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diff --git a/old/10882.txt b/old/10882.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3e3e98d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10882.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6292 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Eagle's Shadow, by James Branch Cabell + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Eagle's Shadow + +Author: James Branch Cabell + +Release Date: January 31, 2004 [EBook #10882] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EAGLE'S SHADOW *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Bradley Norton and PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + +[Illustration: "Margaret"] + +THE + +EAGLE'S SHADOW + +By + +JAMES BRANCH CABELL + +1904 + +To + +Martha Louise Branch + +_In trust that the enterprise may be judged less by the merits of its +factor than by those of its patron_ + + + + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER + +I. + +II. + +III. + +IV. + +V. + +VI. + +VII. + +VIII. + +IX. + +X. + +XI. + +XII. + +XIII. + +XIV. + +XV. + +XVI. + +XVII. + +XVIII. + +XIX. + +XX. + +XXI. + +XXII. + +XXIII. + +XXIV. + +XXV. + +XXVI. + +XXVII. + +XXVIII. + +XXIX. + +XXX. + +XXXI. + +XXXII. + +XXXIII. + + + + +THE CHARACTERS + +Colonel Thomas Hugonin, formerly in the service of Her Majesty the +Empress of India, Margaret Hugonin's father. + +Frederick R. Woods, the founder of Selwoode, Margaret's uncle by +marriage. + +Billy Woods, his nephew, Margaret's quondam fiance. + +Hugh Van Orden, a rather young young man, Margaret's adorer. + +Martin Jeal, M.D., of Fairhaven, Margaret's family physician. + +Cock-Eye Flinks, a gentleman of leisure, Margaret's chance +acquaintance. + +Petheridge Jukesbury, president of the Society for the Suppression of +Nicotine and the Nude, Margaret's almoner in furthering the cause of +education and temperance. + +Felix Kennaston, a minor poet, Margaret's almoner in furthering the +cause of literature and art. + +Sarah Ellen Haggage, Madame President of the Ladies' League for the +Edification of the Impecunious, Margaret's almoner in furthering the +cause of charity and philanthropy. Kathleen Eppes Saumarez, a lecturer +before women's clubs, Margaret's almoner in furthering the cause of +theosophy, nature study, and rational dress. + +Adele Haggage, Mrs. Haggage's daughter, Margaret's rival with Hugh Van +Orden. + +And Margaret Hugonin. + +The other participants in the story are Wilkins, Celestine, The Spring +Moon and The Eagle. + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + +"Margaret" + +"'Altogether,' says Colonel Hugonin, 'they strike me as being the +most ungodly menagerie ever gotten together under one roof since Noah +landed on Ararat'" + +"Then, for no apparent reason, Margaret flushed, and Billy ... thought +it vastly becoming" + +"Billy Woods" + +"Billy unfolded it slowly, with a puzzled look growing in his +countenance" + +"'My lady,' he asked, very softly, 'haven't you any good news for me +on this wonderful morning?'" + +"Miss Hugonin pouted. 'You needn't, be such a grandfather,' she +suggested helpfully." + +"Regarded them with alert eyes" + + + + +THE EAGLE'S SHADOW + + +I + +This is the story of Margaret Hugonin and of the Eagle. And with your +permission, we will for the present defer all consideration of the +bird, and devote our unqualified attention to Margaret. + +I have always esteemed Margaret the obvious, sensible, most +appropriate name that can be bestowed upon a girl-child, for it is a +name that fits a woman--any woman--as neatly as her proper size in +gloves. + +Yes, the first point I wish to make is that a woman-child, once +baptised Margaret, is thereby insured of a suitable name. Be she grave +or gay in after-life, wanton or pious or sullen, comely or otherwise, +there will be no possible chance of incongruity; whether she develop a +taste for winter-gardens or the higher mathematics, whether she take +to golf or clinging organdies, the event is provided for. One has only +to consider for a moment, and if among a choice of Madge, Marjorie, +Meta, Maggie, Margherita, Peggy, and Gretchen, and countless +others--if among all these he cannot find a name that suits her to a +T--why, then, the case is indeed desperate and he may permissibly +fall back upon Madam or--if the cat jump propitiously, and at his own +peril--on Darling or Sweetheart. + +The second proof that this name must be the best of all possible names +is that Margaret Hugonin bore it. And so the murder is out. You may +suspect what you choose. I warn you in advance that I have no part +whatever in her story; and if my admiration for her given name appear +somewhat excessive, I can only protest that in this dissentient world +every one has a right to his own taste. I knew Margaret. I admired +her. And if in some unguarded moment I may have carried my admiration +to the point of indiscretion, her husband most assuredly knows all +about it, by this, and he and I are still the best of friends. So you +perceive that if I ever did so far forget myself it could scarcely +have amounted to a hanging matter. + +I am doubly sure that Margaret Hugonin was beautiful, for the reason +that I have never found a woman under forty-five who shared my +opinion. If you clap a Testament into my hand, I cannot affirm that +women are eager to recognise beauty in one another; at the utmost they +concede that this or that particular feature is well enough. But when +a woman is clean-eyed and straight-limbed, and has a cheery heart, +she really cannot help being beautiful; and when Nature accords her +a sufficiency of dimples and an infectious laugh, I protest she is +well-nigh irresistible. And all these Margaret Hugonin had. + +And surely that is enough. + +I shall not endeavour, then, to picture her features to you in any +nicely picked words. Her chief charm was that she was Margaret. + +And besides that, mere carnal vanities are trivial things; a gray +eye or so is not in the least to the purpose. Yet since it is the +immemorial custom of writer-folk to inventory such possessions of +their heroines, here you have a catalogue of her personal attractions. +Launce's method will serve our turn. + +Imprimis, there was not very much of her--five feet three, at the +most; and hers was the well-groomed modern type that implies a +grandfather or two and is in every respect the antithesis of that +hulking Venus of the Louvre whom people pretend to admire. Item, she +had blue eyes; and when she talked with you, her head drooped forward +a little. The frank, intent gaze of these eyes was very flattering +and, in its ultimate effect, perilous, since it led you fatuously to +believe that she had forgotten there were any other trousered beings +extant. Later on you found this a decided error. Item, she had a quite +incredible amount of yellow hair, that was not in the least like gold +or copper or bronze--I scorn the hackneyed similes of metallurgical +poets--but a straightforward yellow, darkening at the roots; and she +wore it low down on her neck in great coils that were held in place +by a multitude of little golden hair-pins and divers corpulent +tortoise-shell ones. Item, her nose was a tiny miracle of perfection; +and this was noteworthy, for you will observe that Nature, who is an +adept at eyes and hair and mouths, very rarely achieves a creditable +nose. Item, she had a mouth; and if you are a Gradgrindian with a +taste for hairsplitting, I cannot swear that it was a particularly +small mouth. The lips were rather full than otherwise; one saw in them +potentialities of heroic passion, and tenderness, and generosity, and, +if you will, temper. No, her mouth was not in the least like the pink +shoe-button of romance and sugared portraiture; it was manifestly +designed less for simpering out of a gilt frame or the dribbling of +stock phrases over three hundred pages than for gibes and laughter +and cheery gossip and honest, unromantic eating, as well as another +purpose, which, as a highly dangerous topic, I decline even to +mention. + +There you have the best description of Margaret Hugonin that I am +capable of giving you. No one realises its glaring inadequacy more +acutely than I. + +Furthermore, I stipulate that if in the progress of our comedy she +appear to act with an utter lack of reason or even common-sense--as +every woman worth the winning must do once or twice in a +lifetime--that I be permitted to record the fact, to set it down in +all its ugliness, nay, even to exaggerate it a little--all to the end +that I may eventually exasperate you and goad you into crying out, +"Come, come, you are not treating the girl with common justice!" + +For, if such a thing were possible, I should desire you to rival even +me in a liking for Margaret Hugonin. And speaking for myself, I can +assure you that I have come long ago to regard her faults with the +same leniency that I accord my own. + + + +II + +We begin on a fine May morning in Colonel Hugonin's rooms at Selwoode, +which is, as you may or may not know, the Hugonins' country-place. +And there we discover the Colonel dawdling over his breakfast, in an +intermediate stage of that careful toilet which enables him later in +the day to pass casual inspection as turning forty-nine. + +At present the old gentleman is discussing the members of his +daughter's house-party. We will omit, by your leave, a number of +picturesque descriptive passages--for the Colonel is, on occasion, a +man of unfettered speech--and come hastily to the conclusion, to the +summing-up of the whole matter. + +"Altogether," says Colonel Hugonin, "they strike me as being the most +ungodly menagerie ever gotten together under one roof since Noah +landed on Ararat." + +Now, I am sorry that veracity compels me to present the Colonel +in this particular state of mind, for ordinarily he was as +pleasant-spoken a gentleman as you will be apt to meet on the +longest summer day. + +[Illustration: "'Altogether,' says Colonel Hugonin, 'they strike me as +being the most ungodly menagerie ever gotten together under one roof +since Noah landed on Ararat.'"] + +You must make allowances for the fact that, on this especial morning, +he was still suffering from a recent twinge of the gout, and that his +toast was somewhat dryer than he liked it; and, most potent of all, +that the foreign mail, just in, had caused him to rebel anew against +the proprieties and his daughter's inclinations, which chained him to +Selwoode, in the height of the full London season, to preside over a +house-party every member of which he cordially disliked. Therefore, +the Colonel having glanced through the well-known names of those at +Lady Pevensey's last cotillion, groaned and glared at his daughter, +who sat opposite him, and reviled his daughter's friends with point +and fluency, and characterised them as above, for the reason that he +was hungered at heart for the shady side of Pall Mall, and that their +presence at Selwoode prevented his attaining this Elysium. For, I am +sorry to say that the Colonel loathed all things American, saving his +daughter, whom he worshipped. + +And, I think, no one who could have seen her preparing his second cup +of tea would have disputed that in making this exception he acted with +a show of reason. For Margaret Hugonin--but, as you know, she is +our heroine, and, as I fear you have already learned, words are very +paltry makeshifts when it comes to describing her. Let us simply say, +then, that Margaret, his daughter, began to make him a cup of tea, and +add that she laughed. + +Not unkindly; no, for at bottom she adored her father--a comely +Englishman of some sixty-odd, who had run through his wife's fortune +and his own, in the most gallant fashion--and she accorded his +opinions a conscientious, but at times, a sorely taxed, tolerance. +That very month she had reached twenty-three, the age of omniscience, +when the fallacies and general obtuseness of older people become +dishearteningly apparent. + +"It's nonsense," pursued the old gentleman, "utter, bedlamite +nonsense, filling Selwoode up with writing people! Never heard of such +a thing. Gad, I do remember, as a young man, meeting Thackeray at a +garden-party at Orleans House--gentlemanly fellow with a broken nose-- +and Browning went about a bit, too, now I think of it. People had 'em +one at a time to lend flavour to a dinner--like an olive; we didn't +dine on olives, though. You have 'em for breakfast, luncheon, dinner, +and everything! I'm sick of olives, I tell you, Margaret!" Margaret +pouted. + +"They ain't even good olives. I looked into one of that fellow +Charteris's books the other day--that chap you had here last week. +It was bally rot--proverbs standing on their heads and grinning +like dwarfs in a condemned street-fair! Who wants to be told that +impropriety is the spice of life and that a roving eye gathers +remorse? _You_ may call that sort of thing cleverness, if you like; I +call it damn' foolishness." And the emphasis with which he said this +left no doubt that the Colonel spoke his honest opinion. + +"Attractive," said his daughter patiently, "Mr. Charteris is very, +very clever. Mr. Kennaston says literature suffered a considerable +loss when he began to write for the magazines." + +And now that Margaret has spoken, permit me to call your attention to +her voice. Mellow and suave and of astonishing volume was Margaret's +voice; it came not from the back of her throat, as most of our women's +voices do, but from her chest; and I protest it had the timbre of a +violin. Men, hearing her voice for the first time, were wont to stare +at her a little and afterward to close their hands slowly, for always +its modulations had the tonic sadness of distant music, and it +thrilled you to much the same magnanimity and yearning, cloudily +conceived; and yet you could not but smile in spite of yourself at the +quaint emphasis fluttering through her speech and pouncing for the +most part on the unlikeliest word in the whole sentence. + +But I fancy the Colonel must have been tone-deaf. "Don't you make +phrases for me!" he snorted; "you keep 'em for your menagerie Think! +By gad, the world never thinks. I believe the world deliberately +reads the six bestselling books in order to incapacitate itself for +thinking." Then, his wrath gathering emphasis as he went on: "The +longer I live the plainer I see Shakespeare was right--what +fools these mortals be, and all that. There's that Haggage +woman--speech-making through the country like a hiatused politician. +It may be philanthropic, but it ain't ladylike--no, begad! What has +she got to do with Juvenile Courts and child-labour in the South, I'd +like to know? Why ain't she at home attending to that crippled boy +of hers--poor little beggar!--instead of flaunting through America +meddling with other folk's children?" + +Miss Hugonin put another lump of sugar into his cup and deigned no +reply. + +"By gad," cried the Colonel fervently, "if you're so anxious to spend +that money of yours in charity, why don't you found a Day Nursery for +the Children of Philanthropists--a place where advanced men and women +can leave their offspring in capable hands when they're busied with +Mothers' Meetings and Educational Conferences? It would do a thousand +times more good, I can tell you, than that fresh kindergarten scheme +of yours for teaching the children of the labouring classes to make a +new sort of mud-pie." + +"You don't understand these things, attractive," Margaret gently +pointed out. "You aren't in harmony with the trend of modern thought." + +"No, thank God!" said the Colonel, heartily. + +Ensued a silence during which he chipped at his egg-shell in an +absent-minded fashion. + +"That fellow Kennaston said anything to you yet?" he presently +queried. + +"I--I don't understand," she protested--oh, perfectly unconvincingly. +The tea-making, too, engrossed her at this point to an utterly +improbable extent. + +Thus it shortly befell that the Colonel, still regarding her under +intent brows, cleared his throat and made bold to question her +generosity in the matter of sugar; five lumps being, as he suggested, +a rather unusual allowance for one cup. + +Then, "Mr. Kennaston and I are very good friends," said she, with +dignity. And having spoiled the first cup in the making, she began on +another. + +"Glad to hear it," growled the old gentleman. "I hope you value his +friendship sufficiently not to marry him. The man's a fraud--a flimsy, +sickening fraud, like his poetry, begad, and that's made up of botany +and wide margins and indecency in about equal proportions. It ain't +fit for a woman to read--in fact, a woman ought not to read anything; +a comprehension of the Decalogue and the cookery-book is enough +learning for the best of 'em. Your mother never--never--" + +Colonel Hugonin paused and stared at the open window for a little. He +seemed to be interested in something a great way off. + +"We used to read Ouida's books together," he said, somewhat wistfully. +"Lord, Lord, how she revelled in Chandos and Bertie Cecil and those +dashing Life Guardsmen! And she used to toss that little head of hers +and say I was a finer figure of a man than any of 'em--thirty +years ago, good Lord! And I was then, but I ain't now. I'm only a +broken-down, cantankerous old fool," declared the Colonel, blowing +his nose violently, "and that's why I'm quarrelling with the dearest, +foolishest daughter man ever had. Ah, my dear, don't mind me--run your +menagerie as you like, and I'll stand it." + +Margaret adopted her usual tactics; she perched herself on the arm +of his chair and began to stroke his cheek very gently. She +often wondered as to what dear sort of a woman that tender-eyed, +pink-cheeked mother of the old miniature had been--the mother who had +died when she was two years old. She loved the idea of her, vague as +it was. And, just now, somehow, the notion of two grown people reading +Ouida did not strike her as being especially ridiculous. + +"Was she very beautiful?" she asked, softly. + +"My dear," said her father, "you are the picture of her." + +"You dangerous old man!" said she, laughing and rubbing her cheek +against his in a manner that must have been highly agreeable. "Dear, +do you know that is the nicest little compliment I've had for a long +time?" + +Thereupon the Colonel chuckled. "Pay me for it, then," said he, "by +driving the dog-cart over to meet Billy's train to-day. Eh?" + +"I--I can't," said Miss Hugonin, promptly. + +"Why?" demanded her father. + +"Because----" said Miss Hugonin; and after giving this really +excellent reason, reflected for a moment and strengthened it by +adding, "Because----" + +"See here," her father questioned, "what did you two quarrel about, +anyway?" + +"I--I really don't remember," said she, reflectively; then continued, +with hauteur and some inconsistency, "I am not aware that Mr. Woods +and I have ever quarrelled." + +"By gad, then," said the Colonel, "you may as well prepare to, for +I intend to marry you to Billy some day. Dear, dear, child," he +interpolated, with malice aforethought, "have you a fever?--your +cheek's like a coal. Billy's a man, I tell you--worth a dozen of your +Kennastons and Charterises. I like Billy. And besides, it's only right +he should have Selwoode--wasn't he brought up to expect it? It +ain't right he should lose it simply because he had a quarrel with +Frederick, for, by gad--not to speak unkindly of the dead, my +dear--Frederick quarrelled with every one he ever knew, from the woman +who nursed him to the doctor who gave him his last pill. He may have +gotten his genius for money-making from Heaven, but he certainly +got his temper from the devil. I really believe," said the Colonel, +reflectively, "it was worse than mine. Yes, not a doubt of it--I'm a +lamb in comparison. But he had his way, after all; and even now poor +Billy can't get Selwoode without taking you with it," and he caught +his daughter's face between his hands and turned it toward his for a +moment. "I wonder now," said he, in meditative wise, "if Billy will +consider that a drawback?" + +It seemed very improbable. Any number of marriageable males would have +sworn it was unthinkable. + +However, "Of course," Margaret began, in a crisp voice, "if you advise +Mr. Woods to marry me as a good speculation--" + +But her father caught her up, with a whistle. "Eh?" said he. "Love in +a cottage?--is it thus the poet turns his lay? That's damn' nonsense! +I tell you, even in a cottage the plumber's bill has to be paid, and +the grocer's little account settled every month. Yes, by gad, and +even if you elect to live on bread and cheese and kisses, you'll find +Camembert a bit more to your taste than Sweitzer." + +"But I don't want to marry anybody, you ridiculous old dear," said +Margaret. + +"Oh, very well," said the old gentleman; "don't. Be an old maid, and +lecture before the Mothers' Club, if you like. I don't care. Anyhow, +you meet Billy to-day at twelve-forty-five. You will?--that's a good +child. Now run along and tell the menagerie I'll be down-stairs as +soon as I've finished dressing." + +And the Colonel rang for his man and proceeded to finish his toilet. +He seemed a thought absent-minded this morning. + +"I say, Wilkins," he questioned, after a little. "Ever read any of +Ouida's books?" + +"Ho, yes, sir," said Wilkins; "Miss 'Enderson--Mrs. 