Malvina of Brittany .............................................................................................................................................1

Jerome K. Jerome .....................................................................................................................................1

THE PREFACE.......................................................................................................................................1

I. THE STORY.......................................................................................................................................2

II. HOW IT CAME ABOUT..................................................................................................................4

III. HOW COUSIN CHRISTOPHER BECAME MIXED UP WITH IT. ...............................................7

IV. HOW IT WAS KEPT FROM MRS. ARLINGTON. .....................................................................13

V. HOW IT WAS TOLD TO MRS. MARIGOLD..............................................................................19

VI. AND HOW IT WAS FINISHED TOO SOON..............................................................................24

THE PROLOGUE.................................................................................................................................27

THE STREET OF THE BLANK WALL. .............................................................................................31

HIS EVENING OUT.............................................................................................................................44

THE LESSON. .......................................................................................................................................60

SYLVIA OF THE LETTERS. ...............................................................................................................67

THE FAWN GLOVES..........................................................................................................................86

The Doctor never did believe this story, but claims for it that, to a great extent, it has altered his whole

"Of course, what actually happenedwhat took place under my own nose," continued the Doctor, "I do not

dispute. And then there is the case of Mrs. Marigold. That was unfortunate, I admit, and still is, especially for

Marigold. But, standing by itself, it proves nothing. These fluffy, giggling womenas often as not it is a

mere shell that they shed with their first youthone never knows what is underneath. With regard to the

others, the whole thing rests upon a simple scientific basis. The idea was 'in the air,' as we saya passing

brainwave. And when it had worked itself out there was an end of it. As for all this

There came from the darkening uplands the sound of a lost soul. It rose and fell and died away.

"Blowing stones," explained the Doctor, stopping to refill his pipe. "One finds them in these parts. Hollowed

out during the glacial period. Always just about twilight that one hears it. Rush of air caused by sudden

"I don't say," continued the Doctor, "that it would have happened without her coming. Undoubtedly it was

she who supplied the necessary psychic conditions. There was that about hera sort of atmosphere. That

quaint archaic French of hersKing Arthur and the round table and Merlin; it seemed to recreate it all. An

artful minx, that is the only explanation. But while she was looking at you, out of that curious aloofness of

"As for old Littlecherry," the Doctor began again quite suddenly, "that's his specialityfolklore, occultism,

all that flummery. If you knocked at his door with the original Sleeping Beauty on your arm he'd only fuss

round her with cushions and hope that she'd had a good night. Found a seed oncechipped it out of an old

fossil, and grew it in a pot in his study. About the most dilapidated weed you ever saw. Talked about it as if

he had rediscovered the Elixir of Life. Even if he didn't say anything in actually so many words, there was

the way he went about. That of itself was enough to have started the whole thing, to say nothing of that loony

old Irish housekeeper of his, with her head stuffed full of elves and banshees and the Lord knows what."

Again the Doctor lapsed into silence. One by one the lights of the village peeped upward out of the depths. A

long, low line of light, creeping like some luminous dragon across the horizon, showed the track of the Great

"It was altogether out of the common," continued the Doctor, "quite out of the common, the whole thing. But

The Doctor struck his foot against a long grey stone, half hidden in the grass, and only just saved himself

"Remains of some old cromlech," explained the Doctor. "Somewhere about here, if we were to dig down, we

should find a withered bundle of bones crouching over the dust of a prehistoric luncheonbasket. Interesting

The descent was rough. The Doctor did not talk again until we had reached the outskirts of the village.

"I wonder what's become of them?" mused the Doctor. "A rum go, the whole thing. I should like to have got

We had reached the Doctor's gate. The Doctor pushed it open and passed in. He seemed to have forgotten me.

"A taking little minx," I heard him muttering to himself as he fumbled with the door. "And no doubt meant

I pieced it together from the utterly divergent versions furnished me by the Professor and the Doctor, assisted,

It commenced, so I calculate, about the year 2OOO B.C., or, to be more precisefor figures are not the

strong point of the old chroniclerswhen King Heremon ruled over Ireland and Harbundia was Queen of the

White Ladies of Brittany, the fairy Malvina being her favourite attendant. It is with Malvina that this story is

chiefly concerned. Various quite pleasant happenings are recorded to her credit. The White Ladies belonged

to the "good people," and, on the whole, lived up to their reputation. But in Malvina, side by side with much

that is commendable, there appears to have existed a most reprehensible spirit of mischief, displaying itself in

pranks that, excusable, or at all events understandable, in, say, a pixy or a pigwidgeon, strike one as

altogether unworthy of a wellprincipled White Lady, posing as the friend and benefactress of mankind. For

merely refusing to dance with herat midnight, by the shores of a mountain lake; neither the time nor the

place calculated to appeal to an elderly gentleman, suffering possibly from rheumatismshe on one occasion

transformed an eminently respectable proprietor of tin mines into a nightingale, necessitating a change of

habits that to a business man must have been singularly irritating. On another occasion a quite important

queen, having had the misfortune to quarrel with Malvina over some absurd point of etiquette in connection

with a lizard, seems, on waking the next morning, to have found herself changed into what one judges, from

the somewhat vague description afforded by the ancient chroniclers, to have been a sort of vegetable marrow.

Such changes, according to the Professor, who is prepared to maintain that evidence of an historical nature

exists sufficient to prove that the White Ladies formed at one time an actual living community, must be taken

in an allegorical sense. Just as modern lunatics believe themselves to be china vases or pollparrots, and

think and behave as such, so it must have been easy, the Professor argues, for beings of superior intelligence

to have exerted hypnotic influence upon the superstitious savages by whom they were surrounded, and who,

"Take Nebuchadnezzar." I am still quoting the Professor. "Nowadays we should put him into a

straitwaistcoat. Had he lived in Northern Europe instead of Southern Asia, legend would have told us how

some Kobold or Stromkarl had turned him into a composite amalgamation of a serpent, a cat and a

kangaroo." Be that as it may, this passion for changein other peopleseems to have grown upon Malvina

until she must have become little short of a public nuisance, and eventually it landed her in trouble.

The incident is unique in the annals of the White Ladies, and the chroniclers dwell upon it with evident

satisfaction. It came about through the betrothal of King Heremon's only son, Prince Gerbot, to the Princess

Berchta of Normandy. Malvina seems to have said nothing, but to have bided her time. The White Ladies of

Brittany, it must be remembered, were not fairies pure and simple. Under certain conditions they were

capable of becoming women, and this fact, one takes it, must have exerted a disturbing influence upon their

relationships with eligible male mortals. Prince Gerbot may not have been altogether blameless. Young men

in those sadly unenlightened days may not, in their dealings with ladies, white or otherwise, have always

been the soul of discretion and propriety. One would like to think the best of her.

But even the best is indefensible. On the day appointed for the wedding she seems to have surpassed herself.

Into what particular shape or form she altered the wretched Prince Gerbot; or into what shape or form she

persuaded him that he had been altered, it really, so far as the moral responsibility of Malvina is concerned,

seems to be immaterial; the chronicle does not state: evidently something too indelicate for a selfrespecting

chronicler to even hint at. As, judging from other passages in the book, squeamishness does not seem to have

been the author's literary failing, the sensitive reader can feel only grateful for the omission. It would have

It had, of course, from Malvina's point of view, the desired effect. The Princess Berchta appears to have given

one look and then to have fallen fainting into the arms of her attendants. The marriage was postponed

indefinitely, and Malvina, one sadly suspects, chortled. Her triumph was shortlived.

Unfortunately for her, King Heremon had always been a patron of the arts and science of his period. Among

his friends were to be reckoned magicians, genii, the Nine Korrigans or Fays of Brittany all sorts of parties

capable of exerting influence, and, as events proved, only too willing. Ambassadors waited upon Queen

Harbundia; and Harbundia, even had she wished, as on many previous occasions, to stand by her favourite,

had no alternative. The fairy Malvina was called upon to return to Prince Gerbot his proper body and all

She flatly refused. A selfwilled, obstinate fairy, suffering from swelled head. And then there was that

personal note. Merely that he should marry the Princess Berchta! She would see King Heremon, and

Anniamus, in his silly old wizard's robe, and the Fays of Brittany, and all the rest of them! A really nice

White Lady may not have cared to finish the sentence, even to herself. One imagines the flash of the fairy

eye, the stamp of the fairy foot. What could they do to her, any of them, with all their clacking of tongues and

their wagging of heads? She, an immortal fairy! She would change Prince Gerbot back at a time of her own

choosing. Let them attend to their own tricks and leave her to mind hers. One pictures long walks and talks

between the distracted Harbundia and her refractory favouriteappeals to reason, to sentiment: "For my

It seems to have ended by Harbundia losing all patience. One thing there was she could do that Malvina

seems either not to have known of or not to have anticipated. A solemn meeting of the White Ladies was

convened for the night of the midsummer moon. The place of meeting is described by the ancient chroniclers

with more than their usual exactitude. It was on the land that the magician Kalyb had, ages ago, raised up

above all Brittany to form the grave of King Taramis. The "Sea of the Seven Islands" lay to the north. One

guesses it to be the ridge formed by the Arree Mountains. "The Lady of the Fountain" appears to have been

present, suggesting the deep green pool from which the river D'Argent takes its source. Roughly speaking,

one would place it halfway between the modern towns of Morlaix and Callac. Pedestrians, even of the present

day, speak of the still loneliness of that high plateau, treeless, houseless, with no sign of human hand there

but that high, towering monolith round which the shrill winds moan incessantly. There, possibly on some

broken fragment of those great grey stones, Queen Harbundia sat in judgment. And the judgment wasand

from it there was no appeal that the fairy Malvina should be cast out from among the community of the

White Ladies of Brittany. Over the face of the earth she should wander, alone and unforgiven. Solemnly from

the book of the rollcall of the White Ladies the name of Malvina was struck out for ever.

The blow must have fallen upon Malvina as heavily as it was unexpected. Without a word, without one

backward look, she seems to have departed. One pictures the white, frozen face, the wideopen, unseeing

eyes, the trembling, uncertain steps, the groping hands, the deathlike silence clinging like graveclothes

From that night the fairy Malvina disappears from the book of the chroniclers of the White Ladies of

Brittany, from legend and from folklore whatsoever. She does not appear again in history till the year A.D.

It was on an evening towards the end of June, 1914, that Flight Commander Raffleton, temporarily attached

to the French Squadron then harboured at Brest, received instructions by wireless to return at once to the

British Air Service Headquarters at Farnborough, in Hampshire. The night, thanks to a glorious full moon,

would afford all the light he required, and young Raffleton determined to set out at once. He appears to have

left the flying ground just outside the arsenal at Brest about nine o'clock. A little beyond Huelgoat he began

to experience trouble with the carburettor. His idea at first was to push on to Lannion, where he would be

able to secure expert assistance; but matters only getting worse, and noticing beneath him a convenient

stretch of level ground, he decided to descend and attend to it himself. He alighted without difficulty and

proceeded to investigate. The job took him, unaided, longer than he had anticipated. It was a warm, close

night, with hardly a breath of wind, and when he had finished he was feeling hot and tired. He had drawn on

his helmet and was on the point of stepping into his seat, when the beauty of the night suggested to him that it

would be pleasant, before starting off again, to stretch his legs and cool himself a little. He lit a cigar and

The plateau on which he had alighted was a tableland standing high above the surrounding country. It

stretched around him, treeless, houseless. There was nothing to break the lines of the horizon but a group of

gaunt grey stones, the remains, so he told himself, of some ancient menhir, common enough to the lonely

desert lands of Brittany. In general the stones lie overthrown and scattered, but this particular specimen had

by some strange chance remained undisturbed through all the centuries. Mildly interested, Flight Commander

Raffleton strolled leisurely towards it. The moon was at its zenith. How still the quiet night must have been

was impressed upon him by the fact that he distinctly heard, and counted, the strokes of a church clock which

must have been at least six miles away. He remembers looking at his watch and noting that there was a slight

difference between his own and the church time. He made it eight minutes past twelve. With the dying away

of the last vibrations of the distant bell the silence and the solitude of the place seemed to return and settle

down upon it with increased insistence. While he was working it had not troubled him, but beside the black

shadows thrown by those hoary stones it had the effect almost of a presence. It was with a sense of relief that

he contemplated returning to his machine and starting up his engine. It would whir and buzz and give back to

him a comfortable feeling of life and security. He would walk round the stones just once and then be off. It

was wonderful how they had defied old Time. As they had been placed there, quite possibly ten thousand

years ago, so they still stood, the altar of that vast, empty skyroofed temple. And while he was gazing at

them, his cigar between his lips, struggling with a strange forgotten impulse that was tugging at his knees,

there came from the very heart of the great grey stones the measured rise and fall of a soft, even breathing.

Young Raffleton frankly confesses that his first impulse was to cut and run. Only his soldier's training kept

his feet firm on the heather. Of course, the explanation was simple. Some animal had made the place its nest.

But then what animal was ever known to sleep so soundly as not to be disturbed by human footsteps? If

wounded, and so unable to escape, it would not be breathing with that quiet, soft regularity, contrasting so

strangely with the stillness and the silence all round. Possibly an owl's nest. Young owlets make that sort of

noisethe "snorers," so country people call them. Young Raffleton threw away his cigar and went down

upon his knees to grope among the shadows, and, doing so, he touched something warm and soft and

But it wasn't an owl. He must have touched her very lightly, for even then she did not wake. She lay there

with her head upon her arm. And now close to her, his eyes growing used to the shadows, he saw her quite

plainly, the wonder of the parted lips, the gleam of the white limbs beneath their flimsy covering.

Of course, what he ought to have done was to have risen gently and moved away. Then he could have

coughed. And if that did not wake her he might have touched her lightly, say, on the shoulder, and have

called to her, first softly, then a little louder, "Mademoiselle," or "Mon enfant." Even better, he might have

This idea does not seem to have occurred to him. One makes the excuse for him that he was but

threeandtwenty, that, framed in the purple moonlight, she seemed to him the most beautiful creature his

eyes had ever seen. And then there was the brooding mystery of it all, that atmosphere of faroff primeval

times from which the roots of life still draw their sap. One takes it he forgot that he was Flight Commander

Raffleton, officer and gentleman; forgot the proper etiquette applying to the case of ladies found sleeping

upon lonely moors without a chaperon. Greater still, the possibility that he never thought of anything at all,

Not a platonic kiss upon the brow, not a brotherly kiss upon the cheek, but a kiss full upon the parted lips, a

kiss of worship and amazement, such as that with which Adam in all probability awakened Eve.

Her eyes opened, and, just a little sleepily, she looked at him. There could have been no doubt in her mind as

to what had happened. His lips were still pressing hers. But she did not seem in the least surprised, and most

certainly not angry. Raising herself to a sitting posture, she smiled and held out her hand that he might help

her up. And, alone in that vast temple, starroofed and moon illumined, beside that grim grey altar of

"I beg your pardon," said Commander Raffleton. "I'm afraid I have disturbed you."

He remembered afterwards that in his confusion he had spoken to her in English. But she answered him in

French, a quaint, oldfashioned French such as one rarely finds but in the pages of old missals. He would

have had some difficulty in translating it literally, but the meaning of it was, adapted to our modern idiom:

He gathered she had been expecting him. He was not quite sure whether he ought not to apologise for being

apparently a little late. True, he had no recollection of any such appointment. But then at that particular

moment Commander Raffleton may be said to have had no consciousness of anything beyond just himself

and the wondrous other beside him. Somewhere outside was moonlight and a world; but all that seemed

He did not mean to be enigmatical. He was chiefly concerned with still gazing at her.

"I flew here," he answered. Her eyes opened wider at that, but with interest, not doubt.

"Where are your wings?" she asked. She was leaning sideways, trying to get a view of his back.

"Over there," he answered. She looked, and for the first time saw the great shimmering sails gleaming like

She moved towards it, and he followed, noticing without surprise that the heather seemed to make no sign of

She halted a little away from it, and he came and stood beside her. Even to Commander Raffleton himself it

looked as if the great wings were quivering, like the outstretched pinions of a bird preening itself before

"Not till I whisper to it," he answered. He was losing a little of his fear of her. She turned to him.

He stared at her. She was quite serious, that was evident. She was to put her hand in his and go away with

him. It was all settled. That is why he had come. To her it did not matter where. That was his affair. But

To his credit, let it be recorded, he did make an effort. Against all the forces of nature, against his

twentythree years and the red blood pulsing in his veins, against the fumes of the midsummer moonlight

encompassing him and the voices of the stars, against the demons of poetry and romance and mystery

chanting their witches' music in his ears, against the marvel and the glory of her as she stood beside him,

clothed in the purple of the night, Flight Commander Raffleton fought the good fight for common sense.

Young persons who, scantily clad, go to sleep on the heather, five miles from the nearest human habitation,

are to be avoided by wellbroughtup young officers of His Majesty's Aerial Service. The incidence of their

being uncannily beautiful and alluring should serve as an additional note of warning. The girl had had a row

with her mother and wanted to get away. It was this infernal moonlight that was chiefly responsible. No

wonder dogs bayed at it. He almost fancied he could hear one now. Nice, respectable, wholesomeminded

things, dogs. No damned sentiment about them. What if he had kissed her! One is not bound for life to every

woman one kisses. Not the first time she had been kissed, unless all the young men in Brittany were blind or

white blooded. All this pretended innocence and simplicity! It was just put on. If not, she must be a lunatic.

The proper thing to do was to say goodbye with a laugh and a jest, start up his machine and be off to

Englanddear old practical, merry England, where he could get breakfast and a bath.

It wasn't a fair fight; one feels it. Poor little prim Common Sense, with her defiant, turnedup nose and her

shrill giggle and her innate vulgarity. And against her the stillness of the night, and the music of the ages, and

So it all fell down about his feet, a little crumbled dust that a passing breath of wind seemed to scatter,

It did just occur to him that maybe he had not made that descent quite as successfully as he had thought he

had; that maybe he had come down on his head; that in consequence he had done with the experiences of

Flight Commander Raffleton and was now about to enter on a new and less circumscribed existence. If so,

the beginning, to an adventuresome young spirit, seemed promising. It was Malvina's voice that recalled him

"Shall we go?" she repeated, and this time the note in her voice suggested command rather than question.

Why not? Whatever had happened to him, at whatever plane of existence he was now arrived, the machine

apparently had followed him. Mechanically he started it up. The familiar whir of the engine brought back to

him the possibility of his being alive in the ordinary acceptation of the term. It also suggested to him the

practical advisability of insisting that Malvina should put on his spare coat. Malvina being five feet three, and

the coat having been built for a man of six feet one, the effect under ordinary circumstances would have been

comic. What finally convinced Commander Raffleton that Malvina really was a fairy was that, in that coat,

with the collar standing up some six inches above her head, she looked more like one than ever.

Neither of them spoke. Somehow it did not seem to be needed. He helped her to climb into her seat and

tucked the coat about her feet. She answered by the same smile with which she had first stretched out her

hand to him. It was just a smile of endless content, as if all her troubles were now over. Commander

Raffleton sincerely hoped they were. A momentary flash of intelligence suggested to him that his were just

Commander Raffleton's subconscious self it must have been that took charge of the machine. He seems,

keeping a few miles inland, to have followed the line of the coast to a little south of the Hague lighthouse.

Thereabouts he remembers descending for the purpose of replenishing his tank. Not having anticipated a

passenger, he had filled up before starting with a spare supply of petrol, an incident that was fortunate.

Malvina appears to have been interested in watching what she probably regarded as some novel breed of

dragon being nourished from tins extricated from under her feet, but to have accepted this, together with all

other details of the flight, as in the natural scheme of things. The monster refreshed, tugged, spurned the

One has the notion that for Flight Commander Raffleton, as for the rest of us, there lies in wait to test the

heart of him the ugly and the commonplace. So large a portion of the years will be for him a business of mean

hopes and fears, of sordid struggle, of low cares and vulgar fret. But also one has the conviction that there

will always remain with him, to make life wonderful, the memory of that night when, godlike, he rode upon

the winds of heaven crowned with the glory of the world's desire. Now and again he turned his head to look

at her, and still, as ever, her eyes answered him with that strange deep content that seemed to wrap them both

around as with a garment of immortality. One gathers dimly something of what he felt from the look that

would unconsciously come into his eyes when speaking of that enchanted journey, from the sudden

dumbness with which the commonplace words would die away upon his lips. Well for him that his lesser self

kept firm hold upon the wheel or maybe a few broken spars, tossing upon the waves, would have been all that

was left to tell of a promising young aviator who, on a summer night of June, had thought he could reach the

Halfway across the dawn came flaming up over the Needles, and later there stole from east to west a long,

low line of mistenshrouded land. One by one headland and cliff, flashing with gold, rose out of the sea, and

the whitewinged gulls flew out to meet them. Almost he expected them to turn into spirits, circling round

Nearer and nearer they drew, while gradually the mist rose upward as the moonlight grew fainter. And all at

once the sweep of the Chesil Bank stood out before them, with Weymouth sheltering behind it.

It may have been the bathingmachines, or the gasometer beyond the railway station, or the flag above the

Royal Hotel. The curtains of the night fell suddenly away from him. The workaday world came knocking at

He looked at his watch. It was a little after four. He had wired them at the camp to expect him in the morning.

They would be looking out for him. By continuing his course he and Malvina could be there about

breakfasttime. He could introduce her to the colonel: "Allow me, Colonel Goodyer, the fairy Malvina." It

was either that or dropping Malvina somewhere between Weymouth and Farnborough. He decided, without

much consideration, that this latter course would be preferable. But where? What was he to do with her?

There was Aunt Emily. Hadn't she said something about wanting a French governess for Georgina? True,

Malvina's French was a trifle oldfashioned in form, but her accent was charming. And as for salary

There presented itself the thought of Uncle Felix and the three elder boys. Instinctively he felt that Malvina

would not be Aunt Emily's idea. His father, had the dear old gentleman been alive, would have been a safe

refuge. They had always understood one another, he and his father. But his mother! He was not at all sure. He

visualised the scene: the drawingroom at Chester Terrace. His mother's soft, rustling entrance. Her

affectionate but wellbred greeting. And then the disconcerting silence with which she would await his

explanation of Malvina. The fact that she was a fairy he would probably omit to mention. Faced by his

mother's goldrimmed pincenez, he did not see himself insisting upon that detail: "A young lady I happened

to find asleep on a moor in Brittany. And seeing it was a fine night, and there being just room in the machine.

And sheI mean Iwell, here we are." There would follow such a painful silence, and then the raising of

the delicately arched eyebrows: "You mean, my dear lad, that you have allowed this"there would be a

slight hesitation here"this young person to leave her home, her people, her friends and relations in

For that was precisely how it would look, and not only to his mother. Suppose by a miracle it really

represented the facts. Suppose that, in spite of the overwhelming evidence in her favourof the night and the

moon and the stars, and the feeling that had come to him from the moment he had kissed hersuppose that,

in spite of all this, it turned out that she wasn't a fairy. Suppose that suggestion of vulgar Common Sense, that

she was just a little minx that had run away from home, had really hit the mark. Suppose inquiries were

already on foot. A hundred horsepower aeroplane does not go about unnoticed. Wasn't there a law about this

sort of thingsomething about "decoying" and "young girls"? He hadn't "decoyed" her. If anything, it was

the other way about. But would her consent be a valid defence? How old was she? That would be the

question. In reality he supposed about a thousand years or so. Possibly more. Unfortunately, she didn't look it.

A coldly suspicious magistrate would probably consider sixteen a much better guess. Quite possibly he was

going to get into a devil of a mess over this business. He cast a glance behind him. Malvina responded with

her changeless smile of ineffable content. For the first time it caused him a distinct feeling of irritation.

They were almost over Weymouth by this time. He could read plainly the advertisement posters outside the

cinema theatre facing the esplanade: "Wilkins and the Mermaid. Comic Drama." There was a picture of the

lady combing her hair; also of Wilkins, a stoutish gentleman in striped bathing costume.

That mad impulse that had come to him with the first breath of dawn, to shake the dwindling world from his

pinions, to plunge upward towards the stars never to returnhe wished to Heaven he had yielded to it.

Dear old Cousin Christopher, fiftyeight and a bachelor. Why had it not occurred to him before? Out of the

sky there appeared to Commander Raffleton the vision of "Cousin Christopher" as a plump, rubicund angel in

a panama hat and a pepperandsalt tweed suit holding out a lifebelt. Cousin Christopher would take to

Malvina as some motherly hen to an orphaned duckling. A fairy discovered asleep beside one of the ancient

menhirs of Brittany. His only fear would be that you might want to take her away before he had written a

paper about her. He would be down from Oxford at his cottage. Commander Raffleton could not for the

moment remember the name of the village. It would come to him. It was northwest of Newbury. You crossed

Salisbury Plain and made straight for Magdalen Tower. The Downs reached almost to the orchard gate. There

was a level stretch of sward nearly half a mile long. It seemed to Commander Raffleton that Cousin

Christopher had been created and carefully preserved by Providence for this particular job.

He was no longer the moonstruck youth of the previous night, on whom phantasy and imagination could play

what pranks they chose. That part of him the keen, fresh morning air had driven back into its cell. He was

Commander Raffleton, an eager and alert young engineer with all his wits about him. At this point that has to

be remembered. Descending on a lonely reach of shore he proceeded to again disturb Malvina for the purpose

of extracting tins. He expected his passenger would in broad daylight prove to be a pretty, childishlooking

girl, somewhat dishevelled, with, maybe, a tinge of blue about the nose, the natural result of a threehours'

flight at fifty miles an hour. It was with a startling return of his original sensations when first she had come to

life beneath his kiss that he halted a few feet away and stared at her. The night was gone, and the silence. She

stood there facing the sunlight, clad in a Burberry overcoat half a dozen sizes too large for her. Beyond her

was a row of bathingmachines, and beyond that again a gasometer. A goods train half a mile away was

And yet the glamour was about her still; something indescribable but quite palpablesomething out of

He took her proffered hand, and she leapt out lightly. She was not in the least dishevelled. It seemed as if the

air must be her proper element. She looked about her, interested, but not curious. Her first thought was for the

That faint tremor of fear that had come to him when beneath the menhir's shadow he had watched the

opening of her eyes, returned to him. It was not an unpleasant sensation. Rather it added a piquancy to their

relationship. But it was distinctly real. She watched the feeding of the monster; and then he came again and

"England!" he explained with a wave of his hand. One fancies she had the impression that it belonged to him.

