving he had not been taking noticenever did; thinking of far things or of

nothingbut now he saw! Twentysix years ago, just at this time of year, from the farmhouse within half a

mile of this very spot he had started for that day in Torquay whence it might be said he had never returned.

And a sudden ache beset his heart; he had stumbled on just one of those past moments in his life, whose

beauty and rapture he had failed to arrest, whose wings had fluttered away into the unknown; he had

stumbled on a buried memory, a wild sweet time, swiftly choked and ended. And, turning on his face, he

rested his chin on his hands, and stared at the short grass where the little blue milkwort was growing....

On the first of May, after their last year together at college, Frank Ashurst and his friend Robert Garton were

on a tramp. They had walked that day from Brent, intending to make Chagford, but Ashurst's football knee

had given out, and according to their map they had still some seven miles to go. They were sitting on a bank

beside theroad, where a track crossed alongside a wood, resting the knee and talking of the universe, as

young men will. Both were over six feet, and thin as rails; Ashurst pale, idealistic, full of absence; Garton

queer, roundthecorner, knotted, curly, like some primeval beast. Both had a literary bent; neither wore a

Ashurst's hair was smooth, pale, wavy, and had a way of rising on either side of his brow, as if always being

flung back; Carton's was a kind of dark unfathomed mop. They had not met a soul for miles.

"My dear fellow," Garton was saying, "pity's only an effect of self consciousness; it's a disease of the last

"My dear chap, all our modern unhappiness comes from pity. Look at animals, and Red Indians, limited to

feeling their own occasional misfortunes; then look at ourselvesnever free from feeling the toothaches of

"To attain full growth, one mustn't be squeamish. To starve oneself emotionally's a mistake. All emotion is to

"Ah! That's so English! If you speak of emotion the English always think you want something physical, and

are shocked. They're afraid of passion, but not of lustoh, no!so long as they can keep it secret."

Ashurst did not answer; he had plucked a blue floweret, and was twiddling it against the sky. A cuckoo began

calling from a thorn tree. The sky, the flowers, the songs of birds! Robert was talking through his hat! And he

"Well, let's go on, and find some farm where we can put up." In uttering those words, he was conscious of a

girl coming down from the common just above them. She was outlined against the sky, carrying a basket, and

you could see that sky through the crook of her arm. And Ashurst, who saw beauty without wondering how it

could advantage him, thought: 'How pretty!' The wind, blowing her dark frieze skirt against her legs, lifted

her battered peacock tamo'shanter; her greyish blouse was worn and old, her shoes were split, her little

hands rough and red, her neck browned. Her dark hair waved untidy across her broad forehead, her face was

short, her upper lip short, showing a glint of teeth, her brows were straight and dark, her lashes long and dark,

her nose straight; but her grey eyes were the wonderdewy as if opened for the first time that day. She looked

at Ashurstperhaps he struck her as strange, limping along without a hat, with his large eyes on her, and his

hair falling back. He could not take off what was not on his head, but put up his hand in a salute, and said:

"Can you tell us if there's a farm near here where we could stay the night? I've gone lame."

"There's only our farm near, sir." She spoke without shyness, in a pretty soft crisp voice.

"This is Robert Garton, and I am Frank Ashurst. We wanted to get on to Chagford."

Descending past the narrow wood, they came on the farm suddenlya long, low, stonebuilt dwelling with

casement windows, in a farmyard where pigs and fowls and an old mare were straying. A short steepup

grass hill behind was crowned with a few Scotch firs, and in front, an old orchard of apple trees, just breaking

into flower, stretched down to a stream and a long wild meadow. A little boy with oblique dark eyes was

shepherding a pig, and by the house door stood a woman, who came towards them. The girl said:

"Mrs. Narracombe, my aunt," had a quick, dark eye, like a mother wildduck's, and something of the same

"We met your niece on the road," said Ashurst; "she thought you might perhaps put us up for the night."

"Well, I can, if you don't mind one room. Megan, get the spare room ready, and a bowl of cream. You'll be

Passing through a sort of porch made by two yew trees and some floweringcurrant bushes, the girl

disappeared into the house, her peacock tamo'shanter bright athwart that rosypink and the dark green of

"Will you come into the parlour and rest your leg? You'll be from college, perhaps?"

The parlour, brickfloored, with bare table and shiny chairs and sofa stuffed with horsehair, seemed never to

have been used, it was so terribly clean. Ashurst sat down at once on the sofa, holding his lame knee between

his hands, and Mrs. Narracombe gazed at him. He was the only son of a late professor of chemistry, but

people found a certain lordliness in one who was often so sublimely unconscious of them.

"There's the strame at the bottom of the orchard, but sittin' down you'll not be covered!"

"Down the lane, through the second gate on the right, an' the pool's by the big apple tree that stands by itself.

The pool, formed by the damming of a rock, had a sandy bottom; and the big apple tree, lowest in the

orchard, grew so close that its boughs almost overhung the water; it was in leaf, and all but in flowerits

crimson buds just bursting. There was not room for more than one at a time in that narrow bath, and Ashurst

waited his turn, rubbing his knee and gazing at the wild meadow, all rocks and thorn trees and feld flowers,

with a grove of beeches beyond, raised up on a flat mound. Every bough was swinging in the wind, every

spring bird calling, and a slanting sunlight dappled the grass. He thought of Theocritus, and the river

Cherwell, of the moon, and the maiden with the dewy eyes; of so many things that he seemed to think of

During a late and sumptuous tea with eggs to it, cream and jam, and thin, fresh cakes touched with saffron,

Garton descanted on the Celts. It was about the period of the Celtic awakening, and the discovery that there

was Celtic blood about this family had excited one who believed that he was a Celt himself. Sprawling on a

horse hair chair, with a handmade cigarette dribbling from the corner of his curly lips, he had been plunging

his cold pinpoints of eyes into Ashurst's and praising the refinement of the Welsh. To come out of Wales

into England was like the change from china to earthenware! Frank, as a dd Englishman, had not of

course perceived the exquisite refinement and emotional capacity of that Welsh girl! And, delicately stirring

in the dark mat of his still wet hair, he explained how exactly she illustrated the writings of the Welsh bard

Ashurst, full length on the horsehair sofa, and jutting far beyond its end, smoked a deeplycoloured pipe, and

did not listen, thinking of the girl's face when she brought in a relay of cakes. It had been exactly like looking

at a flower, or some other pretty sight in Naturetill, with a funny little shiver, she had lowered her glance

The kitchen was a whitewashed room with rafters, to which were attached smoked hams; there were

flowerpots on the windowsill, and guns hanging on nails, queer mugs, china and pewter, and portraits of

Queen Victoria. A long, narrow table of plain wood was set with bowls and spoons, under a string of

highhung onions; two sheepdogs and three cats lay here and there. On one side of the recessed fireplace sat

two small boys, idle, and good as gold; on the other sat a stout, lighteyed, redfaced youth with hair and

lashes the colour of the tow he was running through the barrel of a gun; between them Mrs. Narracombe

dreamily stirred some savouryscented stew in a large pot. Two other youths, obliqueeyed, darkhaired,

rather sly faced, like the two little boys, were talking together and lolling against the wall; and a short,

elderly, cleanshaven man in corduroys, seated in the window, was conning a battered journal. The girl

Megan seemed the only active creaturedrawing cider and passing with the jugs from cask to table. Seeing

"Ah! If you'll let us, we'll come back when supper's over," and without waiting for an answer they withdrew

again to the parlour. But the colour in the kitchen, the warmth, the scents, and all those faces, heightened the

"Regular gipsy type, those boys. There was only one Saxonthe fellow cleaning the gun. That girl is a very

Ashurst's lips twitched. Garton seemed to him an ass just then. Subtle study! She was a wild flower. A

Garton looked at him and smiled. 'How coarse and English you are!' that curly smile seemed saying.

And Ashurst puffed his pipe. Awaken her! That fool had the best opinion of himself! He threw up the

window and leaned out. Dusk had gathered thick. The farm buildings and the wheelhouse were all dim and

bluish, the apple trees but a blurred wilderness; the air smelled of woodsmoke from the kitchen fire. One bird

going to bed later than the others was uttering a halfhearted twitter, as though surprised at the darkness.

From the stable came the snuffle and stamp of a feeding horse. And away over there was the loom of the

moor, and away and away the shy stars which had not as yet full light, pricking white through the deep blue

heavens. A quavering owl hooted. Ashurst drew a deep breath. What a night to wander out in! A padding of

unshod hoofs came up the lane, and three dim, dark shapes passedponies on an evening march. Their

heads, black and fuzzy, showed above the gate. At the tap of his pipe, and a shower of little sparks, they shied

round and scampered. A bat went fluttering past, uttering its almost inaudible "chip, chip." Ashurst held out

his hand; on the upturned palm he could feel the dew. Suddenly from overhead he heard little burring boys'

voices, little thumps of boots thrown down, and another voice, crisp and softthe girl's putting them to bed,

no doubt; and nine clear words "No, Rick, you can't have the cat in bed"; then came a skirmish of giggles and

gurgles, a soft slap, a laugh so low and pretty that it made him shiver a little. A blowing sound, and the glim

of the candle which was fingering the dusk above, went out; silence reigned. Ashurst withdrew into the room

For Ashurst the wheel of slumber was wont to turn noiseless and slick and swift, but though he seemed sunk

in sleep when his companion came up, he was really wide awake; and long after Carton, smothered in the

other bed of that lowroofed room, was worshipping darkness with his upturned nose, he heard the owls.

Barring the discomfort of his knee, it was not unpleasantthe cares of life did not loom large in night

watches for this young man. In fact he had none; just enrolled a barrister, with literary aspirations, the world

before him, no father or mother, and four hundred a year of his own. Did it matter where he went, what he

did, or when he did it? His bed, too, was hard, and this preserved him from fever. He lay, sniffing the scent of

the night which drifted into the low room through the open casement close to his head. Except for a definite

irritation with his friend, natural when you have tramped with a man for three days, Ashurst's memories and

visions that sleepless night were kindly and wistful and exciting. One vision, specially clear and

unreasonable, for he had not even been conscious of noting it, was the face of the youth cleaning the gun; its

intent, stolid, yet startled uplook at the kitchen doorway, quickly shifted to the girl carrying the cider jug.

This red, blueeyed, lightlashed, towhaired face stuck as firmly in his memory as the girl's own face, so

dewy and simple. But at last, in the square of darkness through the uncurtained casement, he saw day coming,

and heard one hoarse and sleepy caw. Then followed silence, dead as ever, till the song of a blackbird, not

properly awake, adventured into the hush. And, from staring at the framed brightening light, Ashurst fell

Next day his knee was badly swollen; the walking tour was obviously over. Garton, due back in London on

the morrow, departed at midday with an ironical smile which left a scar of irritationhealed the moment his

loping figure vanished round the corner of the steep lane. All day Ashurst rested his knee, in a greenpainted

wooden chair on the patch of grass by the yewtree porch, where the sunlight distilled the scent of stocks and

gillyflowers, and a ghost of scent from the floweringcurrant bushes. Beatifically he smoked, dreamed,

A farm in spring is all birthyoung things coming out of bud and shell, and human beings watching over the

process with faint excitement feeding and tending what has been born. So still the young man sat, that a

mothergoose, with stately crossfooted waddle, brought her six yellownecked greybacked goslings to

strop their little beaks against the grass blades at his feet. Now and again Mrs. Narracombe or the girl Megan

would come and ask if he wanted anything, and he would smile and say: "Nothing, thanks. It's splendid here."

Towards teatime they came out together, bearing a long poultice of some dark stuff in a bowl, and after a

long and solemn scrutiny of his swollen knee, bound it on. When they were gone, he thought of the girl's soft

"Oh!"of her pitying eyes, and the little wrinkle in her brow. And again he felt that unreasoning irritation

against his departed friend, who had talked such rot about her. When she brought out his tea, he said:

She forced down her upper lip, as if afraid that to smile was not polite. "He was a funny gentleman; he made

"Well, he meant that Joe was like the men who came over to England about fourteen hundred years ago, and

"Garton's crazy about that sort of thing; but I must say Joe does look a bit Early Saxon."

That "Yes" tickled Ashurst. It was so crisp and graceful, so conclusive, and politely acquiescent in what was

"He said that all the other boys were regular gipsies. He should not have said that. My aunt laughed, but she

didn't like it, of course, and my cousins were angry. Uncle was a farmerfarmers are not gipsies. It is wrong

"Quite right, Megan. By the way, I heard you putting the little ones to bed last night."

She flushed a little. "Please to drink your teait is getting cold. Shall I get you some fresh?"

When she was gone, Ashurst thought: 'Did she think I was chaffing her? I wouldn't for the world!' He was at

that age when to some men "Beauty's a flower," as the poet says, and inspires in them the thoughts of

chivalry. Never very conscious of his surroundings, it was some time before he was aware that the youth

whom Garton had called "a Saxon type" was standing outside the stable door; and a fine bit of colour he

made in his soiled brown velvetcords, muddy gaiters, and blue shirt; redarmed, redfaced, the sun turning

his hair from tow to flax; immovably stolid, persistent, unsmiling he stood. Then, seeing Ashurst looking at

him, he crossed the yard at that gait of the young countryman always ashamed not to be slow and

heavydwelling on each leg, and disappeared round the end of the house towards the kitchen entrance. A

chill came over Ashurst's mood. Clods? With all the good will in the world, how impossible to get on terms

with them! And yetsee that girl! Her shoes were split, her hands rough; butwhat was it? Was it really

her Celtic blood, as Garton had said?she was a lady born, a jewel, though probably she could do no more

The elderly, cleanshaven man he had seen last night in the kitchen had come into the yard with a dog,

The lame man's face brightened. He had the upward look in his eyes which prolonged suffering often brings.

The lame man touched his own: "I know what 'tes, meself; 'tes a main worritin' thing, the knee. I've a'ad

Ashurst made the sound of sympathy which comes so readily from those who have an independent income,

"The maid she picks et. She'm a gude maid wi' the flowers. There's folks zeem to know the healin' in things.

My mother was a rare one for that. 'Ope as yu'll zune be better, zurr. Goo ahn, therr!"

That evening, after his supper of cold duck, junket, and cider, the girl came in.

Ashurst rose too suddenly for his stiff knee, staggered, and subsided. The girl gave a little gasp, and held out

her hands. Ashurst took them, small, rough, brown; checked his impulse to put them to his lips, and let her

pull him up. She came close beside him, offering her shoulder. And leaning on her he walked across the

room. That shoulder seemed quite the pleasantest thing he had ever touched. But, he had presence of mind

enough to catch his stick out of the rack, and withdraw his hand before arriving at the kitchen.

That night he slept like a top, and woke with his knee of almost normal size. He again spent the morning in

his chair on the grass patch, scribbling down verses; but in the afternoon he wandered about with the two

little boys Nick and Rick. It was Saturday, so they were early home from school; quick, shy, dark little rascals

of seven and six, soon talkative, for Ashurst had a way with children. By four o'clock they had shown him all

their methods of destroying life, except the tickling of trout; and with breeches tucked up, lay on their

stomachs over the trout stream, pretending they had this accomplishment also. They tickled nothing, of

course, for their giggling and shouting scared every spotted thing away. Ashurst, on a rock at the edge of the

beech clump, watched them, and listened to the cuckoos, till Nick, the elder and less persevering, came up

"Dunno; never zeen 'e. Megan zays 'e zets there; an' old Jim zeed 'e once. 'E was zettin' there naight afore our

"'E's black. Old Jim zays 'e's all over 'air. 'E's a praaper bogle. 'E don' come only at naight." The little boy's

oblique dark eyes slid round. "D'yu think 'e might want to take me away? Megan's feared of 'e."

"When I was asleep, she said: 'God bless us all, an' Mr. Ashes.' I yeard 'er whisperin'."

"You're a little ruffian to tell what you hear when you're not meant to hear it!"

But Ashurst had become absent. "God bless us all, and Mr. Ashes!" And puzzled by that sudden

inaccessibility, Nick ran back to the stream where the giggling and shouts again uprose at once.

"They aren't gipsies, anyway; those old men were dead long before gipsies came."

"Why? If there are any, they're only wild, like the rabbits. The flowers aren't bad for being wild; the thorn

trees were never plantedand you don't mind them. I shall go down at night and look for your bogie, and

She flushed crimson, frowned, and went out of the room. He sat, cursing himself, till his tea was stewed. It

was as if he had hacked with his thick boots at a clump of bluebells. Why had he said such a silly thing? Was

he just a towny college ass like Robert Garton, as far from understanding this girl?

Ashurst spent the next week confirming the restoration of his leg, by exploration of the country within easy

reach. Spring was a revelation to him this year. In a kind of intoxication he would watch the pinkwhite buds

of some backward beech tree sprayed up in the sunlight against the deep blue sky, or the trunks and limbs of

the few Scotch firs, tawny in violent light, or again, on the moor, the galebent larches which had such a look

of life when the wind streamed in their young green, above the rusty black underboughs. Or he would lie on

the banks, gazing at the clusters of dogviolets, or up in the dead bracken, fingering the pink, transparent

buds of the dewberry, while the cuckoos called and yafes laughed, or a lark, from very high, dripped its beads

of song. It was certainly different from any spring he had ever known, for spring was within him, not without.

In the daytime he hardly saw the family; and when Megan brought in his meals she always seemed too busy

in the house or among the young things in the yard to stay talking long. But in the evenings he installed

himself in the window seat in the kitchen, smoking and chatting with the lame man Jim, or Mrs. Narracombe,

while the girl sewed, or moved about, clearing the supper things away. And sometimes, with the sensation a

cat must feel when it purrs, he would become conscious that Megan's eyesthose dewgrey eyeswere

It was on Sunday week in the evening, when he was lying in the orchard listening to a blackbird and

composing a love poem, that he heard the gate swing to, and saw the girl come running among the trees, with

the redcheeked, stolid Joe in swift pursuit. About twenty yards away the chase ended, and the two stood

fronting each other, not noticing the stranger in the grassthe boy pressing on, the girl fending him off.

Ashurst could see her face, angry, disturbed; and the youth'swho would have thought that redfaced yokel

could look so distraught! And painfully affected by that sight, he jumped up. They saw him then. Megan

dropped her hands, and shrank behind a tree trunk; the boy gave an angry grunt, rushed at the bank,

scrambled over and vanished. Ashurst went slowly up to her. She was standing quite still, biting her lipvery

pretty, with her fine, dark hair blown loose about her face, and her eyes cast down.

She gave him one upward look, from eyes much dilated; then, catching her breath, turned away. Ashurst

He caught hold of her hands, but she shrank back, till her passionate little face and loose dark hair were

caught among the pink clusters of the apple blossom. Ashurst raised one of her imprisoned hands and put his

lips to it. He felt how chivalrous he was, and superior to that clod Joejust brushing that small, rough hand

with his mouth I Her shrinking ceased suddenly; she seemed to tremble towards him. A sweet warmth

overtook Ashurst from top to toe. This slim maiden, so simple and fine and pretty, was pleased, then, at the

touch of his lips! And, yielding to a swift impulse, he put his arms round her, pressed her to him, and kissed

her forehead. Then he was frightened she went so pale, closing her eyes, so that the long, dark lashes lay

on her pale cheeks; her hands, too, lay inert at her sides. The touch of her breast sent a shiver through him.

"Megan!" he sighed out, and let her go. In the utter silence a blackbird shouted. Then the girl seized his hand,

put it to her cheek, her heart, her lips, kissed it passionately, and fled away among the mossy trunks of the

Ashurst sat down on a twisted old tree growing almost along the ground, and, all throbbing and bewildered,

gazed vacantly at the blossom which had crowned her hairthose pink buds with one white open apple star.

What had he done? How had he let himself be thus stampeded by beautypityorjust the spring! He felt

curiously happy, all the same; happy and triumphant, with shivers running through his limbs, and a vague

alarm. This was the beginning of what? The midges bit him, the dancing gnats tried to fly into his mouth,

and all the spring around him seemed to grow more lovely and alive; the songs of the cuckoos and the

blackbirds, the laughter of the yaflies, the levelslanting sunlight, the apple blossom which had crowned her

head! He got up from the old trunk and strode out of the orchard, wanting space, an open sky, to get on terms

with these new sensations. He made for the moor, and from an ash tree in the hedge a magpie flew out to

Of manat any age from five years onwho can say he has never been in love? Ashurst had loved his

partners at his dancing class; loved his nursery governess; girls in schoolholidays; perhaps never been quite

out of love, cherishing always some more or less remote admiration. But this was different, not remote at all.

Quite a new sensation; terribly delightful, bringing a sense of completed manhood. To be holding in his

fingers such a wild flower, to be able to put it to his lips, and feel it tremble with delight against them! What

intoxication, andembarrassment! What to do with ithow meet her next time? His first caress had been

cool, pitiful; but the next could not be, now that, by her burning little kiss on his hand, by her pressure of it to

her heart, he knew that she loved him. Some natures are coarsened by love bestowed on them; others, like

Ashurst's, are swayed and drawn, warmed and softened, almost exalted, by what they feel to be a sort of

And up there among the tors he was racked between the passionate desire to revel in this new sensation of

spring fulfilled within him, and a vague but very real uneasiness. At one moment he gave himself up

completely to his pride at having captured this pretty, trustful, dewyeyed thing! At the next he thought with

factitious solemnity: 'Yes, my boy! But look out what you're doing! You know what comes of it!'

Dusk dropped down without his noticingdusk on the carved, Assyrian looking masses of the rocks. And

the voice of Nature said: "This is a new world for you!" As when a man gets up at four o'clock and goes out

into a summer morning, and beasts, birds, trees stare at him and he feels as if all had been made new.