'Aggage's maid, +that his, sir--was reading haloud hout hof 'Hunder Two Flags' honly +last hevening, sir." + +"H'm--Wilkins--if you can run across one of them in the servants' +quarters--you might leave it--by my bed--to-night." + +"Yes, sir." + +"And--h'm, Wilkins--you can put it under that book of Herbert +Spencer's my daughter gave me yesterday. _Under_ it, Wilkins--and, +h'm, Wilkins--you needn't mention it to anybody. Ouida ain't cultured, +Wilkins, but she's damn' good reading. I suppose that's why she ain't +cultured, Wilkins." + + + +III + +And now let us go back a little. In a word, let us utilise the next +twenty minutes--during which Miss Hugonin drives to the neighbouring +railway station, in, if you press me, not the most pleasant state of +mind conceivable--by explaining a thought more fully the posture of +affairs at Selwoode on the May morning that starts our story. + +And to do this I must commence with the nature of the man who founded +Selwoode. + +It was when the nineteenth century was still a hearty octogenarian +that Frederick R. Woods caused Selwoode to be builded. I give you the +name by which he was known on "the Street." A mythology has grown +about the name since, and strange legends of its owner are still +narrated where brokers congregate. But with the lambs he sheared, and +the bulls he dragged to earth, and the bears he gored to financial +death, we have nothing to do; suffice it, that he performed these +operations with almost uniform success and in an unimpeachably +respectable manner. + +And if, in his time, he added materially to the lists of inmates in +various asylums and almshouses, it must be acknowledged that he bore +his victims no malice, and that on every Sunday morning he confessed +himself to be a miserable sinner, in a voice that was perfectly +audible three pews off. At bottom, I think he considered his relations +with Heaven on a purely business basis; he kept a species of running +account with Providence; and if on occasions he overdrew it somewhat, +he saw no incongruity in evening matters with a cheque for the church +fund. + +So that at his death it was said of him that he had, in his day, sent +more men into bankruptcy and more missionaries into Africa than any +other man in the country. + +In his sixty-fifth year, he caught Alfred Van Orden short in Lard, +erected a memorial window to his wife and became a country gentleman. +He never set foot in Wall Street again. He builded Selwoode--a +handsome Tudor manor which stands some seven miles from the village of +Fairhaven--where he dwelt in state, by turns affable and domineering +to the neighbouring farmers, and evincing a grave interest in the +condition of their crops. He no longer turned to the financial reports +in the papers; and the pedigree of the Woodses hung in the living-hall +for all men to see, beginning gloriously with Woden, the Scandinavian +god, and attaining a respectable culmination in the names of Frederick +R. Woods and of William, his brother. + +It is not to be supposed that he omitted to supply himself with a +coat-of-arms. Frederick R. Woods evinced an almost childlike pride in +his heraldic blazonings. + +"The Woods arms," he would inform you, with a relishing gusto, "are +vert, an eagle displayed, barry argent and gules. And the crest is +out of a ducal coronet, or, a demi-eagle proper. We have no motto, +sir--none of your ancient coats have mottoes." + +The Woods Eagle he gloried in. The bird was perched in every available +nook at Selwoode; it was carved in the woodwork, was set in the +mosaics, was chased in the tableware, was woven in the napery, was +glazed in the very china. Turn where you would, an eagle or two +confronted you; and Hunston Wyke, who is accounted something of a +wit, swore that Frederick R. Woods at Selwoode reminded him of "a +sore-headed bear who had taken up permanent quarters in an aviary." + +There was one, however, who found the bear no very untractable +monster. This was the son of his brother, dead now, who dwelt at +Selwoode as heir presumptive. Frederick R. Woods's wife had died long +ago, leaving him childless. His brother's boy was an orphan; and so, +for a time, he and the grim old man lived together peaceably enough. +Indeed, Billy Woods was in those days as fine a lad as you would wish +to see, with the eyes of an inquisitive cherub and a big tow-head, +which Frederick R. Woods fell into the habit of cuffing heartily, in +order to conceal the fact that he would have burned Selwoode to the +ground rather than allow any one else to injure a hair of it. + +In the consummation of time, Billy, having attained the ripe age of +eighteen, announced to his uncle that he intended to become a famous +painter. Frederick R. Woods exhorted him not to be a fool, and packed +him off to college. + +Billy Woods returned on his first vacation with a fragmentary mustache +and any quantity of paint-tubes, canvases, palettes, mahl-sticks, and +such-like paraphernalia. Frederick R. Woods passed over the mustache, +and had the painters' trappings burned by the second footman. Billy +promptly purchased another lot. His uncle came upon them one morning, +rubbed his chin meditatively for a moment, and laughed for the first +time, so far as known, in his lifetime; then he tiptoed to his own +apartments, lest Billy--the lazy young rascal was still abed in the +next room--should awaken and discover his knowledge of this act of +flat rebellion. + +I dare say the old gentleman was so completely accustomed to having +his own way that this unlooked-for opposition tickled him by its +novelty; or perhaps he recognised in Billy an obstinacy akin to his +own; or perhaps it was merely that he loved the boy. In any event, he +never again alluded to the subject; and it is a fact that when +Billy sent for carpenters to convert an upper room into an atelier, +Frederick R. Woods spent two long and dreary weeks in Boston in order +to remain in ignorance of the entire affair. + +Billy scrambled through college, somehow, in the allotted four years. +At the end of that time, he returned to find new inmates installed at +Selwoode. + +For the wife of Frederick R. Woods had been before her marriage one of +the beautiful Anstruther sisters, who, as certain New Yorkers still +remember--those grizzled, portly, rosy-gilled fellows who prattle +on provocation of Jenny Lind and Castle Garden, and remember +everything--created a pronounced furor at their debut in the days of +crinoline and the Grecian bend; and Margaret Anstruther, as they +will tell you, was married to Thomas Hugonin, then a gallant cavalry +officer in the service of Her Majesty, the Empress of India. + +And she must have been the nicer of the two, because everybody who +knew her says that Margaret Hugonin is exactly like her. + +So it came about naturally enough, that Billy Woods, now an _Artium +Baccalaureus_, if you please, and not a little proud of it, found the +Colonel and his daughter, then on a visit to this country, installed +at Selwoode as guests and quasi-relatives. And Billy was twenty-two, +and Margaret was nineteen. + + * * * * * + +Precisely what happened I am unable to tell you. Billy Woods claims +it is none of my business; and Margaret says that it was a long, long +time ago and she really can't remember. + +But I fancy we can all form a very fair notion of what is most likely +to occur when two sensible, normal, healthy young people are thrown +together in this intimate fashion at a country-house where the +remaining company consists of two elderly gentlemen. Billy was forced +to be polite to his uncle's guest; and Margaret couldn't well be +discourteous to her host's nephew, could she? Of course not: so +it befell in the course of time that Frederick R. Woods and the +Colonel--who had quickly become a great favourite, by virtue of his +implicit faith in the Eagle and in Woden and Sir Percival de Wode of +Hastings, and such-like flights of heraldic fancy, and had augmented +his popularity by his really brilliant suggestion of Wynkyn de Worde, +the famous sixteenth-century printer, as a probable collateral +relation of the family--it came to pass, I say, that the two gentlemen +nodded over their port and chuckled, and winked at one another and +agreed that the thing would do. + +This was all very well; but they failed to make allowances for the +inevitable quarrel and the subsequent spectacle of the gentleman +contemplating suicide and the lady looking wistfully toward a nunnery. +In this case it arose, I believe, over Teddy Anstruther, who for a +cousin was undeniably very attentive to Margaret; and in the natural +course of events they would have made it up before the week was out +had not Frederick R. Woods selected this very moment to interfere in +the matter. + +Ah, _si vieillesse savait!_ + +The blundering old man summoned Billy into his study and ordered him +to marry Margaret Hugonin, precisely as the Colonel might have ordered +a private to go on sentry-duty. Ten days earlier Billy would have +jumped at the chance; ten days later he would probably have suggested +it himself; but at that exact moment he would have as willingly +contemplated matrimony with Alecto or Medusa or any of the Furies. +Accordingly, he declined. Frederick R. Woods flew into a pyrotechnical +display of temper, and gave him his choice between obeying his +commands and leaving his house forever--the choice, in fact, which he +had been according Billy at very brief intervals ever since the boy +had had the measles, fifteen years before, and had refused to take the +proper medicines. + +It was merely his usual manner of expressing a request or a +suggestion. But this time, to his utter horror and amaze, the boy took +him at his word and left Selwoode within the hour. + +Billy's life, you see, was irrevocably blighted. It mattered very +little what became of him; personally, he didn't care in the least. +But as for that fair, false, fickle woman--perish the thought! Sooner +a thousand deaths! No, he would go to Paris and become a painter of +worldwide reputation; the money his father had left him would easily +suffice for his simple wants. And some day, the observed of all +observers in some bright hall of gaiety, he would pass her coldly by, +with a cynical smile upon his lips, and she would grow pale and totter +and fall into the arms of the bloated Silenus, for whose title she had +bartered her purely superficial charms. + +Yes, upon mature deliberation, that was precisely what Billy decided +to do. + +Followed dark days at Selwoode. Frederick R. Woods told Margaret of +what had occurred; and he added the information that, as his wife's +nearest relative, he intended to make her his heir. + +Then Margaret did what I would scarcely have expected of Margaret. +She turned upon him like a virago and informed Frederick R. Woods +precisely what she thought of him; she acquainted him with the fact +that he was a sordid, low-minded, grasping beast, and a miser, and +a tyrant, and (I think) a parricide; she notified him that he was +thoroughly unworthy to wipe the dust off his nephew's shoes--an +office toward which, to do him justice, he had never shown any marked +aspirations--and that Billy had acted throughout in a most noble and +sensible manner; and that, personally, she wouldn't marry Billy Woods +if he were the last man on earth, for she had always despised him; and +she added the information that she expected to die shortly, and she +hoped they would both be sorry _then_; and subsequently she clapped +the climax by throwing her arms about his neck and bursting into tears +and telling him he was the dearest old man in the world and that she +was thoroughly ashamed of herself. + +So they kissed and made it up. And after a little the Colonel and +Margaret went away from Selwoode, and Frederick R. Woods was left +alone to nourish his anger and indignation, if he could, and to hunger +for his boy, whether he would or not. He was too proud to seek him +out; indeed, he never thought of that; and so he waited alone in his +fine house, sick at heart, impotent, hoping against hope that the boy +would come back. The boy never came. + +No, the boy never came, because he was what the old man had made +him--headstrong, and wilful, and obstinate. Billy had been thoroughly +spoiled. The old man had nurtured his pride, had applauded it as a +mark of proper spirit; and now it was this same pride that had robbed +him of the one thing he loved in all the world. + +So, at last, the weak point in the armour of this sturdy old Pharisee +was found, and Fate had pierced it gaily. It was retribution, if you +will; and I think that none of his victims in "the Street," none of +the countless widows and orphans that he had made, suffered more +bitterly than he in those last days. + +It was almost two years after Billy's departure from Selwoode that his +body-servant, coming to rouse Frederick R. Woods one June morning, +found him dead in his rooms. He had been ailing for some time. It +was his heart, the doctors said; and I think that it was, though not +precisely in the sense which they meant. + +The man found him seated before his great carved desk, on which his +head and shoulders had fallen forward; they rested on a sheet of +legal-cap paper half-covered with a calculation in his crabbed old +hand as to the value of certain properties--the calculation which he +never finished; and underneath was a mass of miscellaneous papers, +among them his will, dated the day after Billy left Selwoode, in which +Frederick R. Woods bequeathed his millions unconditionally to Margaret +Hugonin when she should come of age. + +Her twenty-first birthday had fallen in the preceding month. So +Margaret was one of the richest women in America; and you may depend +upon it, that if many men had loved her before, they worshipped her +now--or, at least, said they did, and, after all, their protestations +were the only means she had of judging. She might have been a +countess--and it must be owned that the old Colonel, who had an honest +Anglo-Saxon reverence for a title, saw this chance lost wistfully--and +she might have married any number of grammarless gentlemen, personally +unknown to her, whose fervent proposals almost every mail brought in; +and besides these, there were many others, more orthodox in their +wooing, some of whom were genuinely in love with Margaret Hugonin, and +some--I grieve to admit it--who were genuinely in love with her money; +and she would have none of them. + +She refused them all with the utmost civility, as I happen to know. +How I learned it is no affair of yours. + +For Miss Hugonin had remarkably keen eyes, which she used to +advantage. In the world about her they discovered very little that she +could admire. She was none the happier for her wealth; the piled-up +millions overshadowed her personality; and it was not long before she +knew that most people regarded her simply as the heiress of the Woods +fortune--an unavoidable encumbrance attached to the property, which +divers thrifty-minded gentlemen were willing to put up with. To put up +with!--at the thought, her pride rose in a hot blush, and, it must be +confessed, she sought consolation in the looking-glass. + +She was an humble-minded young woman, as the sex goes, and she saw no +great reason there why a man should go mad over Margaret Hugonin. This +decision, I grant you, was preposterous, for there were any number of +reasons. Her final conclusion, however, was for the future to regard +all men as fortune-hunters and to do her hair differently. + +She carried out both resolutions. When a gentleman grew pressing in +his attentions, she more than suspected his motives; and when she +eventually declined him it was done with perfect, courtesy, but the +glow of her eyes was at such times accentuated to a marked degree. + +Meanwhile, the Eagle brooded undisturbed at Selwoode. Miss Hugonin +would allow nothing to be altered. + +"The place doesn't belong to me, attractive," she would tell her +father. "I belong to the place. Yes, I do--I'm exactly like a little +cow thrown in with a little farm when they sell it, and _all_ my +little suitors think so, and they are very willing to take me on those +terms, too. But they shan't, attractive. I hate every single solitary +man in the whole wide world but you, beautiful, and I particularly +hate that horrid old Eagle; but we'll keep him because he's a constant +reminder to me that Solomon or Moses, or whoever it was that said all +men were liars, was a person of _very_ great intelligence." + +So that I think we may fairly say the money did her no good. + +If it benefited no one else, it was not Margaret's fault. She had a +high sense of her responsibilities, and therefore, at various times, +endeavoured to further the spread of philanthropy and literature and +theosophy and art and temperance and education and other laudable +causes. Mr. Kennaston, in his laughing manner, was wont to jest at +her varied enterprises and term her Lady Bountiful; but, then, Mr. +Kennaston had no real conception of the proper uses of money. In +fact, he never thought of money. He admitted this to Margaret with a +whimsical sigh. + +Margaret grew very fond of Mr. Kennaston because he was not mercenary. + +Mr. Kennaston was much at Selwoode. Many people came there +now--masculine women and muscleless men, for the most part. They had, +every one of them, some scheme for bettering the universe; and if +among them Margaret seemed somewhat out of place--a butterfly among +earnest-minded ants--her heart was in every plan they advocated, and +they found her purse-strings infinitely elastic. The girl was pitiably +anxious to be of some use in the world. + +So at Selwoode they gossiped of great causes and furthered the +millenium. And above them the Eagle brooded in silence. + +And Billy? All this time Billy was junketing abroad, where every +year he painted masterpieces for the Salon, which--on account of a +nefarious conspiracy among certain artists, jealous of his superior +merits--were invariably refused. + +Now Billy is back again in America, and the Colonel has insisted that +he come to Selwoode, and Margaret is waiting for him in the dog-cart. +The glow of her eyes is very, very bright. Her father's careless words +this morning, coupled with certain speeches of Mr. Kennaston's last +night, have given her food for reflection. + +"He wouldn't dare," says Margaret, to no one in particular. "Oh, no, +he wouldn't dare after what happened four years ago." + +And, Margaret-like, she has quite forgotten that what happened four +years ago was all caused by her having flirted outrageously with Teddy +Anstruther, in order to see what Billy would do. + + + +IV + +The twelve forty-five, for a wonder, was on time; and there descended +from it a big, blond young man, who did not look in the least like a +fortune-hunter. + +Miss Hugonin resented this. Manifestly, he looked clean and honest for +the deliberate purpose of deceiving her. Very well! She'd show him! + +He was quite unembarrassed. He shook hands cordially; then he shook +hands with the groom, who, you may believe it, was grinning in a most +unprofessional manner because Master Billy was back again at Selwoode. +Subsequently, in his old decisive way, he announced they would walk to +the house, as his legs needed stretching. + +The insolence of it!--quite as if he had something to say to Margaret +in private and couldn't wait a minute. Beyond doubt, this was a young +man who must be taken down a peg or two, and that at once. Of course, +she wasn't going to walk back with him!--a pretty figure they'd cut +strolling through the fields, like a house-girl and the milkman on a +Sunday afternoon! She would simply say she was too tired to walk, and +that would end the matter. + +So she said she thought the exercise would do them both good. + +They came presently with desultory chat to a meadow bravely decked in +all the gauds of Spring. About them the day was clear, the air bland. +Spring had revamped her ageless fripperies of tender leaves and +bird-cries and sweet, warm odours for the adornment of this meadow; +above it she had set a turkis sky splashed here and there with little +clouds that were like whipped cream; and upon it she had scattered +largesse, a Danae's shower of buttercups. Altogether, she had made of +it a particularly dangerous meadow for a man and a maid to frequent. + +Yet there Mr. Woods paused under a burgeoning maple--paused +resolutely, with the lures of Spring thick about him, compassed with +every snare of scent and sound and colour that the witch is mistress +of. + +Margaret hoped he had a pleasant passage over. Her father, thank you, +was in the pink of condition. Oh, yes, she was quite well. She hoped +Mr. Woods would not find America-- + +"Well, Peggy," said Mr. Woods, "then, we'll have it out right here." + +His insolence was so surprising that--in order to recover +herself--Margaret actually sat down under the maple-tree. Peggy, +indeed! Why, she hadn't been called Peggy for--no, not for four whole +years! + +"Because I intend to be friends, you know," said Mr. Woods. + +And about them the maple-leaves made a little island of sombre green, +around which more vivid grasses rippled and dimpled under the fitful +spring breezes. And everywhere leaves lisped to one another, and birds +shrilled insistently. It was a perilous locality. + +I fancy Billy Woods was out of his head when he suggested being +friends in such a place. Friends, indeed!--you would have thought from +the airy confidence with which he spoke that Margaret had come safely +to forty year and wore steel-rimmed spectacles! + +But Miss Hugonin merely cast down her eyes and was aware of no reason +why they shouldn't be. She was sure he must be hungry, and she thought +luncheon must be ready by now. + +In his soul, Mr. Woods observed that her lashes were long--long beyond +all reason. Lacking the numbers that Petrarch flowed in, he did not +venture, even to himself, to characterise them further. But oh, how +queer it was they should be pure gold at the roots!