Graciously she repeated the name. And somehow, as it fell from her lips, it conjured up to Commander

He answered that he hoped she would. He was deadly serious about it. He possessed, generally speaking, a

sense of humour; but for the moment this must have deserted him. He told her he was going to leave her in

the care of a wise and learned man called "Cousin Christopher"; his description no doubt suggesting to

Malvina a friendly magician. He himself would have to go away for a little while, but would return.

It did not seem to matter to Malvina, these minor details. It was evidentthe idea in her mindthat he had

been appointed to her. Whether as master or servant it was less easy to conjecture: probably a mixture of

He mentioned again that he would not be away for longer than he could help. There was no necessity for this

Weymouth with its bathing machines and its gasometer faded away. King Rufus was out ahunting as they

passed over the New Forest, and from Salisbury Plain, as they looked down, the pixies waved their hands and

laughed. Later, they heard the clang of the anvil, telling them they were in the neighbourhood of Wayland

Smith's cave; and so planed down sweetly and without a jar just beyond Cousin Christopher's orchard gate.

A shepherd's boy was whistling somewhere upon the Downs, and in the valley a ploughman had just

harnessed his team; but the village was hidden from them by the sweep of the hills, and no other being was in

sight. He helped Malvina out, and leaving her seated on a fallen branch beneath a walnut tree, proceeded

cautiously towards the house. He found a little maid in the garden. She had run out of the house on hearing

the sound of his propeller and was staring up into the sky, so that she never saw him until he put his hand

upon her shoulder, and then was fortunately too frightened to scream. He gave her hasty instructions. She was

to knock at the Professor's door and tell him that his cousin, Commander Raffleton, was there, and would he

come down at once, by himself, into the orchard. Commander Raffleton would rather not come in. Would the

"Good God!" said Cousin Christopher from beneath the bedclothes. "He isn't hurt, is he?"

The little maid, through the jar of the door, thought not. Anyhow, he didn't look it. But would the Professor

So Cousin Christopher, in bedroom slippers, without socks, wearing a mustardcoloured dressinggown and

a black skull cap upon his head the very picture of a friendly magiciantrotted hastily downstairs and

through the garden, talking to himself about "foolhardy boys" and "knowing it would happen"; and was much

relieved to meet young Arthur Raffleton coming towards him, evidently sound in wind and limb. And then

began to wonder why the devil he had been frightened out of bed at six o'clock in the morning if nothing was

But something clearly was. Before speaking Arthur Raffleton looked carefully about him in a manner

suggestive of mystery, if not of crime; and still without a word, taking Cousin Christopher by the arm, led the

way to the farther end of the orchard. And there, on a fallen branch beneath the walnut tree, Cousin

Christopher saw apparently a khaki coat, with nothing in it, which, as they approached it, rose up.

But it did not rise very high. The back of the coat was towards them. Its collar stood out against the sky line.

But there wasn't any head. Standing upright, it turned round, and peeping out of its folds Cousin Christopher

saw a child's face. And then looking closer saw that it wasn't a child. And then wasn't quite sure what it was;

so that coming to a sudden halt in front of it, Cousin Christopher stared at it with round wide eyes, and then at

"This," he said, "is Professor Littlecherry, my Cousin Christopher, about whom I told you."

It was obvious that Malvina regarded the Professor as a person of importance. Evidently her intention was to

curtsy, an operation that, hampered by those trailing yards of clinging khaki, might proveso it flashed upon

His idea was to help Malvina out of Commander Raffleton's coat, and Malvina was preparing to assist him.

"I don't think," said Commander Raffleton. "If you don't mind I think we'd better leave that for Mrs.

The Professor let go the coat. Malvina appeared a shade disappointed. One opines that not unreasonably she

may have thought to make a better impression without it. But a smiling acquiescence in all arrangements

"Perhaps," suggested Commander Raffleton to Malvina while refastening a few of the more important

buttons, "if you wouldn't mind explaining yourself to my Cousin Christopher just exactly who and what you

areyou'd do it so much better than I should." (What Commander Raffleton was saying to himself was: "If I

tell the dear old Johnny, he'll think I'm pulling his leg. It will sound altogether different the way she will put

Malvina hadn't the slightest objection. She accomplished her curtsyor rather it looked as if the coat were

curtsyingquite gracefully, and with a dignity one would not have expected from it.

"I am the fairy Malvina," she explained to the Professor. "You may have heard of me. I was the favourite of

The friendly magician was staring at her with a pair of round eyes that in spite of their amazement looked

kindly and understanding. They probably encouraged Malvina to complete the confession of her sad brief

"It was when King Heremon ruled over Ireland," she continued. "I did a very foolish and a wicked thing, and

was punished for it by being cast out from the companionship of my fellows. Since then"the coat made the

It ought to have sounded so ridiculous to them both; told on English soil in the year One Thousand Nine

Hundred and Fourteen to a smart young officer of Engineers and an elderly Oxford Professor. Across the

road the doctor's odd man was opening garage doors; a noisy milk cart was clattering through the village a

little late for the London train; a faint odour of eggs and bacon came wafted through the garden, mingled with

the scent of lavender and pinks. For Commander Raffleton, maybe, there was excuse. This story, so far as it

has gone, has tried to make that clear. But the Professor! He ought to have exploded in a burst of Homeric

laughter, or else to have shaken his head at her and warned her where little girls go to who do this sort of

Instead of which he stared from Commander Raffleton to Malvina, and from Malvina back to Commander

Raffleton with eyes so astonishingly round that they might have been drawn with a compass.

"Was there a King Heremon of Ireland?" asked Commander Raffleton. The Professor was a wellknown

"Of course there was a King Heremon of Ireland," answered the Professor quite petulantlyas if the

Commander had wanted to know if there had ever been a Julius Caesar or a Napoleon. "And so there was a

"What did she do?" inquired Commander Raffleton. They both of them seemed to be oblivious of Malvina's

"I forget for the moment," confessed the professor. "I must look it up. Something, if I remember rightly, in

connection with the daughter of King Dancrat. He founded the Norman dynasty. William the Conqueror and

"Would you mind her staying with you for a time until I can make arrangements," suggested Commander

What the Professor's answer might have been had he been allowed to exercise such stock of wits as he

possessed, it is impossible to say. Of course he was interestedexcited, if you will. Folklore, legend,

tradition; these had been his lifelong hobbies. Apart from anything else, here at least was a kindred spirit.

Seemed to know a thing or two. Where had she learned it? Might not there be sources unknown to the

But to take her in! To establish her in the only spare bedroom. To introduce heras what? to English village

society. To the new people at the Manor House. To the member of Parliament with his innocent young wife

He might, had he thought it worth his while, have found some respectable French family and boarded her out.

There was a man he had known for years at Oxford, a cabinetmaker; the wife a most worthy woman. He

could have gone over there from time to time, his notebook in his pocket, and have interviewed her.

Left to himself, he might have behaved as a sane and rational citizen; or he might not. There are records

favouring the latter possibility. The thing is not certain. But as regards this particular incident in his career he

To Malvina, on first landing in England, Commander Raffleton had stated his intention of leaving her

temporarily in the care of the wise and learned Christopher. To Malvina, regarding the Commander as a gift

from the gods, that had settled the matter. The wise and learned Christopher, of course, knew of this coming.

In all probability it was heunder the guidance of the godswho had arranged the whole sequence of

events. There remained only to tender him her gratitude. She did not wait for the Professor's reply. The coat a

little hindered her but, on the other hand, added perhaps an appealing touch of its own. Taking the wise and

And in that quaint archaic French of hers, that long study of the Chronicles of Froissart enabled the Professor

In some mysterious way the whole affair had suddenly become imbued with the dignity of an historical event.

The Professor had the sudden impressionand indeed it never altogether left him so long as Malvina

remainedthat he was a great and powerful personage. A sister potentate; incidentallythough, of course,

in high politics such points are immaterialthe most bewilderingly beautiful being he had ever seen; had

graciously consented to become his guest. The Professor, with a bow that might have been acquired at the

court of King Rene, expressed his sense of the honour done to him. What else could a selfrespecting

Flight Commander Raffleton seems to have done nothing in the direction of reopening it. On the contrary,

he appears to have used this precise moment for explaining to the Professor how absolutely necessary it was

that he should depart for Farnborough without another moment's loss of time. Commander Raffleton added

that he would "look them both up again" the first afternoon he could get away; and was sure that if the

Professor would get Malvina to speak slowly, he would soon find her French easy to understand.

It did occur to the Professor to ask Commander Raffleton where he had found Malvinathat is, if he

remembered. Also what he was going to do about herthat is, if he happened to know. Commander

Raffleton, regretting his great need of haste, explained that he had found Malvina asleep beside a menhir not

far from Huelgoat, in Brittany, and was afraid that he had woke her up. For further particulars, would the

Professor kindly apply to Malvina? For himself, he would never, he felt sure, be able to thank the professor

In conclusion, and without giving further opportunity for discussion, the Commander seems to have shaken

his Cousin Christopher by the hand with much enthusiasm; and then to have turned to Malvina. She did not

move, but her eyes were fixed on him. And he came to her slowly. And without a word he kissed her full

"That is twice you have kissed me," said Malvinaand a curious little smile played round her mouth. "The

What surprised the Professor himself, when he came to think of it, was that, left alone with Malvina, and in

spite of all the circumstances, he felt neither embarrassment nor perplexity. It was as if, so far as they two

were concerned, the whole thing was quite simplealmost humorous. It would be the other people who

The little serving maid was hovering about the garden. She was evidently curious and trying to get a peep.

Mrs. Muldoon's voice could be heard calling to her from the kitchen. There was this question of clothes.

"You haven't brought anything with you?" asked the Professor. "I mean, in the way of a frock of any sort."

Malvina, with a smile, gave a little gesture. It implied that all there was of her and hers stood before him.

"We shall have to find you something," said the Professor. "Something in which you can go about"

The Professor had intended to say "our world," but hesitated, not feeling positive at the moment to which he

himself belonged; Malvina's or Mrs. Muldoon's. So he made it "the" world instead. Another gesture conveyed

"What really have you got on?" asked the Professor. "I mean underneath. Is it anything possiblefor a day

Now Commander Raffleton, for some reason of his own not at all clear to Malvina, had forbidden the taking

off of the coat. But had said nothing about undoing it. So by way of response Malvina undid it.

Upon which the Professor, to Malvina's surprise, acted precisely as Commander Raffleton had done. That is

to say, he hastily reclosed the coat, returning the buttons to their buttonholes.

The fear may have come to Malvina that she was doomed never to be rid of Commander Raffleton's coat.

"I wonder," mused the Professor, "if anyone in the village" The little serving maid flittering among the

gooseberry bushesshe was pretending to be gathering gooseberriescaught the Professor's eye.

"We will consult my chatelaine, Mrs. Muldoon," suggested the Professor. "I think we shall be able to

The Professor tendered Malvina his arm. With her other hand she gathered up the skirts of the Commander's

"I think," said the Professor with a sudden inspiration as they passed through the garden, "I think I shall

explain to Mrs. Muldoon that you have just come straight from a fancydress ball."

They found Mrs. Muldoon in the kitchen. A less convincing story than that by which the Professor sought to

account to Mrs. Muldoon for the how and the why of Malvina it would be impossible to imagine. Mrs.

"I'll not be asking ye any questions," said Mrs. Muldoon, "so there'll be no need for ye to imperil your

immortal soul. If ye'll just give a thought to your own appearance and leave the colleen to me and Drusilla,

The reference to his own appearance disconcerted the Professor. He had not anticipated, when hastening into

his dressing gown and slippers and not bothering about his socks, that he was on his way to meet the chief

ladyinwaiting of Queen Harbundia. Demanding that shaving water should be immediately sent up to him,

It was while he was shaving that Mrs. Muldoon, knocking at the door, demanded to speak to him. From her

tone the Professor came to the conclusion that the house was on fire. He opened the door, and Mrs. Muldoon,

"Where did ye find her? How did she get here?" demanded Mrs. Muldoon. Never before had the Professor

seen Mrs. Muldoon other than a placid, goodhumoured body. She was trembling from head to foot.

"I'm not asking ye what ye told me," interrupted Mrs. Muldoon. "I'm asking ye for the truth, if ye know it."

The Professor put a chair for Mrs. Muldoon, and Mrs. Muldoon dropped down upon it.

"It's no mortal woman ye've brought into the house," said Mrs. Muldoon. "It's a fairy."

Whether up to that moment the Professor had really believed Malvina's story, or whether lurking at the back

of his mind there had all along been an innate conviction that the thing was absurd, the Professor himself is

now unable to say. To the front of the Professor lay Oxfordpolitical economy, the higher criticism, the rise

and progress of rationalism. Behind him, fading away into the dim horizon of humanity, lay an unmapped

land where for forty years he had loved to wander; a spirithaunted land of buried mysteries, lost pathways,

"Shure, don't I know the mark?" replied Mrs. Muldoon almost contemptuously. "Wasn't my own sister's child

"Don't ask me," protested Mrs. Muldoon, still in a terrified whisper. "I couldn't do it. Not if all the saints were

Commonsense argument would not have prevailed with Mrs. Muldoon. The Professor felt that; added to

which he had not any handy. He directed, through the door, that "Mademoiselle" should be shown into the

"Have you ever heard of the White Ladies?" whispered the Professor to Mrs. Muldoon.

There was not much in the fairy line, one takes it, that Mrs. Muldoon had not heard of and believed. Was the

The Professor gave Mrs. Muldoon his word of honour as a gentleman. The "White Ladies," as Mrs. Muldoon

was of course aware, belonged to the "good people." Provided nobody offended her there was nothing to fear.

"She won't be staying very long," added the Professor. "We will just be nice to her."

"She's got a kind face," admitted Mrs. Muldoon, "and a pleasant way with her." The good body's spirits were

"And mind," whispered the Professor as he opened the door for Mrs. Muldoon to slip out, "not a word. She

One is convinced that Mrs. Muldoon left the bathroom resolved that, so far as she could help it, no breath of

suspicion that Malvina was other than what in Drusilla's holiday frock she would appear to be should escape

into the village. It was quite a pleasant little frock of a summery character, with short sleeves and loose about

the neck, and fitted Malvina, in every sense, much better than the most elaborate confection would have done.

The boots were not so successful. Malvina solved the problem by leaving them behind her, together with the

stockings, whenever she went out. That she knew this was wrong is proved by the fact that invariably she

tried to hide them. They would be found in the most unlikely places; hidden behind books in the Professor's

study, crammed into empty tea canisters in Mrs. Muldoon's storeroom. Mrs. Muldoon was not to be

persuaded even to abstract them. The canister with its contents would be placed in silence upon the

Professor's table. Malvina on returning would be confronted by a pair of stern, unsympathetic boots. The

corners of the fairy mouth would droop in lines suggestive of penitence and contrition.

Had the Professor been firm she would have yielded. But from the black accusing boots the Professor could

not keep his eyes from wandering to the guilty white feet, and at once in his heart becoming "counsel for the

defence." Must get a pair of sandals next time he went to Oxford. Anyhow, something more dainty than those

Besides, it was not often that Malvina ventured beyond the orchard. At least not during the day

timeperhaps one ought to say not during that part of the day time when the village was astir. For Malvina

appears to have been an early riser. Somewhere about the middle of the night, as any Christian body would

have timed it, Mrs. Muldoonwaking and sleeping during this period in a state of high nervous

tensionwould hear the sound of a softly opened door; peeping from a raised corner of the blind, would

catch a glimpse of fluttering garments that seemed to melt into the dawn; would hear coming fainter and

fainter from the uplands an unknown song, mingling with the answering voices of the birds.

It was on the uplands between dawn and sunrise that Malvina made the acquaintance of the Arlington twins.

They ought, of course, to have been in bedall three of them, for the matter of that. The excuse for the twins

was their Uncle George. He had been telling them all about the Uffington spectre and Wayland Smith's cave,

and had given them "Puck" as a birthday present. They were always given their birthday presents between

them, because otherwise they did not care for them. They had retired to their respective bedrooms at ten

o'clock and taken it in turns to lie awake. At the first streak of dawn Victoria, who had been watching by her

window, woke Victor, as arranged. Victor was for giving it up and going to sleep again, but Victoria

reminding him of the "oath," they dressed themselves quite simply, and let themselves down by the ivy.

They came across Malvina close to the tail of the White Horse. They knew she was a fairy the moment they

saw her. But they were not frightenedat least not very much. It was Victor who spoke first. Taking off his

hat and going down on one knee, he wished Malvina good morning and hoped she was quite well. Malvina,

who seemed pleased to see them, made answer, and here it was that Victoria took charge of the affair. The

Arlington twins until they were nine had shared a French nurse between them; and then Victor, going to

school, had gradually forgotten; while Victoria, remaining at home, had continued her conversations with

Now the Professor had impressed upon Malvina that for reasons needless to be explainedanyhow, he never

had explained themshe was not to mention that she was a fairy. But he had not told her to deny it. Indeed

how could she? The most that could be expected from her was that she should maintain silence on the point.

So in answer to Victoria she explained that her name was Malvina, and that she had flown across from

Brittany in company with "Sir Arthur," adding that she had often heard of England and had wished to see it.

Malvina confessed herself charmed with it. Nowhere had she ever met so many birds. Malvina raised her

hand and they all three stood in silence, listening. The sky was ablaze and the air seemed filled with their

music. The twins were sure that there were millions of them. They must have come from miles and miles and

Also the people. They were so good and kind and round. Malvina for the present was staying

withaccepting the protection, was how she put it, of the wise and learned Christopher. The "habitation"

could be seen from where they stood, its chimneys peeping from among the trees. The twins exchanged a

meaning glance. Had they not all along suspected the Professor! His black skull cap, and his big hooked nose,

and the yellowleaved, wormeaten booksof magic: all doubts were now removedthat for hours he

Victor's French was coming back to him. He was anxious to know if Malvina had ever met Sir

A little cloud gathered upon Malvina's face. Yes, she had known them all: King Uthur and Igraine and Sir

Ulfias of the Isles. Talked with them, walked with them in the fair lands of France. (It ought to have been

England, but Malvina shook her head. Maybe they had travelled.) It was she who had saved Sir Tristram from

the wiles of Morgan le Fay. "Though that, of course," explained Malvina, "was never known."

The twins were curious why it should have been "of course," but did not like to interrupt again. There were

others before and after. Most of them the twins had never heard of until they came to Charlemagne, beyond

They had all of them been very courteous to her, and some of them indeed quite charming. But . . .

One gathers they had never been to Malvina more than mere acquaintances, such as one passes the time with

"But you liked Sir Launcelot," urged Victor. He was wishful that Malvina should admire Sir Launcelot,

feeling how much there was in common between that early lamented knight and himself. That little affair

Ah! yes, admitted Malvina. She had "liked" him. He was always so so "excellent."

"But he was notnone of them were my own people, my own dear companions." The little cloud had settled

It was Bruno who recalled the three of them to the period of contemporary history.

Polley the cowman's first duty in the morning was to let Bruno loose for a run. He arrived panting and

breathless, and evidently offended at not having been included in the escapade. He could have given them

both away quite easily if he had not been the most forgiving of blackandtan collies. As it was, he had been

worrying himself crazy for the last halfhour, feeling sure they had forgotten the time. "Don't you know it's

nearly six o'clock? That in less than half an hour Jane will be knocking at your doors with glasses of hot milk,

and will probably drop them and scream when she finds your beds empty and the window wide open." That is

what he had intended should be his first words, but on scenting Malvina they went from him entirely. He

gave her one look and flopped down flat, wriggling towards her, whining and wagging his tail at the same

time. Malvina acknowledged his homage by laughing and patting his head with her foot, and that sent him

into the seventh heaven of delight. They all four descended the hill together and parted at the orchard gate.

The twins expressed a polite but quite sincere hope that they would have the pleasure of seeing Malvina

again; but Malvina, seized maybe with sudden doubts as to whether she had behaved with discretion, appears

to have replied evasively. Ten minutes later she was lying asleep, the golden head pillowed on the round

white arm; as Mrs. Muldoon on her way down to the kitchen saw for herself. And the twins, fortunate enough

to find a side door open, slipped into the house unnoticed and scrambled back into their beds.

It was quarter past nine when Mrs. Arlington came in herself and woke them up. She was shorttempered

with them both and had evidently been crying. They had their breakfast in the kitchen.

During lunch hardly a word was spoken. And there was no pudding. Mr. Arlington, a stout, florid gentleman,

had no time for pudding. The rest might sit and enjoy it at their leisure, but not so Mr. Arlington. Somebody

had to see to thingsthat is, if they were not to be allowed to go to rack and ruin. If other people could not

be relied upon to do their duty, so that everything inside the house and out of it was thrown upon one pair of

shoulders, then it followed as a natural consequence that that pair of shoulders could not spare the necessary

time to properly finish its meals. This it was that was at the root of the decay of English farming. When

farmers' wives, to say nothing of sons and daughters old enough one might imagine to be anxious to do

something in repayment for the money and care lavished upon them, had all put their shoulders to the wheel,

then English farming had prospered. When, on the other hand, other people shirked their fair share of labour

It was the eldest Arlington girl's quite audible remark that pa could have eaten two helpings of pudding while

he had been talking, that caused Mr. Arlington to lose the thread of his discourse. To put it quite bluntly, what

Mr. Arlington meant to say was this: He had never wanted to be a farmerat least not in the beginning.

Other men in his position, having acquired competency by years of selfsacrificing labour, would have

retired to a wellearned leisure. Having yielded to persuasion and taken on the job, he was going to see it

through; and everybody else was going to do their share or there would be trouble.

Mr. Arlington, swallowing the remains of his glass in a single gulp, spoilt a dignified exit by violently

hiccoughing, and Mrs. Arlington rang the bell furiously for the parlourmaid to clear away. The pudding

passed untouched from before the very eyes of the twins. It was a blackcurrant pudding with brown sugar.

That night Mrs. Arlington appears to have confided in the twins, partly for her own relief and partly for their

moral benefit. If Mrs. Arlington had enjoyed the blessing in disguise of a less indulgent mother, all might

have been well. By nature Mrs. Arlington had been endowed with an active and energetic temperament.

"Miss Can'tsitstillaminute," her nurse had always called her. Unfortunately it had been allowed to sink

into disuse; was now in all probability beyond hope of recovery. Their father was quite right. When they had

lived in Bayswater and the business was in Mincing Lane it did not matter. Now it was different. A farmer's

wife ought to be up at six; she ought to see that everybody else was up at six; servants looked after, kept up to

the mark; children encouraged by their mother's example. Organisation. That was what was wanted. The day

mapped out; to every hour its appointed task. Then, instead of the morning being gone before you could turn

yourself round, and confusion made worse confounded by your leaving off what you were doing and trying to

do six things at once that you couldn't remember whether you had done or whether you hadn't . . .

Here Mrs. Arlington appears to have dissolved into tears. Generally speaking, she was a placid, smiling, most

amiable lady, quite delightful to have about the house provided all you demanded of her were pleasant looks

and a sunny disposition. The twins appear to have joined their tears to hers. Tucked in and left to themselves,

one imagines the problem being discussed with grave seriousness, much whispered conversation, then slept

upon, the morning bringing with it ideas. The result being that the next evening, between high tea and supper,

Mrs. Muldoon, answering herself the knock at the door, found twin figures standing hand in hand on the

There was no need of the proverbial feather. Mrs. Muldoon made a grab at the settle but missed it. She caught

"We're so sorry," apologised Victor. "We thought you knew. We ought to have said Mademoiselle Malvina."

Mrs. Muldoon regained her feet, and without answering walked straight into the study.

"They want to know," said Mrs. Muldoon, "if the Fairy's in." The Professor, with his back to the window, was

"Shall I say 'not at home'?" suggested Mrs. Muldoon. "Or hadn't you better see them yourself."

They came in, looking a little scared and still holding one another by the hand. They wished the Professor

good evening, and when he rose they backed away from him. The Professor shook hands with them, but they

did not let go, so that Victoria gave him her right hand and Victor his left, and then at the Professor's

"I hope we do not disturb you," said Victor. "We wanted to see Mademoiselle Malvina."

"I'm sorry," said the Professor, "but she isn't in. At least, I don't think so." (The Professor never was quite

sure. "She slips in and out making no more noise than a winddriven rose leaf," was Mrs. Muldoon's

They looked at one another. It would never do to offend the wise and learned Christopher. Besides, a

magician, it is to be assumed, has more ways than one of learning what people are thinking.

"It is about mamma," explained Victoria. "We wondered if Malvina would mind changing her."

The Professor had been reading up Malvina. It flashed across him that this had always been her speciality:

Changing people. How had the Arlington twins discovered it? And why did they want their mother changed?

And what did they want her changed into? It was shocking when you come to think of it! The Professor

became suddenly so stern, that if the twins could have seen his expressionwhich, owing to the fading light,

"Why do you want your mother changed?" demanded the Professor. Even as it was his voice alarmed them.

It was still very disgraceful. What were we coming to when children went about clamouring for their mothers

to be "improved"! The atmosphere was charged with indignation. The twins felt it.

"She wants to be," persisted Victoria. "She wants to be energetic and to get up early in the morning and do

The Professor maintains stoutly that his only intention was a joke. It was not even as if anything

objectionable had been suggested. The Professor himself had on occasions been made the confidant of both.

"Best woman that ever lived, if only one could graft a little energy upon her. No sense of time. Too

easygoing. No idea of keeping people up to the mark." So Mr. Arlington, over the nuts and wine.

"It's pure laziness. Oh, yes, it is. My friends say I'm so 'restful'; but that's the proper explanation of itborn

laziness. And yet I try. You have no idea, Professor Littlecherry, how much I try." So Mrs. Arlington,

Besides, how absurd to believe that Malvina could possibly change anybody! Way back, when the human

brain was yet in process of evolution, such things may have been possible. Hypnotic suggestion, mesmeric

influence, dormant brain cells quickened into activity by magnetic vibration. All that had been lost. These

were the days of George the Fifth, not of King Heremon. What the Professor was really after was: How

would Malvina receive the proposal? Of course she would try to get out of it. A dear little thing. But could

Malvina was standing beside him. No one had remarked her entrance. The eyes of the twins had been glued

upon the wise and learned Christopher. The Professor, when he was thinking, never saw anything. Still, it

"We should never change what the good God has once fashioned," said Malvina. She spoke very gravely.