He stayed up there for hours, till it grew cold, then groped his way down the stones and heather roots to the

road, back into the lane, and came again past the wild meadow to the orchard. There he struck a match and

looked at his watch. Nearly twelve! It was black and unstirring in there now, very different from the

lingering, bird befriended brightness of six hours ago! And suddenly he saw this idyll of his with the eyes of

the outer worldhad mental vision of Mrs. Narracombe's snakelike neck turned, her quick dark glance

taking it all in, her shrewd face hardening; saw the gipsylike cousins coarsely mocking and distrustful; Joe

stolid and furious; only the lame man, Jim, with the suffering eyes, seemed tolerable to his mind. And the

village pub!the gossiping matrons he passed on his walks; and thenhis own friendsRobert Carton's

smile when he went off that morning ten days ago; so ironical and knowing! Disgusting! For a minute he

literally hated this earthy, cynical world to which one belonged, willynilly. The gate where he was leaning

grew grey, a sort of shimmer passed be fore him and spread into the bluish darkness. The moon! He could

just see it over the bank be hind; red, nearly rounda strange moon! And turning away, he went up the lane

which smelled of the night and cowdung and young leaves. In the strawyard he could see the dark shapes of

cattle, broken by the pale sickles of their horns, like so many thin moons, fallen endsup. He unlatched the

farm gate stealthily. All was dark in the house. Muffling his footsteps, he gained the porch, and, blotted

against one of the yew trees, looked up at Megan's window. It was open. Was she sleeping, or lying awake

perhaps, disturbed unhappy at his absence? An owl hooted while he stood there peering up, and the sound

seemed to fill the whole night, so quiet was all else, save for the neverending murmur of the stream running

below the orchard. The cuckoos by day, and now the owlshow wonderfully they voiced this troubled

ecstasy within him! And suddenly he saw her at her window, looking out. He moved a little from the yew

tree, and whispered: "Megan!" She drew back, vanished, reappeared, leaning far down. He stole forward on

the grass patch, hit his shin against the greenpainted chair, and held his breath at the sound. The pale blur of

her stretcheddown arm and face did not stir; he moved the chair, and noiselessly mounted it. By stretching

up his arm he could just reach. Her hand held the huge key of the front door, and he clasped that burning

hand with the cold key in it. He could just see her face, the glint of teeth between her lips, her tumbled hair.

She was still dressedpoor child, sitting up for him, no doubt! "Pretty Megan!" Her hot, roughened fingers

clung to his; her face had a strange, lost look. To have been able to reach iteven with his hand! The owl

hooted, a scent of sweetbriar crept into his nostrils. Then one of the farm dogs barked; her grasp relaxed, she

"Goodnight, sir!" She was gone! With a sigh he dropped back to earth, and sitting on that chair, took off his

boots. Nothing for it but to creep in and go to bed; yet for a long while he sat unmoving, his feet chilly in the

dew, drunk on the memory of her lost, half smiling face, and the clinging grip of her burning fingers,

He awoke feeling as if he had eaten heavily overnight, instead of having eaten nothing. And far off, unreal,

seemed yesterday's romance! Yet it was a golden morning. Full spring had burst at lastin one night the

"goldiecups," as the little boys called them, seemed to have made the field their own, and from his window

he could see apple blossoms covering the orchard as with a rose and white quilt. He went down almost

dreading to see Megan; and yet, when not she but Mrs. Narracombe brought in his breakfast, he felt vexed

and disappointed. The woman's quick eye and snaky neck seemed to have a new alacrity this morning. Had

"So you an' the moon went walkin' last night, Mr. Ashurst! Did ye have your supper anywheres?"

"We kept it for you, but I suppose you was too busy in your brain to think o' such a thing as that?"

Was she mocking him, in that voice of hers, which still kept some Welsh crispness against the invading burr

of the West Country? If she knew! And at that moment he thought: 'No, no; I'll clear out. I won't put myself

But, after breakfast, the longing to see Megan began and increased with every minute, together with fear lest

something should have been said to her which had spoiled everything. Sinister that she had not appeared, not

given him even a glimpse of her! And the love poem, whose manufacture had been so important and

absorbing yesterday afternoon under the apple trees, now seemed so paltry that he tore it up and rolled it into

pipe spills. What had he known of love, till she seized his hand and kissed it! And nowwhat did he not

know? But to write of it seemed mere insipidity! He went up to his bedroom to get a book, and his heart

began to beat violently, for she was in there making the bed. He stood in the doorway watching; and

suddenly, with turbulent joy, he saw her stoop and kiss his pillow, just at the hollow made by his head last

How let her know he had seen that pretty act of devotion? And yet, if she heard him stealing away, it would

be even worse. She took the pillow up, holding it as if reluctant to shake out the impress of his cheek,

She put her hands up to her cheeks, but her eyes seemed to look right into him. He had never before realised

the depth and purity and touching faithfulness in those dewbright eyes, and he stammered:

"I was wandering about on the moor; it was such a jolly night. I I've just come up for a book."

Then, the kiss he had seen her give the pillow afflicted him with sudden headiness, and he went up to her.

Touching her eyes with his lips, he thought with queer excitement: 'I've done it! Yesterday all was

suddenanyhow; but nowI've done it!' The girl let her forehead rest against his lips, which moved

downwards till they reached hers. That first real lover's kissstrange, wonderful, still almost innocentin

Then, scared at her white face, scared at everything, he let her go, and went downstairs again. Yes! He had

done it now! Accepted her love, declared his own! He went out to the green chair as devoid of a book as ever;

and there he sat staring vacantly before him, triumphant and remorseful, while under his nose and behind his

back the work of the farm went on. How long he had been sitting in that curious state of vacancy he had no

notion when he saw Joe standing a little behind him to the right. The youth had evidently come from hard

work in the fields, and stood shifting his feet, breathing loudly, his face coloured like a setting sun, and his

arms, below the rolledup sleeves of his blue shirt, showing the hue and furry sheen of ripe peaches. His red

lips were open, his blue eyes with their flaxen lashes stared fixedly at Ashurst, who said ironically:

"Very good of you, but, do you know, I prefer the others should speak for themselves."

The youth moved a pace or two nearer, and the scent of his honest heat afflicted Ashurst's nostrils.

Joe answered only with the loudness of his breathing, but his eyes looked like those of a young and angry

A rush of jealousy, of contempt, and anger with this thick, loud breathing rustic got the better of Ashurst's

And as he said those simple words, he saw Megan in the doorway with a tiny brown spaniel puppy in her

Ashurst put his finger to the mouth of the little brown bullfrog of a creature in her arms. How cosy it looked

She stamped her foot; then looked up at Ashurst. At that adoring look he felt his nerves quiver, just as if he

"No." And smothering her face against the puppy's little fat, brown body, she slipped back into the house.

Ashurst wandered down the lane. At the gate of the wild meadow he came on the lame man and his cows.

"Ah! 'Tes brave weather for the grass. The ashes be later than th' oaks this year. 'When th' oak before th'

"I shouldn't like to say rightly that 't was there. 'Twas in my mind as 'twas there."

"They du zay old master, Mist' Narracombe come o' gipsy stock. But that's tellin'. They'm a wonderful

people, yu know, for claimin' their own. Maybe they knu 'e was goin', and sent this feller along for company.

"'E 'ad 'air all over 'is face, an' goin' like this, he was, zame as if 'e 'ad a viddle. They zay there's no such thing

as bogies, but I've azeen the 'air on this dog standin' up of a dark naight, when I couldn' zee nothin', meself."

The lame man pushed his hat up; his aspiring eyes looked at Ashurst more earnestly than ever.

"'Tes not for me to zay that but 'tes they bein' so unrestin'like. There's things us don' understand, that's zartin,

for zure. There's people that zee things, tu, an' others that don't never zee nothin'. Now, our Joeyu might

putt anything under'is eyes an e'd never zee it; and them other boys, tu, they'm rattlin' fellers. But yu take an'

putt our Megan where there's suthin', she'll zee it, an' more tu, or I'm mistaken."

"Lovin'hearted! "Yes! And what was he doing? What were his intentionsas they say towards this

lovinghearted girl? The thought dogged him, wandering through fields bright with buttercups, where the

little red calves were feeding, and the swallows flying high. Yes, the oaks were before the ashes, browngold

already; every tree in different stage and hue. The cuckoos and a thousand birds were singing; the little

streams were very bright. The ancients believed in a golden age, in the garden of the Hesperides!... A queen

wasp settled on his sleeve. Each queen wasp killed meant two thousand fewer wasps to thieve the apples

which would grow from that blossom in the orchard; but who, with love in his heart, could kill anything on a

day like this? He entered a field where a young red bull was feeding. It seemed to Ashurst that he looked like

Joe. But the young bull took no notice of this visitor, a little drunk himself, perhaps, on the singing and the

glamour of the golden pasture, under his short legs. Ashurst crossed out unchallenged to the hillside above

the stream. From that slope a for mounted to its crown of rocks. The ground there was covered with a mist of

bluebells, and nearly a score of crabapple trees were in full bloom. He threw himself down on the grass. The

change from the buttercup glory and oakgoldened glamour of the fields to this ethereal beauty under the

grey for filled him with a sort of wonder; nothing the same, save the sound of running water and the songs of

the cuckoos. He lay there a long time, watching the sunlight wheel till the crabtrees threw shadows over the

bluebells, his only companions a few wild bees. He was not quite sane, thinking of that morning's kiss, and of

tonight under the apple tree. In such a spot as this, fauns and dryads surely lived; nymphs, white as the

crabapple blossom, retired within those trees; fauns, brown as the dead bracken, with pointed ears, lay in

wait for them. The cuckoos were still calling when he woke, there was the sound of running water; but the

sun had couched behind the tor, the hillside was cool, and some rabbits had come out. 'Tonight!' he thought.

Just as from the earth everything was pushing up, unfolding under the soft insistent fingers of an unseen

hand, so were his heart and senses being pushed, unfolded. He got up and broke off a spray from a

crabapple tree. The buds were like Megan shelllike, rosepink, wild, and fresh; and so, too, the opening

flowers, white, and wild; and touching. He put the spray into his coat. And all the rush of the spring within

It was nearly eleven that night when Ashurst put down the pocket "Odyssey" which for half an hour he had

held in his hands without reading, and slipped through the yard down to the orchard. The moon had just risen,

very golden, over the hill, and like a bright, powerful, watching spirit peered through the bars of an ash tree's

halfnaked boughs. In among the apple trees it was still dark, and he stood making sure of his direction,

feeling the rough grass with his feet. A black mass close behind him stirred with a heavy grunting sound, and

three large pigs settled down again close to each other, under the wall. He listened. There was no wind, but

the stream's burbling whispering chuckle had gained twice its daytime strength. One bird, he could not tell

what, cried "Pippip," "Pip pip," with perfect monotony; he could hear a nightJar spinning very far off; an

owl hooting. Ashurst moved a step or two, and again halted, aware of a dim living whiteness all round his

head. On the dark unstirring trees innumerable flowers and buds all soft and blurred were being bewitched to

life by the creeping moonlight. He had the oddest feeling of actual companionship, as if a million white

moths or spirits had floated in and settled between dark sky and darker ground, and were opening and

shutting their wings on a level with his eyes. In the bewildering, still, scentless beauty of that moment he

almost lost memory of why he had come to the orchard. The flying glamour which had clothed the earth all

day had not gone now that night had fallen, but only changed into this new form. He moved on through the

thicket of stems and boughs covered with that live powdering whiteness, till he reached the big apple tree. No

mistaking that, even in the dark, nearly twice the height and size of any other, and leaning out towards the

open meadows and the stream. Under the thick branches he stood still again, to listen. The same sounds

exactly, and a faint grunting from the sleepy pigs. He put his hands on the dry, almost warm tree trunk, whose

rough mossy surface gave forth a peaty scent at his touch. Would she comewould she? And among these

quivering, haunted, moonwitched trees he was seized with doubts of everything! All was unearthly here, fit

for no earthly lovers; fit only for god and goddess, faun and nymph not for him and this little country girl.

Would it not be almost a relief if she did not come? But all the time he was listening. And still that unknown

bird went "Pippip," "Pippip," and there rose the busy chatter of the little trout stream, whereon the moon

was flinging glances through the bars of her treeprison. The blossom on a level with his eyes seemed to

grow more living every moment, seemed with its mysterious white beauty more and more a part of his

suspense. He plucked a fragment and held it closethree blossoms. Sacrilege to pluck fruittree

blossomsoft, sacred, young blossomand throw it away! Then suddenly he heard the gate close, the pigs

stirring again and grunting; and leaning against the trunk, he pressed his hands to its mossy sides behind him,

and held his breath. She might have been a spirit threading the trees, for all the noise she made! Then he saw

her quite closeher dark form part of a little tree, her white face part of its blossom; so still, and peering

towards him. He whispered: "Megan!" and held out his hands. She ran forward, straight to his breast. When

he felt her heart beating against him, Ashurst knew to the full the sensations of chivalry and passion. Because

she was not of his world, because she was so simple and young and headlong, adoring and defenceless, how

could he be other than her protector, in the dark! Because she was all simple Nature and beauty, as much a

part of this spring night as was the living blossom, how should he not take all that she would give him how

not fulfil the spring in her heart and his! And torn between these two emotions he clasped her close, and

kissed her hair. How long they stood there without speaking he knew not. The stream went on chattering, the

owls hooting, the moon kept stealing up and growing whiter; the blossom all round them and above

brightened in suspense of living beauty. Their lips had sought each other's, and they did not speak. The

moment speech began all would be unreal! Spring has no speech, nothing but rustling and whispering. Spring

has so much more than speech in its unfolding flowers and leaves, and the coursing of its streams, and in its

sweet restless seeking! And sometimes spring will come alive, and, like a mysterious Presence stand,

encircling lovers with its arms, laying on them the fingers of enchantment, so that, standing lips to lips, they

forget everything but just a kiss. While her heart beat against him, and her lips quivered on his, Ashurst felt

nothing but simple raptureDestiny meant her for his arms, Love could not be flouted! But when their lips

parted for breath, division began again at once. Only, passion now was so much the stronger, and he sighed:

So faint that he hardly heard, she whispered: "I shall die if I can't be with you."

"Tomorrow I'll go to Torquay and get some money, and get you some clothes that won't be noticed, and

then we'll steal away. And when we get to London, soon perhaps, if you love me well enough, we'll be

Drunk on his own chivalry, Ashurst went on murmuring "It's I who am not good enough for you. Oh! Megan,

"When I saw you in the road, and you looked at me. The first night I loved you; but I never thought you

A shiver of horror went through Ashurst; he lifted her up bodily and held her fasttoo upset to speak.

Her smile brought tears into his eyes. The whiteness of her moonlit face so close to his, the faint pink of her

And then, suddenly, her eyes widened and stared past him painfully; she writhed out of his arms, and

Ashurst saw nothing but the brightened stream, the furze faintly gilded, the beech trees glistening, and behind

them all the wide loom of the moonlit hill. Behind him came her frozen whisper: "The gipsy bogie!"

Exasperated, he leaped the stream, and strode towards the beech clump. Prank of the moonlight! Nothing! In

and out of the boulders and thorn trees, muttering and cursing, yet with a kind of terror, he rushed and

stumbled. Absurd! Silly! Then he went back to the apple tree. But she was gone; he could hear a rustle, the

grunting of the pigs, the sound of a gate closing. Instead of her, only this old apple tree! He flung his arms

round the trunk. What a substitute for her soft body; the rough moss against his facewhat a substitute for

her soft cheek; only the scent, as of the woods, a little the same! And above him, and around, the blossoms,

Descending from the train at Torquay station, Ashurst wandered uncertainly along the front, for he did not

know this particular queen of English watering places. Having little sense of what he had on, he was quite

unconscious of being remarkable among its inhabitants, and strode along in his rough Norfolk jacket, dusty

boots, and battered hat, without observing that people gazed at him rather blankly. He was seeking a branch

of his London bank, and having found one, found also the first obstacle to his mood. Did he know anyone in

Torquay? No. In that case, if he would wire to his bank in London, they would be happy to oblige him on

receipt of the reply. That suspicious breath from the matteroffact world somewhat tarnished the brightness

Nearly opposite to the post office he saw a shop full of ladies' garments, and examined the window with

strange sensations. To have to undertake the clothing of his rustic love was more than a little disturbing. He

went in. A young woman came forward; she had blue eyes and a faintly puzzled forehead. Ashurst stared at

The young woman smiled. Ashurst frowned the peculiarity of his request struck him with sudden force.

While she was gone he stood disconsolately eyeing the models in the window, and suddenly it seemed to him

incredible that Meganhis Megan could ever be dressed save in the rough tweed skirt, coarse blouse, and

tamo'shanter cap he was wont to see her in. The young woman had come back with several dresses in her

arms, and Ashurst eyed her laying them against her own modish figure. There was one whose colour he liked,

a dovegrey, but to imagine Megan clothed in it was beyond him. The young woman went away, and brought

some more. But on Ashurst there had now come a feeling of paralysis. How choose? She would want a hat

too, and shoes, and gloves; and, suppose, when he had got them all, they commonised her, as Sunday clothes

always commonised village folk! Why should she not travel as she was? Ah! But conspicuousness would

matter; this was a serious elopement. And, staring at the young woman, he thought: 'I wonder if she guesses,

"Do you mind putting aside that grey one for me?" he said desperately at last. "I can't decide now; I'll come in

"Oh! certainly. It's a very tasteful costume. I don't think you'll get anything that will suit your purpose better."

Freed again from the suspicious matteroffactness of the world, he took a long breath, and went back to

visions. In fancy he saw the trustful, pretty creature who was going to join her life to his; saw himself and her

stealing forth at night, walking over the moor under the moon, he with his arm round her, and carrying her

new garments, till, in some faroff wood, when dawn was coming, she would slip off her old things and put

on these, and an early train at a distant station would bear them away on their honeymoon journey, till

Ashurst's frown dissolved; the face, close to his own, was blueeyed, suffused with sunone of those faces

"Oh! nothing. Just looking round, and getting some money. I'm staying on the moor."

"Are you lunching anywhere? Come and lunch with us; I'm here with my young sisters. They've had

Hooked in by that friendly arm Ashurst went along, up a hill, down a hill, away out of the town, while the

voice of Halliday, redolent of optimism as his face was of sun, explained how "in this mouldy place the only

decent things were the bathing and boating," and so on, till presently they came to a crescent of houses a little

Ashurst contemplated his visage in a lookingglass. After his farmhouse bedroom, the comb and one spare

shirt regime of the last fortnight, this room littered with clothes and brushes was a sort of Capua; and he

When he followed Halliday into the sitting room for lunch, three faces, very fair and blueeyed, were turned

Two were indeed young, about eleven and ten. The third was perhaps seventeen, tall and fairhaired too, with

pinkandwhite cheeks just touched by the sun, and eyebrows, rather darker than the hair, running a little

upwards from her nose to their outer points. The voices of all three were like Halliday's, high and cheerful;

they stood up straight, shook hands with a quick movement, looked at Ashurst critically, away again at once,

and began to talk of what they were going to do in the afternoon. A regular Diana and attendant nymphs!

After the farm this crisp, slangy, eager talk, this cool, clean, offhand refinement, was queer at first, and then

so natural that what he had come from became suddenly remote. The names of the two little ones seemed to

Ashurst turned to the new speaker, Stella, shook his head, and smiled. She was very pretty! Sabina said

The three pairs of blue eyes, fixed on him, made him conscious of his new importanceThe sensation was

But again Ashurst smiled and shook his head. Then suddenly he found himself being catechised about his

physical achievements. He had rowedit seemedin his college boat, played in his college football team,

won his college mile; and he rose from table a sort of hero. The two little girls insisted that he must see

"their" cave, and they set forth chattering like magpies, Ashurst between them, Stella and her brother a little

behind. In the cave, damp and darkish like any other cave, the great feature was a pool with possibility of

creatures which might be caught and put into bottles. Sabina and Freda, who wore no stockings on their

shapely brown legs, exhorted Ashurst to join them in the middle of it, and help sieve the water. He too was

soon bootless and sockless. Time goes fast for one who has a sense of beauty, when there are pretty children

in a pool and a young Diana on the edge, to receive with wonder anything you can catch! Ashurst never had

much sense of time. It was a shock when, pulling out his watch, he saw it was well past three. No cashing his

cheque todaythe bank would be closed before he could get there. Watching his expression, the little girls

Ashurst did not answer. He was seeing again Megan's face, when at breakfast time he had whispered: "I'm

going to Torquay, darling, to get everything; I shall be back this evening. If it's fine we can go tonight. Be

ready." He was seeing again how she quivered and hung on his words. What would she think? Then he pulled

himself together, conscious suddenly of the calm scrutiny of this other young girl, so tall and fair and

Dianalike, at the edge of the pool, of her wondering blue eyes under those brows which slanted up a little. If

they knew what was in his mindif they knew that this very night he had meant! Well, there would be a

little sound of disgust, and he would be alone in the cave. And with a curious mixture of anger, chagrin, and

It was impossible not to succumb a little to the contentment of these pretty children, to the smile on Stella's

lips, to Halliday's "Ripping, old chap! I can lend you things for the night!" But again a spasm of longing and

The attractions of the pool palling, they went back to the hotel. Ashurst sent his wire, addressing it to Mrs.

Narracombe: "Sorry, detained for the night, back tomorrow." Surely Megan would understand that he had

too much to do; and his heart grew lighter. It was a lovely afternoon, warm, the sea calm and blue, and

swimming his great passion; the favour of these pretty children flattered him, the pleasure of looking at them,

at Stella, at Halliday's sunny face; the slight unreality, yet extreme naturalness of it allas of a last peep at

normality before be took this plunge with Megan! He got his borrowed bathing dress, and they all set forth.

Halliday and he undressed behind one rock, the three girls behind another. He was first into the sea, and at

once swam out with the bravado of justifying his selfgiven reputation. When he turned he could see

Halliday swimming along shore, and the girls flopping and dipping, and riding the little waves, in the way he

was accustomed to despise, but now thought pretty and sensible, since it gave him the distinction of the only

deepwater fish. But drawing near, he wondered if they would like him, a stranger, to come into their

splashing group; he felt shy, approaching that slim nymph. Then Sabina summoned him to teach her to float,

and between them the little girls kept him so busy that he had no time even to notice whether Stella was

accustomed to his presence, till suddenly he heard a startled sound from her: She was standing submerged to

the waist, leaning a little forward, her slim white arms stretched out and pointing, her wet face puckered by

Ashurst saw at once that Phil was not all right. He was splashing and struggling out of his depth, perhaps a

hundred yards away; suddenly he gave a cry, threw up his arms, and went down. Ashurst saw the girl launch

herself towards him, and crying out: "Go back, Stella! Go back!" he dashed out. He had never swum so fast,

and reached Halliday just as he was coming up a second time. It was a case of cramp, but to get him in was

not difficult, for he did not struggle. The girl, who had stopped where Ashurst told her to, helped as soon as

he was in his depth, and once on the beach they sat down one on each side of him to rub his limbs, while the

little ones stood by with scared faces. Halliday was soon smiling. It washe saidrotten of him, absolutely

rotten! If Frank would give him an arm, he could get to his clothes all right now. Ashurst gave him the arm,

and as he did so caught sight of Stella's face, wet and flushed and tearful, all broken up out of its calm; and he

Clothed, but not quite in their right minds, they went up all together to the hotel and sat down to tea, except

Halliday, who was lying down in his room. After some slices of bread and jam, Sabina said:

Ashurst saw Stella looking down; he got up in confusion, and went to the window. From there he heard

Sabina mutter: "I say, let's swear blood bond. Where's your knife, Freda?" and out of the corner of his eye

could see each of them solemnly prick herself, squeeze out a drop of blood and dabble on a bit of paper. He

"Don't be a stoat! Come back!" His arms were seized; imprisoned between the little girls he was brought back

to the table. On it lay a piece of paper with an effigy drawn in blood, and the three names Stella Halliday,

Sabina Halliday, Freda Hallidayalso in blood, running towards it like the rays of a star. Sabina said:

Before Ashurst could escape, some wettish hair dangled against his face, something like a bite descended on

his nose, he felt his left arm pinched, and other teeth softly searching his cheek. Then he was released, and

Ashurst, red and rigid, looked across the table at a red and rigid Stella. Sabina giggled; Freda cried:

"Well, then, she can kiss her hand, and you can put it against your nose. It is on one side!"