--she must have +dipped them in the ink-pot. And oh, the strong, sudden, bewildering +curve of 'em! He could not recall at the present moment ever noticing +quite such lashes anywhere else. No, it was highly improbable that +there were such lashes anywhere else. Perhaps a few of the superior +angels might have such lashes. He resolved for the future to attend +church more regularly. + +Aloud, Mr. Woods observed that in that case they had better shake +hands. + +It would have been ridiculous to contest the point. The dignified +course was to shake hands, since he insisted on it, and then to return +at once to Selwoode. + +Margaret Hugonin had a pretty hand, and Mr. Woods, as an artist, could +not well fail to admire it. Still, he needn't have looked at it as +though he had never before seen anything quite like it; he needn't +have neglected to return it; and when Miss Hugonin reclaimed it, after +a decent interval, he needn't have laughed in a manner that compelled +her to laugh, too. These things were unnecessary and annoying, as they +caused Margaret to forget that she despised him. + +[Illustration: "Then, for no apparent reason, Margaret flushed, and +Billy ... thought it vastly becoming"] + +For the time being--will you believe it?--she actually thought he was +rather nice. + +"I acted like an ass," said Mr. Woods, tragically. "Oh, yes, I did, +you know. But if you'll forgive me for having been an ass I'll forgive +you for throwing me over for Teddy Anstruther, and at the wedding I'll +dance through any number of pairs of patent-leathers you choose to +mention." + +So that was the way he looked at it. Teddy Anstruther, indeed! Why, +Teddy was a dark little man with brown eyes--just the sort of man she +most objected to. How could any one ever possibly fancy a brown-eyed +man? Then, for no apparent reason, Margaret flushed, and Billy, who +had stretched his great length of limb on the grass beside her, noted +it with a pair of the bluest eyes in the world and thought it vastly +becoming. + +"Billy," said she, impulsively--and the name having slipped out once +by accident, it would have been absurd to call him anything else +afterward--"it was horrid of you to refuse to take any of that money." + +"But I didn't want it," he protested. "Good Lord, I'd only have done +something foolish with it. It was awfully square of you, Peggy, to +offer to divide, but I didn't want it, you see. I don't want to be a +millionaire, and give up the rest of my life to founding libraries and +explaining to people that if they never spend any money on amusements +they'll have a great deal by the time they're too old to enjoy it. I'd +rather paint pictures." + +So that I think Margaret must have endeavoured at some time to make +him accept part of Frederick R. Woods's money. + +"You make me feel--and look--like a thief," she reproved him. + +Then Billy laughed a little. "You don't look in the least like one," +he reassured her. "You look like an uncommonly honest, straightforward +young woman," Mr. Woods added, handsomely, "and I don't believe you'd +purloin under the severest temptation." + +She thanked him for his testimonial, with all three dimples in +evidence. + +This was unsettling. He hedged. + +"Except, perhaps--" said he. + +"Yes?" queried Margaret, after a pause. + +However, she questioned him with her head drooped forward, her brows +raised; and as this gave him the full effect of her eyes, Mr. Woods +became quite certain that there was, at least, one thing she might be +expected to rob him of, and wisely declined to mention it. + +Margaret did not insist on knowing what it was. Perhaps she heard it +thumping under his waistcoat, where it was behaving very queerly. + +So they sat in silence for a while. Then Margaret fell a-humming to +herself; and the air--will you believe it?--chanced by the purest +accident to be that foolish, senseless old song they used to sing +together four years ago. + +Billy chuckled. "Let's!" he obscurely pleaded. + +Spring prompted her. + + "Oh, where have you been, Billy boy?" +queried Margaret's wonderful contralto, + + "Oh, where have you been, Billy boy, Billy boy? + Oh, where have you been, charming Billy?" + +She sang it in a low, hushed voice, just over her breath. Not looking +at him, however. And oh, what a voice! thought Billy Woods. A voice +that was honey and gold and velvet and all that is most sweet and rich +and soft in the world! Find me another voice like that, you _prime +donne!_ Find me a simile for it, you uninventive poets! Indeed, I'd +like to see you do it. + +But he chimed in, nevertheless, with his pleasant throaty baritone, +and lilted his own part quite creditably. + + "I've been to seek a wife, + She's the joy of my life; + She's a young thing, and cannot leave her mother"-- + +Only Billy sang it "father," just as they used to do. + +And then they sang it through, did Margaret and Billy--sang of the +dimple in her chin and the ringlets in her hair, and of the cherry +pies she achieved with such celerity--sang as they sat in the +spring-decked meadow every word of that inane old song that is so +utterly senseless and so utterly unforgettable. + +It was a quite idiotic performance. I set it down to the snares of +Spring--to her insidious, delightful snares of scent and sound and +colour that--for the moment, at least--had trapped these young people +into loving life infinitely. + +But I wonder who is responsible for that tatter of rhyme and melody +that had come to them from nowhere in particular? Mr. Woods, as he sat +up at the conclusion of the singing vigorously to applaud, would have +shared his last possession, his ultimate crust, with that unknown +benefactor of mankind. Indeed, though, the heart of Mr. Woods just now +was full of loving kindness and capable of any freakish magnanimity. + +For--will it be believed?--Mr. Woods, who four years ago had thrown +over a fortune and exiled himself from his native land, rather than +propose marriage to Margaret Hugonin, had no sooner come again into +her presence and looked once into her perfectly fathomless eyes than +he could no more have left her of his own accord than a moth can turn +his back to a lighted candle. He had fancied himself entirely cured +of that boy-and-girl nonsense; his broken heart, after the first few +months, had not interfered in the least with a naturally healthy +appetite; and, behold, here was the old malady raging again in his +veins and with renewed fervour. + +And all because the girl had a pretty face! I think you will agree +with me that in the conversation I have recorded Margaret had not +displayed any great wisdom or learning or tenderness or wit, nor, +in fine, any of the qualities a man might naturally look for in a +helpmate. Yet at the precise moment he handed his baggage-check to the +groom, Mr. Woods had made up his mind to marry her. In an instant he +had fallen head over ears in love; or to whittle accuracy to a point, +he had discovered that he had never fallen out of love; and if you had +offered him an empress or fetched Helen of Troy from the grave for his +delectation he would have laughed you to scorn. + +In his defense, I can only plead that Margaret was an unusually +beautiful woman. It is all very well to flourish a death's-head at the +feast, and bid my lady go paint herself an inch thick, for to this +favour she must come; and it is quite true that the reddest lips in +the universe may give vent to slander and lies, and the brightest eyes +be set in the dullest head, and the most roseate of complexions be +purchased at the corner drug-store; but, say what you will, a pretty +woman is a pretty woman, and while she continue so no amount of +common-sense or experience will prevent a man, on provocation, from +alluring, coaxing, even entreating her to make a fool of him. We like +it. And I think they like it, too. + +So Mr. Woods lost his heart on a fine spring morning and was +unreasonably elated over the fact. + +And Margaret? Margaret was content. + + + +V + +They talked for a matter of a half-hour in the fashion aforetime +recorded--not very wise nor witty talk, if you will, but very pleasant +to make. There were many pauses. There was much laughter over nothing +in particular. There were any number of sentences ambitiously begun +that ended nowhere. Altogether, it was just the sort of talk for a man +and a maid. + +Yet some twenty minutes later, Mr. Woods, preparing for luncheon in +the privacy of his chamber, gave a sudden exclamation. Then he sat +down and rumpled his hair thoroughly. + +"Good Lord!" he groaned; "I'd forgotten all about that damned money! +Oh, you ass!--you abject ass! Why, she's one of the richest women in +America, and you're only a fifth-rate painter with a paltry thousand +or so a year! _You_ marry her!--why, I dare say she's refused a +hundred better men than you! She'd think you were mad! Why, she'd +think you were after her money! She--oh, she'd only think you a +precious cheeky ass, she would, and she'd be quite right. You _are_ an +ass, Billy Woods! You ought to be locked up in some nice quiet stable, +where your heehawing wouldn't disturb people. You need a keeper, you +do!" + +He sat for some ten minutes, aghast. Afterward he rose and threw back +his shoulders and drew a deep breath. + +"No, we aren't an ass," he addressed his reflection in the mirror, as +he carefully knotted his tie. "We're only a poor chuckle-headed moth +who's been looking at a star too long. It's a bright star, Billy, but +it isn't for you. So we're going to be sensible now. We're going to +get a telegram to-morrow that will call us away from Selwoode. We +aren't coming back any more, either. We're simply going to continue +painting fifth-rate pictures, and hoping that some day she'll find the +right man and be very, very happy." + +Nevertheless, he decided that a blue tie would look better, and was +very particular in arranging it. + +At the same moment Margaret stood before her mirror and tidied her +hair for luncheon and assured her image in the glass that she was a +weak-minded fool. She pointed out to herself the undeniable fact that +Billy, having formerly refused to marry her--oh, ignominy!--seemed +pleasant-spoken enough, now that she had become an heiress. His +refusal to accept part of her fortune was a very flimsy device; it +simply meant he hoped to get all of it. Oh, he did, did he! + +Margaret powdered her nose viciously. + +_She_ saw through him! His honest bearing she very plainly perceived +to be the result of consummate hypocrisy. In his laughter her keen ear +detected a hollow ring; and his courteous manner she found, at bottom, +mere servility. And finally she demonstrated--to her own satisfaction, +at least--that his charm of manner was of exactly the, same sort that +had been possessed by many other eminently distinguished criminals. + +How did she do this? My dear sir, you had best inquire of your mother +or your sister or your wife, or any other lady that your fancy +dictates. They know. I am sure I don't. + +And after it all-- + +"Oh, dear, dear!" said Margaret; "I _do_ wish he didn't have such nice +eyes!" + + + +VI + +On the way to luncheon Mr. Woods came upon Adele Haggage and Hugh Van +Orden, both of whom he knew, very much engrossed in one another, in a +nook under the stairway. To Billy it seemed just now quite proper that +every one should be in love; wasn't it--after all--the most pleasant +condition in the world? So he greeted them with a semi-paternal smile +that caused Adele to flush a little. + +For she was--let us say, interested--in Mr. Van Orden. That was +tolerably well known. In fact, Margaret--prompted by Mrs. Haggage, +it must be confessed--had invited him to Selwoode for the especial +purpose of entertaining Miss Adele Haggage; for he was a good match, +and Mrs. Haggage, as an experienced chaperon, knew the value of +country houses. Very unexpectedly, however, the boy had developed a +disconcerting tendency to fall in love with Margaret, who snubbed him +promptly and unmercifully. He had accordingly fallen back on Adele, +and Mrs. Haggage had regained both her trust in Providence and her +temper. + +In the breakfast-room, where luncheon was laid out, the Colonel +greeted Mr. Woods with the enthusiasm a sailor shipwrecked on a desert +island might conceivably display toward the boat-crew come to rescue +him. The Colonel liked Billy; and furthermore, the poor Colonel's +position at Selwoode just now was not utterly unlike that of the +suppositious mariner; were I minded to venture into metaphor, I should +picture him as clinging desperately to the rock of an old fogeyism +and surrounded by weltering seas of advanced thought. Colonel Hugonin +himself was not advanced in his ideas. Also, he had forceful opinions +as to the ultimate destination of those who were. + +Then Billy was presented to the men of the party--Mr. Felix Kennaston +and Mr. Petheridge Jukesbury. Mrs. Haggage he knew slightly; and +Kathleen Saumarez he had known very well indeed, some six years +previously, before she had ever heard of Miguel Saumarez, and when +Billy was still an undergraduate. She was a widow now, and not +well-to-do; and Mr. Woods's first thought on seeing her was that a man +was a fool to write verses, and that she looked like just the sort of +woman to preserve them. + +His second was that he had verged on imbecility when he fancied he +admired that slender, dark-haired type. A woman's hair ought to be an +enormous coronal of sunlight; a woman ought to have very large, candid +eyes of a colour between that of sapphires and that of the spring +heavens, only infinitely more beautiful than either; and all +petticoated persons differing from this description were manifestly +quite unworthy of any serious consideration. + +So his eyes turned to Margaret, who had no eyes for him. She had +forgotten his existence, with an utterness that verged on ostentation; +and if it had been any one else Billy would have surmised she was in a +temper. But that angel in a temper!--nonsense! And, oh, what eyes she +had! and what lashes! and what hair!--and altogether, how adorable she +was, and what a wonder the admiring gods hadn't snatched her up to +Olympus long ago! + +Thus far Mr. Woods. + +But if Miss Hugonin was somewhat taciturn, her counsellors in divers +schemes for benefiting the universe were in opulent vein. Billy heard +them silently. + +"I have spent the entire morning by the lake," Mr. Kennaston informed +the party at large, "in company with a mocking-bird who was practising +a new aria. It was a wonderful place; the trees were lisping verses to +themselves, and the sky overhead was like a robin's egg in colour, +and a faint wind was making tucks and ruches and pleats all over +the water, quite as if the breezes had set up in business as +mantua-makers. I fancy they thought they were working on a great sheet +of blue silk, for it was very like that. And every once in a while a +fish would leap and leave a splurge of bubble and foam behind that you +would have sworn was an inserted lace medallion." + +Mr. Kennaston, as you are doubtless aware, is the author of "The +King's Quest" and other volumes of verse. He is a full-bodied young +man, with hair of no particular shade; and if his green eyes are a +little aged, his manner is very youthful. His voice in speaking is +wonderfully pleasing, and he has a habit of cocking his head on one +side, in a bird-like fashion. + +"Indeed," Mr. Petheridge Jukesbury observed, "it is very true that God +made the country and man made the town. A little more wine, please." + +Mr. Jukesbury is a prominent worker in the cause of philanthropy +and temperance. He is ponderous and bland; and for the rest, he is +president of the Society for the Suppression of Nicotine and the +Nude, vice-president of the Anti-Inebriation League, secretary of the +Incorporated Brotherhood of Benevolence, and the bearer of divers +similar honours. + +"I am never really happy in the country," Mrs. Saumarez dissented; "it +reminds me so constantly of our rural drama. I am always afraid the +quartette may come on and sing something." + +Kathleen Eppes Saumarez, as I hope you do not need to be told, is +the well-known lecturer before women's clubs, and the author of many +sympathetic stories of Nature and animal life of the kind that have +had such a vogue of late. There was always an indefinable air of +pathos about her; as Hunston Wyke put it, one felt, somehow, that her +mother had been of a domineering disposition, and that she took after +her father. + +"Ah, dear lady," Mr. Kennaston cried, playfully, "you, like many of +us, have become an alien to Nature in your quest of a mere Earthly +Paradox. Epigrams are all very well, but I fancy there is more +happiness to be derived from a single impulse from a vernal wood than +from a whole problem-play of smart sayings. So few of us are +natural," Mr. Kennaston complained, with a dulcet sigh; "we are too +sophisticated. Our very speech lacks the tang of outdoor life. +Why should we not love Nature--the great mother, who is, I grant you, +the necessity of various useful inventions, in her angry moods, but +who, in her kindly moments--" He paused, with a wry face. "I beg your +pardon," said he, "but I believe I've caught rheumatism lying by that +confounded pond." + +Mrs. Saumarez rallied the poet, with a pale smile. "That comes of +communing with Nature," she reminded him; "and it serves you rightly, +for natural communications corrupt good epigrams. I prefer Nature +with wide margins and uncut leaves," she spoke, in her best platform +manner. "Art should be an expurgated edition of Nature, with all +the unpleasant parts left out. And I am sure," Mrs. Saumarez added, +handsomely, and clinching her argument, "that Mr. Kennaston gives us +much better sunsets in his poems than I have ever seen in the west." + +He acknowledged this with a bow. + +"Not sherry--claret, if you please," said Mr. Jukesbury. "Art should +be an expurgated edition of Nature," he repeated, with a suave +chuckle. "Do you know, I consider that admirably put, Mrs. +Saumarez--admirably, upon my word. Ah, if our latter-day writers would +only take that saying to heart! We do not need to be told of the vice +and corruption prevalent, I am sorry to say, among the very best +people; what we really need is continually to be reminded of the fact +that pure hearts and homes and happy faces are to be found to-day +alike in the palatial residences of the wealthy and in the humbler +homes of those less abundantly favoured by Fortune, and yet dwelling +together in harmony and Christian resignation and--er--comparatively +moderate circumstances." + +"Surely," Mrs. Saumarez protested, "art has nothing to do with +morality. Art is a process. You see a thing in a certain way; you make +your reader see it in the same way--or try to. If you succeed, the +result is art. If you fail, it may be the book of the year." + +"Enduring immortality and--ah--the patronage of the reading public," +Mr. Jukesbury placidly insisted, "will be awarded, in the end, only +to those who dwell upon the true, the beautiful, and the--er +--respectable. Art must cheer; it must be optimistic and +edifying and--ah--suitable for young persons; it must have an uplift, +a leaven of righteousness, a--er--a sort of moral baking-powder. It +must utterly eschew the--ah--unpleasant and repugnant details of life. +It is, if I may so express myself, not at home in the menage a trois +or--er--the representation of the nude. Yes, another glass of claret, +if you please." + +"I quite agree with you," said Mrs. Haggage, in her deep voice. Sarah +Ellen Haggage is, of course, the well-known author of "Child-Labour in +the South," and "The Down-Trodden Afro-American," and other notable +contributions to literature. She is, also, the "Madame President" both +of the Society for the Betterment of Civic Government and Sewerage, +and of the Ladies' League for the Edification of the Impecunious. + +"And I am glad to see," Mrs. Haggage presently went on, "that the +literature of the day is so largely beginning to chronicle the sayings +and doings of the labouring classes. The virtues of the humble must be +admitted in spite of their dissolute and unhygienic tendencies. Yes," +Mrs. Haggage added, meditatively, "our literature is undoubtedly +acquiring a more elevated tone; at last we are shaking off the +scintillant and unwholesome influence of the French." + +"Ah, the French!" sighed Mr. Kennaston; "a people who think depravity +the soul of wit! Their art is mere artfulness. They care nothing for +Nature." + +"No," Mrs. Haggage assented; "they prefer nastiness. _All_ French +books are immoral. I ran across one the other day that was simply +hideously indecent--unfit for a modest woman to read. And I can assure +you that none of its author's other books are any better. I purchased +the entire set at once and read them carefully, in order to make sure +that I was perfectly justified in warning my working-girls' classes +against them. I wish to misjudge no man--not even a member of a nation +notoriously devoted to absinthe and illicit relations." + +She breathed heavily, and looked at Mr. Woods as if, somehow, he +was responsible. Then she gave the name of the book to Petheridge +Jukesbury. He wished to have it placed on the _Index Expurgatorius_ of +the Brotherhood of Benevolence, he said. + +"Dear, dear," Felix Kennaston sighed, as Mr. Jukesbury made a note of +it; "you are all so practical. You perceive an evil and proceed at +once, in your common-sense way, to crush it, to stamp it out. Now, +I can merely lament certain unfortunate tendencies of the age; I am +quite unable to contend against them. Do you know," Mr. Kenneston +continued gaily, as he trifled with a bunch of grapes, "I feel +horribly out-of-place among you? Here is Mrs. Saumarez creating an +epidemic of useful and improving knowledge throughout the country, by +means of her charming lectures. Here is Mrs. Haggage, the mainspring, +if I may say so, of any number of educational and philanthropic +alarm clocks which will some day rouse the sleeping public from its +lethargy. And here is my friend Jukesbury, whose eloquent pleas for a +higher life have turned so many workmen from gin and improvidence, and +which in a printed form are disseminated even in such remote regions +as Africa, where I am told they have produced the most satisfactory +results upon the unsophisticated but polygamous monarchs of