"You didn't always think so," said the Professor. It nettled the Professor that all idea of this being a good joke

She made a little gesture. It conveyed to the Professor that his remark had not been altogether in good taste.

"But this is something very different," continued the Professor. Quite another interest had taken hold of the

Professor. It was easy enough to summon Dame Commonsense to one's aid when Malvina was not present.

Before those strange eyes the good lady had a habit of sneaking away. Supposeof course the idea was

ridiculous, but supposesomething did happen! As a psychological experiment was not one justified? What

was the beginning of all science but applied curiosity? Malvina might be ableand willingto explain how

it was done. That is, if anything did happen, which, of course, it wouldn't, and so much the better. This thing

"It would be using a gift not for one's own purposes, but to help others," urged the Professor.

"It seems to me, if I may so express it," added the Professor, "that really it would be in the nature of making

amends forwell, for for our youthful follies," concluded the Professor a little nervously.

Malvina's eyes were fixed on the Professor. In the dim light of the lowceilinged room, those eyes seemed all

It was not at all fair, as the Professor told himself afterwards, her laying the responsibility on him. If she

really was the original Malvina, ladyinwaiting to Queen Harbundia, then she was quite old enough to have

decided for herself. From the Professor's calculations she must now be about three thousand eight hundred.

The Professor himself was not yet sixty; in comparison a mere babe! But Malvina's eyes were compelling.

"Well, it can't do any harm," said the Professor. And Malvina seems to have accepted that as her authority.

The Professor saw the twins to the door. For some reason the Professor could not have explained, they all

three walked out on tiptoe. Old Mr. Brent, the postman, was passing, and the twins ran after him and each

took a hand. Malvina was still standing where the Professor had left her. It was very absurd, but the Professor

felt frightened. He went into the kitchen, where it was light and cheerful, and started Mrs. Muldoon on Home

The twins did not talk that night, and decided next morning not to say a word, but just to ask their mother to

come for an evening walk with them. The fear was that she might demand reasons. But, quite oddly, she

consented without question. It seemed to the twins that it was Mrs. Arlington herself who took the pathway

leading past the cave, and when they reached the Cross Stones she sat down and apparently had forgotten

their existence. They stole away without her noticing them, but did not quite know what to do with

themselves. They ran for half a mile till they came to the wood; there they remained awhile, careful not to

venture within; and then they crept back. They found their mother sitting just as they had left her. They

thought she was asleep, but her eyes were wide open. They were tremendously relieved, though what they

had feared they never knew. They sat down, one on each side of her, and each took a hand, but in spite of her

eyes being open, it was quite a time before she seemed conscious of their return. She rose and slowly looked

about her, and as she did so the church clock struck nine. She could not at first believe it was so late.

Convinced by looking at her watchthere was just light enough for her to see itshe became all at once

more angry than the twins had ever known her, and for the first time in their lives they both experienced the

sensation of having their ears boxed. Nine o'clock was the proper time for supper and they were half an hour

from home, and it was all their fault. It did not take them half an hour. It took them twenty minutes, Mrs.

Arlington striding ahead and the twins panting breathless behind her. Mr. Arlington had not yet returned. He

came in five minutes afterwards, and Mrs. Arlington told him what she thought of him. It was the shortest

supper within the twins' recollection. They found themselves in bed ten minutes in advance of the record.

They could hear their mother's voice from the kitchen. A jug of milk had been overlooked and had gone sour.

It was from Mr. Arlington that the Professor heard the news. Mr. Arlington could not stop an instant, dinner

being at twelve sharp and it wanting but ten minutes to; but seems to have yielded to temptation. The

breakfast hour at the Manor Farm was now six a.m., had been so since Thursday; the whole family fully

dressed and Mrs. Arlington presiding. If the Professor did not believe it he could come round any morning

and see for himself. The Professor appears to have taken Mr. Arlington's word for it. By sixthirty everybody

at their job and Mrs. Arlington at hers, consisting chiefly of seeing to it for the rest of the day that everybody

was. Lights out at ten and everybody in bed; most of them only too glad to be there. "Quite right; keeps us all

up to the mark," was Mr. Arlington's opinion (this was on Saturday). Just what was wanted. Not perhaps for a

permanency; and, of course, there were drawbacks. The strenuous lifeseeing to it that everybody else leads

the strenuous life; it does not go with unmixed amiability. Particularly in the beginning. Newborn zeal: must

expect it to outrun discretion. Does not do to discourage it. Modifications to be suggested later. Taken all

round, Mr. Arlington's view was that the thing must be regarded almost as the answer to a prayer. Mr.

Arlington's eyes on their way to higher levels, appear to have been arrested by the church clock. It decided

Mr. Arlington to resume his homeward way without further loss of time. At the bend of the lane the

This seems to have been the end of the Professor, regarded as a sane and intelligent member of modern

society. He had not been sure at the time, but it was now revealed to him that when he had urged Malvina to

test her strength, so to express it, on the unfortunate Mrs. Arlington, it was with the conviction that the result

would restore him to his mental equilibrium. That Malvina with a wave of her wandor whatever the

hocuspocus may have beenwould be able to transform the hitherto incorrigibly indolent and easygoing

Mrs. Arlington into a sort of feminine Lloyd George, had not really entered into his calculations.

Forgetting his lunch, he must have wandered aimlessly about, not returning home until late in the afternoon.

During dinner he appears to have been rather restless and nervous"jumpy," according to the evidence of

the little serving maid. Once he sprang out of his chair as if shot when the little serving maid accidentally let

fall a tablespoon; and twice he upset the salt. It was at mealtime that, as a rule, the Professor found his

attitude towards Malvina most sceptical. A fairy who could put away quite a respectable cut from the joint,

followed by two helpings of pie, does take a bit of believing in. Tonight the Professor found no difficulty.

The White Ladies had never been averse to accepting mortal hospitality. There must always have been a

certain adaptability. Malvina, since that fateful night of her banishment, had, one supposes, passed through

varied experiences. For present purposes she had assumed the form of a jeune fille of the twentieth century

(anno Domini). An appreciation of Mrs. Muldoon's excellent cooking, together with a glass of light sound

One takes it that he could not for a moment get Mrs. Arlington out of his mind. More than once, stealing a

covert glance across the table, it seemed to him that Malvina was regarding him with a mocking smile. Some

impish spirit it must have been that had prompted him. For thousands of years Malvina had ledat all events

so far as was knowna reformed and blameless existence; had subdued and put behind her that fatal passion

of hers for change: in other people. What madness to have revived it! And no Queen Harbundia handy now to

keep her in check. The Professor had a distinct sensation, while peeling a pear, that he was being turned into a

guineapiga curious feeling of shrinking about the legs. So vivid was the impression, that involuntarily the

Professor jumped off his chair and ran to look at himself in the mirror over the sideboard. He was not fully

relieved even then. It may have been the mirror. It was very old; one of those things with little gilt balls all

round it; and it looked to the Professor as if his nose was growing straight out of his face. Malvina, trusting

he had not been taken suddenly ill, asked if there was anything she could do for him. He seems to have

The Professor had taught Malvina cribbage, and usually of an evening they played a hand or two. But

tonight the Professor was not in the mood, and Malvina had contented herself with a book. She was

particularly fond of the old chroniclers. The Professor had an entire shelf of them, many in the original

French. Making believe to be reading himself, he heard Malvina break into a cheerful laugh, and went and

looked over her shoulder. She was reading the history of her own encounter with the proprietor of tin mines,

an elderly gentleman disliking late hours, whom she had turned into a nightingale. It occurred to the Professor

that prior to the Arlington case the recalling of this incident would have brought to her shame and remorse.

"A silly trick," commented the Professor. He spoke quite heatedly. "No one has any right to go about

"Not for one's own pleasure or revenge," she made answer. Her tone was filled with meekness. It had a touch

of selfreproach. "That is very wrong, of course. But changing them for their own goodat least, not

"Little hypocrite!" muttered the Professor to himself. "She's got back a taste for her old tricks, and Lord

The Professor spent the rest of the evening among his indexes in search of the latest information regarding

Meanwhile the Arlington affair had got about the village. The twins in all probability had been unable to keep

their secret. Jane, the dismissed, had looked in to give Mrs. Muldoon her version of Thursday night's scene in

the Arlington kitchen, and Mrs. Muldoon, with a sense of things impending, may unconsciously have

The Marigolds met the Arlingtons on Sunday, after morning service, and heard all about it. That is to say,

they met Mr. Arlington and the other children; Mrs. Arlington, with the two elder girls, having already

attended early communion at seven. Mrs. Marigold was a pretty, fluffy, engaging little woman, ten years

younger than her husband. She could not have been altogether a fool, or she would not have known it.

Marigold, rising politician, ought, of course, to have married a woman able to help him; but seems to have

fallen in love with her a few miles out of Brussels, over a convent wall. Mr. Arlington was not a regular

churchgoer, but felt on this occasion that he owed it to his Maker. He was still in love with his new wife.

But not blindly. Later on a guiding hand might be necessary. But first let the new seed get firmly rooted.

Marigold's engagements necessitated his returning to town on Sunday afternoon, and Mrs. Marigold walked

part of the way with him to the station. On her way back across the fields she picked up the Arlington twins.

Later, she seems to have called in at the cottage and spoken to Mrs. Muldoon about Jane, who, she had heard,

was in want of a place. A little before sunset she was seen by the Doctor climbing the path to the Warren.

Malvina that evening was missing for dinner. When she returned she seemed pleased with herself.

Some days laterit may have been the next week; the exact date appears to have got mislaidMarigold,

M.P., looked in on the Professor. They talked about Tariff Reform, and then Marigold got up and made sure

"You know my wife," he said. "We've been married six years, and there's never been a cloud between us

"If you take my advice," he said, "you'll leave her alone." He spoke with passion and conviction.

"It's just what I wish to goodness I had done," he answered. "I blame myself entirely."

"So long as we see our own mistakes," said the Professor, "there is hope for us all. You go straight home,

young man, and tell her you've changed your mind. Tell her you don't want her with brains. Tell her you like

"I've tried to," said Marigold. "She says it's too late. That the light has come to her and she can't help it."

It was the Professor's turn to stare. He had not heard anything of Sunday's transactions. He had been hoping

against hope that the Arlington affair would remain a locked secret between himself and the twins, and had

"She's joined the Fabian Society," continued Marigold gloomily. "They've put her in the nursery. And the

W.S.P.U. If it gets about before the next election I'll have to look out for another constituencythat's all."

"I didn't hear about her," answered Marigold. "If I had I mightn't have gone up to town. You think it right," he

"Who's encouraging her?" demanded the professor. "If fools didn't go about thinking they could improve

every other fool but themselves, this sort of thing wouldn't happen. Arlington had an amiable,

sweettempered wife, and instead of thanking God and keeping quiet about it, he worries her out of her life

because she is not the managing woman. Well, now he's got the managing woman. I met him on Wednesday

with a bump on his forehead as big as an egg. Says he fell over the mat. It can't be done. You can't have a

person changed just as far as you want them changed and there stop. You let 'em alone or you change them

altogether, and then they don't know themselves what they're going to turn out. A sensible man in your

position would have been only too thankful for a wife who didn't poke her nose into his affairs, and with

whom he could get away from his confounded politics. You've been hinting to her about once a month, I

expect, what a tragedy it was that you hadn't married a woman with brains. Well, now she's found her brains

and is using them. Why shouldn't she belong to the Fabian Society and the W.S.P.U? Shows independence of

character. Best thing for you to do is to join them yourself. Then you'll be able to work together."

"Who said I agreed with her?" snapped the Professor. "I'm in a very awkward position."

"I suppose," said Marigoldhe was hesitating with the door in his hand"it wouldn't be of any use my

"I believe," said the Professor, "that she is fond of the neighbourhood of the Cross Stones towards sundown.

"I was wondering," said Marigold, "whether, if I put it to her as a personal favour, she might not be willing to

"Well," explained Marigold, "I take it that your young foreign friend has met my wife and talked politics to

her, and that what has happened is the result. She must be a young person of extraordinary ability; but it

would be only losing one convert, and I could make it up to her inin other ways." He spoke with

"It might mean," said the Professor"that is, assuming that it can be done at allMrs. Marigold's returning

The Professor had mislaid his spectacles, but thinks there was a tear in Marigold's eye.

"I'll do what I can," said the Professor. "Of course, you mustn't count on it. It may be easier to start a woman

thinking than to stop her, even for a" The Professor checked himself just in time. "I'll talk to her," he said;

It was about time he did. The full extent of Malvina's activities during those few midsummer weeks, till the

return of Flight Commander Raffleton, will never perhaps be fully revealed. According to the Doctor, the

whole business has been grossly exaggerated. There are those who talk as if half the village had been taken to

pieces, altered and improved and sent back home again in a mental state unrecognisable by their own

mothers. Certain it is that Dawson, R.A., generally described by everybody except his wife as "a lovable little

man," and whose only fault was an incurable habit of punning, both in seasonif such a period there

beand more often out, suddenly one morning smashed a Dutch interior, fifteen inches by nine, over the

astonished head of Mrs. Dawson. It clung round her neck, recalling biblical pictures of the head of John the

Baptist, and the framework had to be sawn through before she could get it off. As to the story about his

having been caught by Mrs. Dawson's aunt kissing the housemaid behind the waterbutt, that, as the Doctor

admits, is a bit of bad luck that might have happened to anyone. But whether there was really any evidence

connecting him with Dolly Calthorpe's unaccountable missing of the last train home, is of course, a more

serious matter. Mrs. Dawson, a handsome, highspirited woman herself, may have found Dawson, as

originally fashioned, trying to the nerves; though even then the question arises: Why have married him? But

there is a difference, as Mrs. Dawson has pointed out, between a husband who hasn't enough of the natural

man in him and a husband who has a deal too much. It is difficult to regulate these matters.

Altogether, and taking an outside estimate, the Doctor's opinion is that there may have been half a dozen,

who, with Malvina's assistance, succeeded in hypnotising themselves into temporary insanity. When Malvina,

a little disappointed, but yielding quite sweetly her own judgment to that of the wise and learned Christopher,

consented to "restore" them, the explanation was that, having spent their burst of illacquired energy, they

Mrs. Arlington does not agree with the Doctor. She had been trying to reform herself for quite a long time

and had miserably failed. There was something about themit might almost be described as an aromathat

prompted her that evening to take the twins into her confidence; a sort of intuition that in some way they

could help her. It remained with her all the next day; and when the twins returned in the evening, in company

with the postman, she knew instinctively that they had been about her business. It was this same intuitive

desire that drew her to the Downs. She is confident she would have taken that walk to the Cross Stones even

if the twins had not proposed it. Indeed, according to her own account, she was not aware that the twins had

accompanied her. There was something about the stones; a sense as of a presence. She knew when she

reached them that she had arrived at the appointed place; and when there appeared to hercoming from

where she could not tella diminutive figure that seemed in some mysterious way as if it were clothed

merely in the fading light, she remembered distinctly that she was neither surprised nor alarmed. The

diminutive lady sat down beside her and took Mrs. Arlington's hands in both her own. She spoke in a strange

language, but Mrs. Arlington at the time understood it, though now the meaning of it had passed from her.

Mrs. Arlington felt as if her body were being taken away from her. She had a sense of falling, a feeling that

she must make some desperate effort to rise again. The strange little lady was helping her, assisting her to

make this supreme effort. It was as if ages were passing. She was wrestling with unknown powers. Suddenly

she seemed to slip from them. The little lady was holding her up. Clasping each other, they rose and rose and

rose. Mrs. Arlington had a firm conviction that she must always be struggling upward, or they would

overtake her and drag her down again. When she awoke the little lady had gone, but that feeling remained

with her; that passionate acceptance of ceaseless struggle, activity, contention, as now the end and aim of her

existence. At first she did not recollect where she was. A strange colourless light was around her, and a

strange singing as of myriads of birds. And then the clock struck nine and life came back to her with a rush.

But with it still that conviction that she must seize hold of herself and everybody else and get things done. Its

immediate expression, as already has been mentioned, was experienced by the twins.

When, after a talk with the Professor, aided and abetted by Mr. Arlington and the eldest Arlington girl, she

consented to pay that second visit to the stones, it was with very different sensations that she climbed the

grassgrown path. The little lady had met her as before, but the curious deep eyes looked sadly, and Mrs.

Arlington had the impression, generally speaking, that she was about to assist at her own funeral. Again the

little lady took her by the hands, and again she experienced that terror of falling. But instead of ending with

contest and effort she seemed to pass into a sleep, and when she opened her eyes she was again alone. Feeling

a little chilly and unreasonably tired, she walked slowly home, and not being hungry, retired supperless to

One supposes that something of a similar nature may have occurred to the otherswith the exception of Mrs.

Marigold. It was the case of Mrs. Marigold that, as the Doctor grudgingly admits, went far to weaken his

hypothesis. Mrs. Marigold, having emerged, was spreading herself, much to her own satisfaction. She had

discarded her wedding ring as a relic of barbarismof the days when women were mere goods and chattels,

and had made her first speech at a meeting in favour of marriage reform. Subterfuge, in her case, had to be

resorted to. Malvina had tearfully consented, and Marigold, M.P., was to bring Mrs. Marigold to the Cross

Stones that same evening and there leave her, explaining to her that Malvina had expressed a wish to see her

All might have ended well if only Commander Raffleton had not appeared framed in the parlour door just as

Malvina was starting. His Cousin Christopher had written to the Commander. Indeed, after the Arlington

affair, quite pressingly, and once or twice had thought he heard the sound of Flight Commander Raffleton's

propeller, but on each occasion had been disappointed. "Affairs of State," Cousin Christopher had explained

to Malvina, who, familiar one takes it with the calls upon knights and warriors through all the ages, had

"Only arrived this afternoon from France," he explained. "Haven't a moment to spare."

But he had just time to go straight to Malvina. He laughed as he took her in his arms and kissed her full upon

When last he had kissed herit had been in the orchard; the Professor had been witness to itMalvina had

remained quite passive, only that curious little smile about her lips. But now an odd thing happened. A

quivering seemed to pass through all her body, so that it swayed and trembled. The Professor feared she was

going to fall; and, maybe to save herself, she put up her arms about Commander Raffleton's neck, and with a

strange low cryit sounded to the Professor like the cry one sometimes hears at night from some little dying

It must have been a while later when the chiming of the clock recalled to the Professor the appointment with

"You will only just have time," he said, gently seeking to release her. "I'll promise to keep him till you come

But still she made no movement, save for a little gesture of the hands as if she were seeking to lay hold of

something unseen. And then she dropped her arms and looked from one of them to the other. The Professor

did not think of it at the time, but remembered afterwards; that strange aloofness of hers, as if she were

And here follows the Prologue. It ought, of course, to have been written first, but nobody knew of it until

quite the end entirely. It was told to Commander Raffleton by a French comrade, who in days of peace had

been a painter, mingling with others of his kind, especially such as found their inspiration in the wide

horizons and legendhaunted dells of oldworld Brittany. Afterwards the Commander told it to the Professor,

and the Professor's only stipulation was that it should not be told to the Doctor, at least for a time. For the

Doctor would see in it only confirmation for his own narrow sensebound theories, while to the Professor it

It commenced in the year Eighteen hundred and ninetyeight (anno Domini), on a particularly unpleasant

evening in late February"a stormy winter's night," one would describe it, were one writing mere romance.

It came to the lonely cottage of Madame Lavigne on the edge of the moor that surrounds the sunken village

of AvenaChrist. Madame Lavigne, who was knitting stockingsfor she lived by knitting

stockingsheard, as she thought, a passing of feet, and what seemed like a tap at the door. She dismissed the

idea, for who would be passing at such an hour, and where there was no road? But a few minutes later the

tapping came again, and Madame Lavigne, taking her candle in her hand, went to see who was there. The

instant she released the latch a gust of wind blew out the candle, and Madame Lavigne could see no one. She

called, but there was no answer. She was about to close the door again when she heard a faint sound. It was

not exactly a cry. It was as if someone she could not see, in the tiniest of voices, had said something she could

Madame Lavigne crossed herself and muttered a prayer, and then she heard it again. It seemed to come from

close at her feet, and feeling with her handsfor she thought it might be a stray catshe found quite a large

parcel, It was warm and soft, though, of course, a bit wet, and Madame Lavigne brought it in, and having

closed the door and relit her candle, laid it on the table. And then she saw it was the tiniest of babies.

It must always be a difficult situation. Madame Lavigne did what most people would have done in the case.

She unrolled the wrappings, and taking the little thing on her lap, sat down in front of the dull peat fire and

considered. It seemed wonderfully contented, and Madame Lavigne thought the best thing to do would be to

undress it and put it to bed, and then go on with her knitting. She would consult Father Jean in the morning

and take his advice. She had never seen such fine clothes. She took them off one by one, lovingly feeling

their texture, and when she finally removed the last little shift and the little white thing lay exposed, Madame

Lavigne sprang up with a cry and all but dropped it into the fire. For she saw by the mark that every Breton

Her proper course, as she well knew, was to have opened the door and flung it out into the darkness. Most

women of the village would have done so, and spent the rest of the night on their knees. But someone must

have chosen with foresight. There came to Madame Lavigne the memory of her good man and her three tall

sons, taken from her one by one by the jealous sea, and, come what might of it, she could not do it. The little

thing understood, that was clear, for it smiled quite knowingly and stretched out its little hands, touching

Madame Lavigne's brown withered skin, and stirring forgotten beatings of her heart.

Father Jeanone takes him to have been a tolerant, gently wise old gentlemancould see no harm. That is,

if Madame Lavigne could afford the luxury. Maybe it was a good fairy. Would bring her luck. And certain it

is that the cackling of Madame's hens was heard more often than before, and the weeds seemed fewer in the

Of course, the news spread. One gathers that Madame Lavigne rather gave herself airs. But the neighbours

shook their heads, and the child grew up lonely and avoided. Fortunately, the cottage was far from other

houses, and there was always the great moor with its deep hidingplaces. Father Jean was her sole playmate.

He would take her with him on his long tramps through his scattered district, leaving her screened among the

furze and bracken near to the solitary farmsteads where he made his visitations.

He had learnt it was useless: all attempt of Mother Church to scold out of this sea and moorgirt flock their

pagan superstitions. He would leave it to time. Later, perhaps opportunity might occur to place the child in

some convent, where she would learn to forget, and grow into a good Catholic. Meanwhile, one had to take

pity on the little lonely creature. Not entirely for her own sake maybe; a dear affectionate little soul strangely

wise; so she seemed to Father Jean. Under the shade of trees or sharing warm shelter with the softeyed

cows, he would teach her from his small stock of knowledge. Every now and then she would startle him with

an intuition, a comment strangely unchildlike. It was as if she had known all about it, long ago. Father Jean

would steal a swift glance at her from under his shaggy eyebrows and fall into a silence. It was curious also

how the wild things of the field and wood seemed unafraid of her. At times, returning to where he had left her

hidden, he would pause, wondering to whom she was talking, and then as he drew nearer would hear the

stealing away of little feet, the startled flutter of wings. She had elfish ways, of which it seemed impossible to

cure her. Often the good man, returning from some late visit of mercy with his lantern and his stout oak

cudgel, would pause and listen to a wandering voice. It was never near enough for him to hear the words, and

the voice was strange to him, though he knew it could be no one else. Madame Lavigne would shrug her

shoulders. How could she help it? It was not for her to cross the "child," even supposing bolts and bars likely

to be of any use. Father Jean gave it up in despair. Neither was it for him either to be too often forbidding and

lecturing. Maybe the cunning tender ways had wove their web about the childless old gentleman's heart,

making him also somewhat afraid. Perhaps other distractions! For Madame Lavigne would never allow her to

do anything but the lightest of work. He would teach her to read. So quickly she learnt that it seemed to

Father Jean she must be making believe not to have known it already. But he had his reward in watching the

joy with which she would devour, for preference, the quaint printed volumes of romance and history that he

It was when she was about thirteen that the ladies and gentlemen came from Paris. Of course they were not

real ladies and gentlemen. Only a little company of artists seeking new fields. They had "done" the coast and

the timbered houses of the narrow streets, and one of them had suggested exploring the solitary, unknown

inlands. They came across her seated on an old grey stone reading from an ancientlooking book, and she

had risen and curtsied to them. She was never afraid. It was she who excited fear. Often she would look after

the children flying from her, feeling a little sad. But, of course, it could not be helped. She was a fairy. She

would have done them no harm, but this they could not be expected to understand. It was a delightful change;

meeting human beings who neither screamed nor hastily recited their paternosters, but who, instead, returned

one's smile. They asked her where she lived, and she showed them. They were staying at AvenaChrist; and

one of the ladies was brave enough even to kiss her. Laughing and talking they all walked down the hill

together. They found Madame Lavigne working in her garden. Madame Lavigne washed her hands of all

responsibility. It was for Suzanne to decide. It seemed they wanted to make a picture of her, sitting on the

grey stone where they had found her. It was surely only kind to let them; so next morning she was there again

waiting for them. They gave her a five franc piece. Madame Lavigne was doubtful of handling it, but Father

Jean vouched for it as being good Republican money; and as the days went by Madame Lavigne's black

stocking grew heavier and heavier as she hung it again each night in the chimney.

It was the lady who had first kissed her that discovered who she was. They had all of them felt sure from the

beginning that she was a fairy, and that "Suzanne" could not be her real name. They found it in the

"Heptameron of Friar Bonnet. In which is recorded the numerous adventures of the valiant and puissant King

Ryence of Bretagne," which one of them had picked up on the Quai aux Fleurs and brought with him. It told

all about the White Ladies, and therein she was described. There could be no mistaking her; the fair body that

was like to a willow swayed by the wind. The white feet that could pass, leaving the dew unshaken from the

grass. The eyes blue and deep as mountain lakes. The golden locks of which the sun was jealous.

It was all quite clear. She was Malvina, once favourite to Harbundia, Queen of the White Ladies of Brittany.

For reasons further allusion to which politeness forbadeshe had been a wanderer, no one knowing what

had become of her. And now the whim had taken her to reappear as a little Breton peasant girl, near to the

scene of her past glories. They knelt before her, offering her homage, and all the ladies kissed her. The

gentlemen of the party thought their turn would follow. But it never did. It was not their own shyness that

stood in their way: one must do them that justice. It was as if some youthful queen, exiled and unknown

amongst strangers, had been suddenly recognised by a little band of her faithful subjects, passing by chance

that way. So that, instead of frolic and laughter, as had been intended, they remained standing with bared

She put them at their easeor tried towith a gracious gesture. But enjoined upon them all her wish for

secrecy. And so dismissed they seem to have returned to the village a marvellously sober little party,

experiencing all the sensations of honest folk admitted to their first glimpse of high society.