To his amazement the girl did kiss her hand and stretch it out. Solemnly he took that cool, slim hand and laid

"Now, then, we shall have to save your life at any time; that's settled. Can I have another cup, Stella, not so

beastly weak?" Tea was resumed, and Ashurst, folding up the paper, put it in his pocket. The talk turned on

the advantages of measles, tangerine oranges, honey in a spoon, no lessons, and so forth. Ashurst listened,

silent, exchanging friendly looks with Stella, whose face was again of its normal suntouched pink and

white. It was soothing to be so taken to the heart of this jolly family, fascinating to watch their faces. And

after tea, while the two little girls pressed seaweed, he talked to Stella in the window seat and looked at her

watercolour sketches. The whole thing was like a pleasurable dream; time and incident hung up, importance

and reality suspended. Tomorrow he would go back to Megan, with nothing of all this left save the paper with

the blood of these children, in his pocket. Children! Stella was not quite thatas old as Megan! Her talk

quick, rather hard and shy, yet friendlyseemed to flourish on his silences, and about her there was

something cool and virginala maiden in a bower. At dinner, to which Halliday, who had swallowed too

"Every time Stella calls you Mr. Ashurst, she's got to pay a forfeit. It's ridiculous."

Ashurst released the hair. Stella! What would she call himafter this? But she called him nothing; till at

Ashurst stood motionless in the empty sittingroom. Only last night, under the apple tree and the living

blossom, he had held Megan to him, kissing her eyes and lips. And he gasped, swept by that rush of

remembrance. Tonight it should have begunhis life with her who only wanted to be with him! And now,

twentyfour hours and more must pass, becauseof not looking at his watch! Why had he made friends with

this family of innocents just when he was saying goodbye to innocence, and all the rest of it? 'But I mean to

He took a candle, lighted it, and went to his bedroom, which was next to Halliday's. His friend's voice called,

"I've been thinking about this afternoon, you know," said Halliday rather suddenly. "They say you go through

"Well, I did think of one thingrather oddof a girl at Cambridge that I might haveyou know; I was

glad I hadn't got her on my mind. Anyhow, old chap, I owe it to you that I'm here; I should have been in the

big dark by now. No more bed, or baccy; no more anything. I say, what d'you suppose happens to us?"

"H'm! I think that's rather gloomy. I say, I hope my young sisters have been decent to you?"

Halliday put his pipe down, crossed his hands behind his neck, and turned his face towards the window.

Watching his friend, lying there, with that smile, and the candle light on his face, Ashurst shuddered. Quite

true! He might have been lying there with no smile, with all that sunny look gone out for ever! He might not

have been lying there at all, but "sanded" at the bottom of the sea, waiting for resurrection on the ninth day,

was it? And that smile of Halliday's seemed to him suddenly something wonderful, as if in it were all the

difference between life and deaththe little flamethe all! He got up, and said softly:

"I can't say it, you know; but it must be rotten to be dead. Good night, old boy!"

Stirred and moved, Ashurst squeezed the hand, and went downstairs. The hall door was still open, and he

passed out on to the lawn before the Crescent. The stars were bright in a very dark blue sky, and by their light

some lilacs had that mysterious colour of flowers by night which no one can describe. Ashurst pressed his

face against a spray; and before his closed eyes Megan started up, with the tiny brown spaniel pup against her

breast. "I thought of a girl that I might have you know. I was glad I hadn't got her on my mind!" He jerked his

head away from the lilac, and began pacing up and down over the grass, a grey phantom coming to substance

for a moment in the light from the lamp at either end. He was with her again under the living, breathing white

ness of the blossom, the stream chattering by, the moon glinting steelblue on the bathingpool; back in the

rapture of his kisses on her upturned face of innocence and humble passion, back in the suspense and beauty

of that pagan night. He stood still once more in the shadow of the lilacs. Here the sea, not the stream, was

Night's voice; the sea with its sigh and rustle; no little bird, no owl, no nightJar called or spun; but a piano

tinkled, and the white houses cut the sky with solid curve, and the scent from the lilacs filled the air. A

window of the hotel, high up, was lighted; he saw a shadow move across the blind. And most queer

sensations stirred within him, a sort of churning, and twining, and turning of a single emotion on itself, as

though spring and love, bewildered and confused, seeking the way, were baffled. This girl, who had called

him Frank, whose hand had given his that sudden little clutch, this girl so cool and purewhat would she

think of such wild, unlawful loving? He sank down on the grass, sitting there crosslegged, with his back to

the house, motionless as some carved Buddha. Was he really going to break through innocence, and steal?

Sniff the scent out of a wild flower, andperhapsthrow it away? "Of a girl at Cambridge that I might

haveyou know!" He put his hands to the grass, one on each side, palms downwards, and pressed; it was

just warm stillthe grass, barely moist, soft and firm and friendly. 'What am I going to do?' he thought.

Perhaps Megan was at her window, looking out at the blossom, thinking of him! Poor little Megan! 'Why

not?' he thought. 'I love her! But do I really love her? or do I only want her because she is so pretty, and loves

me? What am I going to do?' The piano tinkled on, the stars winked; and Ashurst gazed out before him at the

dark sea, as if spellbound. He got up at last, cramped and rather chilly. There was no longer light in any

Out of a deep and dreamless sleep he was awakened by the sound of thumping on the door. A shrill voice

He found them already eating marmalade, and sat down in the empty place between Stella and Sabina, who,

Ashurst thought: 'Come! Impossible. I shall be getting things and going back.' He looked at Stella. She said

At the station he wrote a second telegram to the farm, and then tore it up; he could not have explained why.

From Brixham they drove in a very little wagonette. There, squeezed between Sabina and Freda, with his

knees touching Stella's, they played "Up, Jenkins "; and the gloom he was feeling gave way to frolic. In this

one day more to think it over, he did not want to think! They ran races, wrestled, paddledfor today

nobody wanted to bathethey sang catches, played games, and ate all they had brought. The little girls fell

asleep against him on the way back, and his knees still touched Stella's in the narrow wagonette. It seemed

incredible that thirty hours ago he had never set eyes on any of those three flaxen heads. In the train he talked

to Stella of poetry, discovering her favourites, and telling her his own with a pleasing sense of superiority; till

"While one's alive one naturally wants to go on living for ever; that's part of being alive. But it probably isn't

"I believe in the Sermon on the Mount, because it's beautiful and good for all time."

She turned her face quickly to the window, and there sprang into his mind Megan's prayer, repeated by little

Nick: "God bless us all, and Mr. Ashes!" Who else would ever say a prayer for him, like her who at this

moment must be waitingwaiting to see him come down the lane? And he thought suddenly: 'What a

All that evening this thought kept coming back; but, as is not unusual, each time with less poignancy, till it

seemed almost a matter of course to be a scoundrel. Andstrange!he did not know whether he was a

scoundrel if he meant to go back to Megan, or if he did not mean to go back to her.

They played cards till the children were sent off to bed; then Stella went to the piano. From over on the

window seat, where it was nearly dark, Ashurst watched her between the candlesthat fair head on the long,

white neck bending to the movement of her hands. She played fluently, without much expression; but what a

Picture she made, the faint golden radiance, a sort of angelic atmosphere hovering about her! Who could have

passionate thoughts or wild desires in the presence of that swaying, whiteclothed girl with the seraphic

head? She played a thing of Schumann's called "Warum?" Then Halliday brought out a flute, and the spell

was broken. After this they made Ashurst sing, Stella playing him accompaniments from a book of

Schumann songs, till, in the middle of "Ich grolle nicht," two small figures clad in blue dressinggowns crept

in and tried to conceal themselves beneath the piano. The evening broke up in confusion, and what Sabina

That night Ashurst hardly slept at all. He was thinking, tossing and turning. The intense domestic intimacy of

these last two days, the strength of this Halliday atmosphere, seemed to ring him round, and make the farm

and Meganeven Meganseem unreal. Had he really made love to herreally promised to take her away

to live with him? He must have been bewitched by the spring, the night, the apple blossom! This May

madness could but destroy them both! The notion that he was going to make her his mistressthat simple

child not yet eighteen now filled him with a sort of horror, even while it still stung and whipped his blood.

He muttered to himself: "It's awful, what I've doneawful!" And the sound of Schumann's music throbbed

and mingled with his fevered thoughts, and he saw again Stella's cool, white, fairhaired figure and bending

neck, the queer, angelic radiance about her. 'I must have beenI must bemad!' he thought. 'What came into

me? Poor little Megan!' "God bless us all, and Mr. Ashes!" "I want to be with youonly to be with you!"

And burying his face in his pillow, he smothered down a fit of sobbing. Not to go back was awful! To go

Emotion, when you are young, and give real vent to it, loses its power of torture. And he fell asleep, thinking:

Next morning he got his cheque cashed, but avoided the shop of the dovegrey dress like the plague; and,

instead, bought himself some necessaries. He spent the whole day in a queer mood, cherishing a kind of

sullenness against himself. Instead of the hankering of the last two days, he felt nothing but a blankall

passionate longing gone, as if quenched in that outburst of tears. After tea Stella put a book down beside him,

It was Farrar's "Life of Christ." Ashurst smiled. Her anxiety about his beliefs seemed to him comic, but

touching. Infectious too, perhaps, for he began to have an itch to justify himself, if not to convert her. And in

the evening, when the children and Halliday were mending their shrimping nets, he said:

"At the back of orthodox religion, so far as I can see, there's always the idea of rewardwhat you can get for

She was sitting on the sofa making reefer knots with a bit of string. She looked up quickly:

"You think so," he said; "but wanting the 'quid pro quo' is about the deepest thing in all of us! It's jolly hard to

"Well, think, and see if the most religious people aren't those who feel that this life doesn't give them all they

How pretty she looked nowit was easy to be good with her! And he nodded and said:

With her fingers touching his, in manoeuvring the bit of string, he felt soothed and happy. And when he went

to bed he wilfully kept his thoughts on her, wrapping himself in her fair, cool sisterly radiance, as in some

Next day he found they had arranged to go by train to Totnes, and picnic at Berry Pomeroy Castle. Still in

that resolute oblivion of the past, he took his place with them in the landau beside Halliday, back to the

horses. And, then, along the sea front, nearly at the turning to the railway station, his heart almost leaped into

his mouth. MeganMegan herself!was walking on the far pathway, in her old skirt and jacket and her

tamo'shanter, looking up into the faces of the passersby. Instinctively he threw his hand up for cover,

then made a feint of clearing dust out of his eyes; but between his fingers he could see her still, moving, not

with her free country step, but wavering, lostlooking, pitifullike some little dog which has missed its

master and does not know whether to run on, to run backwhere to run. How had she come like

this?what excuse had she found to get away?what did she hope for? But with every turn of the wheels

bearing him away from her, his heart revolted and cried to him to stop them, to get out, and go to her! When

the landau turned the corner to the station he could stand it no more, and opening the carriage door, muttered:

"I've forgotten something! Go ondon't wait for me! I'll join you at the castle by the next train!" He jumped,

stumbled, spun round, recovered his balance, and walked forward, while the carriage with the astonished

>From the corner he could only just see Megan, a long way ahead now. He ran a few steps, checked himself,

and dropped into a walk. With each step nearer to her, further from the Hallidays, he walked more and more

slowly. How did it alter anythingthis sight of her? How make the going to her, and that which must come

of it, less ugly? For there was no hiding itsince he had met the Hallidays he had become gradually sure that

he would not marry Megan. It would only be a wild lovetime, a troubled, remorseful, difficult timeand

thenwell, then he would get tired, just because she gave him everything, was so simple, and so trustful, so

dewy. And dewwears off! The little spot of faded colour, her tamo'shanter cap, wavered on far in front

of him; she was looking up into every face, and at the house windows. Had any man ever such a cruel

moment to go through? Whatever he did, he felt he would be a beast. And he uttered a groan which made a

nursemaid turn and stare. He saw Megan stop and lean against the seawall, looking at the sea; and he too

stopped. Quite likely she had never seen the sea before, and even in her distress could not resist that sight.

'Yesshe's seen nothing,' he thought; 'everything's before her. And just for a few weeks' passion, I shall be

cutting her life to ribbons. I'd better go and hang myself rather than do it!' And suddenly he seemed to see

Stella's calm eyes looking into his, the wave of fluffy hair on her forehead stirred by the wind. Ah! it would

be madness, would mean giving up all that he respected, and his own selfrespect. He turned and walked

quickly back towards the station. But memory of that poor, bewildered little figure, those anxious eyes

searching the passersby, smote him too hard again, and once more he turned towards the sea.

The cap was no longer visible; that little spot of colour had vanished in the stream of the noon promenaders.

And impelled by the passion of longing, the dearth which comes on one when life seems to be whirling

something out of reach, he hurried forward. She was nowhere to be seen; for half an hour he looked for her;

then on the beach flung himself face downward in the sand. To find her again he knew he had only to go to

the station and wait till she returned from her fruitless quest, to take her train home; or to take train himself

and go back to the farm, so that she found him there when she returned. But he lay inert in the sand, among

the indifferent groups of children with their spades and buckets. Pity at her little figure wandering, seeking,

was wellnigh merged in the springrunning of his blood; for it was all wild feeling nowthe chivalrous

part, what there had been of it, was gone. He wanted her again, wanted her kisses, her soft, little body, her

abandonment, all her quick, warm, pagan emotion; wanted the wonderful feeling of that night under the

moonlit apple boughs; wanted it all with a horrible intensity, as the faun wants the nymph. The quick chatter

of the little bright trout stream, the dazzle of the buttercups, the rocks of the old "wild men"; the calling of

the cuckoos and yaffles, the hooting of the owls; and the red moon peeping out of the velvet dark at the living

whiteness of the blossom; and her face just out of reach at the window, lost in its lovelook; and her heart

against his, her lips answering his, under the apple treeall this besieged him. Yet he lay inert. What was it

which struggled against pity and this feverish longing, and kept him there paralysed in the warm sand? Three

flaxen headsa fair face with friendly bluegrey eyes, a slim hand pressing his, a quick voice speaking his

name"So you do believe in being good?" Yes, and a sort of atmosphere as of some old walledin English

garden, with pinks, and cornflowers, and roses, and scents of lavender and lilaccool and fair, untouched,

almost holy all that he had been brought up to feel was clean and good. And suddenly he thought: 'She

might come along the front again and see me!' and he got up and made his way to the rock at the far end of

the beach. There, with the spray biting into his face, he could think more coolly. To go back to the farm and

love Megan out in the woods, among the rocks, with everything around wild and fittingthat, he knew, was

impossible, utterly. To transplant her to a great town, to keep, in some little flat or rooms, one who belonged

so wholly to Naturethe poet in him shrank from it. His passion would be a mere sensuous revel, soon gone;

in London, her very simplicity, her lack of all intellectual quality, would make her his secret plaything

nothing else. The longer he sat on the rock, with his feet dangling over a greenish pool from which the sea

was ebbing, the more clearly he saw this; but it was as if her arms and all of her were slipping slowly, slowly

down from him, into the pool, to be carried away out to sea; and her face looking up, her lost face with

beseeching eyes, and dark, wet hairpossessed, haunted, tortured him! He got up at last, scaled the low

rockcliff, and made his way down into a sheltered cove. Perhaps in the sea he could get back his control

lose this fever! And stripping off his clothes, he swam out. He wanted to tire himself so that nothing mattered

and swam recklessly, fast and far; then suddenly, for no reason, felt afraid. Suppose he could not reach shore

againsuppose the current set him outor he got cramp, like Halliday! He turned to swim in. The red cliffs

looked a long way off. If he were drowned they would find his clothes. The Hallidays would know; but

Megan perhaps neverthey took no newspaper at the farm. And Phil Halliday's words came back to him

again: "A girl at Cambridge I might have Glad I haven't got her on my mind!" And in that moment of

unreasoning fear he vowed he would not have her on his mind. Then his fear left him; he swam in easily

enough, dried himself in the sun, and put on his clothes. His heart felt sore, but no longer ached; his body

When one is as young as Ashurst, pity is not a violent emotion. And, back in the Hallidays' sittingroom,

eating a ravenous tea, he felt much like a man recovered from fever. Everything seemed new and clear; the

tea, the buttered toast and jam tasted absurdly good; tobacco had never smelt so nice. And walking up and

down the empty room, he stopped here and there to touch or look. He took up Stella's workbasket, fingered

the cotton reels and a gailycoloured plait of sewing silks, smelt at the little bag filled with woodroffe she

kept among them. He sat down at the piano, playing tunes with one finger, thinking: 'Tonight she'll play; I

shall watch her while she's playing; it does me good to watch her.' He took up the book, which still lay where

she had placed it beside him, and tried to read. But Megan's little, sad figure began to come back at once, and

he got up and leaned in the window, listening to the thrushes in the Crescent gardens, gazing at the sea,

dreamy and blue below the trees. A servant came in and cleared the tea away, and he still stood, inhaling the

evening air, trying not to think. Then he saw the Hallidays coming through the gate of the Crescent, Stella a

little in front of Phil and the children, with their baskets, and instinctively he drew back. His heart, too sore

and discomfited, shrank from this encounter, yet wanted its friendly solacebore a grudge against this

influence, yet craved its cool innocence, and the pleasure of watching Stella's face. From against the wall

behind the piano he saw her come in and stand looking a little blank as though disappointed; then she saw

"Look! We picked such lovely late violets!" She held out a bunch. Ashurst put his nose to them, and there

stirred within him vague longings, chilled instantly by a vision of Megan's anxious face lifted to the faces of

He said shortly: "How jolly!" and turned away. He went up to his room, and, avoiding the children, who were

coming up the stairs, threw himself on his bed, and lay there with his arms crossed over his face. Now that he

felt the die really cast, and Megan given up, he hated himself, and almost hated the Hallidays and their

Why should they have chanced here, to drive away first loveto show him that he was going to be no better

than a common seducer? What right had Stella, with her fair, shy beauty, to make him know for certain that

he would never marry Megan; and, tarnishing it all, bring him such bitterness of regretful longing and such

pity? Megan would be back by now, worn out by her miserable seekingpoor little thing!expecting,

perhaps, to find him there when she reached home. Ashurst bit at his sleeve, to stifle a groan of remorseful

longing. He went to dinner glum and silent, and his mood threw a dinge even over the children. It was a

melancholy, rather ill tempered evening, for they were all tired; several times he caught Stella looking at him

with a hurt, puzzled expression, and this pleased his evil mood. He slept miserably; got up quite early, and

wandered out. He went down to the beach. Alone there with the serene, the blue, the sunlit sea, his heart

relaxed a little. Conceited foolto think that Megan would take it so hard! In a week or two she would

almost have forgotten! And he well, he would have the reward of virtue! A good young man! If Stella knew,

she would give him her blessing for resisting that devil she believed in; and he uttered a hard laugh. But

slowly the peace and beauty of sea and sky, the flight of the lonely seagulls, made him feel ashamed. He

In the Crescent gardens Stella herself was sitting on a camp stool, sketching. He stole up close behind. How

fair and pretty she was, bent diligently, holding up her brush, measuring, wrinkling her brows.

"It's all right. I knew there was something. Between friends it doesn't matter, does it?"

She looked up at him, nodded vehemently, and her upper teeth gleamed again in that swift, brilliant smile.

Three days later he went back to London, travelling with the Hallidays. He had not written to the farm. What

Such were Ashurst's memories, sitting against the wall among the gorse, on his silverwedding day. At this

very spot, where he had laid out the lunch, Megan must have stood outlined against the sky when he had first

caught sight of her. Of all queer coincidences! And there moved in him a longing to go down and see again

the farm and the orchard, and the meadow of the gipsy bogle. It would not take long; Stella would be an hour

How well he remembered it allthe little crowning group of pine trees, the steepup grass hill behind! He

paused at the farm gate. The low stone house, the yewtree porch, the flowering currantsnot changed a bit;

even the old green chair was out there on the grass under the window, where he had reached up to her that

night to take the key. Then he turned down the lane, and stood leaning on the orchard gategrey skeleton of a

gate, as then. A black pig even was wandering in there among the trees. Was it true that twentysix years had

passed, or had he dreamed and awakened to find Megan waiting for him by the big apple tree? Unconsciously

he put up his hand to his grizzled beard and brought himself back to reality. Opening the gate, he made his

way down through the docks and nettles till he came to the edge, and the old apple tree itself. Unchanged! A

little more of the greygreen lichen, a dead branch or two, and for the rest it might have been only last night

that he had embraced that mossy trunk after Megan's flight and inhaled its woody savour, while above his

head the moonlit blossom had seemed to breathe and live. In that early spring a few buds were showing

already; the blackbirds shouting their songs, a cuckoo calling, the sunlight bright and warm. Incredibly the

samethe chattering troutstream, the narrow pool he had lain in every morning, splashing the water over his

flanks and chest; and out there in the wild meadow the beech clump and the stone where the gipsy bogie was

supposed to sit. And an ache for lost youth, a hankering, a sense of wasted love and sweetness, gripped

Ashurst by the throat. Surely, on this earth of such wild beauty, one was meant to hold rapture to one's heart,

He went to the edge of the stream, and looking down at the little pool, thought: 'Youth and spring! What has

And then, in sudden fear of having this memory jarred by human encounter, he went back to the lane, and

Beside the car an old, greybearded labourer was leaning on a stick, talking to the chauffeur. He broke off at

once, as though guilty of disrespect, and touching his hat, prepared to limp on down the lane.

The old fellow stopped; on his face had come a look as though he were thinking: 'You've come to the right

The old man smiled. "That's a tale, as yu may say. An' not the first time as I've atold etthere's plenty folks

The old man touched his hat again, and slowly filled an old clay pipe. His eyes, looking upward out of a mass

"If yu don' mind, zurr, I'll zet down my leg's 'urtin' a bit today." And he sat down on the mound of turf.

"There's always a flower on this grave. An' 'tain't so very lonesome, neither; brave lot o' folks goes by now, in

they new motor cars an' thingsnot as 'twas in th' old days. She've a got company up 'ere. 'Twas a poor soul

"I see!" said Ashurst. "Crossroads burial. I didn't know that custom was kept up."