that +continent. And here, above all, is Miss Hugonin, utilising the vast +power of money--which I am credibly informed is a very good thing to +have, though I cannot pretend to speak from experience--and casting +whole bakeryfuls of bread upon the waters of charity. And here am +I, the idle singer of an empty day--a mere drone in this hive of +philanthropic bees! Dear, dear," said Mr. Kennaston, enviously, "what +a thing it is to be practical!" And he laughed toward Margaret, in his +whimsical way. + +Miss Hugonin had been strangely silent; but she returned Mr. +Kennaston's smile, and began to take part in the conversation. + +"You're only an ignorant child," she rebuked him, "and a very naughty +child, too, to make fun of us in this fashion." + +"Yes," Mr. Kennaston assented, "I am wilfully ignorant. The world +adores ignorance; and where ignorance is kissed it is folly to be +wise. To-morrow I shall read you a chapter from my 'Defense of +Ignorance,' which my confiding publisher is going to bring out in the +autumn." + +So the table-talk went on, and now Margaret bore a part therein. + + * * * * * + +However, I do not think we need record it further. + +Mr. Woods listened in a sort of a daze. Adele Haggage and Hugh Van +Orden were conversing in low tones at one end of the table; the +Colonel was eating his luncheon, silently and with a certain air of +resignation; and so Billy Woods was left alone to attend and marvel. + +The ideas they advanced seemed to him, for the most part, sensible. +What puzzled him was the uniform gravity which they accorded +equally--as it appeared to him--to the discussion of the most pompous +platitudes and of the most arrant nonsense. They were always serious; +and the general tone of infallibility, Billy thought, could be +warranted only by a vast fund of inexperience. + +But, in the main, they advocated theories he had always +held--excellent theories, he considered. And he was seized with an +unreasonable desire to repudiate every one of them. + +For it seemed to him that every one of them was aimed at Margaret's +approval. It did not matter to whom a remark was ostensibly +addressed--always at its conclusion the speaker glanced more or +less openly toward Miss Hugonin. She was the audience to which they +zealously played, thought Billy; and he wondered. + +I think I have said that, owing to the smallness of the house-party, +luncheon was served in the breakfast-room. The dining-room at Selwoode +is very rarely used, because Margaret declares its size makes a meal +there equivalent to eating out-of-doors. + +And I must confess that the breakfast-room is far cosier. The room, in +the first place, is of reasonable dimensions; it is hung with Flemish +tapestries from designs by Van Eyck representing the Four Seasons, but +the walls and ceiling are panelled in oak, and over the mantel carved +in bas-relief the inevitable Eagle is displayed. + +The mantel stood behind Margaret's chair; and over her golden head, +half-protectingly, half-threateningly, with his wings outstretched to +the uttermost, the Eagle brooded as he had once brooded over Frederick +R. Woods. The old man sat contentedly beneath that symbol of what +he had achieved in life. He had started (as the phrase runs) from +nothing; he had made himself a power. To him, the Eagle meant that +crude, incalculable power of wealth he gloried in. And to Billy Woods, +the Eagle meant identically the same thing, and--I am sorry to say--he +began to suspect that the Eagle was really the audience to whom Miss +Hugonin's friends so zealously played. + +Perhaps the misanthropy of Mr. Woods was not wholly unconnected with +the fact that Margaret never looked at him. _She'd_ show him!--the +fortune-hunter! + +So her eyes never strayed toward him; and her attention never left +him. At the end of luncheon she could have enumerated for you every +morsel he had eaten, every glare he had directed toward Kennaston, +every beseeching look he had turned to her. Of course, he had taken +sherry--dry sherry. Hadn't he told her four years ago--it was the +first day she had ever worn the white organdie dotted with purple +sprigs, and they sat by the lake so late that afternoon that Frederick +R. Woods finally sent for them to come to dinner--hadn't he told her +then that only women and children cared for sweet wines? Of course he +had--the villain! + +[Illustration: "Billy Woods"] + +Billy, too, had his emotions. To hear that paragon, that queen among +women, descant of work done in the slums and of the mysteries of +sweat-shops; to hear her state off-hand that there were seventeen +hundred and fifty thousand children between the ages of ten and +fifteen years employed in the mines and factories of the United +States; to hear her discourse of foreign missions as glibly as though +she had been born and nurtured in Zambesi Land: all these things +filled him with an odd sense of alienation. He wasn't worthy of her, +and that was a fact. He was only a dumb idiot, and half the words that +were falling thick and fast from philanthropic lips about him might as +well have been hailstones, for all the benefit he was deriving from +them. He couldn't understand half she said. + +In consequence, he very cordially detested the people who +could--especially that grimacing ass, Kennaston. + +Altogether, neither Mr. Woods nor Miss Hugonin got much comfort from +their luncheon. + + + +VII + +After luncheon Billy had a quiet half-hour with the Colonel in the +smoking-room. + +Said Billy, between puffs of a cigar: + +"Peggy's changed a bit." + +The Colonel grunted. Perhaps he dared not trust to words. + +"Seems to have made some new friends." + +A more vigorous grunt. + +"Cultured lot, they seem?" said Mr. Woods. "Anxious to do good in the +world, too--philanthropic set, eh?" + +A snort this time. + +"Eh?" said Mr. Woods. There was dawning suspicion in his tone. + +The Colonel looked about him. "My boy," said he, "you thank your stars +you didn't get that money; and, depend upon it, there never was a +gold-ship yet that wasn't followed." + +"Pirates?" Billy Woods suggested, helpfully. + +"Pirates are human beings," said Colonel Hugonin, with dignity. +"Sharks, my boy; sharks!" + + + +VIII + +That evening, after proper deliberation, "Celestine," Miss Hugonin +commanded, "get out that little yellow dress with the little red +bandanna handkerchiefs on it; and for heaven's sake, stop pulling +my hair out by the roots, unless you want a _raving_ maniac on your +hands, Celestine!" + +Whereby she had landed me in a quandary. For how, pray, is it possible +for me, a simple-minded male, fittingly to depict for you the clothes +of Margaret?--the innumerable vanities, the quaint devices, the +pleasing conceits with which she delighted to enhance her comeliness? +The thing is beyond me. Let us keep discreetly out of her wardrobe, +you and I. + +Otherwise, I should have to prattle of an infinity of mysteries--of +her scarfs, feathers, laces, gloves, girdles, knots, hats, shoes, +fans, and slippers--of her embroideries, rings, pins, pendants, +ribbons, spangles, bracelets, and chains--in fine, there would be no +end to the list of gewgaws that went to make Margaret Hugonin even +more adorable than Nature had fashioned her. For when you come to +think of it, it takes the craft and skill and life-work of a thousand +men to dress one girl properly; and in Margaret's case, I protest that +every one of them, could he have beheld the result of their united +labours, would have so gloried in his own part therein that there +would have been no putting up with any of the lot. + +Yet when I think of the tiny shoes she affected--patent-leather ones +mostly, with a seam running straight up the middle (and you may guess +the exact date of our comedy by knowing in what year these shoes were +modish); the string of fat pearls she so often wore about her round, +full throat; the white frock, say, with arabesques of blue all over +it, that Felix Kennaston said reminded him of Ruskin's tombstone; or +that other white-and-blue one--_decollete_, that was--which I swear +seraphic mantua-makers had woven out of mists and the skies of June: +when I remember these things, I repeat, almost am I tempted to become +a boot-maker and a lapidary and a milliner and, in fine, an adept +in all the other arts and trades and sciences that go to make a +well-groomed American girl what she is--the incredible fruit +of grafted centuries, the period after the list of Time's +achievements--just that I might describe Margaret to you properly. + +But the thing is beyond me. I leave such considerations, then, to +Celestine, and resolve for the future rigorously to eschew all such +gauds. Meanwhile, if an untutored masculine description will content +you-- + +Margaret, I have on reliable feminine authority, was one of the very +few blondes whose complexions can carry off reds and yellows. +This particular gown--I remember it perfectly--was of a dim, dull +yellow--flounciful (if I may coin a word), diaphanous, expansive. I +have not the least notion what fabric composed it; but scattered about +it, in unexpected places, were diamond-shaped red things that I am +credibly informed are called medallions. The general effect of it may +be briefly characterised as grateful to the eye and dangerous to the +heart, and to a rational train of thought quite fatal. + +For it was cut low in the neck; and Margaret's neck and shoulders +would have drawn madrigals from a bench of bishops. + +And in consequence, Billy Woods ate absolutely no dinner that evening. + + + +IX + +It was an hour or two later when the moon, drifting tardily up from +the south, found Miss Hugonin and Mr. Kennaston chatting amicably +together in the court at Selwoode. They were discussing the deplorable +tendencies of the modern drama. + +The court at Selwoode lies in the angle of the building, the ground +plan of which is L-shaped. Its two outer sides are formed by covered +cloisters leading to the palm-garden, and by moonlight--the night +bland and sweet with the odour of growing things, vocal with plashing +fountains, spangled with fire-flies that flicker indolently among a +glimmering concourse of nymphs and fauns eternally postured in flight +or in pursuit--by moonlight, I say, the court at Selwoode is perhaps +as satisfactory a spot for a _tete-a-tete_ as this transitory world +affords. + +Mr. Kennaston was in vein to-night; he scintillated; he was also a +little nervous. This was probably owing to the fact that Margaret, +leaning against the back of the stone bench on which they both sat, +her chin propped by her hand, was gazing at him in that peculiar, +intent fashion of hers which--as I think I have mentioned--caused you +fatuously to believe she had forgotten there were any other trousered +beings extant. + +Mr. Kennaston, however, stuck to apt phrases and nice distinctions. +The moon found it edifying, but rather dull. + +After a little Mr. Kennaston paused in his boyish, ebullient speech, +and they sat in silence. The lisping of the fountains was very +audible. In the heavens, the moon climbed a little further and +registered a manifestly impossible hour on the sun-dial. It also +brightened. + +It was a companionable sort of a moon. It invited talk of a +confidential nature. + +"Bless my soul," it was signalling to any number of gentlemen at that +moment, "there's only you and I and the girl here. Speak out, man! +She'll have you now, if she ever will. You'll never have a chance like +this again, I can tell you. Come, now, my dear boy, I'm shining full +in your face, and you've no idea how becoming it is. I'm not like that +garish, blundering sun, who doesn't know any better than to let her +see how red and fidgetty you get when you're excited; I'm an old hand +at such matters. I've presided over these little affairs since Babylon +was a paltry village. _I'll_ never tell. And--and if anything should +happen, I'm always ready to go behind a cloud, you know. So, speak +out!--speak out, man, if you've the heart of a mouse!" + +Thus far the conscienceless spring moon. + +Mr. Kennaston sighed. The moon took this as a promising sign and +brightened over it perceptibly, and thereby afforded him an excellent +gambit. + +"Yes?" said Margaret. "What is it, beautiful?" + +That, in privacy, was her fantastic name for him. + +The poet laughed a little. "Beautiful child," said he--and that, under +similar circumstances, was his perfectly reasonable name for +her--"I have been discourteous. To be frank, I have been sulking as +irrationally as a baby who clamours for the moon yonder." + +"You aren't really anything but a baby, you know." Indeed, Margaret +almost thought of him as such. He was so delightfully naif. + +He bent toward her. A faint tremor woke in his speech. "And so," said +he, softly, "I cry for the moon--the unattainable, exquisite moon. It +is very ridiculous, is it not?" + +But he did not look at the moon. He looked toward Margaret--past +Margaret, toward the gleaming windows of Selwoode, where the Eagle +brooded: + +"Oh, I really can't say," Margaret cried, in haste. "She was kind to +Endymion, you know. We will hope for the best. I think we'd better go +into the house now." + +"You bid me hope?" said he. + +"Beautiful, if you really want the moon, I don't see the _least_ +objection to your continuing to hope. They make so many little +airships and things nowadays, you know, and you'll probably find it +only green cheese, after all. What _is_ green cheese, I wonder?--it +sounds horribly indigestible and unattractive, doesn't it?" Miss +Hugonin babbled, in a tumult of fear and disappointment. He was about +to spoil their friendship now; men were so utterly inconsiderate. "I'm +a little cold," said she, mendaciously, "I really must go in." + +He detained her. "Surely," he breathed, "you must know what I have so +long wanted to tell you--" + +"I haven't the _least_ idea," she protested, promptly. "You can tell +me all about it in the morning. I have some accounts to cast up +to-night. Besides, I'm not a good person to tell secrets to. +You--you'd much better not tell me. Oh, really, Mr. Kennaston," she +cried, earnestly, "you'd much better not tell me!" + +"Ah, Margaret, Margaret," he pleaded, "I am not adamant. I am only a +man, with a man's heart that hungers for you, cries for you, clamours +for you day by day! I love you, beautiful child--love you with a +poet's love that is alien to these sordid days, with a love that is +half worship. I love you as Leander loved his Hero, as Pyramus loved +Thisbe. Ah, child, child, how beautiful you are! You are fairest of +created women, child--fair as those long-dead queens for whose smiles +old cities burned and kingdoms were lightly lost. I am mad for love of +you! Ah, have pity upon me, Margaret, for I love you very tenderly!" + +He delivered these observations with appropriate fervour. + +"Mr. Kennaston," said she, "I am sorry. We got along so nicely before, +and I was _so_ proud of your friendship. We've had such good times +together, you and I, and I've liked your verses so, and I've liked +you--Oh, please, _please_, let's keep on being just friends!" Margaret +wailed, piteously. + +"Friends!" he cried, and gave a bitter laugh. "I was never friends +with you, Margaret. Why, even as I read my verses to you--those +pallid, ineffectual verses that praised you timorously under varied +names--even then there pulsed in my veins the riotous paean of love, +the great mad song of love that shamed my paltry rhymes. I cannot be +friends with you, child! I must have all or nothing. Bid me hope or +go!" + +Miss Hugonin meditated for a moment and did neither. + +"Beautiful," she presently queried, "would you be very, very much +shocked if I descended to slang?" + +"I think," said he, with an uncertain smile, "that I could endure it." + +"Why, then--cut it out, beautiful! Cut it out! I don't believe a word +you've said, in the first place; and, anyhow, it annoys me to have you +talk to me like that. I don't like it, and it simply makes me awfully, +awfully tired." + +With which characteristic speech, Miss Hugonin leaned back and sat up +very rigidly and smiled at him like a cherub. + +Kennaston groaned. + +"It shall be as you will," he assured her, with a little quaver in his +speech that was decidedly effective. "And in any event, I am not sorry +that I have loved you, beautiful child. You have always been a power +for good in my life. You have gladdened me with the vision of a beauty +that is more than human, you have heartened me for this petty business +of living, you have praised my verses, you have even accorded me +certain pecuniary assistance as to their publication--though I must +admit that to accept it of you was very distasteful to me. Ah!" Felix +Kennaston cried, with a quick lift of speech, "impractical child that +I am, I had not thought of that! My love had caused me to forget the +great barrier that stands between us." + +He gasped and took a short turn about the court. + +"Pardon me, Miss Hugonin," he entreated, when his emotions were under +a little better control, "for having spoken as I did. I had forgotten. +Think of me, if you will, as no better than the others--think of me as +a mere fortune-hunter. My presumption will be justly punished." + +"Oh, no, no, it isn't that," she cried; "it isn't that, is it? +You--you would care just as much about me if I were poor, wouldn't +you, beautiful? I don't want you to care for me, of course," Margaret +added, with haste. "I want to go on being friends. Oh, that money, +that _nasty_ money!" she cried, in a sudden gust of petulance. "It +makes me so distrustful, and I can't help it!" + +He smiled at her wistfully. "My dear," said he, "are there no mirrors +at Selwoode to remove your doubts?" + +"I--yes, I do believe in you," she said, at length. "But I don't want +to marry you. You see, I'm not a bit in love with you," Margaret +explained, candidly. + +Ensued a silence. Mr. Kennaston bowed his head. + +"You bid me go?" said he. + +"No--not exactly," said she. + +He indicated a movement toward her. + +"Now, you needn't attempt to take any liberties with me," Miss Hugonin +announced, decisively, "because if you do I'll never speak to you +again. You must let me go now. You--you must let me think." + +Then Felix Kennaston acted very wisely. He rose and stood aside, with +a little bow. + +"I can wait, child," he said, sadly. "I have already waited a long +time." + +Miss Hugonin escaped into the house without further delay. It was very +flattering, of course; he had spoken beautifully, she thought, and +nobly and poetically and considerately, and altogether there was +absolutely no excuse for her being in a temper. Still, she was. + +The moon, however, considered the affair as arranged. + +For she had been no whit more resolute in her refusal, you see, than +becomes any self-respecting maid. In fact, she had not refused him; +and the experienced moon had seen the hopes of many a wooer thrive, +chameleon-like, on answers far less encouraging than that which +Margaret had given Felix Kennaston. + +Margaret was very fond of him. All women like a man who can do a +picturesque thing without bothering to consider whether or not he be +making himself ridiculous; and more than once in thinking of him she +had wondered if--perhaps--possibly--some day--? And always these vague +flights of fancy had ended at this precise point--incinerated, if you +will grant me the simile, by the sudden flaming of her cheeks. + +The thing is common enough. You may remember that Romeo was not the +only gentleman that Juliet noticed at her debut: there was the young +Petruchio; and the son and heir of old Tiberio; and I do not question +that she had a kind glance or so for County Paris. Beyond doubt, there +were many with whom my lady had danced; with whom she had laughed a +little; with whom she had exchanged a few perfectly affable words and +looks--when of a sudden her heart speaks: "Who's he that would not +dance? If he be married, my grave is like to prove my marriage-bed." +In any event, Paris and Petruchio and Tiberio's young hopeful can go +hang; Romeo has come. + +Romeo is seldom the first. Pray you, what was there to prevent Juliet +from admiring So-and-so's dancing? or from observing that Signor +Such-an-one had remarkably expressive eyes? or from thinking of Tybalt +as a dear, reckless fellow whom it was the duty of some good woman to +rescue from perdition? If no one blames the young Montague for sending +Rosaline to the right-about--Rosaline for whom he was weeping and +rhyming an hour before--why, pray, should not Signorina Capulet have +had a few previous _affaires du coeur_? Depend upon it, she had; for +was she not already past thirteen? + +In like manner, I dare say that a deal passed between Desdemona and +Cassio that the honest Moor never knew of; and that Lucrece was +probably very pleasant and agreeable to Tarquin, as a well-bred +hostess should be; and that Helen had that little affair with Theseus +before she ever thought of Paris; and that if Cleopatra died for love +of Antony it was not until she had previously lived a great while with +Caesar. + +So Felix Kennaston had his hour. Now Margaret has gone into Selwoode, +flame-faced and quite unconscious that she is humming under her breath +the words of a certain inane old song: + + "Oh, she sat for me a chair; + She has ringlets in her hair; + She's a young thing and cannot leave her mother"-- + +Only she sang it "father." And afterward, she suddenly frowned and +stamped her foot, did Margaret. + +"I _hate_ him!" said she; but she looked very guilty. + + + +X + +In the living-hall of Selwoode Miss Hugonin paused. Undeniably there +were the accounts of the Ladies' League for the Edification of the +Impecunious to be put in order; her monthly report as treasurer +was due in a few days, and Margaret was in such matters a careful, +painstaking body, and not wholly dependent upon her secretary; but she +was entirely too much out of temper to attend to that now. + +It was really all Mr. Kennaston's fault, she assured a pricking +conscience, as she went out on the terrace before Selwoode. He had +bothered her dreadfully. + +There she found Petheridge Jukesbury smoking placidly in the +effulgence of the moonlight; and the rotund, pasty countenance he +turned toward her was ludicrously like the moon's counterfeit in muddy +water. I am sorry to admit it, but Mr. Jukesbury had dined somewhat +injudiciously. You are not to stretch the phrase; he was merely +prepared to accord the universe his approval, to pat Destiny upon +the head, and his thoughts ran clear enough, but with Aprilian +counter-changes of the jovial and the lachrymose. + +"Ah, Miss Hugonin," he greeted her, with a genial smile, "I am indeed +fortunate. You find me deep in meditation, and also, I am sorry to +say, in the practise of a most pernicious habit. You do not object? +Ah, that is so like you. You are always kind, Miss Hugonin. Your +kindness, which falls, if I may so express myself, as the gentle rain +from Heaven upon all deserving charitable institutions, and daily +comforts the destitute with good advice and consoles the sorrowing +with blankets, would now induce you to tolerate an odour which I am +sure is personally distasteful to you." + +"But _really_ I don't mind," was Margaret's protest. + +"I cannot permit it," Mr. Jukesbury insisted, and waved a pudgy hand +in the moonlight. "No, really, I cannot permit it. We will throw +it away, if you please, and say no more about it," and his glance +followed the glowing flight of his cigar-end somewhat wistfully. "Your +father's cigars are such as it is seldom my privilege to encounter; +but, then, my personal habits are not luxurious, nor my private +income precisely what my childish imaginings had pictured it at this +comparatively advanced period of life. Ah, youth, youth!