They came again next yearat least a few of thembringing with them a dress more worthy of Malvina's

wearing. It was as near as Paris could achieve to the true and original costume as described by the good Friar

Bonnet, the which had been woven in a single night by the wizard spider Karai out of moonlight. Malvina

accepted it with gracious thanks, and was evidently pleased to find herself again in fit and proper clothes. It

was hidden away for rare occasions where only Malvina knew. But the lady who had first kissed her, and

whose speciality was fairies, craving permission, Malvina consented to wear it while sitting for her portrait.

The picture one may still see in the Palais des Beaux Arts at Nantes (the Bretonne Room). It represents her

standing straight as an arrow, a lone little figure in the centre of a treeless moor. The painting of the robe is

said to be very wonderful. "Malvina of Brittany" is the inscription, the date being Nineteen Hundred and

The next year Malvina was no longer there. Madame Lavigne, folding knotted hands, had muttered her last

paternoster. Pere Jean had urged the convent. But for the first time, with him, she had been frankly obstinate.

Some fancy seemed to have got into the child's head. Something that she evidently connected with the vast

treeless moor rising southward to where the ancient menhir of King Taramis crowned its summit. The good

man yielded, as usual. For the present there were Madame Lavigne's small savings. Suzanne's wants were but

few. The rare shopping necessary Father Jean could see to himself. With the coming of winter he would

broach the subject again, and then be quite firm. Just these were the summer nights when Suzanne loved to

roam; and as for danger! there was not a lad for ten leagues round who would not have run a mile to avoid

passing, even in daylight, that cottage standing where the moor dips down to the sealands.

But one surmises that even a fairy may feel lonesome. Especially a banished fairy, hanging as it were

between earth and air, knowing mortal maidens kissed and courted, while one's own companions kept away

from one in hiding. Maybe the fancy came to her that, after all these years, they might forgive her. Still, it

was their meeting place, so legend ran, especially of midsummer nights. Rare it was now for human eye to

catch a glimpse of the shimmering robes, but high on the treeless moor to the music of the Lady of the

Fountain, one might still hear, were one brave enough to venture, the rhythm of their dancing feet. If she

sought them, softly calling, might they not reveal themselves to her, make room for her once again in the

whirling circle? One has the idea that the moonlight frock may have added to her hopes. Philosophy admits

If all of them had not disappearedbeen kissed three times upon the lips by mortal man and so become a

woman? It seems to have been a possibility for which your White Lady had to be prepared. That is, if she

chose to suffer it. If not, it was unfortunate for the too daring mortal. But if he gained favour in her eyes! That

he was brave, his wooing proved. If, added thereto, he were comely, with kind strong ways, and eyes that

drew you? History proves that such dreams must have come even to White Ladies. Maybe more especially on

midsummer nights when the moon is at its full. It was on such a night that Sir Gerylon had woke Malvina's

sister Sighile with a kiss. A true White Lady must always dare to face her fate.

It seems to have befallen Malvina. Some told Father Jean how he had arrived in a chariot drawn by winged

horses, the thunder of his passing waking many in the sleeping villages beneath. And others how he had come

in the form of a great bird. Father Jean had heard strange sounds himself, and certain it was that Suzanne had

Father Jean heard another version a few weeks later, told him by an English officer of Engineers who had

ridden from the nearest station on a bicycle and who arrived hot and ravenously thirsty. And Father Jean,

under promise of seeing Suzanne on the first opportunity, believed it. But to most of his flock it sounded an

So ends my storyor rather the story I have pieced together from information of a contradictory nature

received. Whatever you make of it; whether with the Doctor you explain it away; or whether with Professor

Littlecherry, LL.D., F.R.S., you believe the world not altogether explored and mapped, the fact remains that

Malvina of Brittany has passed away. To the younger Mrs. Raffleton, listening on the Sussex Downs to dull,

distant sounds that make her heart beat, and very nervous of telegraph boys, has come already some of the

disadvantages attendant on her new rank of womanhood. And yet one gathers, looking down into those

strange deep eyes, that she would not change anything about her, even if now she could.

I had turned off from the Edgware Road into a street leading west, the atmosphere of which had appealed to

me. It was a place of quiet houses standing behind little gardens. They had the usual names printed on the

stuccoed gateposts. The fading twilight was just sufficient to enable one to read them. There was a Laburnum

Villa, and The Cedars, and a Cairngorm, rising to the height of three storeys, with a curious little turret that

branched out at the top, and was crowned with a conical roof, so that it looked as if wearing a witch's hat.

Especially when two small windows just below the eaves sprang suddenly into light, and gave one the feeling

The street curved to the right, ending in an open space through which passed a canal beneath a low arched

bridge. There were still the same quiet houses behind their small gardens, and I watched for a while the

lamplighter picking out the shape of the canal, that widened just above the bridge into a lake with an island in

the middle. After that I must have wandered in a circle, for later on I found myself back in the same spot,

though I do not suppose I had passed a dozen people on my way; and then I set to work to find my way back

I thought I had taken the road by which I had come, but the half light must have deceived me. Not that it

mattered. They had a lurking mystery about them, these silent streets with their suggestion of hushed

movement behind drawn curtains, of whispered voices behind the flimsy walls. Occasionally there would

escape the sound of laughter, suddenly stifled as it seemed, and once the sudden cry of a child.

It was in a short street of semidetached villas facing a high blank wall that, as I passed, I saw a blind move

halfway up, revealing a woman's face. A gas lamp, the only one the street possessed, was nearly opposite. I

thought at first it was the face of a girl, and then, as I looked again, it might have been the face of an old

woman. One could not distinguish the colouring. In any case, the cold, blue gaslight would have made it

The remarkable feature was the eyes. It might have been, of course, that they alone caught the light and held

it, rendering them uncannily large and brilliant. Or it might have been that the rest of the face was small and

delicate, out of all proportion to them. She may have seen me, for the blind was drawn down again, and I

There was no particular reason why, but the incident lingered with me. The sudden raising of the blind, as of

the curtain of some small theatre, the barely furnished room coming dimly into view, and the woman

standing there, close to the footlights, as to my fancy it seemed. And then the sudden ringing down of the

curtain before the play had begun. I turned at the corner of the street. The blind had been drawn up again, and

I saw again the slight, girlish figure silhouetted against the side panes of the bow window.

At the same moment a man knocked up against me. It was not his fault. I had stopped abruptly, not giving

him time to avoid me. We both apologised, blaming the darkness. It may have been my fancy, but I had the

feeling that, instead of going on his way, he had turned and was following me. I waited till the next corner,

and then swung round on my heel. But there was no sign of him, and after a while I found myself back in the

Once or twice, in idle mood, I sought the street again, but without success; and the thing would, I expect,

have faded from my memory, but that one evening, on my way home from Paddington, I came across the

woman in the Harrow Road. There was no mistaking her. She almost touched me as she came out of a

fishmonger's shop, and unconsciously, at the beginning, I found myself following her. This time I noticed the

turnings, and five minutes' walking brought us to the street. Half a dozen times I must have been within a

hundred yards of it. I lingered at the corner. She had not noticed me, and just as she reached the house a man

I was due at a bachelor gathering that evening, and after dinner, the affair being fresh in my mind, I talked

about it. I am not sure, but I think it was in connection with a discussion on Maeterlinck. It was that sudden

lifting of the blind that had caught hold of me. As if, blundering into an empty theatre, I had caught a glimpse

of some drama being played in secret. We passed to other topics, and when I was leaving a fellow guest

asked me which way I was going. I told him, and, it being a fine night, he proposed that we should walk

together. And in the quiet of Harley Street he confessed that his desire had not been entirely the pleasure of

"It is rather curious," he said, "but today there suddenly came to my remembrance a case that for nearly

eleven years I have never given a thought to. And now, on top of it, comes your description of that woman's

"It was the eyes that I chiefly remember her by," he replied. "Would you know the street again?"

"It may seem, perhaps, odd to you," I answered, "but it would trouble me, the idea of any harm coming to her

"You can feel quite safe on that point," he assured me. "I was her counselthat is, if it is the same woman.

I could not see the reason for his question. He could hardly expect her to be wearing the clothes of eleven

"I don't think I noticed," I answered. "Some sort of a blouse, I suppose." And then I recollected. "Ah, yes,

there was something uncommon," I added. "An unusually broad band of velvet, it looked like, round her

"I will look you up tomorrow afternoon, if I may," he said. "We might take a stroll round together."

He called on me about halfpast five, and we reached the street just as the one solitary gaslamp had been

lighted. I pointed out the house to him, and he crossed over and looked at the number.

"Quite right," he said, on returning. "I made inquiries this morning. She was released six weeks ago on

"Not much use hanging about," he said. "The blind won't go up tonight. Rather a clever idea, selecting a

He had an engagement that evening; but later on he told me the storythat is, so far as he then knew it.

It was in the early days of the garden suburb movement. One of the first sites chosen was off the Finchley

Road. The place was in the building, and one of the streetsLaleham Gardenshad only some half a dozen

houses in it, all unoccupied save one. It was a lonely, loose end of the suburb, terminating suddenly in open

fields. From the unfinished end of the road the ground sloped down somewhat steeply to a pond, and beyond

that began a small wood. The one house occupied had been bought by a young married couple named

The husband was a goodlooking, pleasant young fellow. Being cleanshaven, his exact age was difficult to

judge. The wife, it was quite evident, was little more than a girl. About the man there was a suggestion of

weakness. At least, that was the impression left on the mind of the houseagent. Today he would decide,

and tomorrow he changed his mind. Jetson, the agent, had almost given up hope of bringing off a deal. In

the end it was Mrs. Hepworth who, taking the matter into her own hands, fixed upon the house in Laleham

Gardens. Young Hepworth found fault with it on the ground of its isolation. He himself was often away for

days at a time, travelling on business, and was afraid she would be nervous. He had been very persistent on

this point; but in whispered conversations she had persuaded him out of his objection. It was one of those

pretty, fussy little houses; and it seemed to have taken her fancy. Added to which, according to her argument,

it was just within their means, which none of the others were. Young Hepworth may have given the usual

references, but if so they were never taken up. The house was sold on the company's usual terms. The deposit

was paid by a cheque, which was duly cleared, and the house itself was security for the rest. The company's

It was early in June when the Hepworths moved in. They furnished only one bedroom; and kept no servant, a

charwoman coming in every morning and going away about six in the evening. Jetson was their nearest

neighbour. His wife and daughters called on them, and confess to have taken a liking to them both. Indeed,

between one of the Jetson girls, the youngest, and Mrs. Hepworth there seems to have sprung up a close

friendship. Young Hepworth, the husband, was always charming, and evidently took great pains to make

himself agreeable. But with regard to him they had the feeling that he was never altogether at his ease. They

described himthough that, of course, was after the eventas having left upon them the impression of a

There was one occasion in particular. It was about ten o'clock. The Jetsons had been spending the evening

with the Hepworths, and were just on the point of leaving, when there came a sudden, clear knock at the door.

It turned out to be Jetson's foreman, who had to leave by an early train in the morning, and had found that he

needed some further instructions. But the terror in Hepworth's face was unmistakable. He had turned a look

towards his wife that was almost of despair; and it had seemed to the Jetsonsor, talking it over afterwards,

they may have suggested the idea to each otherthat there came a flash of contempt into her eyes, though it

yielded the next instant to an expression of pity. She had risen, and already moved some steps towards the

door, when young Hepworth had stopped her, and gone out himself. But the curious thing was that, according

to the foreman's account, Hepworth never opened the front door, but came upon him stealthily from behind.

The incident had puzzled the Jetsons, especially that involuntary flash of contempt that had come into Mrs.

Hepworth's eyes. She had always appeared to adore her husband, and of the two, if possible, to be the one

most in love with the other. They had no friends or acquaintances except the Jetsons. No one else among their

neighbours had taken the trouble to call on them, and no stranger to the suburb had, so far as was known, ever

Jetson was on his way home from his office in the Finchley Road. There had been a mist hanging about all

day, and with nightfall it had settled down into a whitish fog. Soon after leaving the Finchley Road, Jetson

noticed in front of him a man wearing a long, yellow mackintosh, and some sort of soft felt hat. He gave

Jetson the idea of being a sailor; it may have been merely the stiff, serviceable mackintosh. At the corner of

Laleham Gardens the man turned, and glanced up at the name upon the lamppost, so that Jetson had a full

view of him. Evidently it was the street for which he was looking. Jetson, somewhat curious, the Hepworths'

house being still the only one occupied, paused at the corner, and watched. The Hepworths' house was, of

course, the only one in the road that showed any light. The man, when he came to the gate, struck a match for

the purpose of reading the number. Satisfied it was the house he wanted, he pushed open the gate and went up

But, instead of using the bell or knocker, Jetson was surprised to hear him give three raps on the door with his

stick. There was no answer, and Jetson, whose interest was now thoroughly aroused, crossed to the other

corner, from where he could command a better view. Twice the man repeated his three raps on the door, each

time a little louder, and the third time the door was opened. Jetson could not tell by whom, for whoever it was

He could just see one wall of the passage, with a pair of old naval cutlasses crossed above the picture of a

threemasted schooner that he knew hung there. The door was opened just sufficient, and the man slipped in,

and the door was closed behind him. Jetson had turned to continue his way, when the fancy seized him to

give one glance back. The house was in complete darkness, though a moment before Jetson was positive

It all sounded very important afterwards, but at the time there was nothing to suggest to Jetson anything very

much out of the common. Because for six months no friend or relation had called to see them, that was no

reason why one never should. In the fog, a stranger may have thought it simpler to knock at the door with his

stick than to fumble in search of a bell. The Hepworths lived chiefly in the room at the back. The light in the

drawingroom may have been switched off for economy's sake. Jetson recounted the incident on reaching

home, not as anything remarkable, but just as one mentions an item of gossip. The only one who appears to

have attached any meaning to the affair was Jetson's youngest daughter, then a girl of eighteen. She asked one

or two questions about the man, and, during the evening, slipped out by herself and ran round to the

Hepworths. She found the house empty. At all events, she could obtain no answer, and the place, back and

Jetson called the next morning, something of his daughter's uneasiness having communicated itself to him.

Mrs. Hepworth herself opened the door to him. In his evidence at the trial, Jetson admitted that her

appearance had startled him. She seems to have anticipated his questions by at once explaining that she had

had news of an unpleasant nature, and had been worrying over it all night. Her husband had been called away

suddenly to America, where it would be necessary for her to join him as soon as possible. She would come

round to Jetson's office later in the day to make arrangements about getting rid of the house and furniture.

The story seemed to reasonably account for the stranger's visit, and Jetson, expressing his sympathy and

promising all help in his power, continued his way to the office. She called in the afternoon and handed him

over the keys, retaining one for herself. She wished the furniture to be sold by auction, and he was to accept

almost any offer for the house. She would try and see him again before sailing; if not, she would write him

with her address. She was perfectly cool and collected. She had called on his wife and daughters in the

Outside Jetson's office she hailed a cab, and returned in it to Laleham Gardens to collect her boxes. The next

time Jetson saw her she was in the dock, charged with being an accomplice in the murder of her husband.

The body had been discovered in a pond some hundred yards from the unfinished end of Laleham Gardens. A

house was in course of erection on a neighbouring plot, and a workman, in dipping up a pail of water, had

dropped in his watch. He and his mate, worrying round with a rake, had drawn up pieces of torn clothing, and

this, of course, had led to the pond being properly dragged. Otherwise the discovery might never have been

The body, heavily weighted with a number of flatirons fastened to it by a chain and padlock, had sunk deep

into the soft mud, and might have remained there till it rotted. A valuable gold repeater, that Jetson

remembered young Hepworth having told him had been a presentation to his father, was in its usual pocket,

and a cameo ring that Hepworth had always worn on his third finger was likewise fished up from the mud.

Evidently the murder belonged to the category of crimes passionel. The theory of the prosecution was that it

had been committed by a man who, before her marriage, had been Mrs. Hepworth's lover.

The evidence, contrasted with the almost spiritually beautiful face of the woman in the dock, came as a

surprise to everyone in court. Originally connected with an English circus troupe touring in Holland, she

appears, about seventeen, to have been engaged as a "song and dance artiste" at a particularly shady cafe

chantant in Rotterdam, frequented chiefly by sailors. From there a man, an English sailor known as Charlie

Martin, took her away, and for some months she had lived with him at a small estaminet the other side of the

river. Later, they left Rotterdam and came to London, where they took lodgings in Poplar, near to the docks.

It was from this address in Poplar that, some ten months before the murder, she had married young Hepworth.

What had become of Martin was not known. The natural assumption was that, his money being exhausted, he

had returned to his calling, though his name, for some reason, could not be found in any ship's list.

That he was one and the same with the man that Jetson had watched till the door of the Hepworths' house had

closed upon him there could be no doubt. Jetson described him as a thickset, handsomelooking man, with a

reddish beard and moustache. Earlier in the day he had been seen at Hampstead, where he had dined at a

small coffeeshop in the High Street. The girl who had waited on him had also been struck by the bold,

piercing eyes and the curly red beard. It had been an offtime, between two and three, when he had dined

there, and the girl admitted that she had found him a "pleasantspoken gentleman," and "inclined to be

merry." He had told her that he had arrived in England only three days ago, and that he hoped that evening to

see his sweetheart. He had accompanied the words with a laugh, and the girl thoughtthough, of course, this

One imagines that it was this man's return that had been the fear constantly haunting young Hepworth. The

three raps on the door, it was urged by the prosecution, was a prearranged or preunderstood signal, and the

door had been opened by the woman. Whether the husband was in the house, or whether they waited for him,

could not be said. He had been killed by a bullet entering through the back of the neck; the man had evidently

Ten days had elapsed between the murder and the finding of the body, and the man was never traced. A

postman had met him coming from the neighbourhood of Laleham Gardens at about halfpast nine. In the

fog, they had all but bumped into one another, and the man had immediately turned away his face.

About the soft felt hat there was nothing to excite attention, but the long, stiff, yellow mackintosh was quite

unusual. The postman had caught only a momentary glimpse of the face, but was certain it was clean shaven.

This made a sensation in court for the moment, but only until the calling of the next witness. The charwoman

usually employed by the Hepworths had not been admitted to the house on the morning of Mrs. Hepworth's

departure. Mrs. Hepworth had met her at the door and paid her a week's money in lieu of notice, explaining to

her that she would not be wanted any more. Jetson, thinking he might possibly do better by letting the house

furnished, had sent for this woman, and instructed her to give the place a thorough cleaning. Sweeping the

carpet in the diningroom with a dustpan and brush, she had discovered a number of short red hairs. The

That he had still retained the long, yellow mackintosh may have been with the idea of starting a false clue.

Having served its purpose, it could be discarded. The beard would not have been so easy. What roundabout

way he may have taken one cannot say, but it must have been some time during the night or early morning

that he reached young Hepworth's office in Fenchurch Street. Mrs. Hepworth had evidently provided him

There he seems to have hidden the hat and mackintosh and to have taken in exchange some clothes belonging

to the murdered man. Hepworth's clerk, Ellenby, an elderly manof the type that one generally describes as

of gentlemanly appearancewas accustomed to his master being away unexpectedly on business, which was

that of a ships' furnisher. He always kept an overcoat and a bag ready packed in the office. Missing them,

Ellenby had assumed that his master had been called away by an early train. He would have been worried

after a few days, but that he had received a telegramas he then supposed from his masterexplaining that

young Hepworth had gone to Ireland and would be away for some days. It was nothing unusual for Hepworth

to be absent, superintending the furnishing of a ship, for a fortnight at a time, and nothing had transpired in

the office necessitating special instructions. The telegram had been handed in at Charing Cross, but the time

chosen had been a busy period of the day, and no one had any recollection of the sender. Hepworth's clerk

unhesitatingly identified the body as that of his employer, for whom it was evident that he had entertained a

feeling of affection. About Mrs. Hepworth he said as little as he could. While she was awaiting her trial it had

been necessary for him to see her once or twice with reference to the business. Previous to this, he knew

The woman's own attitude throughout the trial had been quite unexplainable. Beyond agreeing to a formal

plea of "Not guilty," she had made no attempt to defend herself. What little assistance her solicitors had

obtained had been given them, not by the woman herself, but by Hepworth's clerk, more for the sake of his

dead master than out of any sympathy towards the wife. She herself appeared utterly indifferent. Only once

had she been betrayed into a momentary emotion. It was when her solicitors were urging her almost angrily

to give them some particulars upon a point they thought might be helpful to her case.

"He's dead!" she had cried out almost with a note of exultation. "Dead! Dead! What else matters?"

It was the astounding callousness of the woman that told against her both with the judge and the jury. That

shaving in the diningroom, the murdered man's body not yet cold! It must have been done with Hepworth's

safetyrazor. She must have brought it down to him, found him a lookingglass, brought him soap and water

and a towel, afterwards removing all traces. Except those few red hairs that had clung, unnoticed, to the

carpet. That nest of flatirons used to weight the body! It must have been she who had thought of them. The

idea would never have occurred to a man. The chain and padlock with which to fasten them. She only could

have known that such things were in the house. It must have been she who had planned the exchange of

clothes in Hepworth's office, giving him the key. She it must have been who had thought of the pond, holding

open the door while the man had staggered out under his ghastly burden; waited, keeping watch, listening to

Evidently it had been her intention to go off with the murdererto live with him! That story about America.

If all had gone well, it would have accounted for everything. After leaving Laleham Gardens she had taken

lodgings in a small house in Kentish Town under the name of Howard, giving herself out to be a chorus

singer, her husband being an actor on tour. To make the thing plausible, she had obtained employment in one

of the pantomimes. Not for a moment had she lost her head. No one had ever called at her lodgings, and there

had come no letters for her. Every hour of her day could be accounted for. Their plans must have been

worked out over the corpse of her murdered husband. She was found guilty of being an "accessory after the

That brought the story up to eleven years ago. After the trial, interested in spite of himself, my friend had

ferreted out some further particulars. Inquiries at Liverpool had procured him the information that Hepworth's

father, a shipowner in a small way, had been well known and highly respected. He was retired from business

when he died, some three years previous to the date of the murder. His wife had survived him by only a few

months. Besides Michael, the murdered son, there were two other childrenan elder brother, who was

thought to have gone abroad to one of the colonies, and a sister who had married a French naval officer.

Either they had not heard of the case or had not wished to have their names dragged into it. Young Michael

had started life as an architect, and was supposed to have been doing well, but after the death of his parents

had disappeared from the neighbourhood, and, until the trial, none of his acquaintances up North ever knew

But a further item of knowledge that my friend's inquiries had elicited had somewhat puzzled him.

Hepworth's clerk, Ellenby, had been the confidential clerk of Hepworth's father! He had entered the service of

the firm as a boy; and when Hepworth senior retired, Ellenbywith the old gentleman's assistancehad

started in business for himself as a ships' furnisher! Nothing of all this came out at the trial. Ellenby had not

been crossexamined. There was no need for it. But it seemed odd, under all the circumstances, that he had

not volunteered the information. It may, of course, have been for the sake of the brother and sister. Hepworth

is a common enough name in the North. He may have hoped to keep the family out of connection with the

As regards the woman, my friend could learn nothing further beyond the fact that, in her contract with the

musichall agent in Rotterdam, she had described herself as the daughter of an English musician, and had

stated that both her parents were dead. She may have engaged herself without knowing the character of the

hall, and the man, Charlie Martin, with his handsome face and pleasing sailor ways, and at least an

She may have been passionately fond of him, and young Hepworth crazy about her, for she was beautiful

enough to turn any man's headmay in Martin's absence have lied to her, told her he was deadlord knows

what!to induce her to marry him. The murder may have seemed to her a sort of grim justice.

But even so, her coldblooded callousness was surely abnormal! She had married him, lived with him for

nearly a year. To the Jetsons she had given the impression of being a woman deeply in love with her husband.

"There was something else." We were discussing the case in my friend's chambers. His brief of eleven years

ago was open before him. He was pacing up and down with his hands in his pockets, thinking as he talked.

"Something that never came out. There was a curious feeling she gave me in that moment when sentence was

pronounced upon her. It was as if, instead of being condemned, she had triumphed. Acting! If she had acted

during the trial, pretended remorse, even pity, I could have got her off with five years. She seemed to be

unable to disguise the absolute physical relief she felt at the thought that he was dead, that his hand would

never again touch her. There must have been something that had suddenly been revealed to her, something

"There must be something fine about the man, too." That was another suggestion that came to him as he stood

staring out of the window across the river. "She's paid and has got her receipt, but he is still 'wanted.' He is

"Yet how could he have let her go through those ten years of living death while he walked the streets scot

free? Some time during the trialthe evidence piling up against her day by daywhy didn't he come

forward, if only to stand beside her? Get himself hanged, if only out of mere decency?"

"Or was that the reward that she claimed? That he should wait, keeping alive the one hope that would make

the suffering possible to her? Yes," he continued, musing, "I can see a man who cared for a woman taking

Now that his interest in the case had been revived he seemed unable to keep it out of his mind. Since our joint

visit I had once or twice passed through the street by myself, and on the last occasion had again seen the

raising of the blind. It obsessed himthe desire to meet the man face to face. A handsome, bold, masterful

man, he conceived him. But there must be something more for such a woman to have sold her soulalmost,

There was just one chance of succeeding. Each time he had come from the direction of the Edgware Road. By

keeping well out of sight at the other end of the street, and watching till he entered it, one might time oneself

to come upon him just under the lamp. He would hardly be likely to turn and go back; that would be to give

himself away. He would probably content himself with pretending to be like ourselves, merely hurrying

Fortune seemed inclined to favour us. About the usual time the blind was gently raised, and very soon

afterwards there came round the corner the figure of a man. We entered the street ourselves a few seconds

later, and it seemed likely that, as we had planned, we should come face to face with him under the gaslight.

He walked towards us, stooping and with bent head. We expected him to pass the house by. To our surprise

he stopped when he came to it, and pushed open the gate. In another moment we should have lost all chance

of seeing anything more of him except his bent back. With a couple of strides my friend was behind him. He

laid his hand on the man's shoulder and forced him to turn round. It was an old, wrinkled face with gentle,

We were both so taken aback that for a moment we could say nothing. My friend stammered out an apology

about having mistaken the house, and rejoined me. At the corner we burst out laughing almost

It seemed to him monstrous. The man had been more than a clerk. The family had treated him as a friend.