"Ah! but 'twas a main long time ago. Us 'ad a parson as was very Godfearin' then. Let me see, I've a 'ad my

pension six year come Michaelmas, an' I were just on fifty when t'appened. There's none livin' knows more

about et than what I du. She belonged close 'ere; same farm as where I used to work along o' Mrs.

Ashurst, who was leaning against the gate, lighting his pipe, left his curved hands before his face for long

"She was one in an 'underd, poor maid! I putts a flower 'ere every time I passes. Pretty maid an' gude maid

she was, though they wouldn't burry 'er up to th' church, nor where she wanted to be burried neither." The old

labourer paused, and put his hairy, twisted hand flat down on the turf beside the bluebells.

"In a manner of speakin'," the old man went on, "I think as 'twas a lovestorythough there's no one never

knu for zartin. Yu can't tell what's in a maid's 'ead but that's wot I think about it." He drew his hand along the

turf. "I was fond o' that maiddon' know as there was anyone as wasn' fond of 'er. But she was to lovin'

'eartedthat's where 'twas, I think." He looked up. And Ashurst, whose lips were trembling in the cover of

"'Twas in the spring, 'bout now as 't might be, or a little later blossom timean' we 'ad one o' they young

college gentlemen stayin' at the farmnice feller tu, with 'is 'ead in the air. I liked 'e very well, an' I never see

nothin' between 'em, but to my thinkin' 'e turned the maid's fancy." The old man took the pipe out of his

"Yu see, 'e went away sudden one day, an' never come back. They got 'is knapsack and bits o' things down

there still. That's what stuck in my mind'is never sendin' for 'em. 'Is name was Ashes, or somethen' like

"'Er never said nothin', but from that day 'er went kind of dazed lukin'; didn'seem rightly therr at all. I never

knu a'uman creature so changed in me lifenever. There was another young feller at the farmJoe

Biddaford 'is name wer', that was praaperly sweet on 'er, tu; I guess 'e used to plague 'er wi 'is attentions. She

got to luke quite wild. I'd zee her sometimes of an avenin' when I was bringin' up the calves; ther' she'd stand

in th' orchard, under the big apple tree, lukin' straight before 'er. 'Well,' I used t'think, 'I dunno what 'tes that's

"I remembers one day I said to 'er: 'What's the matter, Megan?''er name was Megan David, she come from

Wales same as 'er aunt, ol' Missis Narracombe. 'Yu'm frettin' about somethin'. I says. 'No, Jim,' she says, 'I'm

not frettin'.' 'Yes, yu be!' I says. 'No,' she says, and to tears cam' rollin' out. 'Yu'm cryin'what's that, then?' I

says. She putts 'er 'and over 'er 'eart: 'It 'urts me,' she says; 'but 'twill sune be better,' she says. 'But if anything

shude 'appen to me, Jim, I wants to be burried under this 'ere apple tree.' I laughed. 'What's goin' to 'appen to

yu?' I says; 'don't 'ee be fulish.' 'No,' she says, ' I won't be fulish.' Well, I know what maids are, an' I never

thought no more about et, till two days arter that, 'bout six in the avenin' I was comin' up wi' the calves, when

I see somethin' dark lyin' in the strame, close to that big apple tree. I says to meself: 'Is that a pigfunny place

"'Twas the maid, in a little narrer pool ther' that's made by the stoppin' of a rockwhere I see the young

gentleman bathin' once or twice. 'Er was lyin' on 'er face in the watter. There was a plant o' goldiecups

growin' out o' the stone just above 'er'ead. An' when I come to luke at 'er face, 'twas luvly, butiful, so calm's a

baby's wonderful butiful et was. When the doctor saw 'er, 'e said: "Er culdn' never adone it in that little

bit o' watter ef' er 'adn't a been in an extarsy.' Ah! an' judgin' from 'er face, that was just 'ow she was. Et

made me cry praaperbutiful et was! 'Twas June then, but she'd afound a little bit of appleblossom left over

somewheres, and stuck et in 'er 'air. That's why I thinks 'er must abeen in an extarsy, to go to et gay, like that.

Why! there wasn't more than a fute and 'arf o' watter. But I tell 'ee one thingthat meadder's 'arnted; I knu et,

an' she knu et; an' no one'll persuade me as 'tesn't. I told 'em what she said to me 'bout bein' burried under th'

apple tree. But I think that turned 'emmade et luke to much 's ef she'd 'ad it in 'er mind deliberate; an' so

"'Tes wonderful, et seems," he added slowly, "what maids 'll du for love. She 'ad a lovin'eart; I guess 'twas

He looked up as if for approval of his story, but Ashurst had walked past him as if he were not there.

Up on the top of the hill, beyond where he had spread the lunch, over, out of sight, he lay down on his face.

So had his virtue been rewarded, and "the Cyprian," goddess of love, taken her revenge! And before his eyes,

dim with tears, came Megan's face with the sprig of apple blossom in her dark, wet hair. 'What did I do that

was wrong?' he thought. 'What did I do?' But he could not answer. Spring, with its rush of passion, its flowers

and songthe spring in his heart and Megan's! Was it just Love seeking a victim! The Greek was right,

"For mad is the heart of Love, And gold the gleam of his wing; And all to the spell thereof Bend when he

makes his spring. All life that is wild and young In mountain and wave and stream All that of earth is sprung,

Or breathes in the red sunbeam; Yea, and Mankind. O'er all a royal throne, Cyprian, Cyprian, is thine alone!"

The Greek was right! Megan! Poor little Megancoming over the hill! Megan under the old apple tree

Mr. Henry Bosengate, of the London Stock Exchange, seated himself in his car that morning during the great

war with a sense of injury. Major in a Volunteer Corps; member of all the local committees; lending this very

car to the neighbouring hospital, at times even driving it himself for their benefit; subscribing to funds, so far

as his diminished income permittedhe was conscious of being an asset to the country, and one whose time

could not be wasted with impunity. To be summoned to sit on a jury at the local assizes, and not even the

Strong and upright, with hazel eyes and dark eyebrows, pinkishbrown cheeks, a forehead white,

wellshaped, and getting high, with greyish hair glossy and wellbrushed, and a trim moustache, he might

have been taken for that colonel of Volunteers which indeed he was in a fair way of becoming.

His wife had followed him out under the porch, and stood bracing her supple body clothed in lilac linen. Red

rambler roses formed a sort of crown to her dark head; her ivorycoloured face had in it just a suggestion of

"I don't expect to be late, dear. This business is ridiculous. There oughtn't to be any crime in these days."

His wifeher name was Kathleensmiled. She looked very pretty and cool, Mr. Bosengate thought. To

him bound on this dull and stuffy business everything he owned seemed pleasantthe geranium beds beside

the gravel drive, his long, redbrick house mellowing decorously in its creepers and ivy, the little

clocktower over stables now converted to a garage, the dovecote, masking at the other end the conservatory

which adjoined the billiardroom. Close to the redbrick lodge his two children, Kate and Harry, ran out

from under the acacia trees, and waved to him, scrambling barelegged on to the low, red, ivycovered wall

which guarded his domain of eleven acres. Mr. Bosengate waved back, thinking: 'Jolly coupleby Jove,

they are!' Above their heads, through the trees, he could see right away to some Downs, faint in the July heat

Despite the war he had enjoyed these last two years more than any of the ten since he built "Charmleigh" and

settled down to semirural domesticity with his young wife. There had been a certain piquancy, a savour

added to existence, by the country's peril, and all the public service and sacrifice it demanded. His chauffeur

was gone, and one gardener did the work of three. He enjoyedpositively enjoyed, his committee work; even

the serious decline of business and increase of taxation had not much worried one continually conscious of

the national crisis and his own part therein. The country had wanted waking up, wanted a lesson in effort and

economy; and the feeling that he had not spared himself in these strenuous times, had given a zest to those

quiet pleasures of bed and board which, at his age, even the most patriotic could retain with a good

conscience. He had denied himself many thingsnew clothes, presents for Kathleen and the children, travel,

and that pineapple house which he had been on the point of building when the war broke out; new wine, too,

and cigars, and membership of the two Clubs which he had never used in the old days. The hours had seemed

fuller and longer, sleep better earnedwonderful, the things one could do without when put to it! He turned

the car into the high road, driving dreamily for he was in plenty of time. The war was going pretty well now;

he was no fool optimist, but now that conscription was in force, one might reasonably hope for its end within

a year. Then there would be a boom, and one might let oneself go a little. Visions of theatres and supper with

his wife at the Savoy afterwards, and cosy night drives back into the sweetsmelling country behind your

own chauffeur once more teased a fancy which even now did not soar beyond the confines of domestic

pleasures. He pictured his wife in new dresses by Jay she was fifteen years younger than himself, and

"paid for dressing" as they said. He had always delightedas men older than their wives willin the

admiration she excited from others not privileged to enjoy her charms. Her rather queer and ironical beauty,

her cool irreproachable wifeliness, was a constant balm to him. They would give dinner parties again, have

their friends down from town, and he would once more enjoy sitting at the foot of the dinner table while

Kathleen sat at the head, with the light soft on her ivory shoulders, behind flowers she had arranged in that

original way of hers, and fruit which he had grown in his hothouses; once more he would take legitimate

interest in the wine he offered to his guestsonce more stock that Chinese cabinet wherein he kept cigars.

Yesthere was a certain satisfaction in these days of privation, if only from the anticipation they created.

The sprinkling of villas had become continuous on either side of the high road; and women going out to shop,

tradesmen's boys delivering victuals, young men in khaki, began to abound. Now and then a limping or

bandaged form would passsome bit of human wreckage; and Mr. Bosengate would think mechanically:

Running his car into the best hotel garage of the little town, he made his way leisurely over to the court. It

stood back from the marketplace, and was already lapped by a sea of persons having, as in the outer ring at

race meetings, an air of business at which one must not be caught out, together with a soaked or flushed

appearance. Mr. Bosengate could not resist putting his handkerchief to his nose. He had carefully drenched it

with lavender water, and to this fact owed, perhaps, his immunity from the post of foreman on the jury for,

He found himself second in the front row of the jury box, and through the odour of "Sanitas" gazed at the

judge's face expressionless up there, for all the world like a bewigged bust. His fellows in the box had that

appearance of falling between two classes characteristic of jurymen. Mr. Bosengate was not impressed. On

one side of him the foreman sat, a prominent upholsterer, known in the town as "Gentleman Fox." His dark

and beautifully brushed and oiled hair and moustache, his radiant linen, gold watch and chain, the white

piping to his waistcoat, and a habit of never saying "Sir" had long marked him out from commoner men; he

undertook to bury people too, to save them trouble; and was altogether superior. On the other side Mr.

Bosengate had one of those men, who, except when they sit on juries, are never seen without a little brown

bag, and the appearance of having been interrupted in a drink. Pale and shiny, with large loose eyes shifting

from side to side, he had an underdone voice and uneasy flabby hands. Mr. Bosengate disliked sitting next to

him. Beyond this commercial traveller sat a dark pale young man with spectacles; beyond him again, a short

old man with grey moustache, mutton chops, and innumerable wrinkles; and the front row was completed by

a chemist. The three immediately behind, Mr. Bosengate did not thoroughly master; but the three at the end

of the second row he learned in their order of an oldish man in a grey suit, given to winking; an inanimate

person with the mouth of a moustachioed cod fish, over whose long bald crown three wisps of damp hair

were carefully arranged; and a dried, dapperish, cleanshorn man, whose mouth seemed terrified lest it

should be surprised without a smile. Their first and second verdicts were recorded without the necessity for

withdrawal, and Mr. Bosengate was already sleepy when the third case was called. The sight of khaki revived

his drooping attention. But what a weedylooking specimen! This prisoner had a truly nerveless pitiable

dejected air. If he had ever had a military bearing it had shrunk into him during his confinement. His ill

shaped brown tunic, whose little brass buttons seemed trying to keep smiling, struck Mr. Bosengate as

ridiculously short, used though he was to such things. 'Absurd,' he thought'Lumbago! Just where they

ought to be covered!' Then the officer and gentleman stirred in him, and he added to himself: 'Still, there must

be some distinction made!' The little soldier's visage had once perhaps been tanned, but was now the colour

of dark dough; his large brown eyes with white showing below the iris, as so often in the eyes of very

nervous peoplewandered from face to face, of judge, counsel, jury, and public. There were hollows in his

cheeks, his dark hair looked damp; around his neck he wore a bandage. The commercial traveller on Mr.

Bosengate's left turned, and whispered: "Felo de se! My hat! what a guy!" Mr. Bosengate pretended not to

hearhe could not bear that fellow!and slowly wrote on a bit of paper: "Owen Lewis." Welsh! Well, he

looked itnot at all an English face. Attempted suicide not at all an English crime! Suicide implied

surrender, a puttingup of hands to Fateto say nothing of the religious aspect of the matter. And suicide in

khaki seemed to Mr. Bosengate particularly abhorrent; like turning tail in face of the enemy; almost meriting

the fate of a deserter. He looked at the prisoner, trying not to give way to this prejudice. And the prisoner

The Counsel for the prosecution, a little, alert, grey, decided man, above military age, began detailing the

circumstances of the crime. Mr. Bosengate, though not particularly sensitive to atmosphere, could perceive a

sort of current running through the Court. It was as if jury and public were thinking rhythmically in obedience

to the same unexpressed prejudice of which he himself was conscious. Even the Caesarlike pale face up

"Gentlemen of the jury, before I call my evidence, I direct your attention to the bandage the accused is still

wearing. He gave himself this wound with his Army razor, adding, if I may say so, insult to the injury he was

inflicting on his country. He pleads not guilty; and before the magistrates he said that absence from his wife

was preying on his mind"the advocate's close lips widened"Well, gentlemen, if such an excuse is to

weigh with us in these days, I'm sure I don't know what's to happen to the Empire."

The evidence of the first witness, a roommate who had caught the prisoner's hand, and of the sergeant, who

had at once been summoned, was conclusive and he began to cherish a hope that they would get through

without withdrawing, and he would be home before five. But then a hitch occurred. The regimental doctor

failed to respond when his name was called; and the judge having for the first time that day showed himself

Mr. Bosengate received the announcement with equanimity. He would be home even earlier! And gathering

up the sheets of paper he had scribbled on, he put them in his pocket and got up. The wouldbe suicide was

being taken out of the courta shambling drab figure with shoulders hunched. What good were men like that

in these days! What good! The prisoner looked up. Mr. Bosengate encountered in full the gaze of those large

brown eyes, with the white showing underneath. What a suffering, wretched, pitiful face! A man had no

business to give you a look like that! The prisoner passed on down the stairs, and vanished. Mr. Bosengate

went out and across the market place to the garage of the hotel where he had left his car. The sun shone

fiercely and he thought: 'I must do some watering in the garden.' He brought the car out, and was about to

start the engine, when someone passing said: 'Good evenin'. Seedylookin' beggar that last prisoner, ain't he?

We don't want men of that stamp." It was his neighbour on the jury, the commercial traveller, in a straw hat,

with a little brown bag already in his hand and the froth of an interrupted drink on his moustache. Answering

curtly: "Good evening!" and thinking: 'Nor of yours, my friend!' Mr. Bosengate started the car with

unnecessary clamour. But as if brought back to life by the commercial traveller's remark, the prisoner's figure

seemed to speed along too, turning up at Mr. Bosengate his pitifully unhappy eyes. Want of his wife!queer

excuse that for trying to put it out of his power ever to see her again! Why! Half a loaf, even a slice, was

better than no bread. Not many of that neurotic type in the Armythank Heaven! The lugubrious figure

vanished, and Mr. Bosengate pictured instead the form of his own wife bending over her "G3oire de Dijon

roses" in the rosery, where she generally worked a little before tea now that they were short of gardeners. He

saw her, as often he had seen her, raise herself and stand, head to one side, a gloved hand on her slender hip,

gazing as it were ironically from under drooped lids at buds which did not come out fast enough. And the

word 'Caline,' for he was something of a French scholar, shot through his mind: 'Kath3een Caline!' If he

found her there when he got in, he would steal up on the grass andah! but with great care not to crease her

dress or disturb her hair! 'If only she weren't quite so selfcontained,' he thought; 'It's like a cat you can't get

The car, returning faster than it had come down that morning, had already passed the outskirt villas, and was

breasting the hill to where, among fields and the old trees, Charm3eigh lay apart from commoner life.

Turning into his drive, Mr. Bosengate thought with a certain surprise: 'I wonder what she does think of! I

wonder!' He put his gloves and hat down in the outer hall and went into the lavatory, to dip his face in cool

water and wash it with sweet smelling soapdelicious revenge on the unclean atmosphere in which he had

been stewing so many hours. He came out again into the hall dazed by soap and the mellowed light, and a

voice from halfway up the stairs said: "Daddy! Look!" His little daughter was standing up there with one

hand on the banisters. She scrambled on to them and came sliding down, her frock up to her eyes, and her

With her hand in his, Mr. Bosengate went on, through the drawing room, long and cool, with sunblinds

down, through the billiardroom, high and cool, through the conservatory, green and sweetsmelling, out on

to the terrace and the upper lawn. He had never felt such sheer exhilarated joy in his home surroundings, so

"I've fed my rabbits and Harry's; and we've been in the attic; Harry got his leg through the skylight."

"It's all right, Daddy; we got it out again, it's only grazed the skin. And we've been making swabsI made

seventeen, Mummy made thirtythree, and then she went to the hospital. Did you put many men in prison?"

Mr. Bosengate, who had no more knowledge than his little daughter, replied in an absent voice:

They were passing under a young oak tree, where the path wound round to the rosery and summerhouse.

Something shot down and clawed Mr. Bosengate's neck. His little daughter began to hop and suffocate with

Looking up, Mr. Bosengate saw his small son lying along a low branch above himlike the leopard he was

declaring himself to be (for fear of error), and thought blithely: 'What an active little chap it is!' "Let me drop

Mr. Bosengate did not see being a deer; his hair had just been brushed. But he entered the rosery buoyantly

between his offspring. His wife was standing precisely as he had imagined her, in a pale blue frock open at

the neck, with a narrow black band round the waist, and little accordion pleats below. She looked her coolest.

Her smile, when she turned her head, hardly seemed to take Mr. Bosengate seriously enough. He placed his

lips below one of her halfdrooped eyelids. She even smelled of roses. His children began to dance round

their mother, and Mr. Bosengate,firmly held between them, was also compelled to do this, until she said:

It was not the greeting he had imagined coming along in the car. Earwigs were plentiful in the

summerhouseused perhaps twice a year, but indispensable to every country residenceand Mr.

Bosengate was not sorry for the excuse to get out again. Though all was so pleasant, he felt oddly restless,

rather suffocated; and lighting his pipe, began to move about among the roses, blowing tobacco at the

Mr. Bosengate was puzzled. Why did she laugh? He looked round, saw that the children were gone, took his

His wife bent her body forward from the waist, and pushed her lips out till they touched his moustache. Mr.

Bosengate felt a sensation as if he had arisen from breakfast, without having eaten marmalade. He mastered

Not the first time she had used that curious expression! Yet her life was far from dull, so far as he could see;

with the new interests created by the war, and the constant calls on her time made by the perfection of their

home life, she had a useful and busy existence. Again the random thought passed through him: 'But she never

tells me anything!' And suddenly that lugubrious khakiclad figure started up among the rose bushes. "We've

got a lot to be thankful for!" he said abruptly. "I must go to work!" His wife, raising one eyebrow, smiled.

"And I to weep!" Mr. Bosengate laughedshe had a pretty wit! And stroking his comely moustache where it

had been kissed, he moved out into the sunshine. All the evening, throughout his labours, not inconsiderable,

for this jury business had put him behind time, he was afflicted by that restless pleasure in his surroundings;

would break off in mowing the lower lawn to look at the house through the trees; would leave his study and

committee papers, to cross into the drawingroom and sniff its dainty fragrance; paid a special goodnight

visit to the children having supper in the schoolroom; pottered in and out from his dressing room to admire

his wife while she was changing for dinner; dined with his mind perpetually on the next course; talked

volubly of the war; and in the billiard room afterwards, smoking the pipe which had taken the place of his

cigar, could not keep still, but roamed about, now in conservatory, now in the drawingroom, where his wife

and the governess were still making swabs. It seemed to him that he could not have enough of anything.

About eleven o'clock he strolled out beautiful night, only just dark enoughunder the new arrangement with

Timeand went down to the little round fountain below the terrace. His wife was playing the piano. Mr.

Bosengate looked at the water and the flat dark water lily leaves which floated there; looked up at the house,

where only narrow chinks of light showed, because of the Lighting Order. The dreamy music drifted out;

there was a scent of heliotrope. He moved a few steps back, and sat in the children's swing under an old lime

tree. Jollyblissfulin the warm, bloomy dark! Of all hours of the day, this before going to bed was

perhaps the pleasantest. He saw the light go up in his wife's bed room, unscreened for a full minute, and

thought: 'Aha! If I did my duty as a special, I should "strafe" her for that.' She came to the window, her figure

lighted, hands up to the back of her head, so that her bare arms gleamed. Mr. Bosengate wafted her a kiss,

knowing he could not be seen. 'Lucky chap!' he mused; 'she's a great joy!' Up went her arm, down came the

blind the house was dark again. He drew a long breath. 'Another ten minutes,' he thought, 'then I'll go in and

shut up. By Jove! The limes are beginning to smell already!' And, the better to take in that acme of his

wellbeing, he tilted the swing, lifted his feet from the ground, and swung himself toward the scented

blossoms. He wanted to whelm his senses in their perfume, and closed his eyes. But instead of the domestic

vision he expected, the face of the little Welsh soldier, hareeyed, shadowy, pinched and dark and pitiful,

started up with such disturbing vividness that he opened his eyes again at once. Curse! The fellow almost

haunted one! Where would he be now poor little devil!lying in his cell, thinkingthinking of his wife!

Feeling suddenly morbid, Mr. Bosengate arrested the swing and stood up. Absurd!all his well being and

mood of warm anticipation had deserted him! 'A dd world!' he thought. 'Such a lot of misery! Why

should I have to sit in judgment on that poor beggar, and condemn him?' He moved up on to the terrace and

walked briskly, to rid himself of this disturbance before going in. 'That commercial traveller chap,' he

thought, 'the rest of those fellowsthey see nothing!' And, abruptly turning up the three stone steps, he

entered the conservatory, locked it, passed into the billiard room, and drank his barley water. One of the

pictures was hanging crooked; he went up to put it straight. Still life. Grapes and apples, andlobsters! They

struck him as odd for the first time. Why lobsters? The whole picture seemed dead and oily. He turned off the

light, and went upstairs, passed his wife's door, into his own room, and undressed. Clothed in his pyjamas he

opened the door between the rooms. By the light coming from his own he could see her dark head on the

pillow. Was she asleep? Nonot asleep, certainly. The moment of fruition had come; the crowning of his

pride and pleasure in his home. But he continued to stand there. He had suddenly no pride, no pleasure, no

desire; nothing but a sort of dull resentment against everything. He turned back; shut the door, and slipping

between the heavy curtains and his open window, stood looking out at the night. 'Full of misery!' he thought.