--as the poet +admirably says, Miss Hugonin, the thoughts of youth are long, long +thoughts, but its visions of existence are rose-tinged and free from +care, and its conception of the responsibilities of manhood--such +as taxes and the water-rate--I may safely characterise as extremely +sketchy. But pray be seated, Miss Hugonin," Petheridge Jukesbury +blandly urged. + +Common courtesy forced her to comply. So Margaret seated herself on +a little red rustic bench. In the moonlight--but I think I have +mentioned how Margaret looked in the moonlight; and above her golden +head the Eagle, sculptured over the door-way, stretched his wings to +the uttermost, half-protectingly, half-threateningly, and seemed to +view Mr. Jukesbury with a certain air of expectation. + +"A beautiful evening," Petheridge Jukesbury suggested, after a little +cogitation. + +She conceded that this was undeniable. + +"Where Nature smiles, and only the conduct of man is vile and +altogether what it ought not to be," he continued, with unction--"ah, +how true that is and how consoling! It is a good thing to meditate +upon our own vileness, Miss Hugonin--to reflect that we are but worms +with naturally the most vicious inclinations. It is most salutary. +Even I am but a worm, Miss Hugonin, though the press has been pleased +to speak most kindly of me. Even you--ah, no!" cried Mr. Jukesbury, +kissing his finger-tips, with gallantry; "let us say a worm who has +burst its cocoon and become a butterfly--a butterfly with a charming +face and a most charitable disposition and considerable property!" + +Margaret thanked him with a smile, and began to think wistfully of the +Ladies' League accounts. Still, he was a good man; and she endeavoured +to persuade herself that she considered his goodness to atone for his +flabbiness and his fleshiness and his interminable verbosity--which +she didn't. + +Mr. Jukesbury sighed. + +"A naughty world," said he, with pathos--"a very naughty world, which +really does not deserve the honour of including you in its census +reports. Yet I dare say it has the effrontery to put you down in the +tax-lists; it even puts me down--me, an humble worker in the vineyard, +with both hands set to the plough. And if I don't pay up it sells +me out. A very naughty world, indeed! I dare say," Mr. Jukesbury +observed, raising his eyes--not toward heaven, but toward the Eagle, +"that its conduct, as the poet says, creates considerable distress +among the angels. I don't know. I am not acquainted with many angels. +My wife was an angel, but she is now a lifeless form. She has been for +five years. I erected a tomb to her at considerable personal expense, +but I don't begrudge it--no, I don't begrudge it, Miss Hugonin. She +was very hard to live with. But she was an angel, and angels are rare. +Miss Hugonin," said Petheridge Jukesbury, with emphasis, "_you_ are an +angel." + +"Oh, dear, _dear!_" said Margaret, to herself; "I do wish I'd gone to +bed directly after dinner!" + +Above them the Eagle brooded. + +"Surely," he breathed, "you must know what I have so long wanted to +tell you--" + +"No," said Margaret, "and I don't want to know, please. You make me +awfully tired, and I don't care for you in the _least_. Now, you let +go my hand--let go at once!" + +He detained her. "You are an angel," he insisted--"an angel with a +large property. I love you, Margaret! Be mine!--be my blushing bride, +I entreat you! Your property is far too large for an angel to look +after. You need a man of affairs. I am a man of affairs. I am +forty-five, and have no bad habits. My press-notices are, as a rule, +favourable, my eloquence is accounted considerable, and my dearest +aspiration is that you will comfort my declining years. I might add +that I adore you, but I think I mentioned that before. Margaret, will +you be my blushing bride?" + +"No!" said Miss Hugonin emphatically. "No, you tipsy old beast--no!" + +There was a rustle of skirts. The door slammed, and the philanthropist +was left alone on the terrace. + + + +XI + +In the living-hall Margaret came upon Hugh Van Orden, who was +searching in one of the alcoves for a piece of music that Adele +Haggage wanted and had misplaced. + +The boy greeted her miserably. + +"Miss Hugonin," he lamented, "you're awfully hard on me." + +"I am sorry," said Margaret, "that you consider me discourteous to a +guest in my own house." Oh, I grant you Margaret was in a temper now. + +"It isn't that," he protested; "but I never see you alone. And I've +had something to tell you." + +"Yes?" said she, coldly. + +He drew near to her. "Surely," he breathed, "you must know what I have +long wanted to tell you--" + +"Yes, I should think I _did!_" said Margaret, "and if you dare tell +me a word of it I'll never speak to you again. It's getting a little +monotonous. Good-night, Mr. Van Orden." + +Half way up the stairs she paused and ran lightly back. + +"Oh, Hugh, Hugh!" she said, contritely, "I was unpardonably rude. I'm +sorry, dear, but it's quite impossible. You are a dear, cute little +boy, and I love you--but not that way. So let's shake hands, Hugh, and +be friends! And then you can go and play with Adele." He raised her +hand to his lips. He really was a nice boy. + +"But, oh, dear!" said Margaret, when he had gone; "what horrid +creatures men are, and what a temper I'm in, and what a vexatious +place the world is! I wish I were a pauper! I wish I had never been +born! And I wish--and I wish I had those League papers fixed! I'll +do it to-night! I'm sure I need something tranquillising, like +assessments and decimal places and unpaid dues, to keep me from +_screaming_. I hate them all--all three of them--as badly as I do +_him!_" + +Thereupon she blushed, for no apparent reason, and went to her own +rooms in a frame of mind that was inexcusable, but very becoming. Her +cheeks burned, her eyes flashed with a brighter glow that was gem-like +and a little cruel, and her chin tilted up defiantly. Margaret had a +resolute chin, a masculine chin. I fancy that it was only at the last +moment that Nature found it a thought too boyish and modified it with +a dimple--a very creditable dimple, by the way, that she must have +been really proud of. That ridiculous little dint saved it, feminised +it. + +Altogether, then, she swept down upon the papers of the Ladies' League +for the Edification of the Impecunious with very much the look of a +diminutive Valkyrie--a Valkyrie of unusual personal attractions, you +understand--_en route_ for the battle-field and a little, a very +little eager and expectant of the strife. + +Subsequently, "Oh, dear, _dear!_" said she, amid a feverish rustling +of papers; "the whole world is out of sorts to-night! I never _did_ +know how much seven times eight is, and I hate everybody, and I've +left that list of unpaid dues in Uncle Fred's room, and I've got to go +after it, and I don't want to! Bother those little suitors of mine!" + +Miss Hugonin rose, and went out from her own rooms, carrying a bunch +of keys, across the hallway to the room in which Frederick R. Woods +had died. It was his study, you may remember. It had been little +used since his death, but Margaret kept her less important papers +there--the overflow, the flotsam of her vast philanthropic and +educational correspondence. + +And there she found Billy Woods. + + + +XII + +His back was turned to the door as she entered. He was staring at a +picture beside the mantel--a portrait of Frederick R. Woods--and his +eyes when he wheeled about were wistful. + +Then, on a sudden, they lighted up as if they had caught fire from +hers, and his adoration flaunted crimson banners in his cheeks, and +his heart, I dare say, was a great blaze of happiness. He loved her, +you see; when she entered a room it really made a difference to this +absurd young man. He saw a great many lights, for instance, and heard +music. And accordingly, he laughed now in a very contented fashion. + +"I wasn't burglarising," said he--"that is, not exactly. I ought to +have asked your permission, I suppose, before coming here, but I +couldn't find you, and--and it was rather important. You see," Mr. +Woods continued, pointing to the great carved desk. "I happened to +speak of this desk to the Colonel to-night. We--we were talking of +Uncle Fred's death, and I found out, quite by accident, that it hadn't +been searched since then--that is, not thoroughly. There are secret +drawers, you see; one here," and he touched the spring that threw +it open, "and the other on this side. There is--there is nothing of +importance in them; only receipted bills and such. The other drawer is +inside that centre compartment, which is locked. The Colonel wouldn't +come. He said it was all foolishness, and that he had a book he wanted +to read. So he sent me after what he called my mare's nest. It isn't, +you see--no, not quite, not quite," Mr. Woods murmured, with an odd +smile, and then laughed and added, lamely: "I--I suppose I'm the only +person who knew about it." + +Mr. Woods's manner was a thought strange. He stammered a little in +speaking; he laughed unnecessarily; and Margaret could see that his +hands trembled. Taking him all in all, you would have sworn he was +repressing some vital emotion. But he did not seem unhappy--no, not +exactly unhappy. He was with Margaret, you see. + +"Oh, you beauty!" his meditations ran. + +He had some excuse. In the soft, rosy twilight of the room--the study +at Selwoode is panelled in very dark oak, and the doors and windows +are screened with crimson hangings--her parti-coloured red-and-yellow +gown might have been a scrap of afterglow left over from an unusually +fine sunset. In a word, Miss Hugonin was a very quaint and colourful +and delectable figure as she came a little further into the room. Her +eyes shone like blue stars, and her hair shone--there must be pounds +of it, Billy thought--and her very shoulders, plump, flawless, +ineffable, shone with the glow of an errant cloud-tatter that is just +past the track of dawn, and is therefore neither pink nor white, but +manages somehow to combine the best points of both colours. + +"Ah, indeed?" said Miss Hugonin. Her tone imparted a surprising degree +of chilliness to this simple remark. + +"No," she went on, very formally, "this is not a private room; you owe +me no apology for being here. Indeed, I am rather obliged to you, Mr. +Woods, for none of us knew of these secret drawers. Here is the key to +the central compartment, if you will be kind enough to point out the +other one. Dear, dear!" Margaret concluded, languidly, "all this is +quite like a third-rate melodrama. I haven't the least doubt you will +discover a will in there in your favour, and be reinstated as the +long-lost heir and all that sort of thing. How tiresome that will be +for me, though." + +She was in a mood to be cruel to-night. She held out the keys to +him, in a disinterested fashion, and dropped them daintily into his +outstretched palm, just as she might have given a coin to an unusually +grimy mendicant. But the tips of her fingers grazed his hand. + +That did the mischief. Her least touch was enough to set every nerve +in his body a-tingle. "Peggy!" he said hoarsely, as the keys jangled +to the floor. Then Mr. Woods drew a little nearer to her and said +"Peggy, Peggy!" in a voice that trembled curiously, and appeared to +have no intention of saying anything further. + +Indeed, words would have seemed mere tautology to any one who could +have seen his eyes. Margaret looked into them for a minute, and her +own eyes fell before their blaze, and her heart--very foolishly--stood +still for a breathing-space. Subsequently she recalled the fact +that he was a fortune-hunter, and that she despised him, and also +observed--to her surprise and indignation--that he was holding her +hand and had apparently been doing so for some time. You may believe +it, that she withdrew that pink-and-white trifle angrily enough. + +"Pray don't be absurd, Mr. Woods," said she. + +Billy caught up the word. "Absurd!" he echoed--"yes, that describes +what I've been pretty well, doesn't it, Peggy? I _was_ absurd when I +let you send me to the right-about four years ago. I realised that +to-day the moment I saw you. I should have held on like the very +grimmest death; I should have bullied you into marrying me, if +necessary, and in spite of fifty Anstruthers. Oh, yes, I know that +now. But I was only a boy then, Peggy, and so I let a boy's pride come +between us. I know now there isn't any question of pride where you +are concerned--not any question of pride nor of any silly +misunderstandings, nor of any uncle's wishes, nor of anything but just +you, Peggy. It's just you that I care for now--just you." + +"Ah!" Margaret cried, with a swift intake of the breath that was +almost a sob. He had dared, after all; oh, it was shameless, sordid! +And yet (she thought dimly), how dear that little quiver in his voice +had been were it unplanned!--and how she could have loved this big, +eager boy were he not the hypocrite she knew him! + +_She'd_ show him! But somehow--though it was manifestly what he +deserved--she found she couldn't look him in the face while she did +it. + +So she dropped her eyes to the floor and waited for a moment of tense +silence. Then, "Am I to consider this a proposal, Mr. Woods?" she +asked, in muffled tones. + +Billy stared. "Yes," said he, very gravely, after an interval. + +"You see," she explained, still in the same dull voice, "you phrased +it so vaguely I couldn't well be certain. You don't propose very well, +Mr. Woods. I--I've had opportunities to become an authority on such +matters, you see, since I've been rich. That makes a difference, +doesn't it? A great many men are willing to marry me now who wouldn't +have thought of such a thing, say--say, four years ago. So I've had +some experience. Oh, yes, three--three _persons_ have offered to marry +me for my money earlier in this very evening--before you did, Mr. +Woods. And, really, I can't compliment you on your methods, Mr. Woods; +they are a little vague, a little abrupt, a little transparent, don't +you think?" + +"Peggy!" he cried, in a frightened whisper. He could not believe, you +see, that it was the woman he loved who was speaking. + +And for my part, I admit frankly that at this very point, if ever in +her life, Margaret deserved a thorough shaking. + +"Dear me," she airily observed, "I'm sure I've said nothing out of the +way. I think it speaks very well for you that you're so fond of your +old home--so anxious to regain it at _any_ cost. It's quite touching, +Mr. Woods." + +She raised her eyes toward his. I dare say she was suffering as much +as he. But women consider it a point of honour to smile when they +stab; Margaret smiled with an innocence that would have seemed +overdone in an angel. + +Then, in an instant, she had the grace to be abjectly ashamed of +herself. Billy's face had gone white. His mouth was set, mask-like, +and his breathing was a little perfunctory. It stung her, though, that +he was not angry. He was sorry. + +"I--I see," he said, very carefully. "You think I--want the money. +Yes--I see." + +"And why not?" she queried, pleasantly. "Dear me, money's a very +sensible thing to want, I'm sure. It makes a great difference, you +know." + +He looked down into her face for a moment. One might have sworn this +detected fortune-hunter pitied her. + +"Yes," he assented, slowly, "it makes a difference--not a difference +for the better, I'm afraid, Peggy." + +Ensued a silence. + +Then Margaret tossed her head. She was fast losing her composure. +She would have given the world to retract what she had said, and +accordingly she resolved to brazen it out. + +"You needn't look at me as if I were a convicted criminal," she said, +sharply. "I won't marry you, and there's an end of it." + +"It isn't that I'm thinking of," said Mr. Woods, with a grave smile. +"You see, it takes me a little time to realise your honest opinion +of me. I believe I understand now. You think me a very hopeless +cad--that's about your real opinion, isn't it, Peggy? I didn't know +that, you see. I thought you knew me better than that. You did once, +Peggy--once, a long time ago, and--and I hoped you hadn't quite +forgotten that time." + +The allusion was ill chosen. + +"Oh, oh, _oh!_" she cried, gasping. "_You_ to remind me of that +time!--you of all men. Haven't you a vestige of shame? Haven't you +a rag of honour left? Oh, I didn't know there were such men in the +world! And to think--to think--" Margaret's glorious voice broke, and +she wrung her hands helplessly. + +Then, after a little, she raised her eyes to his, and spoke without +a trace of emotion. "To think," she said, and her voice was toneless +now, "to think that I loved you! It's that that hurts, you know. For I +loved you very dearly, Billy Woods--yes, I think I loved you quite as +much as any woman can ever love a man. You were the first, you see, +and girls--girls are very foolish about such things. I thought you +were brave, and strong, and clean, and honest, and beautiful, and +dear--oh, quite the best and dearest man in the world, I thought you, +Billy Woods! That--that was queer, wasn't it?" she asked, with a +listless little shiver. "Yes, it was very queer. You didn't think of +me in quite that way, did you? No, you--you thought I was well enough +to amuse you for a while. I was well enough for a summer flirtation, +wasn't I, Billy? But marriage--ah, no, you never thought of marriage +then. You ran away when Uncle Fred suggested that. You refused +point-blank--refused in this very room--didn't you, Billy? Ah, +that--that hurt," Margaret ended, with a faint smile. "Yes, it--hurt." + +Billy Woods raised a protesting hand, as though to speak, but +afterward he drew a deep, tremulous breath and bit his lip and was +silent. + +She had spoken very quietly, very simply, very like a tired child; +now her voice lifted. "But you've hurt me more to-night," she said, +equably--"to-night, when you've come cringing back to me--to me, whom +you'd have none of when I was poor. I'm rich now, though. That makes +a difference, doesn't it, Billy? You're willing to whistle back the +girl's love you flung away once--yes, quite willing. But can't you +understand how much it must hurt me to think I ever loved you?" +Margaret asked, very gently. + +She wanted him to understand. She wanted him to be ashamed. She prayed +God that he might be just a little, little bit ashamed, so that she +might be able to forgive him. + +But he stood silent, bending puzzled brows toward her. + +"Can't you understand, Billy?" she pleaded, softly. "I can't help +seeing what a cur you are. I must hate you, Billy--of course, I must," +she insisted, very gently, as though arguing the matter with herself; +then suddenly she sobbed and wrung her hands in anguish. "Oh, I can't, +I can't!" she wailed. "God help me, I can't hate you, even though I +know you for what you are!" + +His arms lifted a little; and in a flash Margaret knew that what she +most wanted in all the world was to have them close about her, and +then to lay her head upon his shoulder and cry contentedly. + +Oh, she did want to forgive him! If he had lost all sense of shame, +why could he not lie to her? Surely, he could at least lie? And, +oh, how gladly she would believe!