Hepworth's father had set him up in business. For the murdered lad he had had a sincere attachment; he had

A directory was on the mantelpiece. It was the next afternoon. I had called upon him in his chambers. It was

just an idea that came to me. I crossed over and opened it, and there was his name, "Ellenby and Co., Ships'

Was he helping her for the sake of his dead mastertrying to get her away from the man. But why? The

woman had stood by and watched the lad murdered. How could he bear even to look on her again?

Unless there had been that something that had not come out something he had learnt laterthat excused

Yet what could there be? It had all been so planned, so coldblooded. That shaving in the diningroom! It

was that seemed most to stick in his throat. She must have brought him down a lookingglass; there was not

one in the room. Why couldn't he have gone upstairs into the bathroom, where Hepworth always shaved

He had been moving about the room, talking disjointedly as he paced, and suddenly he stopped and looked at

He was jingling some keys in his pocket. It was a habit of his when crossexamining, and I felt as if

"Perhaps," I said, "it was easier to bring a razor down than to carry a dead man up."

"Can't you see it?" he said. "That little back parlour with its fussy ornaments. The three of them standing

round the table, Hepworth's hands nervously clutching a chair. The reproaches, the taunts, the threats. Young

Hepworthhe struck everyone as a weak man, a man physically afraidwhite, stammering, not knowing

which way to look. The woman's eyes turning from one to the other. That flash of contempt againshe

could not help itfollowed, worse still, by pity. If only he could have answered back, held his own! If only

he had not been afraid! And then that fatal turning away with a sneering laugh one imagines, the bold,

"That must have been the moment. The bullet, if you remember, entered through the back of the man's neck.

Hepworth must always have been picturing to himself this meetingtenants of garden suburbs do not carry

loaded revolvers as a habitdwelling upon it till he had worked himself up into a frenzy of hate and fear.

"Can't you hear the silence? After the reverberations had died away! And then they are both down on their

knees, patting him, feeling for his heart. The man must have gone down like a felled ox; there were no traces

of blood on the carpet. The house is far from any neighbour; the shot in all probability has not been heard. If

He reached for the brief, still lying among his papers; hurriedly turned the scored pages.

"What easier? A house being built on the very next plot. Wheelbarrows to be had for the taking. A line of

planks reaching down to the edge. Depth of water where the body was discovered four feet six inches.

"Think a minute. Must weigh him down, lest he rise to accuse us; weight him heavily, so that he will sink

"Think again. Think it out to the end. Suppose, in spite of all our precautions, he does rise? Suppose the chain

"He is lying on his back, remember. They would have turned him over to feel for his heart. Have closed his

"It would be the woman who first thought of it. She has seen them both lying with closed eyes beside her. It

may have always been in her mind, the likeness between them. With Hepworth's watch in his pocket,

Hepworth's ring on his finger! If only it was not for the beardthat fierce, curling, red beard!

"They creep to the window and peer out. Fog still thick as soup. Not a soul, not a sound. Plenty of time.

"Then to get away, to hide till one is sure. Put on the mackintosh. A man in a yellow mackintosh may have

been seen to enter; let him be seen to go away. In some dark corner or some empty railway carriage take it off

and roll it up. Then make for the office. Wait there for Ellenby. True as steel, Ellenby; good business man. Be

"Why, there's not a missing link!" he cried. "And to think that not a fool among us ever thought of it!"

"Everything fitting into its place," I suggested, "except young Hepworth. Can you see him, from your

description of him, sitting down and coolly elaborating plans for escape, the corpse of the murdered man

"No," he answered. "But I can see her doing it, a woman who for week after week kept silence while we

raged and stormed at her, a woman who for three hours sat like a statue while old Cutbush painted her to a

crowded court as a modern Jezebel, who rose up from her seat when that sentence of fifteen years' penal

servitude was pronounced upon her with a look of triumph in her eyes, and walked out of court as if she had

"I'll wager," he added, "it was she who did the shaving. Hepworth would have cut him, even with a

"It must have been the other one, Martin," I said, "that she loathed. That almost exultation at the thought that

"Yes," he mused. "She made no attempt to disguise it. Curious there having been that likeness between

The office was on the top floor of an oldfashioned house in a culdesac off the Minories. Mr. Ellenby was

out, so the lanky officeboy informed us, but would be sure to return before evening; and we sat and waited

by the meagre fire till, as the dusk was falling, we heard his footsteps on the creaking stairs.

He halted a moment in the doorway, recognising us apparently without surprise; and then, with a hope that

"I do not suppose you remember me," said my friend, as soon as the door was closed. "I fancy that, until last

night, you never saw me without my wig and gown. It makes a difference. I was Mrs. Hepworth's senior

It was unmistakable, the look of relief that came into the old, dim eyes. Evidently the incident of the previous

"You were very good," he murmured. "Mrs. Hepworth was overwrought at the time, but she was very

"I must apologise for my rudeness to you of last night," he continued. "I expected, when I took the liberty of

turning you round, that I was going to find myself face to face with a much younger man."

"I took you to be a detective," answered Ellenby, in his soft, gentle voice. "You will forgive me, I'm sure. I

am rather short sighted. Of course, I can only conjecture, but if you will take my word, I can assure you that

Mrs. Hepworth has never seen or heard from the man Charlie Martin since the date of"he hesitated a

"It would have been difficult," agreed my friend, "seeing that Charlie Martin lies buried in Highgate

"I took more than a professional interest in the case," answered my friend. "Ten years ago I was younger than

I am now. It may have been her youthher extreme beauty. I think Mrs. Hepworth, in allowing her husband

to visit herhere where her address is known to the police, and watch at any moment may be set upon

heris placing him in a position of grave danger. If you care to lay before me any facts that will allow me to

judge of the case, I am prepared to put my experience, and, if need be, my assistance, at her service."

We heard him, a moment later, turn the key in the outer door; and when he came back and had made up the

The name of the man buried in Highgate Cemetery was Hepworth, after all. Not Michael, but Alex, the elder

From boyhood he had been violent, brutal, unscrupulous. Judging from Ellenby's story, it was difficult to

accept him as a product of modern civilisation. Rather he would seem to have been a throwback to some

savage, buccaneering ancestor. To expect him to work, while he could live in vicious idleness at somebody

else's expense, was found to be hopeless. His debts were paid for about the third or fourth time, and he was

shipped off to the Colonies. Unfortunately, there were no means of keeping him there. So soon as the money

provided him had been squandered, he returned, demanding more by menaces and threats. Meeting with

unexpected firmness, he seems to have regarded theft and forgery as the only alternative left to him. To save

him from punishment and the family name from disgrace, his parents' savings were sacrificed. It was grief

and shame that, according to Ellenby, killed them both within a few months of one another.

Deprived by this blow of what he no doubt had come to consider his natural means of support, and his sister,

fortunately for herself, being well out of his reach, he next fixed upon his brother Michael as his stayby.

Michael, weak, timid, and not perhaps without some remains of boyish affection for a strong, handsome,

elder brother, foolishly yielded. The demands, of course, increased, until, in the end, it came almost as a relief

when the man's vicious life led to his getting mixed up with a crime of a particularly odious nature. He was

anxious now for his own sake to get away, and Michael, with little enough to spare for himself, provided him

But the worry and misery of it all had left young Michael a broken man. Unable to concentrate his mind any

longer upon his profession, his craving was to get away from all his old associationsto make a fresh start in

life. It was Ellenby who suggested London and the ship furnishing business, where Michael's small remaining

capital would be of service. The name of Hepworth would be valuable in shipping circles, and Ellenby,

arguing this consideration, but chiefly with the hope of giving young Michael more interest in the business,

They had not been started a year before the man returned, as usual demanding more money. Michael, acting

under Ellenby's guidance, refused in terms that convinced his brother that the game of bullying was up. He

waited a while, and then wrote pathetically that he was ill and starving. If only for the sake of his young wife,

This was the first they had heard of his marriage. There was just a faint hope that it might have effected a

change, and Michael, against Ellenby's advice, decided to go. In a miserable lodginghouse in the East End

he found the young wife, but not his brother, who did not return till he was on the point of leaving. In the

She had been a singer, engaged at a musichall in Rotterdam. There Alex Hepworth, calling himself Charlie

Martin, had met her and made love to her. When he chose, he could be agreeable enough, and no doubt her

youth and beauty had given to his protestations, for the time being, a genuine ring of admiration and desire. It

was to escape from her surroundings, more than anything else, that she had consented. She was little more

than a child, and anything seemed preferable to the nightly horror to which her life exposed her.

He had never married her. At least, that was her belief at the time. During his first drunken bout he had flung

it in her face that the form they had gone through was mere bunkum. Unfortunately for her, this was a lie. He

had always been coolly calculating. It was probably with the idea of a safe investment that he had seen to it

Her life with him, so soon as the first novelty of her had worn off, had been unspeakable. The band that she

wore round her neck was to hide where, in a fit of savagery, because she had refused to earn money for him

on the streets, he had tried to cut her throat. Now that she had got back to England she intended to leave him.

It was for her sake that young Hepworth eventually offered to help his brother again, on the condition that he

would go away by himself. To this the other agreed. He seems to have given a short display of remorse.

There must have been a grin on his face as he turned away. His cunning eyes had foreseen what was likely to

happen. The idea of blackmail was no doubt in his mind from the beginning. With the charge of bigamy as a

weapon in his hand, he might rely for the rest of his life upon a steady and increasing income.

Michael saw his brother off as a secondclass passenger on a ship bound for the Cape. Of course, there was

little chance of his keeping his word, but there was always the chance of his getting himself knocked on the

head in some brawl. Anyhow, he would be out of the way for a season, and the girl, Lola, would be left. A

month later he married her, and four months after that received a letter from his brother containing messages

to Mrs. Martin, "from her loving husband, Charlie," who hoped before long to have the pleasure of seeing her

Inquiries through the English Consul in Rotterdam proved that the threat was no mere bluff. The marriage

What happened on the night of the murder, was very much as my friend had reconstructed it. Ellenby,

reaching the office at his usual time the next morning, had found Hepworth waiting for him. There he had

remained in hiding until one morning, with dyed hair and a slight moustache, he had ventured forth.

Had the man's death been brought about by any other means, Ellenby would have counselled his coming

forward and facing his trial, as he himself was anxious to do; but, viewed in conjunction with the relief the

man's death must have been to both of them, that loaded revolver was too suggestive of premeditation. The

isolation of the house, that conveniently near pond, would look as if thought of beforehand. Even if pleading

extreme provocation, Michael escaped the rope, a long term of penal servitude would be inevitable.

Nor was it certain that even then the woman would go free. The murdered man would still, by a strange freak,

Her passionate will had prevailed. Young Hepworth had sailed for America. There he had no difficulty in

obtaining employmentof course, under another namein an architects office; and later had set up for

himself. Since the night of the murder they had not seen each other till some three weeks ago.

I never saw the woman again. My friend, I believe, called on her. Hepworth had already returned to America,

and my friend had succeeded in obtaining for her some sort of a police permit that practically left her free.

Sometimes of an evening I find myself passing through the street. And always I have the feeling of having

The evidence of the parkkeeper, David Bristow, of Gilder Street, Camden Town, is as follows:

I was on duty in St. James's Park on Thursday evening, my sphere extending from the Mall to the northern

shore of the ornamental water east of the suspension bridge. At fiveandtwenty to seven I took up a position

between the peninsula and the bridge to await my colleague. He ought to have relieved me at halfpast six,

but did not arrive until a few minutes before seven, owing, so he explained, to the breaking down of his

I had just come to a halt, when my attention was arrested by a lady. I am unable to explain why the presence

of a lady in St. James's Park should have seemed in any way worthy of notice except that, for certain reasons,

she reminded me of my first wife. I observed that she hesitated between one of the public seats and two

vacant chairs standing by themselves a little farther to the east. Eventually she selected one of the chairs, and,

having cleaned it with an evening paperthe birds in this portion of the Park being extremely prolificsat

down upon it. There was plenty of room upon the public seat close to it, except for some children who were

I walked to a point from where I could command the southern approaches to the bridge, my colleague

arriving sometimes by way of Birdcage Walk and sometimes by way of the Horse Guards Parade. Not seeing

any signs of him in the direction of the bridge, I turned back. A little way past the chair where the lady was

sitting I met Mr. Parable. I know Mr. Parable quite well by sight. He was wearing the usual grey suit and soft

felt hat with which the pictures in the newspapers have made us all familiar. I judged that Mr. Parable had

come from the Houses of Parliament, and the next morning my suspicions were confirmed by reading that he

had been present at a teaparty given on the terrace by Mr. Will Crooks. Mr. Parable conveyed to me the

suggestion of a man absorbed in thought, and not quite aware of what he was doing; but in this, of course, I

may have been mistaken. He paused for a moment to look over the railings at the pelican. Mr. Parable said

something to the pelican which I was not near enough to overhear; and then, still apparently in a state of

abstraction, crossed the path and seated himself on the chair next to that occupied by the young lady.

From the tree against which I was standing I was able to watch the subsequent proceedings unobserved. The

lady looked at Mr. Parable and then turned away and smiled to herself. It was a peculiar smile, and, again in

some way I am unable to explain, reminded me of my first wife. It was not till the pelican put down his other

leg and walked away that Mr. Parable, turning his gaze westward, became aware of the lady's presence.

From information that has subsequently come to my knowledge, I am prepared to believe that Mr. Parable,

from the beginning, really thought the lady was a friend of his. What the lady thought is a matter for

conjecture; I can only speak to the facts. Mr. Parable looked at the lady once or twice. Indeed, one might say

with truth that he kept on doing it. The lady, it must be admitted, behaved for a while with extreme propriety;

but after a time, as I felt must happen, their eyes met, and then it was I heard her say:

She accompanied the words with the same peculiar smile to which I have already alluded. The exact words of

Mr. Parable's reply I cannot remember. But it was to the effect that he had thought from the first that he had

known her but had not been quite sure. It was at this point that, thinking I saw my colleague approaching, I

went to meet him. I found I was mistaken, and slowly retraced my steps. I passed Mr. Parable and the lady.

They were talking together with what I should describe as animation. I went as far as the southern extremity

of the suspension bridge, and must have waited there quite ten minutes before returning eastward. It was

while I was passing behind them on the grass, partially screened by the rhododendrons, that I heard Mr.

I could not overhear what followed, owing to their sinking their voices. It seemed to be an argument. It ended

with the young lady laughing and then rising. Mr. Parable also rose, and they walked off together. As they

"I wonder if there's any place in London where you're not likely to be recognised."

Mr. Parable, who gave me the idea of being in a state of growing excitement, replied quite loudly:

The parkkeeper said he was convinced he would know the lady again, having taken particular notice of her.

I know Mr. John Parable by sight. Have often heard him speak at public meetings. Am a bit of a Socialist

myself. Remember his dining at the Popular Cafe on the evening of Thursday. Didn't recognise him

immediately on his entrance for two reasons. One was his hat, and the other was his girl. I took it from him

and hung it up. I mean, of course, the hat. It was a brandnew bowler, a trifle ikey about the brim. Have

always associated him with a soft grey felt. But never with girls. Females, yes, to any extent. But this was the

real article. You know what I meanthe sort of girl that you turn round to look after. It was she who selected

I should, in the ordinary course of business, have addressed Mr. Parable by name, such being our instructions

in the case of customers known to us. But, putting the hat and the girl together, I decided not to. Mr. Parable

was all for our threeandsixpenny table d'hote; he evidently not wanting to think. But the lady wouldn't

Of course, at the time I did not know what was meant. She ordered thin soup, a grilled sole, and cutlets au

gratin. It certainly couldn't have been the dinner. With regard to the champagne, he would have his own way.

I picked him out a dry '94, that you might have weaned a baby on. I suppose it was the whole thing

It was after the sole that I heard Mr. Parable laugh. I could hardly credit my ears, but halfway through the

There are two kinds of women. There is the woman who, the more she eats and drinks, the stodgier she gets,

and the woman who lights up after it. I suggested a peche Melba between them, and when I returned with it,

Mr. Parable was sitting with his elbows on the table gazing across at her with an expression that I can only

describe as quite human. It was when I brought the coffee that he turned to me and asked:

"What's doing? Nothing stuffy," he added. "Is there an Exhibition anywheresomething in the open air?"

"For two pins," said Mr. Parable, "I would get up at the meeting and tell Miss Clebb what I really think about

I suggested the Earl's Court Exhibition, little thinking at the time what it was going to lead to; but the lady at

first wouldn't hear of it, and the party at the next table calling for their bill (they had asked for it once or twice

When I got back the argument had just concluded, and the lady was holding up her finger.

"On condition that we leave at halfpast nine, and that you go straight to Caxton Hall," she said.

Tips being against the rules, I couldn't take it. Besides, one of the jumpers had his eye on me. I explained to

him, jocosely, that I was doing it for a bet. He was surprised when I handed him his hat, but, the lady

Mr. Horton thought he would know the lady again. He puts down her age at about twentysix, describing

herto use his own piquant expressionas "a bit of all right." She had brown eyes and a taking way with

Miss Ida Jenks, in charge of the Eastern Cigarette Kiosk at the Earl's Court Exhibition, gives the following

From where I generally stand I can easily command a view of the interior of the Victoria Hall; that is, of

On the evening of Thursday, the twentyseventh, it was fairly well occupied, but not to any great extent. One

couple attracted my attention by reason of the gentleman's erratic steering. Had he been my partner I should

have suggested a polka, the tango not being the sort of dance that can be picked up in an evening. What I

mean to say is, that he struck me as being more willing than experienced. Some of the bumps she got would

have made me cross; but we all have our fancies, and, so far as I could judge, they both appeared to be

The seat to the left of the door is popular by reason of its being partly screened by bushes, but by leaning

forward a little it is quite possible for me to see what goes on there. They were the first couple out, having

had a bad collision near the bandstand, so easily secured it. The gentleman was laughing.

There was something about him from the first that made me think I knew him, and when he took off his hat

to wipe his head it came to me all of a sudden, he being the exact image of his effigy at Madame Tussaud's,

which, by a curious coincidence, I happened to have visited with a friend that very afternoon. The lady was

I was watching them, naturally a little interested. Mr. Parable, in helping the lady to adjust her cloak, drew

herit may have been by accidenttowards him; and then it was that a florid gentleman with a short pipe in

his mouth stepped forward and addressed the lady. He raised his hat and, remarking "Good evening," added

that he hoped she was "having a pleasant time." His tone, I should explain, was sarcastic.

The young woman, whatever else may be said of her, struck me as behaving quite correctly. Replying to his

salutation with a cold and distant bow, she rose, and, turning to Mr. Parable, observed that she thought it was

The gentleman, who had taken his pipe from his mouth, saidagain in a sarcastic tonethat he thought so

"I don't think we need trouble you," said Mr. Parable, and stepped between them.

To describe what followed I, being a lady, am hampered for words. I remember seeing Mr. Parable's hat go

up into the air, and then the next moment the florid gentleman's head was lying on my counter smothered in

cigarettes. I naturally screamed for the police, but the crowd was dead against me; and it was only after what

I believe in technical language would be termed "the fourth round" that they appeared upon the scene.

The last I saw of Mr. Parable he was shaking a young constable who had lost his helmet, while three other

policemen had hold of him from behind. The florid gentleman's hat I found on the floor of my kiosk and

returned to him; but after a useless attempt to get it on his head, he disappeared with it in his hand. The lady

Miss Jenks thinks she would know her again. She was wearing a hat trimmed with black chiffon and a spray

Superintendent S. Wade, in answer to questions put to him by our representative, vouchsafed the following

Yes. I was in charge at the Vine Street Police Station on the night of Thursday, the twentyseventh.

No. I have no recollection of a charge of any description being preferred against any gentleman of the name

Yes. A gentleman was brought in about ten o'clock charged with brawling at the Earl's Court Exhibition and

The gentleman gave the name of Mr. Archibald Quincey, Harcourt Buildings, Temple.

No. The gentleman made no application respecting bail, electing to pass the night in the cells. A certain

amount of discretion is permitted to us, and we made him as comfortable as possible.

No. About a gentleman who had got himself into trouble at the Earl's Court Exhibition. She mentioned no

That I cannot say. I can only tell you that at ninefifteen on Friday morning bail was tendered, and, after

inquiries, accepted in the person of Julius Addison Tupp, of the Sunnybrook Steam Laundry, Twickenham.

The accused who, I had seen to it, had had a cup of tea and a little toast at seventhirty, left in company with

Superintendent Wade admitted he had known cases where accused parties, to avoid unpleasantness, had

stated their names to be other than their own, but declined to discuss the matter further.

Superintendent Wade, while expressing his regret that he had no more time to bestow upon our

representative, thought it highly probable that he would know the lady again if he saw her.

Without professing to be a judge of such matters, Superintendent Wade thinks she might be described as a

From Mr. Julius Tupp, of the Sunnybrook Steam Laundry, Twickenham, upon whom our representative next

called, we have been unable to obtain much assistance, Mr. Tupp replying to all questions put to him by the

Fortunately, our representative, on his way out through the drying ground, was able to obtain a brief

Mrs. Tupp remembers admitting a young lady to the house on the morning of Friday, the twentyeighth,

when she opened the door to take in the milk. The lady, Mrs. Tupp remembers, spoke in a husky voice, the

result, as the young lady explained with a pleasant laugh, of having passed the night wandering about Ham

Common, she having been misdirected the previous evening by a fool of a railway porter, and not wishing to

disturb the neighbourhood by waking people up at two o'clock in the morning, which, in Mrs. Tupp's opinion,

Mrs. Tupp describes the young lady as of agreeable manners, but looking, naturally, a bit washed out. The

lady asked for Mr. Tupp, explaining that a friend of his was in trouble, which did not in the least surprise

Mrs. Tupp, she herself not holding with Socialists and such like. Mr. Tupp, on being informed, dressed

hastily and went downstairs, and he and the young lady left the house together. Mr. Tupp, on being

questioned as to the name of his friend, had called up that it was no one Mrs. Tupp would know, a Mr.

Mrs. Tupp is aware that Mr. Parable is also a Socialist, and is acquainted with the saying about thieves

hanging together. But has worked for Mr. Parable for years and has always found him a most satisfactory

client; and, Mr. Tupp appearing at this point, our representative thanked Mrs. Tupp for her information and

Mr. Horatius Condor, Junior, who consented to partake of luncheon in company with our representative at the

Holborn Restaurant, was at first disinclined to be of much assistance, but eventually supplied our

My relationship to Mr. Archibald Quincey, Harcourt Buildings, Temple, is perhaps a little difficult to define.

How he himself regards me I am never quite sure. There will be days together when we will be quite friendly

like, and at other times he will be that offhanded and peremptory you might think I was his blooming office

On Friday morning, the twentyeighth, I didn't get to Harcourt Buildings at the usual time, knowing that Mr.

Quincey would not be there himself, he having arranged to interview Mr. Parable for the Daily Chronicle at

ten o'clock. I allowed him half an hour, to be quite safe, and he came in at a quarter past eleven.

He took no notice of me. For about ten minutesit may have been lesshe walked up and down the room,

cursing and swearing and kicking the furniture about. He landed an occasional walnut table in the middle of

my shins, upon which I took the opportunity of wishing him "Good morning," and he sort of woke up, as you

He was holding himself in, if you understand, speaking with horrible slowness and deliberation.

"Yes," I says; "Caxton Hall, wasn't it?meeting to demand the release of Miss Clebb."

I wasn't doing any guessing. He had hurt me with the walnut table, and I was feeling a bit shorttempered.

"At the Earl's Court Exhibition," he says; "dancing the tango with a lady that he picked up in St. James's

"Well," I says, "why not? He don't often get much fun." I thought it best to treat it lightly.

"A rival comes upon the scene," he continues"a fatheaded ass, according to my informationand they

have a standup fight. He gets run in and spends the night in a Vine Street police cell."

"I am not worrying about what HE is going to get," he answers back. "I am worrying about what _I_ am

"If old Wotherspoon is in a good humour," he continues, "and the constable's head has gone down a bit

between now and Wednesday, I may get off with forty shillings and a public reprimand.

"On the other hand," he goes onhe was working himself into a sort of fit"if the constable's head goes on

swelling, and old Wotherspoon's liver gets worse, I've got to be prepared for a month without the option. That

He had left both the doors open, which in the daytime we generally do, our chambers being at the top. Miss

Dortonthat's Mr. Parable's secretarybarges into the room. She didn't seem to notice me. She staggers to

"To Fingest," she says through her sobs"to the cottage. Miss Bulstrode came in just after you had left," she

says. "He wants to get away from everyone and have a few days' quiet. And then he is coming back, and he is

"But the case doesn't come on till Wednesday," says the guv'nor. "How do you know it's going to be fourteen

"Miss Bulstrode," she says, "she's seen the magistrate. He says he always gives fourteen days in cases of

"But it wasn't unprovoked," says the guv'nor. "The other man began it by knocking off his hat. It was

"She put that to him," she says, "and he agreed that that would alter his view of the case. But, you see," she

continues, "we can't find the other man. He isn't likely to come forward of his own accord."

"The girl must know," says the guv'nor"this girl he picks up in St. James's Park, and goes dancing with.

"But we can't find her either," she says. "He doesn't even know her namehe can't remember it."

"But he mustn't," she says. "Miss Bulstrode is coming round to see you. Think of it! Think of the headlines in

the papers," she says. "Think of the Fabian Society. Think of the Suffrage cause. We mustn't let him."

"You don't matter," she says. "Besides," she says, "with your influence you'll be able to keep it out of the

papers. If it comes out that it was Mr. Parable, nothing on earth will be able to."

"I'll see the Fabian Society and the Women's Vote and the Home for Lost Cats at Battersea, and all the rest of

"No," answered Miss Dorton. "Now I come to think of it, he has always hitherto put up with Mrs. Meadows."

"You will find the lady down at Fingest," I says, "sitting opposite him and enjoying a recherche dinner for

"You get on back," he says, "and telephone to Miss Bulstrode. I'll be round at halfpast twelve."