Filing into the jury box next morning, Mr. Bosengate collided slightly with a short juryman, whose square

figure and square head of stiff yellowred hair he had only vaguely noticed the day before. The man looked

He sat down quickly, and, to avoid further recognition of his fellows, gazed in front of him. His appearance

on Saturdays was always military, by reason of the route march of his Volunteer Corps in the afternoon.

Gentleman Fox, who belonged to the corps too, was also looking square; but that commercial traveller on his

other side seemed more louche, and as if surprised in immorality, than ever; only the proximity of Gentleman

Fox on the other side kept Mr. Bosengate from shrinking. Then he saw the prisoner being brought in,

shadowy and dark behind the brightness of his buttons, and he experienced a sort of shock, this figure was so

exactly that which had several times started up in his mind. Somehow he had expected a fresh sight of the

fellow to dispel and disprove what had been haunting him, had expected to find him just an outside

phenomenon, not, as it were, a part of his own life. And he gazed at the carven immobility of the judge's face,

trying to steady himself, as a drunken man will, by looking at a light. The regimental doctor, unabashed by

the judge's comment on his absence the day before, gave his evidence like a man who had better things to do,

and the case for the prosecution was forthwith rounded in by a little speech from counsel. The matterhe

saidwas clear as daylight. Those who wore His Majesty's uniform, charged with the responsibility and

privilege of defending their country, were no more entitled to desert their regiments by taking their own lives

than they were entitled to desert in any other way. He asked for a conviction. Mr. Bosengate felt a

"Prisoner, you can either go into the witness box and make your statement on oath, in which case you may be

crossexamined on it; or you can make your statement there from the dock, in which case you will not be

Seeing him now full face, and, as it might be, come to life in the effort to convey his feelings, Mr. Bosengate

had suddenly a quite different impression of the fellow. It was as if his khaki had fallen off, and he had

stepped out of his own shadow, a live and quivering creature. His pinched cleanshaven face seemed to have

an irregular, wilder, hairier look, his large nervous brown eyes darkened and glowed; he jerked his shoulders,

his arms, his whole body, like a man suddenly freed from cramp or a suit of armour.

He spoke, too, in a quick, crisp, rather high voice, pinching his consonants a little, sharpening his vowels, like

"My lord and misters the jury," he said: "I was a hairdresser when the call came on me to join the army. I had

a little home and a wife. I never thought what it would be like to be away from them, I surely never did; and

I'm ashamed to be speaking it out like this how it can squeeze and squeeze a man, how it can prey on your

mind, when you're nervous like I am. 'Tis not everyone that cares for his homethere's lots o' them never

wants to see their wives again. But for me 'tis like being shut up in a cage, it is!" Mr. Bosengate saw daylight

between the skinny fingers of the man's hand thrown out with a jerk. "I cannot bear it shut up away from wife

and home like what you are in the army. So when I took my razor that morning I was wildan' I wouldn't be

here now but for that man catching my hand. There was no reason in it, I'm willing to confess. It was foolish;

but wait till you get feeling like what I was, and see how it draws you. Misters the jury, don't send me back to

prison; it is worse still there. If you have wives you will know what it is like for lots of us; only some is more

nervous than others. I swear to you, sirs, I could not help it?' Again the little man flung out his hand, his

whole thin body shook and Mr. Bosengate felt the same sensation as when he drove his car over a

dog"Misters the jury, I hope you may never in your lives feel as I've been feeling."

The little man ceased, his eyes shrank back into their sockets, his figure back into its mask of shadowy brown

and gleaming buttons, and Mr. Bosengate was conscious that the judge was making a series of remarks; and,

very soon, of being seated at a mahogany table in the jury's withdrawing room, hearing the, voice of the man

with hair like an Irish terrier's saying: "Didn't he talk through his hat, that little blighter!" Conscious, too, of

the commercial traveller, still on his leftalways on his left!mopping his brow, and muttering: "Phew! It's

hot in there today!" while an effluvium, as of an inside accustomed to whisky came from him. Then the man

Mr. Bosengate looked round to where, at the head of the table, Gentleman Fox sat, in defensive gentility and

"Clauster fiddlesticks! The feller's a shirker, that's all. Missed his wifepretty excuse! Indecent, I call it!"

The speaker was the little wirehaired man; and emotion, deep and angry, stirred in Mr. Bosengate. That

"I think it's dd natural!" he muttered. But almost before the words had left his lips he felt dismay.

What had he saidhe, nearly a colonel of volunteersendorsing such a want of patriotism! And hearing the

At this a real tremor seemed to go round the table, as if they all saw themselves sitting there through lunch

"Oh! Come, sirafter what the judge said! Come, sir! What do you say, Mr. Foreman?"

Gentleman Foxas who should say 'This is excellent value, but I don't wish to press it on you!'answered:

"We are only concerned with the facts. Did he or did he not try to shorten his life?"

"Of course he didsaid so himself," Mr. Bosengate heard the wire haired man snap out, and from the

following murmur of assent he alone abstained. Guilty! Wellyes! There was no way out of admitting that,

but his feelings revolted against handing "that poor little beggar" over to the tender mercy of his country's

law. His whole soul rose in arms against agreeing with that illbred little cur, and the rest of this joblot. He

had an impulse to get up and walk out, saying: "Settle it your own way. Good morning."

"It seems, sir," Gentleman Fox was saying, "that we're all agreed to guilty, except yourself. If you will allow

Thus brought up to the very guns, Mr. Bosengate, red in the face, thrust his hands deep into the side pockets

"'Ear, 'ear!" burst from the commercial traveller, and from the chemist came the murmur:

"Well, I think there is. They shoot deserters at the front, and we let this fellow off. I'd hang the cur."

Mr. Bosengate stared at that little wirehaired brute. "Haven't you any feeling for others?" he wanted to say.

"Can't you see that this poor devil suffers tortures?" But the sheer impossibility of doing this before ten other

men brought a slight sweat out on his face and hands; and in agitation he smote the table a blow with his fist.

The effect was instantaneous. Everybody looked at the wirehaired man, as if saying: "Yes, you've gone a bit

too far there!" The "little brute" stood it for a moment, then muttered surlily:

"That's right; they never pay any attention to it," said the grey haired man, winking heartily. And Mr.

But when from the jury box his eyes fell once more on the hareeyed figure in the dock, he had his worst

moment yet. Why should this poor wretch suffer sofor no fault, no fault; while he, and these others, and

that snapping counsel, and the Caesarlike judge up there, went off to their women and their homes, blithe as

bees, and probably never thought of him again? And suddenly he was conscious of the judge's voice:

"You will go back to your regiment, and endeavour to serve your country with better spirit. You may thank

the jury that you are not sent to prison, and your good fortune that you were not at the front when you tried to

A policeman pulled the little soldier by the arm; his drab figure with eyes fixed and lustreless, passed down

and away. From his very soul Mr. Bosengate wanted to lean out and say: "Cheer up, cheer up! I understand."

It was nearly ten o'clock that evening before he reached home, motoring back from the route march. His

physical tiredness was abated, for he had partaken of a snack and a whisky and soda at the hotel; but mentally

he was in a curious mood. His body felt appeased, his spirit hungry. Tonight he had a yearning, not for his

wife's kisses, but for her understanding. He wanted to go to her and say: "I've learnt a lot todayfound out

things I never thought of. Life's a wonderful thing, Kate, a thing one can't live all to oneself; a thing one

shares with everybody, so that when another suffers, one suffers too. It's come to me that what one has

doesn't matter a bitit's what one does, and how one sympathises with other people. It came to me in the

most extraordinary vivid way, when I was on that jury, watching that poor little rat of a soldier in his trap; it's

the first time I've ever feltthethe spirit of Christ, you know. It's a wonderful thing, Katewonderful!

We haven't been closereally close, you and I, so that we each understand what the other is feeling. It's all

in that, you know; understanding sympathyit's priceless. When I saw that poor little devil taken down

and sent back to his regiment to begin his sorrows all over againwanting his wife, thinking and thinking of

her just as you know I would be thinking and wanting you, I felt what an awful outside sort of life we lead,

never telling each other what we really think and feel, never being really close. I daresay that little chap and

his wife keep nothing from each otherlive each other's lives. That's what we ought to do. Let's get to

feeling that what really matters isunderstanding and loving, and not only just saying it as we all do, those

fellows on the jury, and even that poor devil of a judgewhat an awful life judging one's fellowcreatures

When I left that poor little Tommy this morning, and ever since, I've longed to get back here quietly to you

and tell you about it, and make a beginning. There's something wonderful in this, and I want you to feel it as I

This was what he wanted to say to his wife, not touching, or kissing her, just looking into her eyes, watching

them soften and glow as they surely must, catching the infection of his new ardour. And he felt unsteady,

fearfully unsteady with the desire to say it all as it should be said: swiftly, quietly, with the truth and fervour

The hall was not lit up, for daylight still lingered under the new arrangement. He went towards the

drawingroom, but from the very door shied off to his study and stood irresolute under the picture of a "Man

catching a flea" (Dutch school), which had come down to him from his father. The governess would be in

there with his wife! He must wait. Essential to go straight to Kathleen and pour it all out, or he would never

do it. He felt as nervous as an undergraduate going up for his viva' voce. This thing was so big, so

astoundingly and unexpectedly important. He was suddenly afraid of his wife, afraid of her coolness and her

grace, and that something Japanese about herof all those attributes he had been accustomed to admire

most; afraid, as it were, of her attraction. He felt young tonight, almost boyish; would she see that he was

not really fifteen years older than herself, and she not really a part of his collection, of all the admirable

appointments of his home; but a companion spirit to one who wanted a companion badly. In this agitation of

his soul he could keep still no more than he could last night in the agitation of his senses; and he wandered

into the diningroom. A dainty supper was set out there, sandwiches, and cake, whisky and the cigarettes

even an early peach. Mr. Bosengate looked at this peach with sorrow rather than disgust. The perfection of it

was of a piece with all that had gone before this new and sudden feeling. Its delicious bloom seemed to

heighten his perception of the hedge around him, that hedge of the things he so enjoyed, carefully planted and

tended these many years. He passed it by uneaten, and went to the window. Out there all was darkening, the

fountain, the lime tree, the flower beds, and the fields below, with the Jersey cows who would come to your

call; darkening slowly, losing form, blurring into soft blackness, vanishing, but there none the lessall

therethe hedge of his possessions. He heard the door of the drawingroom open, the voices of his wife and

the governess in the hall, going up to bed. If only they didn't look in here! If only! The voices ceased. He was

safe nowhad but to follow in a few minutes, to make sure of Kathleen alone. He turned round and stared

down the length of the dark diningroom, over the rosewood table, to where in the mirror above the

sideboard at the far end, his figure bathed, a stain, a mere blurred shadow; he made his way down to it along

the table edge, and stood before himself as close as he could get. His throat and the roof of his mouth felt dry

with nervousness; he put out his finger and touched his face in the glass. 'You're an ass!' he thought. 'Pull

yourself together, and get it over. She will see; of course she will!' He swallowed, smoothed his moustache,

and walked out. Going up the stairs, his heart beat painfully; but he was in for it now, and marched straight

into her room. Dressed only in a loose blue wrapper, she was brushing her dark hair before the glass. Mr.

Bosengate went up to her and stood there silent, looking down. The words he had thought of were like a

swarm of bees buzzing in his head, yet not one would fly from between his lips. His wife went on brushing

her hair under the light which shone on her polished elbows. She looked up at him from beneath one lifted

With a sort of vehemence the single word "No" passed out. A faint, a quizzical smile flitted over her face; she

shrugged her shoulders ever so gently. That gesturehe had seen it before! And in desperate desire to make

"Kathleen, stoplisten to me!" His fingers tightened in his agitation and eagerness to make his great

discovery known. But before he could get out a word he became conscious of that cool round arm, conscious

of her eyes halfclosed, sliding round at him, of her halfsmiling lips, of her neck under the wrapper. And he

A wave of heat and shame, and of God knows what came over Mr. Bosengate; he fell on his knees and

pressed his forehead to her arm; and he was silent, more silent than the grave. Nothingnothing came from

him but two long sighs. Suddenly he felt her hand stroke his cheekcompassionately, it seemed to him. She

made a little movement towards him; her lips met his, and he remembered nothing but that....

In his own room Mr. Bosengate sat at his wide open window, smoking a cigarette; there was no light. Moths

went past, the moon was creeping up. He sat very calm, puffing the smoke out in to the night air. Curious

thinglife! Curious world! Curious forces in it making one do the opposite of what one wished;

alwaysalways making one do the opposite, it seemed! The furtive light from that creeping moon was

getting hold of things down there, stealing in among the boughs of the trees. 'There's something ironical,' he

thought, 'which walks about. Things don't come off as you think they will. I meant, I tried but one doesn't

change like that all of a sudden, it seems. Fact is, life's too big a thing for one! All the same, I'm not the man I

was yesterdaynot quite!' He closed his eyes, and in one of those flashes of vision which come when the

senses are at rest, he saw himself as it were far down belowdown on the floor of a street narrow as a grave,

high as a mountain, a deep dark slit of a street walking down there, a black midget of a fellow, among other

black midgetshis wife, and the little soldier, the judge, and those jury chapsfantoches straight up on

their tiny feet, wandering down there in that dark, infinitely tall, and narrow street. 'Too much for one!' he

thought; 'Too high for oneno getting on top of it. We've got to be kind, and help one another, and not

expect too much, and not think too much. That'sall!' And, squeezing out his cigarette, he took six deep

In the last day of May in the early 'nineties, about six o'clock of the evening, old Jolyon Forsyte sat under the

oak tree below the terrace of his house at Robin Hill. He was waiting for the midges to bite him, before

abandoning the glory of the afternoon. His thin brown hand, where blue veins stood out, held the end of a

cigar in its tapering, longnailed fingersa pointed polished nail had survived with him from those earlier

Victorian days when to touch nothing, even with the tips of the fingers, had been so distinguished. His domed

forehead, great white moustache, lean cheeks, and long lean jaw were covered from the westering sunshine

by an old brown Panama hat. His legs were crossed; in all his attitude was serenity and a kind of elegance, as

of an old man who every morning put eau de Cologne upon his silk handkerchief. At his feet lay a woolly

brownandwhite dog trying to be a Pomeranianthe dog Balthasar between whom and old Jolyon primal

aversion had changed into attachment with the years. Close to his chair was a swing, and on the swing was

seated one of Holly's dolls called 'Duffer Alice' with her body fallen over her legs and her doleful nose

buried in a black petticoat. She was never out of disgrace, so it did not matter to her how she sat. Below the

oak tree the lawn dipped down a bank, stretched to the fernery, and, beyond that refinement, became fields,

dropping to the pond, the coppice, and the prospect 'Fine, remarkable'at which Swithin Forsyte, from under

this very tree, had stared five years ago when he drove down with Irene to look at the house. Old Jolyon had

heard of his brother's exploitthat drive which had become quite celebrated on Forsyte 'Change.' Swithin!

And the fellow had gone and died, last November, at the age of only seventynine, renewing the doubt

whether Forsytes could live for ever, which had first arisen when Aunt Ann passed away. Died! and left only

Jolyon and James, Roger and Nicholas and Timothy, Julia, Hester, Susan! And old Jolyon thought:

His memory went searching. He had not felt his age since he had bought his nephew Soames' illstarred

house and settled into it here at Robin Hill over three years ago. It was as if he had been getting younger

every spring, living in the country with his son and his grandchildrenJune, and the little ones of the second

marriage, Jolly and Holly; living down here out of the racket of London and the cackle of Forsyte 'Change,'

free of his boards, in a delicious atmosphere of no work and all play, with plenty of occupation in the

perfecting and mellowing of the house and its twenty acres, and in ministering to the whims of Holly and

Jolly. All the knots and crankiness, which had gathered in his heart during that long and tragic business of

June, Soames, Irene his wife, and poor young Bosinney, had been smoothed out. Even June had thrown off

her melancholy at lastwitness this travel in Spain she was taking now with her father and her stepmother.

Curiously perfect peace was left by their departure; blissful, yet blank, because his son was not there. Jo was

never anything but a comfort and a pleasure to him nowadaysan amiable chap; but women,

somehoweven the bestgot a little on one's nerves, unless of course one admired them.

Faroff a cuckoo called; a woodpigeon was cooing from the first elmtree in the field, and how the daisies

and buttercups had sprung up after the last mowing! The wind had got into the sou'west, tooa delicious

air, sappy! He pushed his hat back and let the sun fall on his chin and cheek. Somehow, today, he wanted

company wanted a pretty face to look at. People treated the old as if they wanted nothing. And with the

unForsytean philosophy which ever intruded on his soul, he thought: 'One's never had enough'

With a foot in the grave one'll want something, I shouldn't be surprised!' Down hereaway from the

exigencies of affairshis grandchildren, and the flowers, trees, birds of his little domain, to say nothing of

sun and moon and stars above them, said, 'Open, sesame,' to him day and night. And sesame had

openedhow much, perhaps, he did not know. He had always been responsive to what they had begun to

call 'Nature,' genuinely, almost religiously responsive, though he had never lost his habit of calling a sunset a

sunset and a view a view, however deeply they might move him. But nowadays Nature actually made him

ache, he appreciated it so. Every one of these calm, bright, lengthening days, with Holly's hand in his, and the

dog Balthasar in front looking studiously for what he never found, he would stroll, watching the roses open,

fruit budding on the walls, sunlight brightening the oak leaves and saplings in the coppice, watching the

waterlily leaves unfold and glisten, and the silvery young corn of the one wheat field; listening to the

starlings and skylarks, and the Alderney cows chewing the cud, flicking slow their tufted tails; and every one

of these fine days he ached a little from sheer love of it all, feeling perhaps, deep down, that he had not very

much longer to enjoy it. The thought that some day perhaps not ten years hence, perhaps not fiveall this

world would be taken away from him, before he had exhausted his powers of loving it, seemed to him in the

nature of an injustice brooding over his horizon. If anything came after this life, it wouldn't be what he

wanted; not Robin Hill, and flowers and birds and pretty facestoo few, even now, of those about him! With

the years his dislike of humbug had increased; the orthodoxy he had worn in the 'sixties, as he had worn

sidewhiskers out of sheer exuberance, had long dropped off, leaving him reverent before three things

alonebeauty, upright conduct, and the sense of property; and the greatest of these now was beauty. He had

always had wide interests, and, indeed could still read The Tines, but he was liable at any moment to put it

down if he heard a blackbird sing. Upright conduct, propertysomehow, they were tiring; the blackbirds and

the sunsets never tired him, only gave him an uneasy feeling that he could not get enough of them. Staring

into the stilly radiance of the early evening and at the little gold and white flowers on the lawn, a thought

came to him: This weather was like the music of 'Orfeo,' which he had recently heard at Covent Garden. A

beautiful opera, not like Meyerbeer, nor even quite Mozart, but, in its way, perhaps even more lovely;

something classical and of the Golden Age about it, chaste and mellow, and the Ravogli 'almost worthy of

the old days'highest praise he could bestow. The yearning of Orpheus for the beauty he was losing, for his

love going down to Hades, as in life love and beauty did gothe yearning which sang and throbbed through

the golden music, stirred also in the lingering beauty of the world that evening. And with the tip of his

corksoled, elasticsided boot he involuntarily stirred the ribs of the dog Balthasar, causing the animal to

wake and attack his fleas; for though he was supposed to have none, nothing could persuade him of the fact.

When he had finished, he rubbed the place he had been scratching against his master's calf, and settled down

again with his chin over the instep of the disturbing boot. And into old Jolyon's mind came a sudden

recollectiona face he had seen at that opera three weeks agoIrene, the wife of his precious nephew

Soames, that man of property! Though he had not met her since the day of the 'At Home' in his old house at

Stanhope Gate, which celebrated his granddaughter June's illstarred engagement to young Bosinney, he had

remembered her at once, for he had always admired hera very pretty creature. After the death of young

Bosinney, whose mistress she had so reprehensibly become, he had heard that she had left Soames at once.

Goodness only knew what she had been doing since. That sight of her facea side viewin the row in

front, had been literally the only reminder these three years that she was still alive. No one ever spoke of her.

And yet Jo had told him something oncesomething which had upset him completely. The boy had got it

from George Forsyte, he believed, who had seen Bosinney in the fog the day he was run oversomething

which explained the young fellow's distressan act of Soames towards his wifea shocking act. Jo had

seen her, too, that afternoon, after the news was out, seen her for a moment, and his description had always

lingered in old Jolyon's mind 'wild and lost' he had called her. And next day June had gone there bottled up

her feelings and gone there, and the maid had cried and told her how her mistress had slipped out in the night

and vanished. A tragic business altogether! One thing was certainSoames had never been able to lay hands

on her again. And he was living at Brighton, and journeying up and downa fitting fate, the man of

property! For when he once took a dislike to anyoneas he had to his nephewold Jolyon never got over it.

He remembered still the sense of relief with which he had heard the news of Irene's disappearance. It had

been shocking to think of her a prisoner in that house to which she must have wandered back, when Jo saw

her, wandered back for a momentlike a wounded animal to its hole after seeing that news, 'Tragic death of

an Architect,' in the street. Her face had struck him very much the other nightmore beautiful than he had

remem bered, but like a mask, with something going on beneath it. A young woman stilltwentyeight

perhaps. Ah, well! Very likely she had another lover by now. But at this subversive thoughtfor married

women should never love: once, even, had been too muchhis instep rose, and with it the dog Balthasar's

head. The sagacious animal stood up and looked into old Jolyon's face. 'Walk?' he seemed to say; and old

Slowly, as was their wont, they crossed among the constellations of buttercups and daisies, and entered the

fernery. This feature, where very little grew as yet, had been judiciously dropped below the level of the lawn

so that it might come up again on the level of the other lawn and give the impression of irregularity, so

important in horticulture. Its rocks and earth were beloved of the dog Balthasar, who sometimes found a mole

there. Old Jolyon made a point of passing through it because, though it was not beautiful, he intended that it

should be, some day, and he would think: 'I must get Varr to come down and look at it; he's better than

Beech.' For plants, like houses and human complaints, required the best expert consideration. It was inhabited

by snails, and if accompanied by his grandchildren, he would point to one and tell them the story of the little

boy who said: 'Have plummers got leggers, Mother? 'No, sonny.' 'Then darned if I haven't been and

swallowed a snileybob.' And when they skipped and clutched his hand, thinking of the snileybob going down

the little boy's 'red lane,' his, eyes would twinkle. Emerging from the fernery, he opened the wicket gate,

which just there led into the first field, a large and parklike area, out of which, within brick walls, the

vegetable garden had been carved. Old Jolyon avoided this, which did not suit his mood, and made down the

hill towards the pond. Balthasar, who knew a waterrat or two, gambolled in front, at the gait which marks an

oldish dog who takes the same walk every day. Arrived at the edge, old Jolyon stood, noting another

waterlily opened since yesterday; he would show it to Holly tomorrow, when 'his little sweet' had got over

the upset which had followed on her eating a tomato at lunchher little arrangements were very delicate.