--only the tiniest, the flimsiest +fiction, her eyes craved of him. + +But he merely said "I see--I see," very slowly, and then smiled. +"We'll put the money aside just now," he said. "Perhaps, after a +little, we--we'll came back to that. I think you've forgotten, though, +that when--when Uncle Fred and I had our difference you had just +thrown me over--had just ordered me never to speak to you again? +I couldn't very well ask you to marry me, could I, under those +circumstances?" + +"I spoke in a moment of irritation," a very dignified Margaret pointed +out; "you would have paid no attention whatever to it if you had +really--cared." + +Billy laughed, rather sadly. "Oh, I cared right enough," he said. "I +still care. The question is--do you?" + +"No," said Margaret, with decision, "I don't--not in the _least_." + +"Peggy," Mr. Woods commanded, "look at me!" + +"You have had your answer, I think," Miss Hugonin indifferently +observed. + +Billy caught her chin in his hand and turned her face to his. "Peggy, +do you--care?" he asked, softly. + +And Margaret looked into his honest-seeming eyes and, in a panic, knew +that her traitor lips were forming "yes." + +"That would be rather unfortunate, wouldn't it?" she asked, with a +smile. "You see, it was only an hour ago I promised to marry Mr. +Kennaston." + +"Kennaston!" Billy gasped. "You--you don't mean that you care for +_him_, Peggy?" + +"I really can't see why it should concern you," said Margaret, +sweetly, "but since you ask--I do. You couldn't expect me to remain +inconsolable forever, you know." + +Then the room blurred before her eyes. She stood rigid, defiant. +She was dimly aware that Billy was speaking, speaking from a great +distance, it seemed, and then after a century or two his face came +back to her out of the whirl of things. And, though she did not know +it, they were smiling bravely at one another. + +"--and so," Mr. Woods was stating, "I've been an even greater ass than +usual, and I hope you'll be very, very happy." + +[Illustration: "Billy unfolded it slowly, with a puzzled look growing +in his countenance."] + +"Thank you," she returned, mechanically, "I--I hope so." + +After an interval, "Good-night, Peggy," said Mr. Woods. + +"Oh--? Good-night," said she, with a start. + +He turned to go. Then, "By Jove!" said he, grimly, "I've been so busy +making an ass of myself I'd forgotten all about more--more important +things." + +Mr. Woods picked up the keys and, going to the desk, unlocked the +centre compartment with a jerk. Afterward he gave a sharp exclamation. +He had found a paper in the secret drawer at the back which appeared +to startle him. + +Billy unfolded it slowly, with a puzzled look growing in his +countenance. Then for a moment Margaret's golden head drew close to +his yellow curls and they read it through together. And in the most +melodramatic and improbable fashion in the world they found it to be +the last will and testament of Frederick R. Woods. + +"But--but I don't understand," was Miss Hugonin's awed comment. "It's +exactly like the other will, only--why, it's dated the seventeenth +of June, the day before he died! And it's witnessed by Hodges and +Burton--the butler and the first footman, you know--and they've never +said anything about such a paper. And, then, why should he have made +another will just like the first?" + +Billy pondered. + +By and bye, "I think I can explain that," he said, in a rather +peculiar voice. "You see, Hodges and Burton witnessed all his papers, +half the time without knowing what they were about. They would hardly +have thought of this particular one after his death. And it isn't +quite the same will as the other; it leaves you practically +everything, but it doesn't appoint any trustees, as the other did, +because this will was drawn up after you were of age. Moreover, it +contains these four bequests to colleges, to establish a Woods chair +of ethnology, which the other will didn't provide for. Of course, it +would have been simpler merely to add a codicil to the first will, +but Uncle Fred was always very methodical. I--I think he was probably +going through the desk the night he died, destroying various papers. +He must have taken the other will out to destroy it just--just before +he died. Perhaps--perhaps--" Billy paused for a little and then +laughed, unmirthfully. "It scarcely matters," said he. "Here is the +will. It is undoubtedly genuine and undoubtedly the last he made. +You'll have to have it probated, Peggy, and settle with the colleges. +It--it won't make much of a hole in the Woods millions." + +There was a half-humorous bitterness in his voice that Margaret noted +silently. So (she thought) he had hoped for a moment that at the last +Frederick R. Woods had relented toward him. It grieved her, in a dull +fashion, to see him so mercenary. It grieved her--though she would +have denied it emphatically--to see him so disappointed. Since he +wanted the money so much, she would have liked for him to have had it, +worthless as he was, for the sake of the boy he had been. + +"Thank you," she said, coldly, as she took the paper; "I will give it +to my father. He will do what is necessary. Good-night, Mr. Woods." + +Then she locked up the desk in a businesslike fashion and turned to +him, and held out her hand. + +"Good-night, Billy," said this perfectly inconsistent young woman. +"For a moment I thought Uncle Fred had altered his will in your +favour. I almost wish he had." + +Billy smiled a little. + +"That would never have done," he said, gravely, as he shook +hands; "you forget what a sordid, and heartless, and generally +good-for-nothing chap I am, Peggy. It's much better as it is." + +Only the tiniest, the flimsiest fiction, her eyes craved of him. Even +now, at the eleventh hour, lie to me, Billy Woods, and, oh, how gladly +I will believe! + +But he merely said "Good-night, Peggy," and went out of the room. His +broad shoulders had a pathetic droop, a listlessness. + +Margaret was glad. Of course, she was glad. At last, she had told him +exactly what she thought of him. Why shouldn't she be glad? She was +delighted. + +So, by way of expressing this delight, she sat down at the desk and +began to cry very softly. + + + +XIII + +Having duly considered the emptiness of existence, the unworthiness of +men, the dreary future that awaited her--though this did not trouble +her greatly, as she confidently expected to die soon--and many other +such dolorous topics, Miss Hugonin decided to retire for the night. +She rose, filled with speculations as to the paltriness of life and +the probability of her eyes being red in the morning. + +"It will be all his fault if they are," she consoled herself. +"Doubtless he'll be very much pleased. After robbing me of all faith +in humanity, I dare say the one thing needed to complete his happiness +is to make me look like a fright. I hate him! After making me +miserable, now, I suppose he'll go off and make some other woman +miserable. Oh, of course, he'll make love to the first woman he meets +who has any money. I'm sure she's welcome to him. I only pity any +woman who has to put up with _him_. No, I don't," Margaret decided, +after reflection; "I hate her, too!" + +Miss Hugonin went to the door leading to the hallway and paused. +Then--I grieve to relate it--she shook a little pink-tipped fist in +the air. + +"I detest you!" she commented, between her teeth; "oh, how _dare_ you +make me feel so ashamed of the way I've treated you!" + +The query--as possibly you may have divined--was addressed to Mr. +Woods. He was standing by the fireplace in the hallway, and his tall +figure was outlined sharply against the flame of the gas-logs that +burned there. His shoulders had a pathetic droop, a listlessness. + +Billy was reading a paper of some kind by the firelight, and the black +outline of his face smiled grimly over it. Then he laughed and threw +it into the fire. + +"Billy!" a voice observed--a voice that was honey and gold and velvet +and all that is most sweet and rich and soft in the world. + +Mr. Woods was aware of a light step, a swishing, sibilant, delightful +rustling--the caress of sound is the rustling of a well-groomed +woman's skirts--and of an afterthought of violets, of a mere +reminiscence of orris, all of which came toward him through the +dimness of the hall. He started, noticeably. + +"Billy," Miss Hugonin stated, "I'm sorry for what I said to you. I'm +not sure it isn't true, you know, but I'm sorry I said it." + +"Bless your heart!" said Billy; "don't you worry over that, Peggy. +That's all right. Incidentally, the things you've said to me and about +me aren't true, of course, but we won't discuss that just now. I--I +fancy we're both feeling a bit fagged. Go to bed, Peggy! We'll both +go to bed, and the night will bring counsel, and we'll sleep off all +unkindliness. Go to bed, little sister!--get all the beauty-sleep you +aren't in the least in need of, and dream of how happy you're going to +be with the man you love. And--and in the morning I may have something +to say to you. Good-night, dear." + +And this time he really went. And when he had come to the bend in the +stairs his eyes turned back to hers, slowly and irresistibly, drawn +toward them, as it seemed, just as the sunflower is drawn toward the +sun, or the needle toward the pole, or, in fine, as the eyes of young +gentlemen ordinarily are drawn toward the eyes of the one woman in the +world. Then he disappeared. + +The mummery of it vexed Margaret. There was no excuse for his looking +at her in that way. It irritated her. She was almost as angry with him +for doing it as she would have been for not doing it. + +Therefore, she bent an angry face toward the fire, her mouth pouting +in a rather inviting fashion. Then it rounded slowly into a sanguine +O, which of itself suggested osculation, but in reality stood for +"observe!" For the paper Billy had thrown into the fire had fallen +under the gas-logs, and she remembered his guilty start. + +"After all," said Margaret, "it's none of my business." + +So she eyed it wistfully. + +"It may be important," she considerately remembered. "It ought not to +be left there." + +So she fished it out with a big paper-cutter. + +"But it can't be very important," she dissented afterward, "or he +wouldn't have thrown it away." + +So she looked at the superscripture on the back of it. + +Then she gave a little gasp and tore it open and read it by the +firelight. + +Miss Hugonin subsequently took credit to herself for not going into +hysterics. And I think she had some reason to; for she found the paper +a duplicate of the one Billy had taken out of the secret drawer, with +his name set in the place of hers. At the last Frederick R. Woods had +relented toward his nephew. + +Margaret laughed a little; then she cried a little; then she did both +together. Afterward she sat in the firelight, very puzzled and very +excited and very penitent and very beautiful, and was happier than she +had ever been in her life. + +"He had it in his pocket," her dear voice quavered; "he had it in his +pocket, my brave, strong, beautiful Billy did, when he asked me to +marry him. It was King Cophetua wooing the beggar-maid--and the beggar +was an impudent, ungrateful, idiotic little _piece!_" Margaret hissed, +in her most shrewish manner. "She ought to be spanked. She ought to go +down on her knees to him in sackcloth, and tears, and ashes, and all +sorts of penitential things. She will, too. Oh, it's such a beautiful +world--_such_ a beautiful world! Billy loves me--really! Billy's a +millionaire, and I'm a pauper. Oh, I'm glad, glad, _glad!_" + +She caressed the paper that had rendered the world such a goodly place +to live in--caressed it tenderly and rubbed her check against it. That +was Margaret's way of showing affection, you know; and I protest it +must have been very pleasant for the paper. The only wonder was that +the ink it was written in didn't turn red with delight. + +Then she read it through again, for sheer enjoyment of those +beautiful, incomprehensible words that disinherited her. How _lovely_ +of Uncle Fred! she thought. Of course, he'd forgiven Billy; who +wouldn't? What beautiful language Uncle Fred used! quite prayer-booky, +she termed it. Then she gasped. + +The will in Billy's favour was dated a week earlier than the one they +had found in the secret drawer. It was worthless, mere waste paper. At +the last Frederick R. Woods's pride had conquered his love. + +"Oh, the horrid old man!" Margaret wailed; "he's left me everything he +had! How _dare_ he disinherit Billy! I call it rank impertinence in +him. Oh, boy dear, dear, _dear_ boy!" Miss Hugonin crooned, in an +ecstacy of tenderness and woe. "He found this first will in one of the +other drawers, and thought _he_ was the rich one, and came in a great +whirl of joy to ask me to marry him, and I was horrid to him! Oh, what +a mess I've made of it! I've called him a fortune-hunter, and I've +told him I love another man, and he'll never, never ask me to marry +him now. And I love him, I worship him, I adore him! And if only +I were poor--" + +Ensued a silence. Margaret lifted the two wills, scrutinised them +closely, and then looked at the fire, interrogatively. + +"It's penal servitude for quite a number of years," she said. "But, +then, he really _couldn't_ tell any one, you know. No gentleman would +allow a lady to be locked up in jail. And if he knew--if he knew I +didn't and couldn't consider him a fortune-hunter, I really believe he +would--" + +Whatever she believed he would do, the probability of his doing it +seemed highly agreeable to Miss Hugonin. She smiled at the fire in the +most friendly fashion, and held out one of the folded papers to it. + +"Yes," said Margaret, "I'm quite sure he will." + +There I think we may leave her. For I have dredged the dictionary, +and I confess I have found no fitting words wherewith to picture this +inconsistent, impulsive, adorable young woman, dreaming brave dreams +in the firelight of her lover and of their united future. I should +only bungle it. You must imagine it for yourself. + +It is a pretty picture, is it not?--with its laughable side, perhaps; +under the circumstances, whimsical, if you will; but very, very +sacred. For she loved him with a clean heart, loved him infinitely. + +Let us smile at it--tenderly--and pass on. + +But upon my word, when I think of how unreasonably, how outrageously +Margaret had behaved during the entire evening, I am tempted to +depose her as our heroine. I begin to regret I had not selected Adele +Haggage. + +She would have done admirably. For, depend upon it, she, too, had +her trepidations, her white nights, her occult battles over Hugh Van +Orden. Also, she was a pretty girl--if you care for brunettes--and +accomplished. She was versed in I forget how many foreign languages, +both Continental and dead, and could discourse sensibly in any one of +them. She was perfectly reasonable, perfectly consistent, perfectly +unimpulsive, and never expressed an opinion that was not countenanced +by at least two competent authorities. I don't know a man living, +prepared to dispute that Miss Haggage excelled Miss Hugonin in all +these desirable qualities. + +Yet with pleasing unanimity they went mad for Margaret and had the +greatest possible respect for Adele. + +And, my dear Mrs. Grundy, I grant you cheerfully that this was all +wrong. A sensible man, as you very justly observe, will seek in a +woman something more enduring than mere personal attractions; he will +value her for some sensible reason--say, for her wit, or her learning, +or her skill in cookery, or her proficiency in Greek. A sensible man +will look for a sensible woman; he will not concern his sensible head +over such trumperies as a pair of bright eyes, or a red lip or so, or +a satisfactory suit of hair. These are fleeting vanities. + +However-- + +You have doubtless heard ere this, my dear madam, that had Cleopatra's +nose been an inch shorter the destiny of the world would have been +changed; had she been the woman you describe--perfectly reasonable, +perfectly consistent, perfectly sensible in all she said and +did--confess, dear lady, wouldn't Antony have taken to his heels and +have fled from such a monster? + + + +XIV + +I regret to admit that Mr. Woods did not toss feverishly about his bed +all through the silent watches of the night. He was very miserable, +but he was also twenty-six. That is an age when the blind bow-god +deals no fatal wounds. It is an age to suffer poignantly, if you will; +an age wherein to aspire to the dearest woman on earth, to write her +halting verses, to lose her, to affect the _cliches_ of cynicism, to +hear the chimes at midnight--and after it all, to sleep like a top. + +So Billy slept. And kind Hypnos loosed a dream through the gates of +ivory that lifted him to a delectable land where Peggy was nineteen, +and had never heard of Kennaston, and was unbelievably sweet and dear +and beautiful. But presently they and the Colonel put forth to sea--on +a great carved writing-desk--fishing for sharks, which the Colonel +said were very plentiful in those waters; and Frederick R. Woods +climbed up out of the sea, and said Billy was a fool and must go to +college; and Peggy said that was impossible, as seventeen hundred and +fifty thousand children had to be given an education apiece, and they +couldn't spare one for Billy; and a missionary from Zambesi Land came +out of one of the secret drawers and said Billy must give him both +of his feet as he needed them for his working-girls' classes; and +thereupon the sharks poked their heads out of the water and began, in +a deafening chorus, to cry, "Feet, feet, feet!" And Billy then woke +with a start, and found it was only the birds chattering in the dawn +outside. + +Then he was miserable. + +He tossed, and groaned, and dozed, and smoked cigarettes until he +could stand it no longer. He got up and dressed, in sheer desperation, +and went for a walk in the gardens. + +The day was clear as a new-minted coin. It was not yet wholly aired, +not wholly free from the damp savour of night, but low in the east the +sun was taking heart. A mile-long shadow footed it with Billy Woods +in his pacings through the amber-chequered gardens. Actaeon-like, he +surprised the world at its toilet, and its fleeting grace somewhat +fortified his spirits. + +But his thoughts pestered him like gnats. The things he said to the +roses it is not necessary to set down. + + + +XV + +After a vituperative half-hour or so Mr. Woods was hungry. He came +back toward Selwoode; and upon the terrace in front of the house he +found Kathleen Saumarez. + +During the warm weather, one corner of the terrace had been converted, +by means of gay red-and-white awnings, into a sort of living-room. +There were chairs, tables, sofa-cushions, bowls of roses, and any +number of bright-coloured rugs. Altogether, it was a cosy place, +and the glowing hues of its furnishings were very becoming to Mrs. +Saumarez, who sat there writing industriously. + +It was a thought embarrassing. They had avoided one another +yesterday--rather obviously--both striving to put off a necessarily +awkward meeting. Now it had come. And now, somehow, their eyes met for +a moment, and they laughed frankly, and the awkwardness was gone. + +"Kathleen," said Mr. Woods, with conviction, "you're a dear." + +"You broke my heart," said she, demurely, "but I'm going to forgive +you." + +Mrs. Saumarez was not striving to be clever now. And, heavens (thought +Billy), how much nicer she was like this! It wasn't the same woman: +her thin cheeks flushed arbutus-like, and her rather metallic voice +was grown low and gentle. Billy brought memories with him, you see; +and for the moment, she was Kathleen Eppes again--Kathleen Eppes in +the first flush of youth, eager, trustful, and joyous-hearted, as he +had known her long ago. Since then, the poor woman had eaten of the +bread of dependence and had found it salt enough; she had paid for it +daily, enduring a thousand petty slights, a thousand petty insults, +and smiling under them as only women can. But she had forgotten now +that shrewd Kathleen Saumarez who must earn her livelihood as best she +might. She smiled frankly--a purely unprofessional smile. + +"I was sorry when I heard you were coming," she said, irrelevantly, +"but I'm glad now." + +Mr. Woods--I grieve to relate--was still holding her hand in his. +There stirred in his pulses the thrill Kathleen Eppes had always +wakened--a thrill of memory now, a mere wraith of emotion. He was +thinking of a certain pink-cheeked girl with crinkly black-brown +hair and eyes that he had likened to chrysoberyls--and he wondered +whimsically what had become of her. This was not she. This was +assuredly not Kathleen, for this woman had a large mouth--a humorous +and kindly mouth it was true, but undeniably a large one--whereas, +Kathleen's mouth had been quite perfect and rather diminutive than +otherwise. Hadn't he rhymed of it often enough to know? + +They stood gazing at one another for a long time; and in the back of +Billy's brain lines of his old verses sang themselves to a sad little +tune--the verses that reproved the idiocy of all other poets, who had +very foolishly written their sonnets to other women: and yet, as the +jingle pointed out, + + Had these poets ever strayed + In thy path, they had not made + Random rhymes of Arabella, + Songs of Dolly, hymns of Stella, + Lays of Lalage or Chloris-- + Not of Daphne nor of Doris, + Florimel nor Amaryllis, + Nor of Phyllida nor Phyllis, + Were their wanton melodies: + But all of these-- + All their melodies had been + Of thee, Kathleen. + +Would they have been? Billy thought it improbable. The verses were +very silly; and, recalling the big, blundering boy who had written +them, Billy began to wonder--somewhat forlornly--whither he, too, +had vanished. He and the girl he had gone mad for both seemed rather +mythical--legendary as King Pepin. + +"Yes," said Mrs. Saumarez--and oh, she startled him; "I fancy they're +both quite dead by now. Billy," she cried, earnestly, "don't laugh +at them!