Miss Dorton went out in a dazed sort of condition, and the guv'nor gives me a sovereign, and tells me I can

Mr. Condor, Junior, considers that what happened subsequently goes to prove that he was right more than it

Mr. Condor, Junior, also promised to send us a photograph of himself for reproduction, but, unfortunately, up

From Mrs. Meadows, widow of the late Corporal John Meadows, V.C., Turberville, Bucks, the following

I have done for Mr. Parable now for some years past, my cottage being only a mile off, which makes it easy

Mr. Parable likes the place to be always ready so that he can drop in when he chooses, he sometimes giving

me warning and sometimes not. It was about the end of last monthon a Friday, if I remember rightlythat

As a rule, he walks from Henley station, but on this occasion he arrived in a fly, he having a young woman

with him, and she having a baghis cook, as he explained to me. As a rule, I do everything for Mr. Parable,

sleeping in the cottage when he is there; but to tell the truth, I was glad to see her. I never was much of a cook

myself, as my poor dead husband has remarked on more than one occasion, and I don't pretend to be. Mr.

Parable added, apologetic like, that he had been suffering lately from indigestion.

"I am only too pleased to see her," I says. "There are the two beds in my room, and we shan't quarrel." She

was quite a sensible young woman, as I had judged from the first look at her, though suffering at the time

from a cold. She hires a bicycle from Emma Tidd, who only uses it on a Sunday, and, taking a market basket,

off she starts for Henley, Mr. Parable saying he would go with her to show her the way.

They were gone a goodish time, which, seeing it's eight miles, didn't so much surprise me; and when they got

back we all three had dinner together, Mr. Parable arguing that it made for what he called "labour saving."

Afterwards I cleared away, leaving them talking together; and later on they had a walk round the garden, it

In the morning I had a chat with her before he was down. She seemed a bit worried.

"Well," I says, "surely a gent can bring his cook along with him to cook for him. And as for people talking,

what I always say is, one may just as well give them something to talk about and save them the trouble of

"Perhaps you will be, all in good time," I says, but, of course, I could see what she was driving at. A nice,

clean, pleasantfaced young woman she was, and not of the ordinary class. "Meanwhile," I says, "if you don't

mind taking a bit of motherly advice, you might remember that your place is the kitchen, and his the parlour.

He's a dear good man, I know, but human nature is human nature, and it's no good pretending it isn't."

She and I had our breakfast together before he was up, so that when he came down he had to have his alone,

"He wants to show me the way to High Wycombe," she says. "He will have it there are better shops at

My experience is that advising folks to do what they don't want to do isn't the way to do it.

"What's the harm!" she says. "I have heard him from a dozen platforms ridiculing class distinctions. Besides,"

she says, "my people have been farmers for generations. What was Miss Bulstrode's father but a grocer? He

"The day before yesterday," she answers. "He had never seen me before," she says. "I was just

'Cook'something in a cap and apron that he passed occasionally on the stairs. On Thursday he saw me in

my best clothes, and fell in love with me. He doesn't know it himself, poor dear, not yet, but that's what he's

Well, I couldn't contradict her, not after the way I had seen him looking at her across the table.

"What are your feelings towards him," I says, "to be quite honest? He's rather a good catch for a young

"That's my trouble," she says. "I can't help thinking of that. And then to be 'Mrs. John Parable'! That's enough

"Geniuses always are," she says; "it's easy enough if you just think of them as children. He'd be a bit fractious

I wasn't expecting them back soon, and they didn't come back soon. In the afternoon a motor stops at the gate,

and out of it steps Miss Bulstrode, Miss Dortonthat's the young lady that writes for himand Mr.

Quincey. I told them I couldn't say when he'd be back, and they said it didn't matter, they just happening to be

"Did anybody call on him yesterday?" asks Miss Bulstrode, careless like"a lady?"

"To market," I says. "It's a little farther, but, of course, it stands to reason the shops there are better."

"That settles it," says Mr. Quincey. "Delicacies worthy to be set before her not available nearer than

Wycombe, but must be had. There's going to be a pleasant little dinner here tonight."

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Meadows," says Mr. Quincey. "You needn't say we called. He wanted to be alone, and

Before dinner I had call to go into the woodshed. I heard a scuttling as I opened the door. If I am not

mistaken, Miss Dorton was hiding in the corner where we keep the coke. I didn't see any good in making a

fuss, so I left her there. When I got back to the kitchen, cook asked me if we'd got any parsley.

"You'll find a bit in the front," I says, "to the left of the gate," and she went out. She came back looking

"I could have sworn I saw a goat's face looking at me out of the gooseberry bushes while I was picking the

I thought I'd have another look round, and made the excuse that I wanted a pail of water. I was stooping over

the well, which is just under the mulberry tree, when something fell close to me and lodged upon the bricks.

It was a hairpin. I fixed the cover carefully upon the well in case of accident, and when I got in I went round

"I shouldn't go for any stroll in the garden tonight," I says. "People from the village may be about, and we

Next night they were there again. I thought I wouldn't spoil the dinner, but mention it afterwards. I saw to it

again that the curtains were drawn, and slipped the catch of both the doors. And just as well that I did.

I had always heard that Mr. Parable was an amusing speaker, but on previous visits had not myself noticed it.

But this time he seemed ten years younger than I had ever known him before; and during dinner, while we

were talking and laughing quite merry like, I had the feeling more than once that people were meandering

about outside. I had just finished clearing away, and cook was making the coffee, when there came a knock at

"Coffee for one, cook," I says, and she understood. Her cap and apron were hanging behind the door. I flung

They pushed past me without speaking, and went straight into the parlour. And they didn't waste many words

"Don't lie about it," said Miss Bulstrode, making no effort to control herself. "The hussy you've been dining

If they had taken the trouble to look at her they might have had an idea. The tray was trembling in her hands,

and in her haste and excitement she had put on her cap the wrong way round. But she kept control of her

"Ah, yes! You'd all like some coffee, wouldn't you?" says Mr. Parable. Miss Bulstrode did not reply, but Mr.

Quincey said he was cold and would like it. It was a nasty night, with a thin rain.

Cottages are only cottages, and if people in the parlour persist in talking loudly, people in the kitchen can't

There was a good deal of talk about "fourteen days," which Mr. Parable said he was going to do himself, and

which Miss Dorton said he mustn't, because, if he did, it would be a victory for the enemies of humanity. Mr.

Parable said something about "humanity," which I didn't rightly hear, but, whatever it was, it started Miss

Dorton crying; and Miss Bulstrode called Mr. Parable a "blind Samson," who had had his hair cut by a

It was all French to me, but cook was drinking in every word, and when she returned from taking them in

their coffee she made no bones about it, but took up her place at the door with her ear to the keyhole.

It was Mr. Quincey who got them all quiet, and then he began to explain things. It seemed that if they could

only find a certain gentleman and persuade him to come forward and acknowledge that he began a row, that

then all would be well. Mr. Quincey would be fined forty shillings, and Mr. Parable's name would never

appear. Failing that, Mr. Parable, according to Mr. Quincey, could do his fourteen days himself.

"I've told you once," says Mr. Parable, "and I tell you again, that I don't know the man's name, and can't give

"We are not asking you to," says Mr. Quincey. "You give us the name of your tango partner, and we'll do the

I could see cook's face; I had got a bit interested myself, and we were both close to the door. She hardly

"I am sorry," says Mr. Parable, speaking very deliberatelike, "but I am not going to have her name dragged

"It wouldn't be," says Mr. Quincey. "All we want to get out of her is the name and address of the gentleman

"Then who was he?" says Miss Bulstrode. "He must have been something to herfiance?"

"I am going to do the fourteen days myself," says Mr. Parable. "I shall come out all the fresher after a

Cook leaves the door with a smile on her face that made her look quite beautiful, and, taking some paper

They went on talking in the other room for another ten minutes, and then Mr. Parable lets them out himself,

and goes a little way with them. When he came back we could hear him walking up and down the other room.

"'Joseph Onions, Esq.,'" I says, reading the address. "'Auctioneer and House Agent, Broadway,

"That is the young man," she says, folding her letter and putting it in the envelope.

"A little joke that will amuse him later on," she says, slipping a cloak on her shoulders. "How once he nearly

"I shan't be a minute," she says. And, with the letter in her hand, she slips out.

Mrs. Meadows, we understand, has expressed indignation at our publication of this interview, she being

under the impression that she was simply having a friendly gossip with a neighbour. Our representative,

however, is sure he explained to Mrs. Meadows that his visit was official; and, in any case, our duty to the

Mr. Joseph Onions, of the Broadway, Hammersmith, auctioneer and house agent, expressed himself to our

representative as most surprised at the turn that events had subsequently taken. The letter that Mr. Onions

received from Miss Comfort Price was explicit and definite. It was to the effect that if he would call upon a

certain Mr. Quincey, of Harcourt Buildings, Temple, and acknowledge that it was he who began the row at

the Earl's Court Exhibition on the evening of the twentyseventh, that then the engagement between himself

and Miss Price, hitherto unacknowledged by the lady, might be regarded as a fact.

Mr. Onions, who describes himself as essentially a business man, decided before complying with Miss Price's

request to take a few preliminary steps. As the result of judiciously conducted inquiries, first at the Vine

Street Police Station, and secondly at Twickenham, Mr. Onions arrived later in the day at Mr. Quincey's

chambers, with, to use his own expression, all the cards in his hand. It was Mr. Quincey who, professing

himself unable to comply with Mr. Onion's suggestion, arranged the interview with Miss Bulstrode. And it

was Miss Bulstrode herself who, on condition that Mr. Onions added to the undertaking the further condition

that he would marry Miss Price before the end of the month, offered to make it two hundred. It was in their

joint interestMr. Onions regarding himself and Miss Price as now onethat Mr. Onions suggested her

making it three, using such arguments as, under the circumstances, naturally occurred to himas, for

example, the damage caused to the lady's reputation by the whole proceedings, culminating in a night spent

by the lady, according to her own account, on Ham Common. That the price demanded was reasonable Mr.

Onions considers as proved by Miss Bulstrode's eventual acceptance of his terms. That, having got out of him

all that he wanted, Mr. Quincey should have "considered it his duty" to communicate the entire details of the

transaction to Miss Price, through the medium of Mr. Andrews, thinking it "as well she should know the

character of the man she proposed to marry," Mr. Onions considers a gross breach of etiquette as between

gentlemen; and having regard to Miss Price's after behaviour, Mr. Onions can only say that she is not the girl

Mr. Aaron Andrews, on whom our representative called, was desirous at first of not being drawn into the

matter; but on our representative explaining to him that our only desire was to contradict false rumours likely

to be harmful to Mr. Parable's reputation, Mr. Andrews saw the necessity of putting our representative in

She came back on Tuesday afternoon, explained Mr. Andrews, and I had a talk with her.

"It is all right, Mr. Andrews," she told me; "they've been in communication with my young man, and Miss

Bulstrode has seen the magistrate privately. The case will be dismissed with a fine of forty shillings, and Mr.

"Well, all's well that ends well," I answered; "but it might have been better, my girl, if you had mentioned

"I did not know it was of any importance," she explained. "Mr. Parable told me nothing. If it hadn't been for

I had always liked the young woman. Mr. Quincey had suggested my waiting till after Wednesday. But there

"Yes," she answered. "I am fonder than" And then she stopped herself suddenly and flared scarlet. "Who

"I told him," she said, "that if he would do what I asked him to do, I'd marry him. And he seems to have done

"There are ways of doing everything," I said; and, seeing it wasn't going to break her heart, I told her just the

plain facts. She listened without a word, and when I had finished she put her arms round my neck and kissed

me. I am old enough to be her grandfather, but twenty years ago it might have upset me.

"I think I shall be able to save Miss Bulstrode that three hundred pounds," she laughed, and ran upstairs and

"Pack me some things for a walking tour," he said. "Don't forget the knapsack. I am going to Scotland by the

"It depends upon how long it takes me," he answered. "When I come back I am going to be married."

"That will do," he said; "I have had all that from the three of them for the last two days. She is a Socialist, and

a Suffragist, and all the rest of it, and my ideal helpmate. She is well off, and that will enable me to devote all

my time to putting the world to rights without bothering about anything else. Our home will be the nursery of

advanced ideas. We shall share together the joys and delights of the public platform. What more can any man

"You will want your dinner early," I said, "if you are going by the eightthirty. I had better tell cook"

"She is going to marry a beastly little rotter of a rent collector that she doesn't care a damn for," he went on.

"I don't see, in any case, what it's got to do with you," I said, "but, as a matter of fact, she isn't."

I didn't know at the time that it was a silly thing to say, and I am not sure that I should not have said it if I

had. When he is in one of his moods I always seem to get into one of mine. I have looked after Mr. John ever

since he was a baby, so that we do not either of us treat the other quite as perhaps we ought to.

"I don't care where she is," he said. He seemed determined never to let me finish a sentence. "Send her up

"But you do," she said. She always had an obstinate twist in her, and, feeling it would save time, I told her

She was standing stock still staring at the pastry she was making. She turned to me, and there was a curious

"Do you know what you ought to be wearing?" she said. "Wings, and a little bow and arrow."

She didn't even think to wipe her hands, but went straight upstairs. It was about half an hour later when the

I have looked after Mr. John ever since he was a boy. He was fortytwo last birthday, but when I shook

hands with him through the cab window I could have sworn he was twentyfive again.

The first time I met him, to my knowledge, was on an evilsmelling, onefunnelled steam boat that in those

days plied between London Bridge and Antwerp. He was walking the deck arminarm with a showily

dressed but decidedly attractive young woman; both of them talking and laughing loudly. It struck me as odd,

finding him a fellowtraveller by such a route. The passage occupied eighteen hours, and the firstclass

return fare was one pound twelve and six, including three meals each way; drinks, as the contract was careful

to explain, being extra. I was earning thirty shillings a week at the time as clerk with a firm of agents in

Fenchurch Street. Our business was the purchasing of articles on commission for customers in India, and I

had learned to be a judge of values. The beaver lined coat he was wearingfor the evening, although it was

late summer, was chillymust have cost him a couple of hundred pounds, while his carelessly displayed

After dinner, as I was leaning with my back against the gunwale on the starboard side, he came out of the

only private cabin that the vessel boasted, and taking up a position opposite to me, with his legs well apart

and a big cigar between his thick lips, stood coolly regarding me, as if appraising me.

I had not been quite sure before he spoke, but his lisp, though slight, betrayed the Jew. His features were

coarse, almost brutal; but the restless eyes were so brilliant, the whole face so suggestive of power and

character, that, taking him as a whole, the feeling he inspired was admiration, tempered by fear. His tone was

one of kindly contemptthe tone of a man accustomed to find most people his inferiors, and too used to the

"Yes," I answered, adding the information that I had never been abroad before, and had heard that Antwerp

"Like to see a bit more than Antwerp, if you could afford it, wouldn't you?" he suggested. "Fascinating little

country Holland. Just long enougha fortnightto do the whole of it. I'm a Dutchman, a Dutch Jew."

"You speak English just like an Englishman," I told him. It was somehow in my mind to please him. I could

"And half a dozen other languages equally well," he answered, laughing. "I left Amsterdam when I was

He closed the cabin door behind him, and, crossing over, laid a strong hand on my shoulder.

"I will make a proposal to you," he said. "My business is not of the kind that can be put out of mind, even for

a few days, and there are reasons"he glanced over his shoulder towards the cabin door, and gave vent to a

short laugh"why I did not want to bring any of my own staff with me. If you care for a short tour, all

expenses paid at slapup hotels and a tenpound note in your pocket at the end, you can have it for two

"Only one thing I stipulate for," he added, "that you mind your own business and keep your mouth shut.

"That's your hotel at Antwerp," he said. "You are Mr. Horatio Jones's secretary." He chuckled to himself as

he repeated the name, which certainly did not fit him. "Knock at my sittingroom door at nine o'clock

He ended the conversation as abruptly as he had begun it, and returned to his cabin.

I got a glimpse of him next morning, coming out of the hotel bureau. He was speaking to the manager in

French, and had evidently given instructions concerning me, for I found myself preceded by an obsequious

waiter to quite a charming bedroom on the second floor, while the "English breakfast" placed before me later

in the coffeeroom was of a size and character that in those days I did not often enjoy. About the work, also,

he was as good as his word. I was rarely occupied for more than two hours each morning. The duties

consisted chiefly of writing letters and sending off telegrams. The letters he signed and had posted himself, so

that I never learnt his real namenot during that fortnightbut I gathered enough to be aware that he was a

He never introduced me to "Mrs. Horatio Jones," and after a few days he seemed to be bored with her, so that

I could not help liking the man. Strength always compels the adoration of youth; and there was something big

and heroic about him. His daring, his swift decisions, his utter unscrupulousness, his occasional cruelty when

necessity seemed to demand it. One could imagine him in earlier days a born leader of savage hordes, a lover

of fighting for its own sake, meeting all obstacles with fierce welcome, forcing his way onward, indifferent to

the misery and destruction caused by his progress, his eyes never swerving from their goal; yet not without a

sense of rough justice, not altogether without kindliness when it could be indulged in without danger.

One afternoon he took me with him into the Jewish quarter of Amsterdam, and threading his way without

hesitation through its maze of unsavoury slums, paused before a narrow threestoreyed house overlooking a

"The room I was born in," he explained. "Window with the broken pane on the second floor. It has never

I stole a glance at him. His face betrayed no suggestion of sentiment, but rather of amusement. He offered me

a cigar, which I was glad of, for the stench from the offalladen water behind us was distracting, and for a

while we both smoked in silence: he with his eyes halfclosed; it was a trick of his when working out a

"Curious, my making such a choice," he remarked. "A butcher's assistant for my father and a consumptive

buttonholemaker for my mother. I suppose I knew what I was about. Quite the right thing for me to have

I stared at him, wondering whether he was speaking seriously or in grim jest. He was given at times to

making odd remarks. There was a vein of the fantastic in him that was continually cropping out and

"It was a bit risky," I suggested. "Better choose something a little safer next time."

He looked round at me sharply, and, not quite sure of his mood, I kept a grave face.

"Perhaps you are right," he agreed, with a laugh. "We must have a talk about it one day."

After that visit to the Goortgasse he was less reserved with me, and would often talk to me on subjects that I

should never have guessed would have interested him. I found him a curious mixture. Behind the shrewd,

I parted from him at The Hague. He paid my fare back to London, and gave me an extra pound for travelling

expenses, together with the tenpound note he had promised me. He had packed off "Mrs. Horatio Jones"

some days before, to the relief, I imagine, of both of them, and he himself continued his journey to Berlin. I

never expected to see him again, although for the next few months I often thought of him, and even tried to

discover him by inquiries in the City. I had, however, very little to go upon, and after I had left Fenchurch

Until one day I received a letter addressed to the care of my publishers. It bore the Swiss postmark, and

opening it and turning to the signature I sat wondering for the moment where I had met "Horatio Jones." And

He was lying bruised and broken in a woodcutter's hut on the slopes of the Jungfrau. Had been playing a

fool's trick, so he described it, thinking he could climb mountains at his age. They would carry him down to

Lauterbrunnen as soon as he could be moved farther with safety, but for the present he had no one to talk to

but the nurse and a Swiss doctor who climbed up to see him every third day. He begged me, if I could spare

the time, to come over and spend a week with him. He enclosed a hundredpound cheque for my expenses,

making no apology for doing so. He was complimentary about my first book, which he had been reading, and

asked me to telegraph him my reply, giving me his real name, which, as I had guessed it would, proved to be

one of the best known in the financial world. My time was my own now, and I wired him that I would be

He was lying in the sun outside the hut when I arrived late in the afternoon, after a threehours' climb

followed by a porter carrying my small amount of luggage. He could not raise his hand, but his strangely

"I am glad you were able to come," he said. "I have no near relations, and my friendsif that is the right

termare business men who would be bored to tears. Besides, they are not the people I feel I want to talk to,

He was entirely reconciled to the coming of death. Indeed, there were moments when he gave me the idea

that he was looking forward to it with an awed curiosity. With the conventional notion of cheering him, I

talked of staying till he was able to return with me to civilisation, but he only laughed.

"I am not going back," he said. "Not that way. What they may do afterwards with these broken bones does

It was difficult to feel sorry for him, his own fate appearing to make so little difference to himself. The world

was still full of interest to himnot his own particular corner of it: that, he gave me to understand, he had

tidied up and dismissed from his mind. It was the future, its coming problems, its possibilities, its new

developments, about which he seemed eager to talk. One might have imagined him a young man with the

One eveningit was near the endwe were alone together. The woodcutter and his wife had gone down

into the valley to see their children, and the nurse, leaving him in my charge, had gone for a walk. We had

carried him round to his favourite side of the hut facing the towering mass of the Jungfrau. As the shadows

Gradually I became aware that his piercing eyes were fixed on me, and in answer I turned and looked at him.

"I wonder if we shall meet again," he said, "or, what is more important, if we shall remember one another."

I was puzzled for the moment. We had discussed more than once the various religions of mankind, and his

"It has been growing upon me these last few days," he continued. "It flashed across me the first time I saw

you on the boat. We were fellowstudents. Something, I don't know what, drew us very close together. There

was a woman. They were burning her. And then there was a rush of people and a sudden darkness, and your

I suppose it was some form of hypnotism, for, as he spoke, his searching eyes fixed on mine, there came to

me a dream of narrow streets filled with a strange crowd, of painted houses such as I had never seen, and a

haunting fear that seemed to be always lurking behind each shadow. I shook myself free, but not without an

"So that's what you meant," I said, "that evening in the Goortgasse. You believe in it?"

"A curious thing happened to me," he said, "when I was a child. I could hardly have been six years old. I had

gone to Ghent with my parents. I think it was to visit some relative. One day we went into the castle. It was in

ruins then, but has since been restored. We were in what was once the council chamber. I stole away by

myself to the other end of the great room and, not knowing why I did so, I touched a spring concealed in the

masonry, and a door swung open with a harsh, grinding noise. I remember peering round the opening. The

others had their backs towards me, and I slipped through and closed the door behind me. I seemed

instinctively to know my way. I ran down a flight of steps and along dark corridors through which I had to

feel my way with my hands, till I came to a small door in an angle of the wall. I knew the room that lay the

other side. A photograph was taken of it and published years afterwards, when the place was discovered, and

it was exactly as I knew it with its way out underneath the city wall through one of the small houses in the

"I could not open the door. Some stones had fallen against it, and fearing to get punished, I made my way

back into the council room. It was empty when I reached it. They were searching for me in the other rooms,

At any other time I might have laughed. Later, recalling his talk that evening, I dismissed the whole story as

mere suggestion, based upon the imagination of a child; but at the time those strangely brilliant eyes had

taken possession of me. They remained still fixed upon me as I sat on the low rail of the veranda watching his

I had a feeling that, through them, he was trying to force remembrance of himself upon me. The man

himselfthe very soul of himseemed to be concentrated in them. Something formless and yet distinct was

visualising itself before me. It came to me as a physical relief when a spasm of pain caused him to turn his

"You will find a letter when I am gone," he went on, after a moment's silence. "I thought that you might come

too late, or that I might not have strength enough to tell you. I felt that out of the few people I have met

outside business, you would be the most likely not to dismiss the matter as mere nonsense. What I am glad of

myself, and what I wish you to remember, is that I am dying with all my faculties about me. The one thing I

have always feared through life was old age, with its gradual mental decay. It has always seemed to me that I

have died more or less suddenly while still in possession of my will. I have always thanked God for that."

He closed his eyes, but I do not think he was sleeping; and a little later the nurse returned, and we carried him

indoors. I had no further conversation with him, though at his wish during the following two days I continued

I found the letter he had spoken of. He had told me where it would be. It contained a bundle of banknotes

which he was giving meso he wrotewith the advice to get rid of them as quickly as possible.

"If I had not loved you," the letter continued, "I would have left you an income, and you would have blessed

This world was a school, so he viewed it, for the making of men; and the one thing essential to a man was

strength. One gathered the impression of a deeply religious man. In these days he would, no doubt, have been

claimed as a theosophist; but his beliefs he had made for, and adapted to, himselfto his vehement,

conquering temperament. God needed men to serve Himto help Him. So, through many changes, through

many ages, God gave men life: that by contest and by struggle they might ever increase in strength; to those

who proved themselves most fit the sterner task, the humbler beginnings, the greater obstacles. And the

crown of welldoing was ever victory. He appeared to have convinced himself that he was one of the chosen,

that he was destined for great ends. He had been a slave in the time of the Pharaohs; a priest in Babylon; had

clung to the swaying ladders in the sack of Rome; had won his way into the councils when Europe was a

battlefield of contending tribes; had climbed to power in the days of the Borgias.

To most of us, I suppose, there come at odd moments haunting thoughts of strangely familiar, faroff things;

and one wonders whether they are memories or dreams. We dismiss them as we grow older and the present

with its crowding interests shuts them out; but in youth they were more persistent. With him they appeared to

have remained, growing in reality. His recent existence, closed under the white sheet in the hut behind me as

He wondered, so the letter ran, whether he would have any voice in choosing it. In either event he was

curious of the result. What he anticipated confidently were new opportunities, wider experience. In what

The letter ended with a strange request. It was that, on returning to England, I should continue to think of

him: not of the dead man I had known, the Jewish banker, the voice familiar to me, the trick of speech, of

mannerall such being but the changing clothesbut of the man himself, the soul of him, that would seek

A postscript concluded the letter, to which at the time I attached no importance. He had made a purchase of

I folded the letter and placed it among other papers, and passing into the hut took a farewell glance at the

massive, rugged face. The mask might have served a sculptor for the embodiment of strength. He gave one

I did what he had requested of me. Indeed, I could not help it. I thought of him constantly. That may have

I was bicycling through Norfolk, and one afternoon, to escape a coming thunderstorm, I knocked at the door

of a lonely cottage on the outskirts of a common. The woman, a kindly bustling person, asked me in; and

hoping I would excuse her, as she was busy ironing, returned to her work in another room. I thought myself

alone, and was standing at the window watching the pouring rain. After a while, without knowing why, I

turned. And then I saw a child seated on a high chair behind a table in a dark corner of the room. A book of

pictures was open before it, but it was looking at me. I could hear the sound of the woman at her ironing in

the other room. Outside there was the steady thrashing of the rain. The child was looking at me with large,

round eyes filled with a terrible pathos. I noticed that the little body was misshapen. It never moved; it made

no sound; but I had the feeling that out of those strangely wistful eyes something was trying to speak to me.