Now that Jolly had gone to schoolhis first termHolly was with him nearly all day long, and he missed

her badly. He felt that pain too, which often bothered him now, a little dragging at his left side. He looked

back up the hill. Really, poor young Bosinney had made an uncommonly good job of the house; he would

have done very well for himself if he had lived! And where was he now? Perhaps, still haunting this, the site

of his last work, of his tragic love affair. Or was Philip Bosinney's spirit diffused in the general? Who could

say? That dog was getting his legs muddy! And he moved towards the coppice. There had been the most

delightful lot of bluebells, and he knew where some still lingered like little patches of sky fallen irk

between the trees, away out of the sun. He passed the cowhouses and the henhouses there installed, and

pursued a path into the thick of the saplings, making for one of the bluebell plots. Balthasar, preceding him

once more, uttered a low growl. Old Jolyon stirred him with his foot, but the dog remained motionless, just

where there was no room to pass, and the hair rose slowly along the centre of his woolly back. Whether from

the growl and the look of the dog's stivered hair, or from the sensation which a man feels in a wood, old

Jolyon also felt something move along his spine. And then the path turned, and there was an old mossy log,

and on it a woman sitting. Her face was turned away, and he had just time to think: 'She's trespassingI

must have a board put up!' before she turned. Powers above! The face he had seen at the operathe very

woman he had just been thinking of! In that confused moment he saw things blurred, as if a spiritqueer

effectthe slant of sunlight perhaps on her violetgrey frock! And then she rose and stood smiling, her head

a little to one side. Old Jolyon thought: 'How pretty she is!' She did not speak, neither did he; and he realized

why with a certain admiration. She was here no doubt because of some memory, and did not mean to try and

"Don't let that dog touch your frock," he said; "he's got wet feet. Come here, you!"

But the dog Balthasar went on towards the visitor, who put her hand down and stroked his head. Old Jolyon

He felt a subtle flattery in that, as though she had added: 'Do you think one could miss seeing you?'

"They're all in Spain," he remarked abruptly. "I'm alone; I drove up for the opera. The Ravogli's good. Have

In a situation so charged with mystery and something very like emotion he moved instinctively towards that

bit of property, and she moved beside him. Her figure swayed faintly, like the best kind of French figures; her

dress, too, was a sort of French grey. He noticed two or three silver threads in her ambercoloured hair,

strange hair with those dark eyes of hers, and that creamypale face. A sudden sidelong look from the velvety

brown eyes disturbed him. It seemed to come from deep and far, from another world almost, or at all events

He did not want to hear what she was doing, did not want to hear anything; but the perverse word came out:

She nodded. It was a relief to know that. And it came into his mind that, but for a twist of fate, she would

"All Alderneys," he muttered; "they give the best milk. This one's a pretty creature. Woa, Myrtle!"

The fawncoloured cow, with eyes as soft and brown as Irene's own, was standing absolutely still, not having

long been milked. She looked round at them out of the corner of those lustrous, mild, cynical eyes, and from

her grey lips a little dribble of saliva threaded its way towards the straw. The scent of hay and vanilla and

"You must come up and have some dinner with me. I'll send you home in the carriage."

He perceived a struggle going on within her; natural, no doubt, with her memories. But he wanted her

company; a pretty face, a charming figure, beauty! He had been alone all the afternoon. Perhaps his eyes were

"Capital! Let's go up, then!" And, preceded by the dog Balthasar, they ascended through the field. The sun

was almost level in their faces now, and he could see, not only those silver threads, but little lines, just deep

enough to stamp her beauty with a coinlike finenessthe special look of life unshared with others. "I'll take

"Work!" said old Jolyon, picking up the doll from off the swing, and smoothing its black petticoat. "Nothing

"Trying to help women who've come to grief." Old Jolyon did not quite understand. "To grief?" he repeated;

then realised with a shock that she meant exactly what he would have meant himself if he had used that

expression. Assisting the Magdalenes of London! What a weird and terrifying interest! And, curiosity

"Not much. I've no money to spare. I can only give sympathy and food sometimes."

Involuntarily old Jolyon's hand sought his purse. He said hastily: "How d'you get hold of them?"

Old Jolyon straightened the doll. "Beauty!" he ejaculated: "Ha! Yes! A sad business!" and he moved towards

the house. Through a French window, under sunblinds not yet drawn up, he preceded her into the room

where he was wont to study 'The Times' and the sheets of an agricultural magazine, with huge illustrations of

mangold wurzels, and the like, which provided Holly with material for her paint brush.

"Dinner's in half an hour. You'd like to wash your hands! I'll take you to June's room."

He saw her looking round eagerly; what changes since she had last visited this house with her husband, or her

lover, or both perhaps he did not know, could not say! All that was dark, and he wished to leave it so. But

"My boy Jo's a painter, you know. He's got a lot of taste. It isn't mine, of course, but I've let him have his

She was standing very still, her eyes roaming through the hall and music room, as it now wasall thrown

into one, under the great skylight. Old Jolyon had an odd impression of her. Was she trying to conjure

somebody from the shades of that space where the colouring was all pearlgrey and silver? He would have

had gold himself; more lively and solid. But Jo had French tastes, and it had come out shadowy like that, with

an effect as of the fume of cigarettes the chap was always smoking, broken here and there by a little blaze of

blue or crimson colour. It was not his dream! Mentally he had hung this space with those goldframed

masterpieces of still and stiller life which he had bought in days when quantity was precious. And now where

were they? Sold for a song! That something which made him, alone among Forsytes, move with the times

had warned him against the struggle to retain them. But in his study he still had 'Dutch Fishing Boats at

"These are the bathrooms," he said, "and other arrangements. I've had them tiled. The nurseries are along

there. And this is Jo's and his wife's. They all communicate. But you remember, I expect."

Irene nodded. They passed on, up the gallery and entered a large room with a small bed, and several

"This is mine," he said. The walls were covered with the photographs of children and watercolour sketches,

"These are Jo's. The view's firstrate. You can see the Grand Stand at Epsom in clear weather."

The sun was down now, behind the house, and over the 'prospect' a luminous haze had settled, emanation of

the long and prosperous day. Few houses showed, but fields and trees faintly glistened, away to a loom of

"The country's changing," he said abruptly, "but there it'll be when we're all gone. Look at those

thrushesthe birds are sweet here in the mornings. I'm glad to have washed my hands of London."

Her face was close to the window pane, and he was struck by its mournful look. 'Wish I could make her look

happy!' he thought. 'A pretty face, but sad!' And taking up his can of hot water he went out into the gallery.

"This is June's room," he said, opening the next door and putting the can down; "I think you'll find

everything." And closing the door behind her he went back to his own room. Brushing his hair with his great

ebony brushes, and dabbing his forehead with eau de Cologne, he mused. She had come so strangelya sort

of visitation; mysterious, even romantic, as if his desire for company, for beauty, had been fulfilled by

whatever it was which fulfilled that sort of thing. And before the mirror he straightened his still upright

figure, passed the brushes over his great white moustache, touched up his eyebrows with eau de Cologne, and

"I forgot to let them know that I have a lady to dinner with me. Let cook do something extra, and tell Beacon

to have the landau and pair at halfpast ten to drive her back to Town tonight. Is Miss Holly asleep?"

The maid thought not. And old Jolyon, passing down the gallery, stole on tiptoe towards the nursery, and

opened the door whose hinges he kept specially oiled that he might slip in and out in the evenings without

But Holly was asleep, and lay like a miniature Madonna, of that type which the old painters could not tell

from Venus, when they had completed her. Her long dark lashes clung to her cheeks; on her face was perfect

peaceher little arrangements were evidently all right again. And old Jolyon, in the twilight of the room,

stood adoring her! It was so charming, solemn, and lovingthat little face. He had more than his share of the

blessed capacity of living again in the young. They were to him his future lifeall of a future life that his

fundamental pagan sanity perhaps admitted. There she was with everything before her, and his bloodsome

of itin her tiny veins. There she was, his little companion, to be made as happy as ever he could make her,

so that she knew nothing but love. His heart swelled, and he went out, stilling the sound of his patentleather

boots. In the corridor an eccentric notion attacked him: To think that children should come to that which Irene

had told him she was helping! Women who were all, once, little things like this one sleeping there! 'I must

give her a cheque!' he mused; 'Can't bear to think of them!' They had never borne reflecting on, those poor

outcasts; wounding too deeply the core of true refinement hidden under layers of conformity to the sense of

propertywounding too grievously the deepest thing in hima love of beauty which could give him, even

now, a flutter of the heart, thinking of his evening in the society of a pretty woman. And he went downstairs,

through the swinging doors, to the back regions. There, in the winecellar, was a hock worth at least two

pounds a bottle, a Steinberg Cabinet, better than any Johannisberg that ever went down throat; a wine of

perfect bouquet, sweet as a nectarinenectar indeed! He got a bottle out, handling it like a baby, and holding

it level to the light, to look. Enshrined in its coat of dust, that mellow coloured, slender necked bottle gave

him deep pleasure. Three years to settle down again since the move from Townought to be in prime

condition! Thirtyfive years ago he had bought itthank God he had kept his palate, and earned the right to

drink it. She would appreciate this; not a spice of acidity in a dozen. He wiped the bottle, drew the cork with

his own hands, put his nose down, inhaled its perfume, and went back to the music room.

Irene was standing by the piano; she had taken off her hat and a lace scarf she had been wearing, so that her

goldcoloured hair was visible, and the pallor of her neck. In her grey frock she made a pretty picture for old

He gave her his arm, and solemnly they went. The room, which had been designed to enable twentyfour

people to dine in comfort, held now but a little round table. In his present solitude the big diningtable

oppressed old Jolyon; he had caused it to be removed till his son came back. Here in the company of two

really good copies of Raphael Madonnas he was wont to dine alone. It was the only disconsolate hour of his

day, this summer weather. He had never been a large eater, like that great chap Swithin, or Sylvanus

Heythorp, or Anthony Thornworthy, those cronies of past times; and to dine alone, overlooked by the

Madonnas, was to him but a sorrowful occupation, which he got through quickly, that he might come to the

more spiritual enjoyment of his coffee and cigar. But this evening was a different matter! His eyes twinkled at

her across the little table and he spoke of Italy and Switzerland, telling her stories of his travels there, and

other experiences which he could no longer recount to his son and granddaughter because they knew them.

This fresh audience was precious to him; he had never become one of those old men who ramble round and

round the fields of reminiscence. Himself quickly fatigued by the insensitive, he instinctively avoided

fatiguing others, and his natural flirtatiousness towards beauty guarded him specially in his relations with a

woman. He would have liked to draw her out, but though she murmured and smiled and seemed to be

enjoying what he told her, he remained conscious of that mysterious remoteness which constituted half her

fascination. He could not bear women who threw their shoulders and eyes at you, and chattered away; or

hardmouthed women who laid down the law and knew more than you did. There was only one quality in a

woman that appealed to himcharm; and the quieter it was, the more he liked it. And this one had charm,

shadowy as afternoon sunlight on those Italian hills and valleys he had loved. The feeling, too, that she was,

as it were, apart, cloistered, made her seem nearer to himself, a strangely desirable companion. When a man

is very old and quite out of the running, he loves to feel secure from the rivalries of youth, for he would still

be first in the heart of beauty. And he drank his hock, and watched her lips, and felt nearly young. But the

dog Balthasar lay watching her lips too, and despising in his heart the interruptions of their talk, and the

tilting of those greenish glasses full of a golden fluid which was distasteful to him.

The light was just failing when they went back into the musicroom. And, cigar in mouth, old Jolyon said:

By the cigars they smoke, and the composers they love, ye shall know the texture of men's souls. Old Jolyon

could not beara strong cigar or Wagner's music. He loved Beethoven and Mozart, Handel and Gluck, and

Schumann, and, for some occult reason, the operas of Meyerbeer; but of late years he had been seduced by

Chopin, just as in painting he had succumbed to Botticelli. In yielding to these tastes he had been conscious

of divergence from the standard of the Golden Age. Their poetry was not that of Milton and Byron and

Tennyson; of Raphael and Titian; Mozart and Beethoven. It was, as it were, behind a veil; their poetry hit no

one in the face, but slipped its fingers under the ribs and turned and twisted, and melted up the heart. And,

never certain that this was healthy, he did not care a rap so long as he could see the pictures of the one or hear

Irene sat down at the piano under the electric lamp festooned with pearlgrey, and old Jolyon, in an armchair,

whence he could see her, crossed his legs and drew slowly at his cigar. She sat a few moments with her hands

on the keys, evidently searching her mind for what to give him. Then she began and within old Jolyon there

arose a sorrowful pleasure, not quite like anything else in the world. He fell slowly into a trance, interrupted

only by the movements of taking the cigar out of his mouth at long intervals, and replacing it. She was there,

and the hock within him, and the scent of tobacco; but there, too, was a world of sunshine lingering into

moonlight, and pools with storks upon them, and bluish trees above, glowing with blurs of winered roses,

and fields of lavender where milkwhite cows were grazing, and a woman all shadowy, with dark eyes and a

white neck, smiled, holding out her arms; and through air which was like music a star dropped and was

caught on a cow's horn. He opened his eyes. Beautiful piece; she played wellthe touch of an angel! And he

closed them again. He felt miraculously sad and happy, as one does, standing under a limetree in full

honey flower. Not live one's own life again, but just stand there and bask in the smile of a woman's eyes, and

enjoy the bouquet! And he jerked his hand; the dog Balthasar had reached up and licked it.

She began to play again. This time the resemblance between her and 'Chopin' struck him. The swaying he had

noticed in her walk was in her playing too, and the Nocturne she had chosen and the soft darkness of her

eyes, the light on her hair, as of moonlight from a golden moon. Seductive, yes; but nothing of Delilah in her

or in that music. A long blue spiral from his cigar ascended and dispersed. 'So we go out!' he thought. 'No

"Would you like some Gluck? He used to write his music in a sunlit garden, with a bottle of Rhine wine

"Ah!; yes. Let's have 'Orfeo."' Round about him now were fields of gold and silver flowers, white forms

swaying in the sunlight, bright birds flying to and fro. All was summer. Lingering waves of sweetness and

regret flooded his soul. Some cigar ash dropped, and taking out a silk handkerchief to brush it off, he inhaled

a mingled scent as of snuff and eau de Cologne. 'Ah!' he thought, 'Indian summerthat's all!' and he said:

She did not answer; did not move. He was conscious of something some strange upset. Suddenly he saw

her rise and turn away, and a pang of remorse shot through him. What a clumsy chap! Like Orpheus, she of

courseshe too was looking for her lost one in the hall of memory! And disturbed to the heart, he got up

from his chair. She had gone to the great window at the far end. Gingerly he followed. Her hands were folded

over her breast; he could just see her cheek, very white. And, quite emotionalized, he said:

"There, there, my love!" The words had escaped him mechanically, for they were those he used to Holly

when she had a pain, but their effect was instantaneously distressing. She raised her arms, covered her face

Old Jolyon stood gazing at her with eyes very deep from age. The passionate shame she seemed feeling at her

abandonment, so unlike the control and quietude of her whole presence was as if she had never before broken

"There, therethere, there!" he murmured, and putting his hand out reverently, touched her. She turned, and

leaned the arms which covered her face against him. Old Jolyon stood very still, keeping one thin hand on her

The window was still open, the curtains had not been drawn, the last of daylight from without mingled with

faint intrusion from the lamp within; there was a scent of newmown grass. With the wisdom of a long life

old Jolyon did not speak. Even grief sobbed itself out in time; only Time was good for sorrowTime who

saw the passing of each mood, each emotion in turn; Time the layertorest. There came into his mind the

words: 'As panteth the hart after cooling streams'but they were of no use to him. Then, conscious of a scent

of violets, he knew she was drying her eyes. He put his chin forward, pressed his moustache against her

forehead, and felt her shake with a quivering of her whole body, as of a tree which shakes itself free of

raindrops. She put his hand to her lips, as if saying: "All over now! Forgive me!"

The kiss filled him with a strange comfort; he led her back to where she had been so upset. And the dog

Balthasar, following, laid the bone of one of the cutlets they had eaten at their feet.

Anxious to obliterate the memory of that emotion, he could think of nothing better than china; and moving

with her slowly from cabinet to cabinet, he kept taking up bits of Dresden and Lowestoft and Chelsea, turning

them round and round with his thin, veined hands, whose skin, faintly freckled, had such an aged look.

"I bought this at Jobson's," he would say; "cost me thirty pounds. It's very old. That dog leaves his bones all

over the place. This old 'shipbowl' I picked up at the sale when that precious rip, the Marquis, came to grief.

But you don't remember. Here's a nice piece of Chelsea. Now, what would you say this was?" And he was

comforted, feeling that, with her taste, she was taking a real interest in these things; for, after all, nothing

"You must come again; you must come to lunch, then I can show you these by daylight, and my little

For Balthasar, feeling that she was about to leave, was rubbing his side against her leg. Going out under the

"He'll get you up in an hour and a quarter. Take this for your protegees," and he slipped a cheque for fifty

pounds into her hand. He saw her brightened eyes, and heard her murmur: "Oh Uncle Jolyon!" and a real

throb of pleasure went through him. That meant one or two poor creatures helped a little, and it meant that

she would come again. He put his hand in at the window and grasped hers once more. The carriage rolled

away. He stood looking at the moon and the shadows of the trees, and thought: 'A sweet night! She ...!'

Two days of rain, and summer set in bland and sunny. Old Jolyon walked and talked with Holly. At first he

felt taller and full of a new vigour; then he felt restless. Almost every afternoon they would enter the coppice,

and walk as far as the log. 'Well, she's not there!' he would think, 'of course not!' And he would feel a little

shorter, and drag his feet walking up the hill home, with his hand clapped to his left side. Now and then the

thought would move in him: 'Did she comeor did I dream it?' and he would stare at space, while the dog

Balthasar stared at him. Of course she would not come again! He opened the letters from Spain with less

excitement. They were not returning till July; he felt, oddly, that he could bear it. Every day at dinner he

screwed up his eyes and looked at where she had sat. She was not there, so he unscrewed his eyes again.

On the seventh afternoon he thought: 'I must go up and get some boots.' He ordered Beacon, and set out.

Passing from Putney towards Hyde Park he reflected: 'I might as well go to Chelsea and see her.' And he

called out: "Just drive me to where you took that lady the other night." The coachman turned his broad red

The carriage stopped before a small threestoried block of flats, standing a little back from the river. With a

practised eye old Jolyon saw that they were cheap. 'I should think about sixty pound a year,' he mused; and

entering, he looked at the nameboard. The name 'Forsyte' was not on it, but against 'First Floor, Flat C' were

the words: 'Mrs. Irene Heron.' Ah! She had taken her maiden name again! And somehow this pleased him. He

went upstairs slowly, feeling his side a little. He stood a moment, before ringing, to lose the feeling of drag

and fluttering there. She would not be in! And then Boots! The thought was black. What did he want with

Old Jolyon followed a very little maidnot more than sixteen one would sayinto a very small

drawingroom where the sunblinds were drawn. It held a cottage piano and little else save a vague

fragrance and good taste. 'He stood in the middle, with his top hat in his hand, and thought: 'I expect she's

very badly off!' There was a mirror above the fireplace, and he saw himself reflected. An oldlooking chap!

He heard a rustle, and turned round. She was so close that his moustache almost brushed her forehead, just

"I was driving up," he said. "Thought I'd look in on you, and ask you how you got up the other night."

And, seeing her smile, he felt suddenly relieved. She was really glad to see him, perhaps.

But while she was gone to put her hat on, he frowned. The Park! James and Emily! Mrs. Nicholas, or some

other member of his precious family would be there very likely, prancing up and down. And they would go

and wag their tongues about having seen him with her, afterwards. Better not! He did not wish to revive the

echoes of the past on Forsyte 'Change.' He removed a white hair from the lapel of his closelybuttonedup

frock coat, and passed his hand over his cheeks, moustache, and square chin. It felt very hollow there under

the cheekbones. He had not been eating much latelyhe had better get that little whippersnapper who

attended Holly to give him a tonic. But she had come back and when they were in the carriage, he said:

"Suppose we go and sit in Kensington Gardens instead?" and added with a twinkle: "No prancing up and

Leaving the carriage, they entered those select precincts, and strolled towards the water.

"I? I forgave you as soon as I saw how the land really lay." And perhaps he had; his instinct had always been

She drew a deep breath. "I never regrettedI couldn't. Did you ever love very deeply, Uncle Jolyon?"

At that strange question old Jolyon stared before him. Had he? He did not seem to remember that he ever had.

But he did not like to say this to the young woman whose hand was touching his arm, whose life was

suspended, as it were, by memory of a tragic love. And he thought: 'If I had met you when I was young II

might have made a fool of myself, perhaps.' And a longing to escape in generalities beset him.

"Love's a queer thing," he said, "fatal thing often. It was the Greekswasn't it?made love into a goddess;

Phil! The word jarred him, for suddenlywith his power to see all round a thing, he perceived why she was

putting up with him like this. She wanted to talk about her lover! Well! If it was any pleasure to her! And he

"Yes. He loved balance and symmetry; he loved the wholehearted way the Greeks gave themselves to art."

Balance! The chap had no balance at all, if he remembered; as for symmetrycleanbuilt enough he was, no

Old Jolyon looked round at her. Was she chaffing him? No, her eyes were soft as velvet. Was she flattering

"Phil thought so. He used to say: 'But I can never tell him that I admire him."'

Ah! There it was again. Her dead lover; her desire to talk of him! And he pressed her arm, half resentful of

those memories, half grateful, as if he recognised what a link they were between herself and him.

"He was a very talented young fellow," he murmured. "It's hot; I feel the heat nowadays. Let's sit down."