--don't laugh at those dear, foolish children! I--somehow, I +couldn't bear that, Billy." + +"Kathleen," said Mr. Woods, in admiration, "you're a witch. I wasn't +laughing, though, my dear. I was developing quite a twilight mood over +them--a plaintive, old-lettery sort of mood, you know." + +She sighed a little. "Yes--I know." Then her eyelids flickered in a +parody of Kathleen's glance that Billy noted with a queer tenderness. +"Come and talk to me, Billy," she commanded. "I'm an early bird this +morning, and entitled to the very biggest and best-looking worm I can +find. You're only a worm, you know--we're all worms. Mr. Jukesbury +told me so last night, making an exception in my favour, for it +appears I'm an angel. He was amorously inclined last night, the tipsy +old fraud! It's shameless, Billy, the amount of money he gets out of +Miss Hugonin--for the deserving poor. Do you know, I rather fancy he +classes himself under that head? And I grant you he's poor enough--but +deserving!" Mrs. Saumarez snapped her fingers eloquently. + +"Eh? Shark, eh?" queried Mr. Woods, in some discomfort. + +She nodded. "He is as bad as Sarah Haggage," she informed him, "and +everybody knows what a bloodsucker she is. The Haggage is a disease, +Billy, that all rich women are exposed to--'more easily caught than +the pestilence, and the taker runs presently mad.' Depend upon it, +Billy, those two will have every penny they can get out of your +uncle's money." + +"Peggy's so generous," he pleaded. "She wants to make everybody +happy--bring about a general millenium, you know." + +"She pays dearly enough for her fancies," said Mrs. Saumarez, in a +hard voice. Then, after a little, she cried, suddenly: "Oh, Billy, +Billy, it shames me to think of how we lie to her, and toady to her, +and lead her on from one mad scheme to another!--all for the sake of +the money we can pilfer incidentally! We're all arrant hypocrites, you +know; I'm no better than the others, Billy--not a bit better. But +my husband left me so poor, and I had always been accustomed to the +pretty things of life, and I couldn't--I couldn't give them up, Billy. +I love them too dearly. So I lie, and toady, and write drivelling +talks about things I don't understand, for drivelling women to +listen to, and I still have the creature comforts of life. I pawn my +self-respect for them--that's all. Such a little price to pay, isn't +it, Billy?" + +She spoke in a sort of frenzy. I dare say that at the outset she +wanted Mr. Woods to know the worst of her, knowing he could not fail +to discover it in time. Billy brought memories with him, you see; and +this shrewd, hard woman wanted, somehow, more than anything else in +the world, that he should think well of her. So she babbled out the +whole pitiful story, waiting in a kind of terror to see contempt and +disgust awaken in his eyes. + +But he merely said "I see--I see," very slowly, and his eyes were +kindly. He couldn't be angry with her, somehow; that pink-cheeked, +crinkly haired girl stood between them and shielded her. He was only +very, very sorry. + +"And Kennaston?" he asked, after a little. + +Mrs. Saumarez flushed. "Mr. Kennaston is a man of great genius," she +said, quickly. "Of course, Miss Hugonin is glad to assist him in +publishing his books--it's an honour to her that he permits it. They +have to be published privately, you know, as the general public isn't +capable of appreciating such dainty little masterpieces. Oh, don't +make any mistake, Billy--Mr. Kennaston is a very wonderful and very +admirable man." + +"H'm, yes; he struck me as being an unusually nice chap," said Mr. +Woods, untruthfully. "I dare say they'll be very happy." + +"Who?" Mrs. Saumarez demanded. + +"Why--er--I don't suppose they'll make any secret of it," Billy +stammered, in tardy repentance of his hasty speaking. "Peggy told me +last night she had accepted him." + +Mrs. Saumarez turned to rearrange a bowl of roses. She seemed to have +some difficulty over it. + +"Billy," she spoke, inconsequently, and with averted head, "an honest +man is the noblest work of God--and the rarest." + +Billy groaned. + +"Do you know," said he, "I've just been telling the roses in the +gardens yonder the same thing about women? I'm a misogynist this +morning. I've decided no woman is worthy of being loved." + +"That is quite true," she assented, "but, on the other hand, no man is +worthy of loving." + +Billy smiled. + +"I've likewise come to the conclusion," said he, "that a man's love is +like his hat, in that any peg will do to hang it on; also, in that the +proper and best place for it is on his own head. Oh, I assure you, +I vented any number of cheap cynicisms on the helpless roses! And +yet--will you believe it, Kathleen?--it doesn't seem to make me feel a +bit better--no, not a bit." + +"It's very like his hat," she declared, "in that he has a new one +every year." Then she rested her hand on his, in a half-maternal +fashion. "What's the matter, boy?" she asked, softly. "You're always +so fresh and wholesome. I don't like to see you like this. Better +leave phrase-making to us phrase-mongers." + +Her voice rang true--true, and compassionate, and tender, and all that +a woman's voice should be. Billy could not but trust her. + +"I've been an ass," said he, rather tragically. "Oh, not an unusual +ass, Kathleen--just the sort men are always making of themselves. You +see, before I went to France, there was a girl I--cared for. And I let +a quarrel come between us--a foolish, trifling, idle little quarrel, +Kathleen, that we might have made up in a half-hour. But I was too +proud, you see. No, I wasn't proud, either," Mr. Woods amended, +bitterly; "I was simply pig-headed and mulish. So I went away. And +yesterday I saw her again and realised that I--still cared. That's +all, Kathleen. It isn't an unusual story." And Mr. Woods laughed, +mirthlessly, and took a turn on the terrace. + +Mrs. Saumarez was regarding him intently. Her cheeks were of a deeper, +more attractive pink, and her breath came and went quickly. + +"I--I don't understand," she said, in a rather queer voice. + +"Oh, it's simple enough," Billy assured her. "You see, she--well, I +think she would have married me once. Yes, she cared for me once. And +I quarreled with her--I, conceited young ass that I was, actually +presumed to dictate to the dearest, sweetest, most lovable woman on +earth, and tell her what she must do and what she mustn't. I!--good +Lord, I, who wasn't worthy to sweep a crossing clean for her!--who +wasn't worthy to breathe the same air with her!--who wasn't worthy to +exist in the same world she honoured by living in! Oh, I _was_ an ass! +But I've paid for it!--oh, yes, Kathleen, I've paid dearly for it, +and I'll pay more dearly yet before I've done. I tried to avoid her +yesterday--you must have seen that. And I couldn't--I give you my +word, I could no more have kept away from her than I could have spread +a pair of wings and flown away. She doesn't care a bit for me now; but +I can no more give up loving her than I can give up eating my dinner. +That isn't a pretty simile, Kathleen, but it expresses the way I feel +toward her. It isn't merely that I want her; it's more than that--oh, +far more than that. I simply can't do without her. Don't you +understand, Kathleen?" he asked, desperately. + +"Yes--I think I understand," she said, when he had ended. "I--oh, +Billy, I am almost sorry. It's dear of you--dear of you, Billy, to +care for me still, but--but I'm almost sorry you care so much. I'm not +worth it, boy dear. And I--I really don't know what to say. You must +let me think." + +Mr. Woods gave an inarticulate sound. The face she turned to him +was perplexed, half-sad, fond, a little pleased, and strangely +compassionate. It was Kathleen Eppes who sat beside him; the six years +were as utterly forgotten as the name of Magdalen's first lover. She +was a girl again, listening--with a heart that fluttered, I dare +say--to the wild talk, the mad dithyrambics of a big, blundering boy. + +The ludicrous horror of it stunned Mr. Woods. + +He could no more have told her of her mistake than he could have +struck her in the face. + +"Kathleen--!" said he, vaguely. + +"Let me think!--ah, let me think, Billy!" she pleaded, in a flutter of +joy and amazement. "Go away, boy dear!--Go away for a little and +let me think! I'm not an emotional woman, but I'm on the verge of +hysterics now, for--for several reasons. Go in to breakfast, Billy! +I--I want to be alone. You've made me very proud and--and sorry, I +think, and glad, and--and--oh, I don't know, boy dear. But please go +now--please!" + +Billy went. + +In the living-hall he paused to inspect a picture with peculiar +interest. Since Kathleen cared for him (he thought, rather forlornly), +he must perjure himself in as plausible a manner as might be possible; +please God, having done what he had done, he would lie to her like a +gentleman and try to make her happy. + +A vision in incredible violet ruffles, coming down to breakfast, saw +him, and paused on the stairway, and flushed and laughed deliciously. + +Poor Billy stared at her; and his heart gave a great bound and then +appeared to stop for an indefinite time. + +"Good Lord!" said Mr. Woods, in his soul. "And I thought I was an ass +last night! Why, last night, in comparison, I displayed intelligence +that was almost human! Oh, Peggy, Peggy! if I only dared tell you what +I think of you, I believe I would gladly die afterward--yes, I'm sure +I would. You really haven't any right to be so beautiful!--it isn't +fair to us, Peggy!" + +But the vision was peeping over the bannisters at him, and the +vision's eyes were sparkling with a lucent mischief and a wonderful, +half-hushed contralto was demanding of him: + + "Oh, where have you been, Billy boy, Billy boy? + Oh, where have you been, charming Billy?" + +And Billy's baritone answered her: + + "I've been to seek a wife--" + +and broke off in a groan. + +"Good Lord!" said Mr. Woods. + +It was a ludicrous business, if you will. Indeed, it was vastly +humorous--was it not?--this woman's thinking a man's love might by any +chance endure through six whole years. But their love endures, you +see; and the silly creatures have a superstition among them that love +is a sacred thing, stronger than time, victorious over death itself. +Let us laugh, then, at Kathleen Saumarez--those of us who have learned +that love is only a tinkling cymbal and faith a sounding brass and +fidelity an obsolete affectation: but for my part, I honour and +think better of the woman who through all her struggles with the +world--through all those sordid, grim, merciless, secret battles where +the vanquished may not even cry for succour--I honour her, I say, for +that she had yet cherished the memory of that first love which is the +best and purest and most unselfish and most excellent thing in life. + + + +XVI + +Breakfast Margaret enjoyed hugely. I regret to confess that the fact +that every one of her guests was more or less miserable moved this +hard-hearted young woman to untimely and excessive mirth. Only Mrs. +Saumarez puzzled her, for she could think of no reason for that lady's +manifest agitation when Kathleen eventually joined the others. + +But for the rest, the hopeless glances that Hugh Van Orden cast toward +her caused Adele to flush, and Mrs. Haggage to become despondent and +speechless and astonishingly rigid; and Petheridge Jukesbury's vaguely +apologetic attitude toward the world struck Miss Hugonin as infinitely +diverting. Kennaston she pitied a little; but his bearing toward +her ranged ludicrously from that of proprietorship to that of +supplication, and, moreover, she was furious with him for having +hinted at various times that Billy was a fortune-hunter. + +Margaret was quite confident by this that she had never believed +him--"not really, you know"--having argued the point out at some +length the night before, and reaching her conclusion by a course of +reasoning peculiar to herself. + +Mr. Woods, as you may readily conceive, was sunk in the Slough of +Despond deeper than ever plummet sounded. Margaret thought this very +nice of him; it was a delicate tribute to her that he ate nothing; +and the fact that Hugh Van Orden and Petheridge Jukesbury--as she +believed--acted in precisely the same way for precisely the same +reason, merely demonstrated, of course, their overwhelming conceit and +presumption. + +So sitting in the great Eagle's shadow, she ate a quantity of +marmalade--she was wont to begin the day in this ungodly English +fashion--and gossiped like a brook trotting over sunlit pebbles. She +had planned a pulverising surprise for the house-party; and in due +time, she intended to explode it, and subsequently Billy was to +apologise for his conduct, and then they were to live happily ever +afterward. + +She had not yet decided what he was to apologise for; that was his +affair. His conscience ought to have told him, by this, wherein he had +offended; and if his conscience hadn't, why then, of course, he would +have to apologise for his lack of proper sensibility. + +After breakfast she went, according to her usual custom, to her +father's rooms, for, as I think I have told you, the old gentleman was +never visible until noon. She had astonishing news for him. + +What time she divulged it, the others sat on the terrace, and Mr. +Kennaston read to them, as he had promised, from his "Defense of +Ignorance." It proved a welcome diversion to more than one of the +party. Mr. Woods, especially, esteemed it a godsend; it staved off +misfortune for at least a little; so he sat at Kathleen's side in +silence, trying desperately to be happy, trying desperately not to see +the tiny wrinkles, the faint crow's feet Time had sketched in her face +as a memorandum of the work he meant to do shortly. + +Billy consoled himself with the reflection that he was very fond of +her; but, oh (he thought), what worship, what adoration he could +accord this woman if she would only decline--positively--to have +anything whatever to do with him! + +I think we ought not to miss hearing Mr. Kennaston's discourse. It is +generally conceded that his style is wonderfully clever; and I have +no doubt that his detractors--who complain that his style is mere +word-twisting, a mere inversion of the most ancient truisms--are +actuated by the very basest jealousy. Let us listen, then, and be duly +edified as he reads in a low, sweet voice, and the birds twitter about +him in the clear morning. + +"It has been for many years," Mr. Kennaston began, "the custom of +patriotic gentlemen in quest of office to point with pride to the fact +that the schoolmaster is abroad in the land, in whose defense they +stand pledged to draw their salaries and fight to the last gasp +for reelection. These lofty platitudes, while trying to the lungs, +doubtless appeal to a certain class of minds. But, indeed, the +schoolmaster is not abroad; he is domesticated in every village in +America, where each hamlet has its would-be Shakespeare, and each +would-be Shakespeare has his 'Hamlet' by heart. Learning is rampant in +the land, and valuable information is pasted up in the streetcars so +that he who rides may read. + +"And Ignorance--beautiful, divine Ignorance--is forsaken by a +generation that clamours for the truth. And what value, pray, has this +Truth that we should lust after it?" + +He glanced up, in an inquiring fashion. Mr. Jukesbury, meeting his +eye, smiled and shook his head and said "Fie, fie!" very placidly. + +To do him justice, he had not the least idea what Kennaston was +talking about. + +"I am aware," the poet continued, with an air of generosity, "that +many pleasant things have been said of it. In fact, our decade has +turned its back relentlessly upon the decayed, and we no longer read +the lament over the lost art of lying issued many magazines ago by +a once prominent British author. Still, without advancing any Wilde +theories, one may fairly claim that truth is a jewel--a jewel with +many facets, differing in appearance from each point of view. + +"And while 'Tell the truth and shame the Devil' is a very pretty +sentiment, it need not necessarily mean anything. The Devil, if there +be a personal devil--and it has been pointed out, with some show of +reason, that an impersonal one could scarcely carry out such enormous +contracts--would, in all probability, rather approve than otherwise of +indiscriminate truth-telling. Irritation is the root of all evil; and +there is nothing more irritating than to hear the truth about one's +self. It is bad enough, in all conscience, to be insulted, but the +truth of an insult is the barb that prevents its retraction. 'Truth +hurts' has all the pathos of understatement. It not only hurts, but +infuriates. It has no more right to go naked in public than any one +else. Indeed, it has less right; for truth-telling is natural to +mankind--as is shown by its prevalence among the younger sort, such as +children and cynics--and, as Shakespeare long ago forgot to tell us, a +touch of nature makes the whole world embarrassed." + +At this point Mrs. Haggage sniffed. She considered he was growing +improper. She distrusted Nature. + +"Truth-telling, then, may safely be regarded as an unamiable +indiscretion. In art, the bare truth must, in common gallantry, be +awarded a print petticoat or one of canvas, as the case may be, to +hide her nakedness; and in life, it is a disastrous virtue that we +have united to commend and avoid. Nor is the decision an unwise one; +for man is a gregarious animal, knowing that friendship is, at best, +but a feeble passion and therefore to be treated with the care due an +invalid. It is impossible to be quite candid in conversation with a +man; and with a woman it is absolutely necessary that your speech +should be candied. + +"Truth, then, is the least desirable of acquaintances. + +"But even if one wished to know the truth, the desire could scarcely +be fulfilled. Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam, a prominent lawyer of +Elizabeth's time, who would have written Shakespeare's plays had his +other occupations not prevented it, quotes Pilate as inquiring, 'What +is Truth?'--and then not staying for an answer. Pilate deserves all +the praise he has never received. Nothing is quite true. Even Truth +lies at the bottom of a well and not infrequently in other places. No +assertion is one whit truer than its opposite." + +A mild buzz of protest rose about him. Kennaston smiled and cocked his +head on one side. + +"We have, for example," he pointed out, "a large number of proverbs, +the small coin of conversation, received everywhere, whose value no +one disputes. They are rapped forth, like an oath, with an air of +settling the question once and forever. Well! there is safety in +quotations. But even the Devil can cite Shakespeare for his purpose. +'Never put off till to-morrow what you can do to-day' agrees ill with +'Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof'; and it is somewhat +difficult to reconcile 'Take care of the pence, and the pounds will +take care of themselves' with the equally familiar 'Penny-wise, +pound-foolish.' Yet the sayings are equally untrue; any maxim is, +perforce, a general statement, and therefore fallacious, and therefore +universally accepted. Art is long, and life is short, but the +platitudes concerning them are both insufferable and eternal. We must +remember that a general statement is merely a snap-shot at flying +truth, an instantaneous photograph of a moving body. It may be the way +that a thing is; but it is never the way in which any one ever saw +that thing, or ever will. This is, of course, a general statement. + +"As to present events, then, it may be assumed that no one is either +capable or desirous of speaking the truth; why, then, make such +a pother about it as to the past? There we have carried the +investigation of truth to such an extreme that nowadays very few of us +dare believe anything. Opinions are difficult to secure when a quarter +of an hour in the library will prove either side of any question. +Formerly, people had a few opinions, which, if erroneous, were at +least universal. Nero was not considered an immaculate man. The Flood +was currently believed to have caused the death of quite a number of +persons. And George Washington, it was widely stated, once cut down +a cherry-tree. But now all these comfortable illusions have been +destroyed by 'the least little men who spend their time and lose their +wits in chasing nimble and retiring truth, to the extreme perturbation +and drying up of the moistures.'" + +Kennaston looked up for a moment, and Billy Woods, who had counted +seven wrinkles and was dropping into a forlorn doze, started +violently. His interest then became abnormal. + +"There are," Mr. Kennaston complained, rather reproachfully, "too many +inquiries, doubts, investigations, discoveries, and apologies. There +are palliations of Tiberius, eulogies of Henry VIII., rehabilitations +of Aaron Burr. Lucretia Borgia, it appears, was a grievously +misunderstood woman, and Heliogabalus a most exemplary monarch; even +the dog in the manger may have been a nervous animal in search of +rest and quiet. As for Shakespeare, he was an atheist, a syndicate, a +lawyer's clerk, an inferior writer, a Puritan, a scholar, a _nom de +plume_, a doctor of medicine, a fool, a poacher, and another man of +the same name. Information of this sort crops up on every side. Even +the newspapers are infected; truth lurks in the patent-medicine +advertisements, and sometimes creeps stealthily into the very +editorials. We must all learn the true facts of history, whether we +will or no; eventually, the writers of historical romance will not +escape. + +"So the sad tale goes. Ignorance--beautiful, divine Ignorance--is +forsaken by a generation that clamours for the truth. The +earnest-minded person has plucked Zeus out of Heaven, and driven the +Maenad from the wood, and dragged Poseidon out of his deep-sea palace. +The conclaves of Olympus, it appears, are merely nature-myths; +the stately legends clustering about them turn out to be a rather +elaborate method of expressing the fact that it occasionally rains. +The heroes who endured their angers and jests and tragic loves are +delicately veiled allusions to the sun--surely, a very harmless topic +of conversation, even in Greece; and the monsters, 'Gorgons and Hydras +and Chimaeras dire,' their grisly offspring, their futile opponents, +are but personified frosts. Mythology--the poet's necessity, the +fertile