Something was forming itself before menot visible to my sight; but it was there, in the room. It was the

man I had last looked upon as, dying, he sat beside me in the hut below the Jungfrau. But something had

happened to him. Moved by instinct I went over to him and lifted him out of his chair, and with a sob the

little wizened arms closed round my neck and he clung to me cryinga pitiful, low, wailing cry.

Hearing his cry, the woman came back. A comely, healthylooking woman. She took him from my arms and

"He gets a bit sorry for himself at times," she explained. "At least, so I fancy. You see, he can't run about like

"No," she answered, "and his father as fine a man as you would find in a day's march. Just a visitation of God,

as they tell me. Sure I don't know why. There never was a better little lad, and clever, too, when he's not in

The storm had passed. He grew quieter in her arms, and when I had promised to come again and bring him a

new picturebook, a little grateful smile flickered across the drawn face, but he would not talk.

I kept in touch with him. Mere curiosity would have made me do that. He grew more normal as the years

went by, and gradually the fancy that had come to me at our first meeting faded farther into the background.

Sometimes, using the very language of the dead man's letter, I would talk to him, wondering if by any chance

some flash of memory would come back to him, and once or twice it seemed to me that into the mild,

pathetic eyes there came a look that I had seen before, but it passed away, and indeed, it was difficult to think

of this sad little human oddity, with its pleading helplessness, in connection with the strong, swift, conquering

The one thing that brought joy to him was his art. I cannot help thinking that, but for his health, he would

have made a name for himself. His work was always clever and original, but it was the work of an invalid.

"I shall never be great," he said to me once. "I have such wonderful dreams, but when it comes to working

them out there is something that hampers me. It always seems to me as if at the last moment a hand was

stretched out that clutched me by the feet. I long so, but I have not the strength. It is terrible to be one of the

It clung to me, that word he had used. For a man to know he is weak; it sounds a paradox, but a man must be

strong to know that. And dwelling upon this, and upon his patience and his gentleness, there came to me

suddenly remembrance of that postscript, the significance of which I had not understood.

He was a young man of about three or fourandtwenty at the time. His father had died, and he was living

in poor lodgings in the south of London, supporting himself and his mother by strenuous, illpaid work.

I had some difficulty in getting him to accept my help, for he was very proud in his sensitive, apologetic way.

But I succeeded eventually, persuading him it would be good for his work. Physically the journey must have

cost him dear, for he could never move his body without pain, but the changing landscapes and the strange

cities more than repaid him; and when one morning I woke him early and he saw for the first time the distant

We reached the hut late in the afternoon. I had made my arrangements so that we should be there alone. Our

needs were simple, and in various wanderings I had learnt to be independent. I did not tell him why I had

brought him there, beyond the beauty and stillness of the place. Purposely I left him much alone there,

making everlengthening walks my excuse, and though he was always glad of my return I felt that the desire

One evening, having climbed farther than I had intended, I lost my way. It was not safe in that neighbourhood

to try new pathways in the dark, and chancing upon a deserted shelter, I made myself a bed upon the straw.

I found him seated outside the hut when I returned, and he greeted me as if he had been expecting me just at

that moment and not before. He guessed just what had happened, he told me, and had not been alarmed.

During the day I found him watching me, and in the evening, as we sat in his favourite place outside the hut,

"I cannot tell," I answered. "I only know that he died here, if there be such a thing as deaththat no one has

"They have always been with me," he continued, "these dreams. But I have always dismissed them. They

seemed so ludicrous. Always there came to me wealth, power, victory. Life was so easy."

He laid his thin hand on mine. A strange new look came into his eyesa look of hope, almost of joy.

"Do you know what it seems to me?" he said. "You will laugh perhaps, but the thought has come to me up

here that God has some fine use for me. Success was making me feeble. He has given me weakness and

Old Ab Herrick, so most people called him. Not that he was actually old; the term was an expression of liking

rather than any reflection on his years. He lived in an oldfashioned houseoldfashioned, that is, for New

Yorkon the south side of West Twentieth Street: once upon a time, but that was long ago, quite a

fashionable quarter. The house, together with Mrs. Travers, had been left him by a maiden aunt. An

"apartment" would, of course, have been more suitable to a bachelor of simple habits, but the situation was

convenient from a journalistic point of view, and for fifteen years Abner Herrick had lived and worked there.

Then one evening, after a three days' absence, Abner Herrick returned to West Twentieth Street, bringing

with him a little girl wrapped up in a shawl, and a wooden box tied with a piece of cord. He put the box on

the table; and the young lady, loosening her shawl, walked to the window and sat down facing the room.

Mrs. Travers took the box off the table and put it on the floorit was quite a little boxand waited.

"This young lady," explained Abner Herrick, "is Miss Ann Kavanagh, daughter ofof an old friend of

"Miss Kavanagh," continued Abner Herrick, "will be staying with us for" He appeared to be uncertain of

the length of Miss Kavanagh's visit. He left the sentence unfinished and took refuge in more pressing

"What about the bedroom on the second floor? Is it ready? Sheets airedall that sort of thing?"

"It can be," replied Mrs. Travers. The tone was suggestive of judgment reserved.

"I think, if you don't mind, Mrs. Travers, that we'd like to go to bed as soon as possible." From force of habit

Abner S. Herrick in speaking employed as a rule the editorial "we." "We have been travelling all day and we

"I'd like some supper," said Miss Kavanagh from her seat in the window, without moving.

"Of course," agreed Miss Kavanagh's host, with a feeble pretence that the subject had been on the tip of his

tongue. As a matter of fact, he really had forgotten all about it. "We might have it up here while the room is

"A soft boiled egg and a glass of milk, if you please, Mrs. Travers," interrupted Miss Kavanagh, still from her

"I'll see about it," said Mrs. Travers, and went out, taking the quite small box with her.

Such was the coming into this story of Ann Kavanagh at the age of eight years; or, as Miss Kavanagh herself

would have explained, had the question been put to her, eight years and seven months, for Ann Kavanagh

was a precise young lady. She was not beautifulnot then. She was much too sharp featured; the little

pointed chin protruding into space to quite a dangerous extent. Her large dark eyes were her one redeeming

feature. But the level brows above them were much too ready with their frown. A sallow complexion and

nondescript hair deprived her of that charm of colouring on which youth can generally depend for attraction,

whatever its faults of form. Nor could it truthfully be said that sweetness of disposition afforded

"A selfwilled, cantankerous little imp I call her," was Mrs. Travers's comment, expressed after one of the

many trials of strength between them, from which Miss Kavanagh had as usual emerged triumphant.

"It's her father," explained Abner Herrick, feeling himself unable to contradict.

To Uncle Ab himself, as she had come to call him, she could on occasion be yielding and affectionate; but

that, as Mrs. Travers took care to point out to her, was a small thing to her credit.

"If you had the instincts of an ordinary Christian child," explained Mrs. Travers to her, "you'd be thinking

twentyfour hours a day of what you could do to repay him for all his loving kindness to you; instead of

causing him, as you know you do, a dozen heartaches in a week. You're an ungrateful little monkey, and

Upon which Miss Kavanagh, not waiting to hear more, flew upstairs and, locking herself in her own room,

gave herself up to howling and remorse; but was careful not to emerge until she felt bad tempered again; and

able, should opportunity present itself, to renew the contest with Mrs. Travers unhampered by sentiment.

But Mrs. Travers's words had sunk in deeper than that good lady herself had hoped for; and one evening,

when Abner Herrick was seated at his desk penning a scathing indictment of the President for lack of

firmness and decision on the tariff question, Ann, putting her thin arms round his neck and rubbing her little

"You're not bringing me up properlynot as you ought to," explained Ann. "You give way to me too much,

"Not scold you!" exclaimed Abner with a certain warmth of indignation. "Why, I'm doing it all"

"Not what _I_ call scolding," continued Ann. "It's very wrong of you. I shall grow up horrid if you don't help

As Ann with great clearness pointed out to him, there was no one else to undertake the job with any chance of

success. If Abner failed her, then she supposed there was no hope for her: she would end by becoming a

wicked woman, and everybody, including herself, would hate her. It was a sad prospect. The contemplation

He saw the justice of her complaint and promised to turn over a new leaf. He honestly meant to do so; but,

like many another repentant sinner, found himself feeble before the difficulties of performance. He might

have succeeded better had it not been for her soft deep eyes beneath her level brows.

"You're not much like your mother," so he explained to her one day, "except about the eyes. Looking into

He was smoking a pipe beside the fire, and Ann, who ought to have been in bed, had perched herself upon

one of the arms of his chair and was kicking a hole in the worn leather with her little heels.

Abner Herrick blew a cloud from his pipe and watched carefully the curling smoke.

"It was a spiritual beauty, your mother's," Abner explained. "The soul looking out of her eyes. I don't think it

possible to imagine a more beautiful disposition than your mother's. Whenever I think of your mother,"

He murmured the quotation to himself, but loud enough to be heard by sharp ears. Miss Kavanagh was

"Yes, I suppose I was," mused Abner, still with his gaze upon the curling smoke.

"I was in love with your mother very much," he corrected himself, turning to her with a smile.

"No, you wouldn't," he contradicted her quite shortly. They were both beginning to lose patience with one

"I'm not a woman," explained Ann, "and I'm very smart. You've said so yourself."

"Not so smart as all that," growled Abner. "Added to which, it's time for you to go to bed."

Her anger with him was such that it rendered her absolutely polite. It had that occasional effect upon her. She

slid from the arm of his chair and stood beside him, a rigid figure of frozen femininity.

"I think you are quite right, Uncle Herrick. Good night!" But at the door she could not resist a parting shot:

"You might have been my father, and then perhaps she wouldn't have died. I think it was very wicked of

After she was gone Abner sat gazing into the fire, and his pipe went out. Eventually the beginnings of a smile

stole to the corners of his mouth, but before it could spread any farther he dismissed it with a sigh.

Abner, for the next day or two, feared a renewal of the conversation, but Ann appeared to have forgotten it;

and as time went by it faded from Abner's own memory. Until one evening quite a while later.

The morning had brought him his English mail. It had been arriving with some regularity, and Ann had

noticed that Abner always opened it before his other correspondence. One letter he read through twice, and

Ann, who was pretending to be reading the newspaper, felt that he was looking at her.

"I have been thinking, my dear," said Abner, "that it must be rather lonely for you here, all by yourself."

"I mean," said Abner, "without any other young person to talk to andand to play with."

"It isn't a 'she,'" explained Abner. "It's a 'he.' Poor little chap lost his mother two years ago, and now his

father's dead. I thoughtit occurred to me we might put him up for a time. Look after him a bit. What do you

She sat very silent, and Abner, whose conscience was troubling him, watched her a little anxiously. After a

"Precisely what I am wondering myself," confessed Abner. "We shall have to wait and see. But his

motherhis mother," repeated Abner, "was the most beautiful woman I have ever known. If he is anything

Abner shook his head. "She married an Englishman. He took her back with him to London."

"They have their points," suggested Abner. "Besides, boys take after their mothers, they say." And Abner

Ann remained very thoughtful all that day. In the evening, when Abner for a moment laid down his pen for

the purpose of relighting his pipe, Ann came to him, seating herself on the corner of the desk.

"What are you talking about?" said Abner, dismissing altogether the Panama Canal.

"You loved my mother very much," explained Ann with cold deliberation. "She always made you think of

"It was the day you took me away from Miss Carew's because she said she couldn't manage me," Ann

"I wish you'd use your memory for things you're wanted to remember," growled Abner.

"You said you had never asked her to marry you," pursued Ann relentlessly; "you wouldn't tell me why. You

"My fault," muttered Abner. "I forget you're a child. You ask all sorts of questions that never ought to enter

One small tear that had made its escape unnoticed by her was stealing down her cheek. He wiped it away and

"I loved your mother very dearly," he said gravely. "I had loved her from a child. But no woman will ever

understand the power that beauty has upon a man. You see we're built that way. It's Nature's lure. Later on, of

"But you still love her," reasoned Ann through her tears, "or you wouldn't want him to come here."

"She had such a hard time of it," pleaded Abner. "It made things easier to her, my giving her my word that I

Nor did Matthew Pole himself, when he arrived, do much to help matters. He was so hopelessly English. At

least, that was the way Ann put it. He was shy and sensitive. It is a trying combination. It made him appear

stupid and conceited. A lonely childhood had rendered him unsociable, unadaptable. A dreamy, imaginative

temperament imposed upon him long moods of silence: a liking for long solitary walks. For the first time

"A sulky young dog," commented Mrs. Travers. "If I were your uncle I'd look out for a job for him in San

"You see," said Ann in excuse for him, "it's such a foggy country, England. It makes them like that."

Also, sixteen is an awkward age for a boy. Virtues, still in the chrysalis state, are struggling to escape from

their parent vices. Pride, an excellent quality making for courage and patience, still appears in the swathings

of arrogance. Sincerity still expresses itself in the language of rudeness. Kindness itself is apt to be mistaken

It was kindnessa genuine desire to be useful, that prompted him to point out to Ann her undoubted faults

and failings, nerved him to the task of bringing her up in the way she should go. Mrs. Travers had long since

washed her hands of the entire business. Uncle Ab, as Matthew also called him, had proved himself a

weakling. Providence, so it seemed to Matthew, must have been waiting impatiently for his advent. Ann at

first thought it was some new school of humour. When she found he was serious she set herself to cure him.

But she never did. He was too conscientious for that. The instincts of the guide, philosopher, and friend to

humanity in general were already too strong in him. There were times when Abner almost wished that

But he did not lose hope. At the back of his mind was the fancy that these two children of his loves would

come together. Nothing is quite so sentimental as a healthy old bachelor. He pictured them making unity

from his confusions; in imagination heard the patter on the stairs of tiny feet. To all intents and purposes he

would be a grandfather. Priding himself on his cunning, he kept his dream to himself, as he thought, but

For days together she would follow Matthew with her eyes, watching him from behind her long lashes,

listening in silence to everything he said, vainly seeking to find points in him. He was unaware of her

generous intentions. He had a vague feeling he was being criticised. He resented it even in those days.

"I do try," said Ann suddenly one evening apropos of nothing at all. "No one will ever know how hard I try

"Sometimes," continued Ann, "I tell myself I have almost succeeded. And then he will go and do something

"Oh, I can't tell you," confessed Ann. "If I told you it would sound as if it was my fault. It's all so silly. And

then he thinks such a lot of himself. If one only knew why! He can't tell you himself when you ask him."

"I wanted to know," explained Ann. "I thought there might be something in him that I could like."

"I know," wailed Ann. "You are hoping that when I am grown up I shall marry him. And I don't want to. It's

"Well, you're not grown up yet," Abner consoled her. "And so long as you are feeling like that about it, I'm

"Yes, but we've got to think of the boy, don't forget that," laughed Abner. "Perhaps he might object."

"He would. I know he would," cried Ann with conviction. "He's no better than I am."

"Not to marry me," explained Ann. "But I told him he must be an unnatural little beast not to try to like me

Abner succeeded in persuading her that the path of dignity and virtue lay in her dismissing the whole subject

He had made a mistake, so he told himself. Age may be attracted by contrast, but youth has no use for its

opposite. He would send Matthew away. He could return for weekends. Continually so close to one another,

they saw only one another's specks and flaws; there is no beauty without perspective. Matthew wanted the

corners rubbed off him, that was all. Mixing more with men, his priggishness would be laughed out of him.

Otherwise he was quite a decent youngster, clean minded, high principled. Clever, too: he often said quite

unexpected things. With approaching womanhood, changes were taking place in Ann. Seeing her every day

one hardly noticed them; but there were times when, standing before him flushed from a walk or bending

over him to kiss him before starting for some friendly dance, Abner would blink his eyes and be puzzled. The

thin arms were growing round and firm; the sallow complexion warming into olive; the once patchy,

mousecoloured hair darkening into a rich harmony of brown. The eyes beneath her level brows, that had

always been her charm, still reminded Abner of her mother; but there was more light in them, more danger.

"I'll run down to Albany and talk to Jephson about him," decided Abner. "He can come home on Saturdays."

The plot might have succeeded: one never can tell. But a New York blizzard put a stop to it. The cars broke

down, and Abner, walking home in thin shoes from a meeting, caught a chill, which, being neglected, proved

Abner was troubled as he lay upon his bed. The children were sitting very silent by the window. He sent

Matthew out on a message, and then beckoned Ann to come to him. He loved the boy, too, but Ann was

"You must never think," he said, "to show your love for my memory by doing anything that would not make

you happy. If I am anywhere around," he continued with a smile, "it will be your good I shall be watching

He had meant to do more for them, but the end had come so much sooner than he had expected. To Ann he

left the house (Mrs. Travers had already retired on a small pension) and a sum that, judiciously invested, the

friend and attorney thought should be sufficient for her needs, even supposingThe friend and attorney,

pausing to dwell upon the oval face with its dark eyes, left the sentence unfinished.

To Matthew he wrote a loving letter, enclosing a thousand dollars. He knew that Matthew, now in a position

to earn his living as a journalist, would rather have taken nothing. It was to be looked upon merely as a

parting gift. Matthew decided to spend it on travel. It would fit him the better for his journalistic career, so he

explained to Ann. But in his heart he had other ambitions. It would enable him to put them to the test.

So there came an evening when Ann stood waving a handkerchief as a great liner cast its moorings. She

watched it till its lights grew dim, and then returned to West Twentieth Street. Strangers would take

possession of it on the morrow. Ann had her supper in the kitchen in company with the nurse, who had stayed

on at her request; and that night, slipping noiselessly from her room, she lay upon the floor, her head resting

against the arm of the chair where Abner had been wont to sit and smoke his evening pipe; somehow it

seemed to comfort her. And Matthew the while, beneath the stars, was pacing the silent deck of the great liner

To only one other being had he ever confided his dreams. She lay in the churchyard; and there was nothing

left to encourage him but his own heart. But he had no doubts. He would be a great writer. His two hundred

pounds would support him till he had gained a foothold. After that he would climb swiftly. He had done right,

so he told himself, to turn his back on journalism: the grave of literature. He would see men and cities,

writing as he went. Looking back, years later, he was able to congratulate himself on having chosen the right

road. He thought it would lead him by easy ascent to fame and fortune. It did better for him than that. It led

him through poverty and loneliness, through hope deferred and heartachethrough long nights of fear, when

His great poems, his brilliant essays, had been rejected so often that even he himself had lost all love for

them. At the suggestion of an editor more kindly than the general run, and urged by need, he had written

some short pieces of a less ambitious nature. It was in bitter disappointment he commenced them, regarding

them as mere potboilers. He would not give them his name. He signed them "Aston Rowant." It was the

name of the village in Oxfordshire where he had been born. It occurred to him by chance. It would serve the

purpose as well as another. As the work progressed it grew upon him. He made his stories out of incidents

and people he had seen; everyday comedies and tragedies that he had lived among, of things that he had felt;

and when after their appearance in the magazine a publisher was found willing to make them into a book,

It was but shortlived. The few reviews that reached him contained nothing but ridicule. So he had no place

He was living in Paris at the time in a noisy, evilsmelling street leading out of the Quai SaintMichel. He

thought of Chatterton, and would loaf on the bridges looking down into the river where the drowned lights

And then one day there came to him a letter, sent on to him from the publisher of his one book. It was signed

"Sylvia," nothing else, and bore no address. Matthew picked up the envelope. The postmark was "London,

It was a childish letter. A prosperous, wellfed genius, familiar with such, might have smiled at it. To

Matthew in his despair it brought healing. She had found the book lying in an empty railway carriage; and

undeterred by moral scruples had taken it home with her. It had remained forgotten for a time, until when the

end really seemed to have come her hand by chance had fallen on it. She fancied some kind little wandering

spiritthe spirit perhaps of someone who had known what it was to be lonely and very sad and just about

broken almostmust have manoeuvred the whole thing. It had seemed to her as though some strong and

gentle hand had been laid upon her in the darkness. She no longer felt friendless. And so on.

The book, he remembered, contained a reference to the magazine in which the sketches had first appeared.

She would be sure to have noticed this. He would send her his answer. He drew his chair up to the flimsy

He did not have to think. It came to him, and for the first time since the beginning of things he had no fear of

its not being accepted. It was mostly about himself, and the rest was about her, but to most of those who read

it two months later it seemed to be about themselves. The editor wrote a charming letter, thanking him for it;

but at the time the chief thing that worried him was whether "Sylvia" had seen it. He waited anxiously for a

few weeks, and then received her second letter. It was a more womanly letter than the first. She had

understood the story, and her words of thanks almost conveyed to him the flush of pleasure with which she

had read it. His friendship, she confessed, would be very sweet to her, and still more delightful the thought

that he had need of her: that she also had something to give. She would write, as he wished, her real thoughts

and feelings. They would never know one another, and that would give her boldness. They would be

In this way commenced the whimsical romance of Sylvia and Aston Rowant; for it was too late now to

change the nameit had become a name to conjure with. The stories, poems, and essays followed now in

regular succession. The anxiously expected letters reached him in orderly procession. They grew in interest,

in helpfulness. They became the letters of a wonderfully sane, broadminded, thoughtful womana woman

of insight, of fine judgment. Their praise was rare enough to be precious. Often they would contain just

criticism, tempered by sympathy, lightened by humour. Of her troubles, sorrows, fears, she came to write less

and less, and even then not until they were past and she could laugh at them. The subtlest flattery she gave

him was the suggestion that he had taught her to put these things into their proper place. Intimate,

selfrevealing as her letters were, it was curious he never shaped from them any satisfactory image of the

A brave, kind, tender woman. A selfforgetting, quicklyforgiving woman. A manysided woman,

responding to joy, to laughter: a merry lady, at times. Yet by no means a perfect woman. There could be

flashes of temper, one felt that; quite often occasional unreasonableness; a tongue that could be cutting. A

sweet, restful, greatly loving woman, but still a woman: it would be wise to remember that. So he read her

from her letters. But herself, the eyes, and hair, and lips of her, the voice and laugh and smile of her, the

He was in Alaska one spring, where he had gone to collect material for his work, when he received the last

letter she ever wrote him. They neither of them knew then it would be the last. She was leaving London, so

the postscript informed him, sailing on the following Saturday for New York, where for the future she

It worried him that postscript. He could not make out for a long time why it worried him. Suddenly, in a

waste of endless snows, the explanation flashed across him. Sylvia of the letters was a living woman! She

could travelwith a box, he supposed, possibly with two or three, and parcels. Could take tickets, walk up a

gangway, stagger about a deck feeling, maybe, a little seasick. All these years he had been living with her in

dreamland she had been, if he had only known it, a Miss Somebodyorother, who must have stood every

morning in front of a lookingglass with hairpins in her mouth. He had never thought of her doing these

things; it shocked him. He could not help feeling it was indelicate of hercoming to life in this sudden,

He struggled with this new conception of her, and had almost forgiven her, when a further and still more

startling suggestion arrived to plague him. If she really lived why should he not see her, speak to her? So long

as she had remained in her hidden temple, situate in the vague recesses of London, S.E., her letters had

contented him. But now that she had moved, now that she was no longer a voice but a woman! Well, it would

be interesting to see what she was like. He imagined the introduction: "Miss Somebody orother, allow me

to present you to Mr. Matthew Pole." She would have no idea he was Aston Rowant. If she happened to be

young, beautiful, in all ways satisfactory, he would announce himself. How astonished, how delighted she

But if not! If she were elderly, plain? The wisest, wittiest of women have been known to have an incipient

moustache. A beautiful spirit can, and sometimes does, look out of goggle eyes. Suppose she suffered from

indigestion and had a shiny nose! Would her letters ever again have the same charm for him? Absurd that

The risk was too great. Giving the matter long and careful consideration, he decided to send her back into

But somehow she would not go back into dreamland, would persist in remaining in New York, a living,

Yet even so, how could he find her? He might, say, in a poem convey to her his desire for a meeting. Would

she comply? And if she did, what would be his position, supposing the inspection to result unfavourably for

her? Could he, in effect, say to her: "Thank you for letting me have a look at you; that is all I wanted.

She must, she should remain in dreamland. He would forget her postscript; in future throw her envelopes

unglanced at into the wastepaper basket. Having by this simple exercise of his will replaced her in London,

he himself started for New Yorkon his way back to Europe, so he told himself. Still, being in New York,

there was no reason for not lingering there a while, if merely to renew old memories.

Of course, if he had really wanted to find Sylvia it would have been easy from the date upon the envelope to

have discovered the ship "sailing the following Saturday." Passengers were compelled to register their names

in full, and to state their intended movements after arrival in America. Sylvia was not a common Christian

name. By the help of a fivedollar bill or two. The idea had not occurred to him before. He dismissed it

New York was changed less than he had anticipated. West Twentieth Street in particular was precisely as,

leaning out of the cab window, he had looked back upon it ten years ago. Business had more and more taken

possession of it, but had not as yet altered its appearance. His conscience smote him as he turned the corner

that he had never once written to Ann. He had meant to, it goes without saying, but during those first years of

struggle and failure his pride had held him back. She had always thought him a fool; he had felt she did. He

would wait till he could write to her of success, of victory. And then when it had slowly, almost

imperceptibly, arrived! He wondered why he never had. Quite a nice little girl, in some respects. If only

she had been less conceited, less selfwilled. Also rather a pretty girl she had shown signs of becoming.

There were times He remembered an evening before the lamps were lighted. She had fallen asleep curled

up in Abner's easy chair, one small hand resting upon the arm. She had always had quite attractive handsa

little too thin. Something had moved him to steal across softly without waking her. He smiled at the memory.

And then her eyes, beneath the level brows! It was surprising how Ann was coming back to him. Perhaps

they would be able to tell him, the people of the house, what had become of her. If they were decent people

they would let him wander round a while. He would explain that he had lived there in Abner Herrick's time.

The room where they had sometimes been agreeable to one another while Abner, pretending to read, had sat

watching them out of the corner of an eye. He would like to sit there for a few moments, by himself.

He forgot that he had rung the bell. A very young servant had answered the door and was staring at him. He

would have walked in if the small servant had not planted herself deliberately in his way. It recalled him to

The surprise was so great it rendered him speechless. In another moment the small servant would have

It gave Matthew a few minutes to recover himself, for which he was glad. Then the door opened again

It sounded so like Ann that it quite put him at his ease. He followed the small servant up the stairs.