They took two chairs beneath a chestnut tree whose broad leaves covered them from the peaceful glory of the

afternoon. A pleasure to sit there and watch her, and feel that she liked to be with him. And the wish to

"I expect he showed you a side of him I never saw. He'd be at his best with you. His ideas of art were a little

"Yes: but he used to say you had a real sense of beauty." Old Jolyon thought: 'The devil he did!' but answered

with a twinkle: "Well, I have, or I shouldn't be sitting here with you." She was fascinating when she smiled

"He thought you had one of those hearts that never grow old. Phil had real insight."

He was not taken in by this flattery spoken out of the past, out of a longing to talk of her dead lovernot a

bit; and yet it was precious to hear, because she pleased his eyes and heart which quite true! had never

grown old. Was that becauseunlike her and her dead lover, he had never loved to desperation, had always

kept his balance, his sense of symmetry. Well! It had left him power, at eightyfour, to admire beauty. And

he thought, 'If I were a painter or a sculptor! But I'm an old chap. Make hay while the sun shines.'

A couple with arms entwined crossed on the grass before them, at the edge of the shadow from their tree. The

sunlight fell cruelly on their pale, squashed, unkempt young faces. "We're an ugly lot!" said old Jolyon

With that glow in her pale face, her breast heaving, her eyes so large and dark and soft, she looked like Venus

come to life! But this extravagance brought instant reaction, and, twinkling, he said: "Well, if it had limits,

Then, removing his top hat, he brushed it round with a cuff. The great clumsy thing heated his forehead; in

these days he often got a rush of blood to the headhis circulation was not what it had been.

"Was it your son? I heard a voice in the hall; I thought for a second it wasPhil."

Old Jolyon saw her lips tremble. She put her hand over them, took it away again, and went on calmly: "That

night I went to the Embankment; a woman caught me by the dress. She told me about herself. When one

She nodded, and horror stirred within old Jolyon, the horror of one who has never known a struggle with

"I didn't care whether I lived or died. When you're like that, Fate ceases to want to kill you. She took care of

me three daysshe never left me. I had no money. That's why I do what I can for them, now."

But old Jolyon was thinking: 'No money!' What fate could compare with that? Every other was involved in it.

"I wish you had come to me," he said. "Why didn't you?" But Irene did not answer.

"Because my name was Forsyte, I suppose? Or was it June who kept you away? How are you getting on

now?" His eyes involuntarily swept her body. Perhaps even now she was! And yet she wasn't thinnot

"Oh! with my fifty pounds a year, I make just enough." The answer did not reassure him; he had lost

confidence. And that fellow Soames! But his sense of justice stifled condemnation. No, she would certainly

have died rather than take another penny from him. Soft as she looked, there must be strength in her

somewherestrength and fidelity. But what business had young Bosinney to have got run over and left her

"Well, you must come to me now," he said, "for anything you want, or I shall be quite cut up." And putting

on his hat, he rose. "Let's go and get some tea. I told that lazy chap to put the horses up for an hour, and come

He enjoyed that stroll to the Kensington end of the gardensthe sound of her voice, the glancing of her eyes,

the subtle beauty of a charming form moving beside him. He enjoyed their tea at Ruffel's in the High Street,

and came out thence with a great box of chocolates swung on his little finger. He enjoyed the drive back to

Chelsea in a hansom, smoking his cigar. She had promised to come down next Sunday and play to him again,

and already in thought he was plucking carnations and early roses for her to carry back to town. It was a

pleasure to give her a little pleasure, if it WERE pleasure from an old chap like him! The carriage was already

there when they arrived. Just like that fellow, who was always late when he was wanted! Old Jolyon went in

for a minute to say goodbye. The little dark hall of the fiat was impregnated with a disagreeable odour of

patchouli, and on a bench against the wallits only furniturehe saw a figure sitting. He heard Irene say

softly: "Just one minute." In the little drawingroom when the door was shut, he asked gravely: "One of your

He stood, staring, and stroking that chin whose strength had frightened so many in its time. The idea of her

thus actually in contact with this outcast, grieved and frightened him. What could she do for them? Nothing.

Only soil and make trouble for herself, perhaps. And he said: "Take care, my dear! The world puts the worst

"Goodbye," he said again; "take care of yourself." And he went out, not looking towards the figure on the

bench. He drove home by way of Hammersmith; that he might stop at a place he knew of and tell them to

send her in two dozen of their best Burgundy. She must want pickingup sometimes! Only in Richmond Park

did he remember that he had gone up to order himself some boots, and was surprised that he could have had

The little spirits of the past which throng an old man's days had never pushed their faces up to his so seldom

as in the seventy hours elapsing before Sunday came. The spirit of the future, with the charm of the unknown,

put up her lips instead. Old Jolyon was not restless now, and paid no visits to the log, because she was

coming to lunch. There is wonderful finality about a meal; it removes a world of doubts, for no one misses

meals except for reasons beyond control. He played many games with Holly on the lawn, pitching them up to

her who was batting so as to be ready to bowl to Jolly in the holidays. For she was not a Forsyte, but Jolly

wasand Forsytes always bat, until they have resigned and reached the age of eightyfive. The dog

Balthasar, in attendance, lay on the ball as often as he could, and the pageboy fielded, till his face was like

the harvest moon. And because the time was getting shorter, each day was longer and more golden than the

last. On Friday night he took a liver pill, his side hurt him rather, and though it was not the liver side, there is

no remedy like that. Anyone telling him that he had found a new excitement in life and that excitement was

not good for him, would have been met by one of those steady and rather defiant looks of his deepset

irongrey eyes, which seemed to say: 'I know my own business best.' He always had and always would.

On Sunday morning, when Holly had gone with her governess to church, he visited the strawberry beds.

There, accompanied by the dog Balthasar, he examined the plants narrowly and succeeded in finding at least

two dozen berries which were really ripe. Stooping was not good for him, and he became very dizzy and red

in the forehead. Having placed the strawberries in a dish on the diningtable, he washed his hands and bathed

his forehead with eau de Cologne. There, before the mirror, it occurred to him that he was thinner. What a

'threadpaper' he had been when he was young! It was nice to be slim he could not bear a fat chap; and yet

perhaps his cheeks were too thin! She was to arrive by train at halfpast twelve and walk up, entering from

the road past Drage's farm at the far end of the coppice. And, having looked into June's room to see that there

was hot water ready, he set forth to meet her, leisurely, for his heart was beating. The air smelled sweet, larks

sang, and the Grand Stand at Epsom was visible. A perfect day! On just such a one, no doubt, six years ago,

Soames had brought young Bosinney down with him to look at the site before they began to build. It was

Bosinney who had pitched on the exact spot for the houseas June had often told him. In these days he was

thinking much about that young fellow, as if his spirit were really haunting the field of his last work, on the

chance of seeingher. Bosinneythe one man who had possessed her heart, to whom she had given her

whole self with rapture! At his age one could not, of course, imagine such things, but there stirred in him a

queer vague achingas it were the ghost of an impersonal jealousy; and a feeling, too, more generous, of

pity for that love so early lost. All over in a few poor months! Well, well! He looked at his watch before

entering the coppiceonly a quarter past, twentyfive minutes to wait! And then, turning the corner of the

path, he saw her exactly where he had seen her the first time, on the log; and realised that she must have

come by the earlier train to sit there alone for a couple of hours at least. Two hours of her society missed!

What memory could make that log so dear to her? His face showed what he was thinking, for she said at

"Yes, yes; there it is for you whenever you like. You're looking a little Londony; you're giving too many

That she should have to give lessons worried him. Lessons to a parcel of young girls thumping out scales

"They had better be, by George!" He took her armhis side always hurt him a little going uphilland said:

"Did you ever see anything like those buttercups? They came like that in a night."

Her eyes seemed really to fly over the field, like bees after the flowers and the honey. "I wanted you to see

themwouldn't let them turn the cows in yet." Then, remembering that she had come to talk about Bosinney,

"I expect be wouldn't have let me put that therehad no notion of time, if I remember."

But, pressing his arm to her, she talked of flowers instead, and he knew it was done that he might not feel she

"The best flower I can show you," he said, with a sort of triumph, "is my little sweet. She'll be back from

Church directly. There's something about her which reminds me a little of you," and it did not seem to him

peculiar that he had put it thus, instead of saying: "There's something about you which reminds me a little of

Holly, followed closely by her elderly French governess, whose digestion had been ruined twentytwo years

ago in the siege of Strasbourg, came rushing towards them from under the oak tree. She stopped about a

dozen yards away, to pat Balthasar and pretend that this was all she had in her mind. Old Jolyon who knew

Holly raised herself and looked up. He watched the two of them with a twinkle, Irene smiling, Holly

beginning with grave inquiry, passing into a shy smile too, and then to something deeper. She had a sense of

beauty, that childknew what was what! He enjoyed the sight of the kiss between them.

For, now that he had not much more time before him, the only part of the service connected with this world

absorbed what interest in church remained to him. Mam'zelle Beauce stretched out a spidery hand clad in a

black kid gloveshe had been in the best families and the rather sad eyes of her lean yellowish face

seemed to ask: "Are you wellbrrred?" Whenever Holly or Jolly did anything unpleasing to hera not

uncommon occurrence he would say to them: "The little Tayleurs never did thatthey were such

wellbrrred little children." Jolly hated the little Tayleurs; Holly wondered dreadfully how it was she fell so

short of them. 'A thin rum little soul,' old Jolyon thought herMam'zelle Beauce.

Luncheon was a successful meal, the mushrooms which he himself had picked in the mushroom house, his

chosen strawberries, and another bottle of the Steinberg cabinet filled him with a certain aromatic spirituality,

After lunch they sat under the oak tree drinking Turkish coffee. It was no matter of grief to him when

Mademoiselle Beauce withdrew to write her Sunday letter to her sister, whose future had been endangered in

the past by swallowing a pinan event held up daily in warning to the children to eat slowly and digest what

they had eaten. At the foot of the bank, on a carriage rug, Holly and the dog Balthasar teased and loved each

other, and in the shade old Jolyon with his legs crossed and his cigar luxuriously savoured, gazed at Irene

sitting in the swing. A light, vaguely swaying, grey figure with a fleck of sunlight here and there upon it, lips

just opened, eyes dark and soft under lids a little drooped. She looked content; surely it did her good to come

and see him! The selfishness of age had not set its proper grip on him, for he could still feel pleasure in the

pleasure of others, realising that what he wanted, though much, was not quite all that mattered.

"It's quiet here," he said; "you mustn't come down if you find it dull. But it's a pleasure to see you. My little

>From her smile he knew that she was not beyond liking to be appreciated, and this reassured him. "That's

not humbug," he said. "I never told a woman I admired her when I didn't. In fact I don't know when I've told a

woman I admired her, except my wife in the old days; and wives are funny." He was silent, but resumed

"She used to expect me to say it more often than I felt it, and there we were." Her face looked mysteriously

troubled, and, afraid that he had said something painful, he hurried on: "When my little sweet marries, I hope

she'll find someone who knows what women feel. I shan't be here to see it, but there's too much

topsyturvydom in marriage; I don't want her to pitch up against that." And, aware that he had made bad

A silence followed. Of what was she thinking, this pretty creature whose life was spoiled; who had done with

love, and yet was made for love? Some day when he was gone, perhaps, she would find another matenot

so disorderly as that young fellow who had got himself run over. Ah! but her husband?

She shook her head. Her face had closed up suddenly. For all her softness there was something irreconcilable

about her. And a glimpse of light on the inexorable nature of sex antipathies strayed into a brain which,

belonging to early Victorian civilisationso much older than this of his old agehad never thought about

"That's a comfort," he said. "You can see the Grand Stand today. Shall we take a turn round?"

Through the flower and fruit garden, against whose high outer walls peach trees and nectarines were trained

to the sun, through the stables, the vinery, the mushroom house, the asparagus beds, the rosery, the

summerhouse, he conducted hereven into the kitchen garden to see the tiny green peas which Holly loved

to scoop out of their pods with her finger, and lick up from the palm of her little brown hand. Many delightful

things he showed her, while Holly and the dog Balthasar danced ahead, or came to them at intervals for

attention. It was one of the happiest afternoons he had ever spent, but it tired him and he was glad to sit down

in the music room and let her give him tea. A special little friend of Holly's had come ina fair child with

short hair like a boy's. And the two sported in the distance, under the stairs, on the stairs, and up in the

gallery. Old Jolyon begged for Chopin. She played studies, mazurkas, waltzes, till the two children, creeping

near, stood at the foot of the piano their dark and golden heads bent forward, listening. Old Jolyon watched.

Shyly, with a false start, they began. Bobbing and circling, earnest, not very adroit, they went past and past

his chair to the strains of that waltz. He watched them and the face of her who was playing turned smiling

But the children came close to old Jolyon, knowing that he would save them, and gazed into a face which was

"Better the day, better the deed, Mam'zelle. It's all my doing. Trot along, chicks, and have your tea."

And, when they were gone, followed by the dog Balthasar, who took every meal, he looked at Irene with a

"Well, there we are! Aren't they sweet? Have you any little ones among your pupils?"

Old Jolyon sighed; he had an insatiable appetite for the very young. "My little sweet," he said, "is devoted to

music; she'll be a musician some day. You wouldn't give me your opinion of her playing, I suppose?"

"You wouldn't like" but he stifled the words "to give her lessons." The idea that she gave lessons was

unpleasant to him; yet it would mean that he would see her regularly. She left the piano and came over to his

But as if answering, Irene shook her head. "You know she couldn't; one doesn't forget."

He talked to her an hour or more, of the children, and a hundred little things, till the carriage came round to

take her home. And when she had gone he went back to his chair, and sat there smoothing his face and chin,

That evening after dinner he went to his study and took a sheet of paper. He stayed for some minutes without

writing, then rose and stood under the masterpiece 'Dutch Fishing Boats at Sunset.' He was not thinking of

that picture, but of his life. He was going to leave her something in his Will; nothing could so have stirred the

stilly deeps of thought and memory. He was going to leave her a portion of his wealth, of his aspirations,

deeds, qualities, workall that had made that wealth; going to leave her, too, a part of all he had missed in

life, by his sane and steady pursuit of wealth. All! What had he missed? 'Dutch Fishing Boats' responded

blankly; he crossed to the French window, and drawing the curtain aside, opened it. A wind had got up, and

one of last year's oak leaves which had somehow survived the gardener's brooms, was dragging itself with a

tiny clicking rustle along the stone terrace in the twilight. Except for that it was very quiet out there, and he

could smell the heliotrope watered not long since. A bat went by. A bird uttered its last 'cheep.' And right

above the oak tree the first star shone. Faust in the opera had bartered his soul for some fresh years of youth.

Morbid notion! No such bargain was possible, that was real tragedy! No making oneself new again for love

or life or anything. Nothing left to do but enjoy beauty from afar off while you could, and leave it something

in your Will. But how much? And, as if he could not make that calculation looking out into the mild freedom

of the country night, he turned back and went up to the chimneypiece. There were his pet bronzesa

Cleopatra with the asp at her breast; a Socrates; a greyhound playing with her puppy; a strong man reining in

some horses. 'They last!' he thought, and a pang went through his heart. They had a thousand years of life

'How much?' Well! enough at all events to save her getting old before her time, to keep the lines out of her

face as long as possible, and grey from soiling that bright hair. He might live another five years. She would

be well over thirty by then. 'How much?' She had none of his blood in her! In loyalty to the tenor of his life

for forty years and more, ever since he married and founded that mysterious thing, a family, came this

warning thoughtNone of his blood, no right to anything! It was a luxury then, this notion. An

extravagance, a petting of an old man's whim, one of those things done in dotage. His real future was vested

in those who had his blood, in whom he would live on when he was gone. He turned away from the bronzes

and stood looking at the old leather chair in which he had sat and smoked so many hundreds of cigars. And

suddenly he seemed to see her sitting there in her grey dress, fragrant, soft, darkeyed, graceful, looking up at

him. Why! She cared nothing for him, really; all she cared for was that lost lover of hers. But she was there,

whether she would or no, giving him pleasure with her beauty and grace. One had no right to inflict an old

man's company, no right to ask her down to play to him and let him look at herfor no reward! Pleasure

must be paid for in this world. 'How much?' After all, there was plenty; his son and his three grandchildren

would never miss that little lump. He had made it himself, nearly every penny; he could leave it where he

liked, allow himself this little pleasure. He went back to the bureau. 'Well, I'm going to,' he thought, 'let them

'How much?' Ten thousand, twenty thousandhow much? If only with his money he could buy one year,

'DEAR HERRING,Draw me a codicil to this effect: "I leave to my niece Irene Forsyte, born Irene Heron,

by which name she now goes, fifteen thousand pounds free of legacy duty." 'Yours faithfully, 'JOLYON

When he had sealed and stamped the envelope, he went back to the window and drew in a long breath. It was

He woke at halfpast two, an hour which long experience had taught him brings panic intensity to all

awkward thoughts. Experience had also taught him that a further waking at the proper hour of eight showed

the folly of such panic. On this particular morning the thought which gathered rapid momentum was that if he

became ill, at his age not improbable, he would not see her. From this it was but a step to realisation that he

would be cut off, too, when his son and June returned from Spain. How could he justify desire for the

company of one who had stolenearly morning does not mince words June's lover? That lover was dead;

but June was a stubborn little thing; warmhearted, but stubborn as wood, andquite truenot one who

forgot! By the middle of next month they would be back. He had barely five weeks left to enjoy the new

interest which had come into what remained of his life. Darkness showed up to him absurdly clear the nature

of his feeling. Admiration for beautya craving to see that which delighted his eyes.

Preposterous, at his age! And yetwhat other reason was there for asking June to undergo such painful

reminder, and how prevent his son and his son's wife from thinking him very queer? He would be reduced to

sneaking up to London, which tired him; and the least indisposition would cut him off even from that. He lay

with eyes open, setting his jaw against the prospect, and calling himself an old fool, while his heart beat

loudly, and then seemed to stop beating altogether. He had seen the dawn lighting the window chinks, heard

the birds chirp and twitter, and the cocks crow, before he fell asleep again, and awoke tired but sane. Five

weeks before he need bother, at his age an eternity! But that early morning panic had left its mark, had

slightly fevered the will of one who had always had his own way. He would see her as often as he wished!

Why not go up to town and make that codicil at his solicitor's instead of writing about it; she might like to go

to the opera! But, by train, for he would not have that fat chap Beacon grinning behind his back. Servants

were such fools; and, as likely as not, they had known all the past history of Irene and young

Bosinneyservants knew everything, and suspected the rest. He wrote to her that morning:

"MY DEAR IRENE,I have to be up in town tomorrow. If you would like to have a look in at the opera,

But where? It was decades since he had dined anywhere in London save at his Club or at a private house. Ah!

"Let me have a line tomorrow morning to the Piedmont Hotel whether to expect you there at 7 o'clock."

She would understand that he just wanted to give her a little pleasure; for the idea that she should guess he

had this itch to see her was instinctively unpleasant to him; it was not seemly that one so old should go out of

The journey next day, short though it was, and the visit to his lawyer's, tired him. It was hot too, and after

dressing for dinner he lay down on the sofa in his bedroom to rest a little. He must have had a sort of fainting

fit, for he came to himself feeling very queer; and with some difficulty rose and rang the bell. Why! it was

past seven! And there he was and she would be waiting. But suddenly the dizziness came on again, and he

"Yes, come here"; he could not see her clearly, for the cloud in front of his eyes. "I'm not well, I want some

"Don't go. Take this message to my niecea lady waiting in the halla lady in grey. Say Mr. Forsyte is not

wellthe heat. He is very sorry; if he is not down directly, she is not to wait dinner."

When she was gone, he thought feebly: 'Why did I say a lady in grey she may be in anything. Sal volatile!'

He did not go off again, yet was not conscious of how Irene came to be standing beside him, holding smelling

salts to his nose, and pushing a pillow up behind his head. He heard her say anxiously: "Dear Uncle Jolyon,

what is it?" was dimly conscious of the soft pressure of her lips on his hand; then drew a long breath of

"Ha!" he said, "it's nothing. How did you get here? Go down and dinethe tickets are on the dressingtable.

He felt her cool hand on his forehead, smelled violets, and sat divided between a sort of pleasure and a

"Why! You are in grey!" he said. "Help me up." Once on his feet he gave himself a shake.

"What business had I to go off like that!" And he moved very slowly to the glass. What a cadaverous chap!

"Fiddlesticks! A glass of champagne'll soon set me to rights. I can't have you missing the opera."

But the journey down the corridor was troublesome. What carpets they had in these newfangled places, so

thick that you tripped up in them at every step! In the lift he noticed how concerned she looked, and said with

When the lift stopped he had to hold firmly to the seat to prevent its slipping under him; but after soup and a

glass of champagne he felt much better, and began to enjoy an infirmity which had brought such solicitude

"I should have liked you for a daughter," he said suddenly; and watching the smile in her eyes, went on:

"You mustn't get wrapped up in the past at your time of life; plenty of that when you get to my age. That's a

Ah! A woman who could make herself a pretty frock had not lost her interest in life.

"Make hay while the sun shines," he said; "and drink that up. I want to see some colour in your cheeks. We

mustn't waste life; it doesn't do. There's a new Marguerite tonight; let's hope she won't be fat. And

Mephistoanything more dreadful than a fat chap playing the Devil I can't imagine."

But they did not go to the opera after all, for in getting up from dinner the dizziness came over him again, and

she insisted on his staying quiet and going to bed early. When he parted from her at the door of the hotel,

having paid the cabman to drive her to Chelsea, he sat down again for a moment to enjoy the memory of her

words: "You are such a darling to me, Uncle Jolyon!" Why! Who wouldn't be! He would have liked to stay

up another day and take her to the Zoo, but two days running of him would bore her to death. No, he must

wait till next Sunday; she had promised to come then. They would settle those lessons for Holly, if only for a

month. It would be something. That little Mam'zelle Beauce wouldn't like it, but she would have to lump it.

He drove to Waterloo next morning, struggling with a desire to say: 'Drive me to Chelsea.' But his sense of

proportion was too strong. Besides, he still felt shaky, and did not want to risk another aberration like that of

last night, away from home. Holly, too, was expecting him, and what he had in his bag for her. Not that there

was any cupboard love in his little sweetshe was a bundle of affection. Then, with the rather bitter

cynicism of the old, he wondered for a second whether it was not cupboard love which made Irene put up

with him. No, she was not that sort either. She had, if anything, too little notion of how to butter her bread, no

sense of property, poor thing! Besides, he had not breathed a word about that codicil, nor should

In the victoria which met him at the station Holly was restraining the dog Balthasar, and their caresses made

'jubey' his drive home. All the rest of that fine hot day and most of the next he was content and peaceful,

reposing in the shade, while the long lingering sunshine showered gold on the lawns and the flowers. But on

Thursday evening at his lonely dinner he began to count the hours; sixtyfive till he would go down to meet

her again in the little coppice, and walk up through the fields at her side. He had intended to consult the

doctor about his fainting fit, but the fellow would be sure to insist on quiet, no excitement and all that; and he

did not mean to be tied by the leg, did not want to be told of an infirmityif there were one, could not afford

to hear of it at his time of life, now that this new interest had come. And he carefully avoided making any

mention of it in a letter to his son. It would only bring them back with a run! How far this silence was due to

consideration for their pleasure, how far to regard for his own, he did not pause to consider.