Ann was standing by the window and came to meet him. It was in front of Abner's empty chair that they

"Yes," she answered. "It never let well. The last people who had it gave it up at Christmas. It seemed the best

"Oh, knocking about," he answered. "Earning my living." He was curious to discover what she thought of

"It seems to have agreed with you," she commented, with a glance that took him in generally, including his

He laughed. "So you haven't changed so very much," he said. "Except in appearance.

"Don't leave it for another ten years," she said, "before letting me know what is happening to you. We didn't

get on very well together as children; but we mustn't let him think we're not friends. It would hurt him."

She spoke quite seriously, as if she were expecting him any moment to open the door and join them.

Involuntarily Matthew glanced round the room. Nothing seemed altered. The worn carpet, the faded curtains,

Abner's easy chair, his pipe upon the corner of the mantelpiece beside the vase of spills.

"It is curious," he said, "finding this vein of fancy, of tenderness in you. I always regarded you as such a

"Perhaps we neither of us knew each other too well, in those days," she answered.

"What have you been doing with yourself?" he asked, drawing his chair up to the table.

"Yes," he agreed. "Life doesn't temper the wind to the human lamb. But was there any need in your case?" he

"Oh, we have been a couple of pigs," she laughed, replying to his thoughts. "I did sometimes think of writing

you. I kept the address you gave me. Not for any assistance; I wanted to fight it out for myself. But I was a bit

"It's rather soon to make up one's mind," she said, "but you seem to me to have changed. Your voice sounds

so different. But as a boy well, you were a bit of a prig, weren't you? I imagined you writing me good

She opened a bureau that had always been her own and handed him a programme. "Miss Ann Kavanagh,

"Your speaking voice," he corrected her. "And it wasn't the quality of that I objected to. It was the quantity."

They talked a while longer: of Abner and his kind, quaint ways; of old friends. Ann had lost touch with most

of them. She had studied singing in Brussels, and afterwards her master had moved to London and she had

The small servant entered to clear away the tea things. She said she thought that Ann had rung. Her tone

implied that anyhow it was time she had. Matthew rose and Ann held out her hand.

"Oh, I'm not in any particular hurry," said Matthew. "Are you generally in of an afternoon?"

He thought as he sat watching her from his stall that she was one of the most beautiful women he had ever

"It will never set the Thames on fire," she had said. "I thought at first that it would. But such as it is I thank

Matthew waited for her at the end. She was feeling well disposed towards all creatures and accepted his

He had called on her once or twice during the preceding days. It was due to her after his long neglect of her,

he told himself, and had found improvement in her. But tonight she seemed to take a freakish pleasure in

letting him see that there was much of the old Ann still left in her: the frank conceit of her; the amazing

selfopinionatedness of her; the waywardness, the wilfulness, the unreasonableness of her; the general

uppishness and dictatorialness of her; the contradictoriness and flat impertinence of her; the swift temper and

It was almost as if she were warning him. "You see, I am not changed, except, as you say, in appearance. I

am still Ann with all the old faults and failings that once made life in the same house with me a constant trial

to you. Just now my very imperfections appear charms. You have been looking at the sunat the glory of

my face, at the wonder of my arms and hands. Your eyes are blinded. But that will pass. And underneath I am

They had quarrelled in the cab on the way home. He forgot what it was about, but Ann had said some quite

rude things, and her face not being there in the darkness to excuse her, it had made him very angry. She had

laughed again on the steps, and they had shaken hands. But walking home through the still streets Sylvia had

What fools we mortals beespecially men! Here was a noble womana restful, understanding, tenderly

loving woman; a woman as nearly approaching perfection as it was safe for a woman to go! This marvellous

woman was waiting for him with outstretched arms (why should he doubt it?)and just because Nature had

at last succeeded in making a temporary success of Ann's skin and had fashioned a rounded line above her

shoulderblade! It made him quite cross with himself. Ten years ago she had been gawky and

sallowcomplexioned. Ten years hence she might catch the yellow jaundice and lose it all. Passages in

Sylvia's letters returned to him. He remembered that faroff evening in his Paris attic when she had knocked

at his door with her great gift of thanks. Recalled how her soft shadow hand had stilled his pain. He spent the

next two days with Sylvia. He reread all her letters, lived again the scenes and moods in which he had

Her personality still defied the efforts of his imagination, but he ended by convincing himself that he would

know her when he saw her. But counting up the women on Fifth Avenue towards whom he had felt

instinctively drawn, and finding that the number had already reached eleven, began to doubt his intuition. On

the morning of the third day he met Ann by chance in a bookseller's shop. Her back was towards him. She

"What I," said the cheerful young lady who was attending to her, "like about him is that he understands

"There's something in that," agreed the cheerful young lady. "They say he's here in New York."

"He wrote for a long time under another name," volunteered the cheerful young lady. "He's quite an elderly

"You know him?" queried Ann. She was most astonished, and appeared disbelieving. That irritated him

Ann made no answer. He bought a copy of the book for himself, and they went out together. They turned

He thought the time was come to break it to her that he was a great and famous man. Then perhaps she would

be sorry she had said what she had said in the cab. Seeing he had made up his mind that his relationship to

her in the future would be that of an affectionate brother, there would be no harm in also letting her know

They walked two blocks before Ann spoke. Matthew, anticipating a pleasurable conversation, felt no desire

"How intimate are you with him?" she demanded. "I don't think he would have said that to a mere

He waited for further questions, but they did not come. At Thirty fourth Street he saved her from being run

over and killed, and again at Fortysecond Street. Just inside the park she stopped abruptly and held out her

"Tell him," she replied, "that if he is really serious about finding Sylvia, I mayI don't say I canbut I may

He did not take her hand, but stood stock still in the middle of the path and stared at her.

She was prepared for his surprise. She was also preparednot with a lie, that implies evil intention. Her only

object was to have a talk with the gentleman and see what he was like before deciding on her future

"We crossed on the same boat," she said. "We found there was a good deal in common between us. Sheshe

"Oh, justwell, not exactly" It was an awkward question. There came to her relief the reflection that there

The Central Park, together with the universe in general, fell away and disappeared. Somewhere out of chaos

was sounding a plaintive voice: "What is she like? Can't you tell me? Is she young or old?"

It seemed to have been going on for ages. She made one supreme gigantic effort, causing the Central Park to

reappear, dimly, faintly, but it was there again. She was sitting on a seat. MatthewAston Rowant, whatever

"Why can't you tell meor, why won't you tell me? Do you mean she's too awful for words?"

She felt she must get away or there would be hysterics somewhere. She sprang up and began to walk rapidly

A car was passing. She made a dash for it and clambered on. Before he could make up his mind it had

Ann let herself in with her key. She called downstairs to the small servant that she wasn't to be disturbed for

So it was to Matthew that for six years she had been pouring out her inmost thoughts and feelings! It was to

Matthew that she had laid bare her tenderest, most sacred dreams! It was at Matthew's feet that for six years

she had been sitting, gazing up with respectful admiration, with reverential devotion! She recalled her letters,

almost passage for passage, till she had to hold her hands to her face to cool it. Her indignation, one might

In the eveningit was in the evening time that she had always written to hima more reasonable frame of

mind asserted itself. After all, it was hardly his fault. He couldn't have known who she was. He didn't know

now. She had wanted to write. Without doubt he had helped her, comforted her loneliness; had given her a

charming friendship, a delightful comradeship. Much of his work had been written for her, to her. It was fine

work. She had been proud of her share in it. Even allowing there were faultsirritability, shortness of

temper, a tendency to bossiness!underneath it all was a man. The gallant struggle, the difficulties

overcome, the long suffering, the high courageall that she, reading between the lines, had divined of his

life's battle! Yes, it was a man she had worshipped. A woman need not be ashamed of that. As Matthew he

had seemed to her conceited, priggish. As Aston Rowant she wondered at his modesty, his patience.

And all these years he had been dreaming of her; had followed her to New York; had

There came a sudden mood so ludicrous, so absurdly unreasonable that Ann herself stopped to laugh at it. Yet

it was real, and it hurt. He had come to New York thinking of Sylvia, yearning for Sylvia. He had come to

New York with one desire: to find Sylvia. And the first pretty woman that had come across his path had sent

Sylvia clean out of his head. There could be no question of that. When Ann Kavanagh stretched out her hand

to him in that very room a fortnight ago he had stood before her dazzled, captured. From that moment Sylvia

had been tossed aside and forgotten. Ann Kavanagh could have done what she liked with him. She had

quarrelled with him that evening of the concert. She had meant to quarrel with him.

And then for the first time he had remembered Sylvia. That was her rewardSylvia's: it was Sylvia she was

thinking offor six years' devoted friendship; for the help, the inspiration she had given him.

As Sylvia, she suffered from a very genuine and explainable wave of indignant jealousy. As Ann, she

admitted he ought not to have done it, but felt there was excuse for him. Between the two she feared her mind

would eventually give way. On the morning of the second day she sent Matthew a note asking him to call in

the afternoon. Sylvia might be there, or she might not. She would mention it to her.

She dressed herself in a quiet, darkcoloured frock. It seemed uncommittal and suitable to the occasion. It

also happened to be the colour that best suited her. She would not have the lamps lighted.

Matthew arrived in a dark serge suit and a blue necktie, so that the general effect was quiet. Ann greeted him

with kindliness and put him with his face to what little light there was. She chose for herself the

windowseat. Sylvia had not arrived. She might be a little latethat is, if she came at all.

They talked about the weather for a while. Matthew was of opinion they were going to have some rain. Ann,

"Sylvia? Oh, what you told me," replied Ann. "That you had come to New York toto look for her."

"What do you think yourself she will be like?" she continued. "Have you formed any notion?"

"It is curious," he replied. "I have never been able to conjure up any picture of her until just now."

"I had an idea I should find her here when I opened the door," he answered. "You were standing in the

"Uncle Ab made a mistake," he continued. "He ought to have sent me away. Let me come home now and

"You mean," said Ann, "that if you had seen less of me you might have liked me better?"

"A thin, gawky girl with a bad complexion," she suggested. "Would it have been of any use?"

"You must always have been wonderful with those eyes," he answered. "And your hands were beautiful even

"I used to cry sometimes when I looked at myself in the glass as a child," she confessed. "My hands were the

"I kissed them once," he told her. "You were asleep, curled up in Uncle Ab's chair."

She was seated with one foot tucked underneath her. She didn't look a bit grown up.

"It used to make me so angry with you," said Ann, "that you seemed to have no go, no ambition in you. I

"I may be exaggerating to myself," he answered. "But I am not sure that I could go on with my work without

"I often do," he confessed. "Till something goes wrong. Then she comes to me. As she did on that first

evening, six years ago. You see, I have been more or less living with her since then," he added with a smile.

"Yes, but in my case," he answered, "the best part of my life is passed in dreamland."

"And when you are not in dreamland?" she demanded. "When you're just irritable, shorttempered, cranky

"No she won't," said Ann. "She'll snap your head off. Most of the 'putting up with' you'll have to do."

He tried to get between her and the window, but she kept her face close to the pane.

"You make me tired with Sylvia," she said. "It's about time you did know what she's like. She's just the

commonplace, shorttempered, disagreeableifshedoesn'tgetherownway, unreasonable woman. Only

It was not at all the way she had meant to break it to him. She had meant the conversation to be chiefly about

Sylvia. She had a high opinion of Sylvia, a much higher opinion than she had of Ann Kavanagh. If he proved

to be worthy of herof Sylvia, that is, then, with the whimsical smile that she felt belonged to Sylvia, she

What had happened to interfere with the programme was Ann Kavanagh. It seemed that Ann Kavanagh had

disliked Matthew Pole less than she had thought she did. It was after he had sailed away that little Ann

Kavanagh had discovered this. If only he had shown a little more interest in, a little more appreciation of,

Ann Kavanagh! He could be kind and thoughtful in a patronising sort of way. Even that would not have

Ann Kavanagh, who ought to have taken a back seat on this occasion, had persisted in coming to the front. It

"Well," she said, "what are you going to say to her?" She did get it in, after all.

"I was going," said Matthew, "to talk to her about Art and Literature, touching, maybe, upon a few other

subjects. Also, I might have suggested our seeing each other again once or twice, just to get better acquainted.

"You're sure there's nobody else," said Ann, "that you're in love with. Only us two?"

She was standing with her hand on old Abner's empty chair. "You've got to choose," she said. She was

Always he remembered her as he saw her first: the little spiritual face, the little brown shoes pointed

downwards, their toes just touching the ground; the little fawn gloves folded upon her lap. He was not

conscious of having noticed her with any particular attention: a plainly dressed, childishlooking figure alone

on a seat between him and the setting sun. Even had he felt curious his shyness would have prevented his

deliberately running the risk of meeting her eyes. Yet immediately he had passed her he saw her again, quite

clearly: the pale oval face, the brown shoes, and, between them, the little fawn gloves folded one over the

other. All down the Broad Walk and across Primrose Hill, he saw her silhouetted against the sinking sun. At

least that much of her: the wistful face and the trim brown shoes and the little folded hands; until the sun

went down behind the high chimneys of the brewery beyond Swiss Cottage, and then she faded.

She was there again the next evening, precisely in the same place. Usually he walked home by the Hampstead

Road. Only occasionally, when the beauty of the evening tempted him, would he take the longer way by

Regent Street and through the Park. But so often it made him feel sad, the quiet Park, forcing upon him the

He would walk down merely as far as the Great Vase, so he arranged with himself. If she were not thereit

was not likely that she would behe would turn back into Albany Street. The newsvendors' shops with their

display of the cheaper illustrated papers, the secondhand furniture dealers with their faded engravings and

old prints, would give him something to look at, to take away his thoughts from himself. But seeing her in the

distance, almost the moment he had entered the gate, it came to him how disappointed he would have been

had the seat in front of the red tulip bed been vacant. A little away from her he paused, turning to look at the

flowers. He thought that, waiting his opportunity, he might be able to steal a glance at her undetected. Once

for a moment he did so, but venturing a second time their eyes met, or he fancied they did, and blushing

furiously he hurried past. But again she came with him, or, rather, preceded him. On each empty seat between

him and the sinking sun he saw her quite plainly: the pale oval face and the brown shoes, and, between them,

Only this evening, about the small, sensitive mouth there seemed to be hovering just the faintest suggestion

of a timid smile. And this time she lingered with him past Queen's Crescent and the Malden Road, till he

turned into Carlton Street. It was dark in the passage, and he had to grope his way up the stairs, but with his

hand on the door of the bedsitting room on the third floor he felt less afraid of the solitude that would rise to

All day long in the dingy back office in Abingdon Street, Westminster, where from ten to six each day he sat

copying briefs and petitions, he thought over what he would say to her; tactful beginnings by means of which

he would slide into conversation with her. Up Portland Place he would rehearse them to himself. But at

Cambridge Gate, when the little fawn gloves came in view, the words would run away, to join him again

maybe at the gate into the Chester Road, leaving him meanwhile to pass her with stiff, hurried steps and eyes

fixed straight in front of him. And so it might have continued, but that one evening she was no longer at her

usual seat. A crowd of noisy children swarmed over it, and suddenly it seemed to him as if the trees and

flowers had all turned drab. A terror gnawed at his heart, and he hurried on, more for the need of movement

than with any definite object. And just beyond a bed of geraniums that had hidden his view she was seated on

a chair, and stopping with a jerk absolutely in front of her, he said, quite angrily:

Which was not a bit the speech with which he had intended to introduce himself, but served his purpose just

"It was the children," she explained. "They wanted to play; so I thought I would come on a little farther."

Upon which, as a matter of course, he took the chair beside her, and it did not occur to either of them that

they had not known one another since the beginning, when between St. John's Wood and Albany Street God

Each evening they would linger there, listening to the pleading passion of the blackbird's note, the thrush's

call to joy and hope. He loved her gentle ways. From the bold challenges, the sly glances of invitation flashed

upon him in the street or from some neighbouring table in the cheap luncheon room he had always shrunk

confused and awkward. Her shyness gave him confidence. It was she who was half afraid, whose eyes would

fall beneath his gaze, who would tremble at his touch, giving him the delights of manly dominion, of tender

authority. It was he who insisted on the aristocratic seclusion afforded by the private chair; who, with the

careless indifference of a man to whom pennies were unimportant, would pay for them both. Once on his way

through Piccadilly Circus he had paused by the fountain to glance at a great basket of lilies of the valley,

struck suddenly by the thought how strangely their little pale petals seemed suggestive of her.

"'Ere y' are, honey. Her favourite flower!" cried the girl, with a grin, holding a bunch towards him.

"How much?" he had asked, vainly trying to keep the blood from rushing to his face.

"Sixpence," she demanded; and he bought them. She had meant to ask him a shilling, and knew he would

have paid it. "Same as silly fool!" she called herself as she pocketed the money.

He gave them to her with a fine lordly air, and watched her while she pinned them to her blouse, and a

squirrel halting in the middle of the walk watched her also with his head on one side, wondering what was the

good of them that she should store them with so much care. She did not thank him in words, but there were

tears in her eyes when she turned her face to his, and one of the little fawn gloves stole out and sought his

hand. He took it in both his, and would have held it, but she withdrew it almost hurriedly.

They appealed to him, her gloves, in spite of their being old and much mended; and he was glad they were of

kid. Had they been of cotton, such as girls of her class usually wore, the thought of pressing his lips to them

would have put his teeth on edge. He loved the little brown shoes, that must have been expensive when new,

for they still kept their shape. And the fringe of dainty petticoat, always so spotless and with never a tear, and

the neat, plain stockings that showed below the closely fitting frock. So often he had noticed girls, showily,

extravagantly dressed, but with red bare hands and sloppy shoes. Handsome girls, some of them, attractive

enough if you were not of a finicking nature, to whom the little accessories are almost of more importance

He loved her voice, so different from the strident tones that every now and then, as some couple, laughing

and talking, passed them, would fall upon him almost like a blow; her quick, graceful movements that always

brought back to his memory the vision of hill and stream. In her little brown shoes and gloves and the frock

which was also of a shade of brown though darker, she was strangely suggestive to him of a fawn. The gentle

look, the swift, soft movements that have taken place before they are seen; the haunting suggestion of fear

never quite conquered, as if the little nervous limbs were always ready for sudden flight. He called her that

one day. Neither of them had ever thought to ask one another's names; it did not seem to matter.

"My little brown fawn," he had whispered, "I am always expecting you to suddenly dig your little heels into

the ground and spring away"; and she had laughed and drawn a little closer to him. And even that was just the

movement of a fawn. He had known them, creeping near to them upon the hillsides when he was a child.

There was much in common between them, so they found. Though he could claim a few distant relatives

scattered about the North, they were both, for all practical purposes, alone in the world. To her, also, home

meant a bedsitting room"over there," as she indicated with a wave of the little fawn glove embracing the

northwest district generally; and he did not press her for any more precise address.

It was easy enough for him to picture it: the mean, closesmelling street somewhere in the neighbourhood of

Lisson Grove, or farther on towards the Harrow Road. Always he preferred to say goodbye to her at some

point in the Outer Circle, with its peaceful vista of fine trees and stately houses, watching her little fawnlike

No friend or relative had she ever known, except the pale, girlishlooking mother who had died soon after

they had come to London. The elderly landlady had let her stay on, helping in the work of the house; and

when even this last refuge had failed her, wellmeaning folk had interested themselves and secured her

employment. It was light and fairly well paid, but there were objections to it, so he gathered, more from her

halting silences than from what she said. She had tried for a time to find something else, but it was so

difficult without help or resources. There was nothing really to complain about it, except And then she

paused with a sudden clasp of the gloved hands, and, seeing the troubled look in her eyes, he had changed the

It did not matter; he would take her away from it. It was very sweet to him, the thought of putting a protective

arm about this little fragile creature whose weakness gave him strength. He was not always going to be a

clerk in an office. He was going to write poetry, books, plays. Already he had earned a little. He told her of

his hopes, and her great faith in him gave him new courage. One evening, finding a seat where few people

ever passed, he read to her. And she had understood. All unconsciously she laughed in the right places, and

when his own voice trembled, and he found it difficult to continue for the lump in his own throat, glancing at

her he saw the tears were in her eyes. It was the first time he had tasted sympathy.

And so spring grew to summer. And then one evening a great thing happened. He could not make out at first

what it was about her: some little added fragrance that made itself oddly felt, while she herself seemed to be

conscious of increased dignity. It was not until he took her hand to say goodbye that he discovered it. There

was something different about the feel of her, and, looking down at the little hand that lay in his, he found the

reason. She had on a pair of new gloves. They were still of the same fawn colour, but so smooth and soft and

cool. They fitted closely without a wrinkle, displaying the slightness and the gracefulness of the hands

beneath. The twilight had almost faded, and, save for the broad back of a disappearing policeman, they had

the Outer Circle to themselves; and, the sudden impulse coming to him, he dropped on one knee, as they do

in plays and story books and sometimes elsewhere, and pressed the little fawn gloves to his lips in a long,

passionate kiss. The sound of approaching footsteps made him rise hurriedly. She did not move, but her

whole body was trembling, and in her eyes was a look that was almost of fear. The approaching footsteps

came nearer, but a bend of the road still screened them. Swiftly and in silence she put her arms about his neck

and kissed him. It was a strange, cold kiss, but almost fierce, and then without a word she turned and walked

away; and he watched her to the corner of Hanover Gate, but she did not look back.

It was almost as if it had raised a barrier between them, that kiss. The next evening she came to meet him

with a smile as usual, but in her eyes was still that odd suggestion of lurking fear; and when, seated beside

her, he put his hand on hers it seemed to him she shrank away from him. It was an unconscious movement. It

brought back to him that haunting memory of hill and stream when some soft eyed fawn, strayed from her

fellows, would let him approach quite close to her, and then, when he put out his hand to caress her, would

"But this is not out of doors," he had pleaded. "We have come into the garden. Won't you take them off?"

She had looked at him from under bent brows, as if trying to read him. She did not answer him then. But on

the way out, on the last seat close to the gate, she had sat down, motioning him to sit beside her. Quietly she

unbuttoned the fawn gloves; drew each one off and laid them aside. And then, for the first time, he saw her

Had he looked at her, seen the faint hope die out, the mute agony in the quiet eyes watching him, he would

have tried to hide the disgust, the physical repulsion that showed itself so plainly in his face, in the

involuntary movement with which he drew away from her. They were small and shapely with rounded

curves, but raw and seared as with hot irons, with a growth of red, angrycoloured warts, and the nails all

"I ought to have shown them to you before," she said simply as she drew the gloves on again. "It was silly of

It was the work, she explained as they walked on. It made your hands like that after a time. If only she could

They parted near to the Hanover Gate, but tonight he did not stand watching her as he had always done till

she waved a last goodbye to him just before disappearing; so whether she turned or not he never knew.

He did not go to meet her the next evening. A dozen times his footsteps led him unconsciously almost to the

gate. Then he would hurry away again, pace the mean streets, jostling stupidly against the passersby. The

pale, sweet face, the little nymphlike figure, the little brown shoes kept calling to him. If only there would

pass away the horror of those hands! All the artist in him shuddered at the memory of them. Always he had

imagined them under the neat, smooth gloves as fitting in with all the rest of her, dreaming of the time when

he would hold them in his own, caressing them, kissing them. Would it be possible to forget them, to

reconcile oneself to them? He must thinkmust get away from these crowded streets where faces seemed to

grin at him. He remembered that Parliament had just risen, that work was slack in the office. He would ask

He packed a few things into a knapsack. From the voices of the hills and streams he would find counsel.

He took no count of his wanderings. One evening at a lonely inn he met a young doctor. The innkeeper's wife

was expecting to be taken with child that night, and the doctor was waiting downstairs till summoned. While

they were talking, the idea came to him. Why had he not thought of it? Overcoming his shyness, he put his

questions. What work would it be that would cause such injuries? He described them, seeing them before him

Oh! a dozen things might account for itthe doctor's voice sounded callousthe handling of flax, even of

linen under certain conditions. Chemicals entered so much nowadays into all sorts of processes and

preparations. All this new photography, cheap colour printing, dyeing and cleaning, metal work. Might all be

avoided by providing rubber gloves. It ought to be made compulsory. The doctor seemed inclined to hold

Cured? Hope? Of course it could be cured. It was only localthe effect being confined to the hands proved

that. A poisoned condition of the skin aggravated by general poverty of blood. Take her away from it; let her

have plenty of fresh air and careful diet, using some such simple ointment or another as any local man, seeing

He could hardly stay to thank the young doctor. He wanted to get away by himself, to shout, to wave his

arms, to leap. Had it been possible he would have returned that very night. He cursed himself for the

fancifulness that had prevented his inquiring her address. He could have sent a telegram. Rising at dawn, for

he had not attempted to sleep, he walked the ten miles to the nearest railway station, and waited for the train.

All day long it seemed to creep with him through the endless country. But London came at last.

It was still the afternoon, but he did not care to go to his room. Leaving his knapsack at the station, he made

his way to Westminster. He wanted all things to be unchanged, so that between this evening and their parting

it might seem as if there had merely passed an ugly dream; and timing himself, he reached the park just at

He waited till the gates were closed, but she did not come. All day long at the back of his mind had been that

And the next evening he told himself the same. He dared not whisper to himself anything else. And each

succeeding evening again. He never remembered how many. For a time he would sit watching the path by

which she had always come; and when the hour was long past he would rise and walk towards the gate, look

east and west, and then return. One evening he stopped one of the parkkeepers and questioned him. Yes, the

man remembered her quite well: the young lady with the fawn gloves. She had come once or twicemaybe

oftener, the parkkeeper could not be sureand had waited. No, there had been nothing to show that she was

in any way upset. She had just sat there for a time, now and then walking a little way and then coming back

again, until the closing hour, and then she had gone. He left his address with the parkkeeper. The man

Sometimes, instead of the park, he would haunt the mean streets about Lisson Grove and far beyond the other

He wondered, beating against the bars of his poverty, if money would have helped him. But the grim, endless

city, hiding its million secrets, seemed to mock the thought. A few pounds he had scraped together he spent

in advertisements; but he expected no response, and none came. It was not likely she would see them.

And so after a time the park, and even the streets round about it, became hateful to him; and he moved away

to another part of London, hoping to forget. But he never quite succeeded. Always it would come back to him

when he was not thinking: the broad, quiet walk with its prim trees and gay beds of flowers. And always he

would see her seated there, framed by the fading light. At least, that much of her: the little spiritual face, and

the brown shoes pointing downwards, and between them the little fawn gloves folded upon her lap.