That night in his study he had just finished his cigar and was dozing off, when he heard the rustle of a gown,

and was conscious of a scent of violets. Opening his eyes he saw her, dressed in grey, standing by the

fireplace, holding out her arms. The odd thing was that, though those arms seemed to hold nothing, they were

curved as if round someone's neck, and her own neck was bent back, her lips open, her eyes closed. She

vanished at once, and there were the mantelpiece and his bronzes. But those bronzes and the mantelpiece had

not been there when she was, only the fireplace and the wall! Shaken and troubled, he got up. 'I must take

medicine,' he thought; 'I can't be well.' His heart beat too fast, he had an asthmatic feeling in the chest; and

going to the window, he opened it to get some air. A dog was barking far away, one of the dogs at Gage's

farm no doubt, beyond the coppice. A beautiful still night, but dark. 'I dropped off,' he mused, 'that's it! And

Putting his hand to his side to still the beating of his heart, he stepped out on the terrace. Something soft

scurried by in the dark. "Shoo!" It was that great grey cat. 'Young Bosinney was like a great cat!' he thought.

'It was him in there, that shethat she wasHe's got her still!' He walked to the edge of the terrace, and

looked down into the darkness; he could just see the powdering of the daisies on the unmown lawn. Here

today and gone tomorrow! And there came the moon, who saw all, young and old, alive and dead, and

didn't care a dump! His own turn soon. For a single day of youth he would give what was left! And he turned

again towards the house. He could see the windows of the night nursery up there. His little sweet would be

asleep. 'Hope that dog won't wake her!' he thought. 'What is it makes us love, and makes us die! I must go to

And across the terrace stones, growing grey in the moonlight, he passed back within.

How should an old man live his days if not in dreaming of his wellspent past? In that, at all events, there is

no agitating warmth, only pale winter sunshine. The shell can withstand the gentle beating of the dynamos of

memory. The present he should distrust; the future shun. From beneath thick shade he should watch the

sunlight creeping at his toes. If there be sun of summer, let him not go out into it, mistaking it for the

Indiansummer sun! Thus peradventure he shall decline softly, slowly, imperceptibly, until impatient Nature

clutches his windpipe and he gasps away to death some early morning before the world is aired, and they

put on his tombstone: 'In the fulness of years!' yea! If he preserve his principles in perfect order, a Forsyte

Old Jolyon was conscious of all this, and yet there was in him that which transcended Forsyteism. For it is

written that a Forsyte shall not love beauty more than reason; nor his own way more than his own health. And

something beat within him in these days that with each throb fretted at the thinning shell. His sagacity knew

this, but it knew too that he could not stop that beating, nor would if he could. And yet, if you had told him he

was living on his capital, he would have stared you down. No, no; a man did not live on his capital; it was not

done! The shibboleths of the past are ever more real than the actualities of the present. And he, to whom

living on one's capital had always been anathema, could not have borne to have applied so gross a phrase to

his own case. Pleasure is healthful; beauty good to see; to live again in the youth of the youngand what

Methodically, as had been the way of his whole life, he now arranged his time. On Tuesdays he journeyed up

to town by train; Irene came and dined with him. And they went to the opera. On Thursdays he drove to

town, and, putting that fat chap and his horses up, met her in Kensington Gardens, picking up the carriage

after he had left her, and driving home again in time for dinner. He threw out the casual formula that he had

business in London on those two days. On Wednesdays and Saturdays she came down to give Holly music

lessons. The greater the pleasure he took in her society, the more scrupulously fastidious he became, just a

matteroffact and friendly uncle. Not even in feeling, really, was he morefor, after all, there was his age.

And yet, if she were late he fidgeted himself to death. If she missed coming, which happened twice, his eyes

And so a month went bya month of summer in the fields, and in his heart, with summer's heat and the

fatigue thereof. Who could have believed a few weeks back that he would have looked forward to his son's

and his granddaughter's return with something like dread! There was such a delicious freedom, such

recovery of that independence a man enjoys before he founds a family, about these weeks of lovely weather,

and this new companionship with one who demanded nothing, and remained always a little unknown,

retaining the fascination of mystery. It was like a draught of wine to him who has been drinking water for so

long that he has almost forgotten the stir wine brings to his blood, the narcotic to his brain. The flowers were

coloured brighter, scents and music and the sunlight had a living valuewere no longer mere reminders of

past enjoyment. There was something now to live for which stirred him continually to anticipation. He lived

in that, not in retrospection; the difference is considerable to any so old as he. The pleasures of the table,

never of much consequence to one naturally abstemious, had lost all value. He ate little, without knowing

what he ate; and every day grew thinner and more worn to look at. He was again a 'threadpaper'; and to this

thinned form his massive forehead, with hollows at the temples, gave more dignity than ever. He was very

well aware that he ought to see the doctor, but liberty was too sweet. He could not afford to pet his frequent

shortness of breath and the pain in his side at the expense of liberty. Return to the vegetable existence he had

led among the agricultural journals with the lifesize mangold wurzels, before this new attraction came into

his lifeno! He exceeded his allowance of cigars. Two a day had always been his rule. Now he smoked

three and sometimes foura man will when he is filled with the creative spirit. But very often he thought: 'I

must give up smoking, and coffee; I must give up rattling up to town.' But he did not; there was no one in any

The servants perhaps wondered, but they were, naturally, dumb. Mam'zelle Beauce was too concerned with

her own digestion, and too 'wellbrrred' to make personal allusions. Holly had not as yet an eye for the relative

appearance of him who was her plaything and her god. It was left for Irene herself to beg him to eat more, to

rest in the hot part of the day, to take a tonic, and so forth. But she did not tell him that she was the a cause of

his thinnessfor one cannot see the havoc oneself is working. A man of eightyfive has no passions, but the

Beauty which produces passion works on in the old way, till death closes the eyes which crave the sight of

On the first day of the second week in July he received a letter from his son in Paris to say that they would all

be back on Friday. This had always been more sure than Fate; but, with the pathetic improvidence given to

the old, that they may endure to the end, he had never quite admitted it. Now he did, and something would

have to be done. He had ceased to be able to imagine life without this new interest, but that which is not

imagined sometimes exists, as Forsytes are perpetually finding to their cost. He sat in his old leather chair,

doubling up the letter, and mumbling with his lips the end of an unlighted cigar. After tomorrow his

Tuesday expeditions to town would have to be abandoned. He could still drive up, perhaps, once a week, on

the pretext of seeing his man of business. But even that would be dependent on his health, for now they

would begin to fuss about him. The lessons! The lessons must go on! She must swallow down her scruples,

and June must put her feelings in her pocket. She had done so once, on the day after the news of Bosinney's

death; what she had done then, she could surely do again now. Four years since that injury was inflicted on

hernot Christian to keep the memory of old sores alive. June's will was strong, but his was stronger, for his

sands were running out. Irene was soft, surely she would do this for him, subdue her natural shrinking, sooner

than give him pain! The lessons must continue; for if they did, he was secure. And lighting his cigar at last,

he began trying to shape out how to put it to them all, and explain this strange intimacy; how to veil and wrap

it away from the naked truth that he could not bear to be deprived of the sight of beauty. Ah! Holly! Holly

was fond of her, Holly liked her lessons. She would save himhis little sweet! And with that happy thought

he became serene, and wondered what he had been worrying about so fearfully. He must not worry, it left

That evening after dinner he had a return of the dizziness, though he did not faint. He would not ring the bell,

because he knew it would mean a fuss, and make his going up on the morrow more conspicuous. When one

grew old, the whole world was in conspiracy to limit freedom, and for what reason?just to keep the breath

in him a little longer. He did not want it at such cost. Only the dog Balthasar saw his lonely recovery from

that weakness; anxiously watched his master go to the sideboard and drink some brandy, instead of giving

him a biscuit. When at last old Jolyon felt able to tackle the stairs he went up to bed. And, though still shaky

next morning, the thought of the evening sustained and strengthened him. It was always such a pleasure to

give her a good dinnerhe suspected her of undereating when she was alone; and, at the opera to watch her

eyes glow and brighten, the unconscious smiling of her lips. She hadn't much pleasure, and this was the last

time he would be able to give her that treat. But when he was packing his bag he caught himself wishing that

he had not the fatigue of dressing for dinner before him, and the exertion, too, of telling her about June's

The opera that evening was 'Carmen,' and he chose the last entr'acte to break the news, instinctively putting it

She took it quietly, queerly; in fact, he did not know how she had taken it before the wayward music lifted up

again and silence became necessary. The mask was down over her face, that mask behind which so much

went on that he could not see. She wanted time to think it over, no doubt! He would not press her, for she

would be coming to give her lesson tomorrow afternoon, and he should see her then when she had got used

to the idea. In the cab he talked only of the Carmen; he had seen better in the old days, but this one was not

bad at all. When he took her hand to say goodnight, she bent quickly forward and kissed his forehead.

"Tomorrow then," he said. "Goodnight. Sleep well." She echoed softly: "Sleep welll" and from the cab

window, already moving away, he saw her face screwed round towards him, and her hand put out in a gesture

He sought his room slowly. They never gave him the same, and he could not get used to these

'spickandspandy' bedrooms with new furniture and greygreen carpets sprinkled all over with pink roses.

His French had never been equal to its words, but its sense he knew, if it had any sense, a gipsy thingwild

and unaccountable. Well, there was in life something which upset all your care and plans something which

made men and women dance to its pipes. And he lay staring from deepsunk eyes into the darkness where

the unaccountable held sway. You thought you had hold of life, but it slipped away behind you, took you by

the scruff of the neck, forced you here and forced you there, and then, likely as not, squeezed life out of you!

It took the very stars like that, he shouldn't wonder, rubbed their noses together and flung them apart; it had

never done playing its pranks. Five million people in this great blunderbuss of a town, and all of them at the

mercy of that LifeForce, like a lot of little dried peas hopping about on a board when you struck your fist on

it. Ah, well! Himself would not hop much longera good long sleep would do him good!

How hot it was up here!how noisy! His forehead burned; she had kissed it just where he always worried;

just thereas if she had known the very place and wanted to kiss it all away for him. But, instead, her lips

left a patch of grievous uneasiness. She had never spoken in quite that voice, had never before made that

He got out of bed and pulled the curtains aside; his room faced down over the river. There was little air, but

the sight of that breadth of water flowing by, calm, eternal, soothed him. 'The great thing,' he thought 'is not

to make myself a nuisance. I'll think of my little sweet, and go to sleep.' But it was long before the heat and

throbbing of the London night died out into the short slumber of the summer morning. And old Jolyon had

When he reached home next day he went out to the flower garden, and with the help of Holly, who was very

delicate with flowers, gathered a great bunch of carnations. They were, he told her, for 'the lady in grey'a

name still bandied between them; and he put them in a bowl in his study where he meant to tackle Irene the

moment she came, on the subject of June and future lessons. Their fragrance and colour would help. After

lunch he lay down, for he felt very tired, and the carriage would not bring her from the station till four

o'clock. But as the hour approached he grew restless, and sought the schoolroom, which overlooked the drive.

The sunblinds were down, and Holly was there with Mademoiselle Beauce, sheltered from the heat of a

stifling July day, attending to their silkworms. Old Jolyon had a natural antipathy to these methodical

creatures, whose heads and colour reminded him of elephants; who nibbled such quantities of holes in nice

green leaves; and smelled, as he thought, horrid. He sat down on a chintzcovered windowseat whence he

could see the drive, and get what air there was; and the dog Balthasar who appreciated chintz on hot days,

jumped up beside him. Over the cottage piano a violet dustsheet, faded almost to grey, was spread, and on it

the first lavender, whose scent filled the room. In spite of the coolness here, perhaps because of that coolness

the beat of life vehemently impressed his ebbeddown senses. Each sunbeam which came through the chinks

had annoying brilliance; that dog smelled very strong; the lavender perfume was overpowering; those

silkworms heaving up their greygreen backs seemed horribly alive; and Holly's dark head bent over them

had a wonderfully silky sheen. A marvellous cruelly strong thing was life when you were old and weak; it

seemed to mock you with its multitude of forms and its beating vitality. He had never, till those last few

weeks, had this curious feeling of being with one half of him eagerly borne along in the stream of life, and

with the other half left on the bank, watching that helpless progress. Only when Irene was with him did he

Holly turned her head, pointed with her little brown fist to the pianofor to point with a finger was not

Old Jolyon's heart gave a flutter, and for a second the room was clouded; then it cleared, and he said with a

That prim little Frenchwoman! She hadn't yet got over the music lessons being taken away from her. That

wouldn't help. His little sweet was the only friend they had. Well, they were her lessons. And he shouldn't

budge shouldn't budge for anything. He stroked the warm wool on Balthasar's head, and heard Holly say:

"When mother's home, there won't be any changes, will there? She doesn't like strangers, you know."

The child's words seemed to bring the chilly atmosphere of opposition about old Jolyon, and disclose all the

menace to his newfound freedom. Ah! He would have to resign himself to being an old man at the mercy of

care and love, or fight to keep this new and prized companionship; and to fight tired him to death. But his

thin, worn face hardened into resolution till it appeared all Jaw. This was his house, and his affair; he should

not budge! He looked at his watch, old and thin like himself; he had owned it fifty years. Past four already!

And kissing the top of Holly's head in passing, he went down to the hall. He wanted to get hold of her before

she went up to give her lesson. At the first sound of wheels he stepped out into the porch, and saw at once

Old Jolyon gave him a sharp upward look, his eyes seemed to push away that fat chap's curiosity, and defy

"Very well," he said, and turned back into the house. He went to his study and sat down, quivering like a leaf.

What did this mean? She might have lost her train, but he knew well enough she hadn't. 'Goodbye, dear

Uncle Jolyon.' Why 'Goodbye' and not 'Goodnight'? And that hand of hers lingering in the air. And her

kiss. What did it mean? Vehement alarm and irritation took possession of him. He got up and began to pace

the Turkey carpet, between window and wall. She was going to give him up! He felt it for certainand he

defenceless. An old man wanting to look on beauty! It was ridiculous! Age closed his mouth, paralysed his

power to fight. He had no right to what was warm and living, no right to anything but memories and sorrow.

He could not plead with her; even an old man has his dignity. Defenceless! For an hour, lost to bodily fatigue,

he paced up and down, past the bowl of carnations he had plucked, which mocked him with its scent. Of all

things hard to bear, the prostration of willpower is hardest, for one who has always had his way. Nature had

got him in its net, and like an unhappy fish he turned and swam at the meshes, here and there, found no hole,

no breaking point. They brought him tea at five o'clock, and a letter. For a moment hope beat up in him. He

"DEAREST UNCLE JOLYON,I can't bear to write anything that may disappoint you, but I was too

cowardly to tell you last night. I feel I can't come down and give Holly any more lessons, now that June is

coming back. Some things go too deep to be forgotten. It has been such a joy to see you and Holly. Perhaps I

shall still see you sometimes when you come up, though I'm sure it's not good for you; I can see you are tiring

yourself too much. I believe you ought to rest quite quietly all this hot weather, and now you have your son

and June coming back you will be so happy. Thank you a million times for all your sweetness to me.

So, there it was! Not good for him to have pleasure and what he chiefly cared about; to try and put off feeling

the inevitable end of all things, the approach of death with its stealthy, rustling footsteps. Not good for him!

Not even she could see how she was his new lease of interest in life, the incarnation of all the beauty he felt

His tea grew cold, his cigar remained unlit; and up and down he paced, torn between his dignity and his hold

on life. Intolerable to be squeezed out slowly, without a say of your own, to live on when your will was in the

hands of others bent on weighing you to the ground with care and love. Intolerable! He would see what

telling her the truth would dothe truth that he wanted the sight of her more than just a lingering on. He sat

down at his old bureau and took a pen. But he could not write. There was something revolting in having to

plead like this; plead that she should warm his eyes with her beauty. It was tantamount to confessing dotage.

"I had hoped that the memory of old sores would not be allowed to stand in the way of what is a pleasure and

a profit to me and my little granddaughter. But old men learn to forego their whims; they are obliged to,

even the whim to live must be foregone sooner or later; and perhaps the sooner the better. "My love to you,

'Bitter,' he thought, 'but I can't help it. I'm tired.' He sealed and dropped it into the box for the evening post,

and hearing it fall to the bottom, thought: 'There goes all I've looked forward to!'

That evening after dinner which he scarcely touched, after his cigar which he left halfsmoked for it made

him feel faint, he went very slowly upstairs and stole into the nightnursery. He sat down on the

windowseat. A nightlight was burning, and he could just see Holly's face, with one hand underneath the

cheek. An early cockchafer buzzed in the Japanese paper with which they had filled the grate, and one of the

horses in the stable stamped restlessly. To sleep like that child! He pressed apart two rungs of the venetian

blind and looked out. The moon was rising, bloodred. He had never seen so red a moon. The woods and

fields out there were dropping to sleep too, in the last glimmer of the summer light. And beauty, like a spirit,

walked. 'I've had a long life,' he thought, 'the best of nearly everything. I'm an ungrateful chap; I've seen a lot

of beauty in my time. Poor young Bosinney said I had a sense of beauty. There's a man in the moon tonight!'

A moth went by, another, another. 'Ladies in grey!' He closed his eyes. A feeling that he would never open

them again beset him; he let it grow, let himself sink; then, with a shiver, dragged the lids up. There was

something wrong with him, no doubt, deeply wrong; he would have to have the doctor after all. It didn't much

matter now! Into that coppice the moonlight would have crept; there would be shadows, and those shadows

would be the only things awake. No birds, beasts, flowers, insects; Just the shadowsmoving; 'Ladies in

grey!' Over that log they would climb; would whisper together. She and Bosinney! Funny thought! And the

frogs and little things would whisper too! How the clock ticked, in here! It was all eerieout there in the light

of that red moon; in here with the little steady nightlight and, the ticking clock and the nurse's

dressinggown hanging from the edge of the screen, tall, like a woman's figure. 'Lady in grey!' And a very

odd thought beset him: Did she exist? Had she ever come at all? Or was she but the emanation of all the

beauty he had loved and must leave so soon? The violetgrey spirit with the dark eyes and the crown of

amber hair, who walks the dawn and the moonlight, and at bluebell time? What was she, who was she, did

she exist? He rose and stood a moment clutching the windowsill, to give him a sense of reality again; then

began tiptoeing towards the door. He stopped at the foot of the bed; and Holly, as if conscious of his eyes

fixed on her, stirred, sighed, and curled up closer in defence. He tiptoed on and passed out into the dark

passage; reached his room, undressed at once, and stood before a mirror in his nightshirt. What a

scarecrowwith temples fallen in, and thin legs! His eyes resisted his own image, and a look of pride came

on his face. All was in league to pull him down, even his reflection in the glass, but he was not downyet!

He got into bed, and lay a long time without sleeping, trying to reach resignation, only too well aware that

fretting and disappointment were very bad for him. He woke in the morning so unrefreshed and strengthIess

that he sent for the doctor. After sounding him, the fellow pulled a face as long as your arm, and ordered him

to stay in bed and give up smoking. That was no hardship; there was nothing to get up for, and when he felt

ill, tobacco always lost its savour. He spent the morning languidly with the sunblinds down, turning and

returning The Times, not reading much, the dog Balthasar lying beside his bed. With his lunch they brought

'Your letter received coming down this afternoon will be with you at fourthirty. Irene.'

Coming down! After all! Then she did existand he was not deserted. Coming down! A glow ran through

his limbs; his cheeks and forehead felt hot. He drank his soup, and pushed the traytable away, lying very

quiet until they had removed lunch and left him alone; but every now and then his eyes twinkled. Coming

down! His heart beat fast, and then did not seem to beat at all. At three o'clock he got up and dressed

deliberately, noiselessly. Holly and Mam'zelle would be in the schoolroom, and the servants asleep after their

dinner, he shouldn't wonder. He opened his door cautiously, and went downstairs. In the hall the dog

Balthasar lay solitary, and, followed by him, old Jolyon passed into his study and out into the burning

afternoon. He meant to go down and meet her in the coppice, but felt at once he could not manage that in this

heat. He sat down instead under the oak tree by the swing, and the dog Balthasar, who also felt the heat, lay

down beside him. He sat there smiling. What a revel of bright minutes! What a hum of insects, and cooing of

pigeons! It was the quintessence of a summer day. Lovely! And he was happyhappy as a sandboy,

whatever that might be. She was coming; she had not given him up! He had everything in life he

wantedexcept a little more breath, and less weightjust here! He would see her when she emerged from

the fernery, come swaying just a little, a violetgrey figure passing over the daisies and dandelions and

'soldiers' on the lawnthe soldiers with their flowery crowns. He would not move, but she would come up to

him and say: 'Dear Uncle Jolyon, I am sorry!' and sit in the swing and let him look at her and tell her that he

had not been very well but was all right now; and that dog would lick her hand. That dog knew his master

It was quite shady under the tree; the sun could not get at him, only make the rest of the world bright so that

he could see the Grand Stand at Epsom away out there, very far, and the cows cropping the clover in the

field and swishing at the flies with their tails. He smelled the scent of limes, and lavender. Ah! that was why

there was such a racket of bees. They were excitedbusy, as his heart was busy and excited. Drowsy, too,

The stable clock struck four; in half an hour she would be here. He would have just one tiny nap, because he

had had so little sleep of late; and then he would be fresh for her, fresh for youth and beauty, coming towards

him across the sunlit lawnlady in grey! And settling back in his chair he closed his eyes. Some

thistledown came on what little air there was, and pitched on his moustache more white than itself. He did

not know; but his breathing stirred it, caught there. A ray of sunlight struck through and lodged on his boot. A

bumblebee alighted and strolled on the crown of his Panama hat. And the delicious surge of slumber

reached the brain beneath that hat, and the head swayed forward and rested on his breast. Summersummer!

The stable clock struck the quarter past. The dog Balthasar stretched and looked up at his master. The

thistledown no longer moved. The dog placed his chin over the sunlit foot. It did not stir. The dog withdrew

his chin quickly, rose, and leaped on old Jolyon's lap, looked in his face, whined; then, leaping down, sat on