mother of his inventions--has become a series of atmospheric +phenomena, and the labours of Hercules prove to be a dozen weather +bulletins. + +"Is it any cause for wonder, that under this cheerless influence our +poetry is either silent or unsold? The true poet must be ignorant, for +information is the thief of rhyme. And it is only in dealing with--" + +Kennaston paused. Margaret had appeared in the vestibule, and behind +her stood her father, looking very grave. + +"We have made a most interesting discovery," Miss Hugonin airily +announced to the world at large. "It appears that Uncle Fred left all +his property to Mr. Woods here. We found the will only last night. I'm +sure you'll all be interested to learn I'm a pauper now, and intend to +support myself by plain sewing. Any work of this nature you may +choose to favour me with, ladies and gentlemen, will receive my most +_earnest_ attention." + +She dropped a courtesy. The scene appealed to her taste for the +dramatic. + +Billy came toward her quickly. + +"Peggy," he demanded of her, in the semi-privacy of the vestibule, +"will you kindly elucidate the meaning of this da--this idiotic +foolishness?" + +"Why, this," she explained, easily, and exhibited a folded paper. "I +found it in the grate last night." + +He inspected it with large eyes. "That's absurd," he said, at length. +"You know perfectly well this will isn't worth the paper it's written +on." + +"My dear sir," she informed him, coldly, "you are vastly mistaken. You +see, I've burned the other one." She pushed by him. "Mr. Kennaston, +are you ready for our walk? We'll finish the paper some other time. +Wasn't it the strangest thing in the world--?" Her dear, deep, mellow +voice died away as she and Kennaston disappeared in the gardens. + +Billy gasped. + +But meanwhile, Colonel Hugonin had given the members of his daughter's +house-party some inkling as to the present posture of affairs. They +were gazing at Billy Woods rather curiously. He stood in the vestibule +of Selwoode, staring after Margaret Hugonin; but they stared at him, +and over his curly head, sculptured above the door-way, they saw the +Eagle--the symbol of the crude, incalculable power of wealth. + +Mr. Woods stood in the vestibule of his own house. + + + +XVII + +"By gad!" said Colonel Hugonin, very grimly, "anybody would think +you'd just lost a fortune instead of inheriting one! Wish you joy of +it, Billy. I ain't saying, you know, we shan't miss it, my daughter +and I--no, begad, for it's a nice pot of money, and we'll miss it +damnably. But since somebody had to have it, I'd much rather it was +you, my boy, than a set of infernal, hypocritical, philanthropic +sharks, and I'm damn' glad Frederick has done the square thing by +you--yes, begad!" + +The old gentleman was standing beside Mr. Woods in the vestibule of +Selwoode, some distance from the other members of the house-party, +and was speaking in confidence. He was sincere; I don't say that +the thought of facing the world at sixty-five with practically +no resources save his half-pay--I think I have told you that the +Colonel's diversions had drunk up his wife's fortune and his own like +a glass of water--I don't say that this thought moved him to hilarity. +Over it, indeed, he pulled a frankly grave face. + +But he cared a deal for Billy; and even now there was balm--soothing, +priceless balm--to be had of the reflection that this change in +his prospects affected materially the prospects of those cultured, +broad-minded, philanthropic persons who had aforetime set his daughter +to requiring of him a perusal of Herbert Spencer. + +Billy was pretty well aware how monetary matters stood with the old +wastrel; and the sincerity of the man affected him far more than the +most disinterested sentiments would have done. Mr. Woods accordingly +shook hands, with entirely unnecessary violence. + +"You're a trump, that's what you are!" he declared; "oh, yes, you are, +Colonel! You're an incorrigible, incurable old ace of trumps--the +very best there is in the pack--and it's entirely useless for you to +attempt to conceal it." + +"Gad----!" said the Colonel. + +"And don't you worry about that will," Mr. Woods advised. "I--I can't +explain things just now, but it's all right. You just wait--just wait +till I've seen Peggy," Billy urged, in desperation, "and I'll explain +everything." + +"By gad----!" said the Colonel. But Mr. Woods was half-way out of the +vestibule. + +Mr. Woods was in an unenviable state of perturbation. + +He could not quite believe that Peggy had destroyed the will; the +thing out-Heroded Herod, out-Margareted Margaret. But if she had, +it struck him as a high-handed proceeding, entailing certain +vague penalties made and provided by the law to cover just such +cases--penalties of whose nature he was entirely ignorant and didn't +care to think. Heavens! for all he knew, that angel might have let +herself in for a jail sentence. + +Billy pictured that queen among women! that paragon! with her glorious +hair cropped and her pink-tipped little hands set to beating hemp--he +had a shadowy notion that the lives of all female convicts were +devoted to this pursuit--and groaned in horror. + +"In the name of Heaven!" Mr. Woods demanded of his soul, "what +_possible_ reason could she have had for this new insanity? And in the +name of Heaven, why couldn't she have put off her _tete-a-tete_ with +Kennaston long enough to explain? And in the name of Heaven, what does +she see to admire in that putty-faced, grimacing ass, any way! And in +the name of Heaven, what am I to say to this poor, old man here? I +can't explain that his daughter isn't in any danger of being poor, but +merely of being locked up in jail! And in the name of Heaven, how +long does that outrageous angel expect me to remain in this state of +suspense!" + +Billy groaned again and paced the vestibule. Then he retraced his +steps, shook hands with Colonel Hugonin once more, and, Kennaston or +no Kennaston, set out to find her. + + + +XVIII + +But when he came out upon the terrace, Sarah Ellen Haggage stopped +him--stopped him with a queer blending of diffidence and resolve in +her manner. + +The others, by this, had disappeared in various directions, puzzled +and exceedingly uncertain what to do. Indeed, to congratulate Billy +in the Colonel's presence would have been tactless; and, on the other +hand, to condole with the Colonel without seeming to affront the +wealthy Mr. Woods was almost impossible. So they temporised and +fled--all save Mrs. Haggage. + +She, alone, remained to view Mr. Woods with newly opened eyes; for +as he paused impatiently--the sculptured Eagle above his head--she +perceived that he was a remarkably handsome and intelligent young man. +Her motherly heart opened toward this lonely, wealthy orphan. + +"My dear Billy," she cooed, with asthmatic gentleness, "as an old, +old friend of your mother's, aren't you going to let me tell you how +rejoiced Adele and I are over your good fortune? It isn't polite, you +naughty boy, for you to run away from your friends as soon as they've +heard this wonderful news. Ah, such news it was--such a manifest +intervention of Providence! My heart has been fluttering, fluttering +like a little bird, Billy, ever since I heard it." + +In testimony to this fact, Mrs. Haggage clasped a stodgy hand to an +exceedingly capacious bosom, and exhibited the whites of her eyes +freely. Her smile, however, remained unchanged and ample. + +"Er--ah--oh, yes! Very kind of you, I'm sure!" said Mr. Woods. + +"I never in my life saw Adele so deeply affected by _anything_," Mrs. +Haggage continued, with a certain large archness. "The sweet child +was always so fond of you, you know, Billy. Ah, I remember distinctly +hearing her speak of you many and many a time when you were in that +dear, delightful, wicked Paris, and wonder when you would come back +to your friends--not very grand and influential friends, Billy, but +sincere, I trust, for all that." + +Mr. Woods said he had no doubt of it. + +"So many people," she informed him, confidentially, "will pursue you +with adulation now that you are wealthy. Oh, yes, you will find that +wealth makes a great difference, Billy. But not with Adele and +me--no, dear boy, despise us if you will, but my child and I are not +mercenary. Money makes no difference with us; we shall be the same to +you that we always were--sincerely interested in your true welfare, +overjoyed at your present good fortune, prayerful as to your brilliant +future, and delighted to have you drop in any evening to dinner. We do +not consider money the chief blessing of life; no, don't tell me that +most people are different, Billy, for I know it very well, and many is +the tear that thought has cost me. We live in a very mercenary world, +my dear boy; but _our_ thoughts, at least, are set on higher things, +and I trust we can afford to despise the merely temporal blessings of +life, and I entreat you to remember that our humble dwelling is always +open to the son of my old, old friend, and that there is always a jug +of good whiskey in the cupboard." + +Thus in the shadow of the Eagle babbled the woman whom--for all her +absurdities--Margaret had loved as a mother. + +Billy thanked her with an angry heart. + +"And this"--I give you the gist of his meditations--"this is Peggy's +dearest friend! Oh, Philanthropy, are thy protestations, then, all +void and empty, and are thy noblest sentiments--every one of 'em--so +full of sound and rhetoric, so specious, so delectable--are these, +then, but dicers' oaths!" + +Aloud, "I'm rather surprised, you know," he said, slowly, "that you +take it just this way, Mrs. Haggage. I should have thought you'd have +been sorry on--on Miss Hugonin's account. It's awfully jolly of you, +of course--oh, awfully jolly, and I appreciate it at its true worth, I +assure you. But it's a bit awkward, isn't it, that the poor girl will +be practically penniless? I really don't know whom she'll turn to +now." + +Then Billy, the diplomatist, received a surprise. + +"She'll come with me, of course," said Mrs. Haggage. + +Mr. Woods made an--unfortunately--inaudible observation. + +"I beg your pardon?" she queried. Then, obtaining no response, she +continued, with perfect simplicity: "Margaret's quite like a daughter +to me, you know. Of course, she and the Colonel will come with us--at +least, until affairs are a bit more settled. Even afterward--well, we +have a large house, Billy, and I don't see that they'd be any better +off anywhere else." + +Billy's emotions were complex. + +"You big-hearted old parasite," his own heart was singing. "If you +could only keep that ring of truth that's in your voice for your +platform utterances--why, in less than no time you could afford to +feed your Afro-Americans on nightingales' tongues and clothe every +working-girl in the land in cloth of gold! You've been pilfering from +Peggy for years--pilfering right and left with both hands! But you've +loved her all the time, God bless you; and now the moment she's in +trouble you're ready to take both her and the Colonel--whom, by the +way, you must very cordially detest--and share your pitiful, pilfered +little crusts with 'em and--having two more mouths to feed--probably +pilfer a little more outrageously in the future! You're a +sanctimonious old hypocrite, you are, and a pious fraud, and a +delusion, and a snare, and you and Adele have nefarious designs on me +at this very moment, but I think I'd like to kiss you!" + +Indeed, I believe Mr. Woods came very near doing so. She loved Peggy, +you see; and he loved every one who loved her. + +But he compromised by shaking hands energetically, for a matter of +five minutes, and entreating to be allowed to subscribe to some of her +deserving charitable enterprises--any one she might mention--and so +left the old lady a little bewildered, but very much pleased. + +She decided that for the future Adele must not see so much of Mr. +Van Orden. She began to fear that gentleman's views of life were not +sufficiently serious. + + + +XIX + +Billy went into the gardens in pursuit of Margaret. He was almost +happy now and felt vaguely ashamed of himself. Then he came upon +Kathleen Saumarez, who, indeed, was waiting for him there; and his +heart went down into his boots. + +He realised on a sudden that he was one of the richest men in America. +It was a staggering thought. Also, Mr. Woods's views, at this moment, +as to the advantages of wealth, might have been interesting. + +Kathleen stood silent for an instant, eyes downcast, face flushed. She +was trembling. + +Then, "Billy," she asked, almost inaudibly, "do--do you still +want--your answer?" + +The birds sang about them. Spring triumphed in the gardens. She looked +very womanly and very pretty. + +To all appearances, it might easily have been a lover and his lass met +in the springtide, shamefaced after last night's kissing. But Billy, +somehow, lacked much of the elation and the perfect content and the +disposition to burst into melody that is currently supposed to seize +upon rustic swains at such moments. He merely wanted to know if at +any time in the remote future his heart would be likely to resume the +discharge of its proper functions. It was standing still now. + +However, "Can you ask--dear?" His words, at least, lied gallantly. + +The poor woman looked up into Billy's face. After years of battling +with the world, here for the asking was peace and luxury and wealth +incalculable, and--as Kathleen thought--a love that had endured since +they were boy and girl together. Yet she shrunk from him a little and +clinched her hands before she spoke. + +"Yes," Kathleen faltered, and afterward she shuddered. + +And here, if for the moment I may prefigure the Eagle as a sentient +being, I can imagine his chuckle. + +"Please God," thought poor Billy, "I will make her happy. Yes, please +God, I can at least do that, since she cares for me." + +Then he kissed her. + +"My dear," said he, aloud, "I'll try to make you happy. And--and you +don't mind, do you, if I leave you now?" queried this ardent lover. +"You see, it's absolutely necessary I should see--see Miss Hugonin +about this will business. You don't mind very much, do you--darling?" +Mr. Woods inquired of her, the last word being rather obviously an +afterthought. + +"No," said she. "Not if you must--dear." + +Billy went away, lugging a heart of lead in his breast. + +Kathleen stared after him and gave a hard, wringing motion of her +hands. She had done what many women do daily; the thing is common and +sensible and universally commended; but in her own eyes, the draggled +trollop of the pavements was neither better nor worse than she. + +At the entrance of the next walkway Billy encountered Felix +Kennaston--alone and in the most ebulliently mirthful of humours. + + + +XX + +But we had left Mr. Kennaston, I think, in company with Miss Hugonin, +at the precise moment she inquired of him whether it were not the +strangest thing in the world--referring thereby to the sudden manner +in which she had been disinherited. + +The poet laughed and assented. Afterward, turning north from the front +court, they descended past the shield-bearing griffins--and you may +depend upon it that each shield is adorned with a bas-relief of the +Eagle--that guard the broad stairway leading to the formal gardens +of Selwoode. The gardens stretch northward to the confines of Peter +Blagden's estate of Gridlington; and for my part--unless it were that +primitive garden that Adam lost--I can imagine no goodlier place. + +On this particular forenoon, however, neither Miss Hugonin nor Felix +Kennaston had eyes for its comeliness; silently they braved the +griffins, and in silence they skirted the fish-pond--silver-crinkling +in the May morning--and passed through cloistral ilex-shadowed walks, +and amphitheatres of green velvet, and terraces ample and mellow +in the sunlight, silently. The trees pelted them with blossoms; +pedestaled in leafy recesses, Satyrs grinned at them apishly, and the +arrows of divers pot-bellied Cupids threatened them, and Fauns piped +for them ditties of no tone; the birds were about shrill avocations +overhead, and everywhere the heatless, odourful air was a caress; but +for all this, Miss Hugonin and Mr. Kennaston were silent and very +fidgetty. + +Margaret was hatless--and the glory of the eminently sensible spring +sun appeared to centre in her hair--and violet-clad; and the gown, +like most of her gowns, was all tiny tucks and frills and flounces, +diapered with semi-transparencies--unsubstantial, foam-like, mere +violet froth. As she came starry-eyed through the gardens, the +impudent wind trifling with her hair, I protest she might have been +some lady of Oberon's court stolen out of Elfland to bedevil us poor +mortals, with only a moonbeam for the changeable heart of her, and +for raiment a violet shadow spirited from the under side of some big, +fleecy cloud. + +They came presently through a trim, yew-hedged walkway to a +summer-house covered with vines, into which Margaret peeped and +declined to enter, on the ground that it was entirely too chilly +and gloomy and _exactly_ like a mausoleum; but nearby they found a +semi-circular marble bench about which a group of elm-trees made a +pleasant shadow splashed at just the proper intervals with sunlight. + +On this Margaret seated herself; and then pensively moved to the other +end of the bench, because a slanting sunbeam fell there. Since it +was absolutely necessary to blast Mr. Kennaston's dearest hopes, +she thoughtfully endeavoured to distract his attention from his own +miseries--as far as might be possible--by showing him how exactly like +an aureole her hair was in the sunlight. Margaret always had a kind +heart. + +Kennaston stood before her, smiling a little. He was the sort of man +to appreciate the manoeuver. + +"My lady," he asked, very softly, "haven't you any good news for me on +this wonderful morning?" + +"Excellent news," Margaret assented, with a cheerfulness that was +not utterly free from trepidation. "I've decided not to marry you, +beautiful, and I trust you're properly grateful. You see, you're very +nice, of course, but I'm going to marry somebody else, and bigamy is +a crime, you know; and, anyhow, I'm only a pauper, and you'd never be +able to put up with my temper--now, beautiful, I'm quite sure you +couldn't, so there's not a bit of use in arguing it. Some day you'd +end by strangling me, which would be horribly disagreeable for me, and +then they'd hang you for it, you know, and that would be equally +disagreeable for you. Fancy, though, what a good advertisement it would +be for your poems!" + +[Illustration: "'My lady,' he asked, very softly, 'haven't you any +good news for me on this wonderful morning?'"] + +She was not looking at him now--oh, no, Margaret was far too busily +employed getting the will (which she had carried all this time) into +an absurd little silver chain-bag hanging at her waist. She had no +time to look at Felix Kennaston. There was such scant room in the bag; +her purse took up so much space there was scarcely any left for the +folded paper; the affair really required her closest, undivided +attention. Besides, she had not the least desire to look at Kennaston +just now. + +"Beautiful child," he pleaded, "look at me!" + +But she didn't. + +She felt that at that moment she could have looked at a gorgon, say, +or a cockatrice, or any other trifle of that nature with infinitely +greater composure. The pause that followed Margaret accordingly +devoted to a scrutiny of his shoes and sincere regret that their owner +was not a mercenary man who would be glad to be rid of her. + +"Beautiful child," spoke the poet's voice, sadly, "you aren't--surely, +you aren't saying this in mistaken kindness to me? Surely, you aren't +saying this because of what has happened in regard to your money +affairs? Believe me, my dear, that makes no difference to me. It +is you I love--you, the woman of my heart--and not a certain, and +doubtless desirable, amount of metal disks and dirty paper." + +"Now I suppose you're going to be very noble and very nasty about it," +observed Miss Hugonin, resentfully. "That's my main objection to +you, you know, that you haven't any faults I can recognise and feel +familiar and friendly with." + +"My dear," he protested, "I assure you I am not intentionally +disagreeable." + +At that, she raised velvet eyes to his--with a visible effort, +though--and smiled. + +"I know you far too well to think that," she said, wistfully. "I +know I'm not worthy of you. I'm tremendously fond of you, beautiful, +but--but, you see, I love somebody else," Margaret concluded, with +admirable candour. + +"Ah!" said he, in a rather curious voice. "The painter chap, eh?" + +Then Margaret's face flamed in a wonderful glow of shame and happiness +and pride that must have made the surrounding roses very hopelessly +jealous. A quaint mothering look, sacred, divine, Madonna-like, +woke in her great eyes as she thought--remorsefully--of +how unhappy Billy must be at that very moment and of how big he was +and of his general niceness; and she desired, very heartily, that this +fleshy young man would make his scene and have done with it. Who was +he, forsooth, to keep her from Billy? She wished she had never heard +of Felix Kennaston. + +_Souvent femme varie_, my brothers. + +However, "Yes," said Margaret.. + +"You are a dear," said Mr. Kennaston, with conviction in his voice. + +I dare say Margaret was surprised. + +But the poet had taken her hand and had kissed it reverently, and then +sat down beside her, twisting one foot under him in a fashion he had. +He was frankly grateful to her for refusing him; and, the mask of +affectation slipped, she saw in him another man. + +"I am an out-and-out fraud," he confessed, with the gayest of smiles. +"I am not in love with you, and I am inexpressibly glad that you are +not in love with me. Oh, Margaret, Margaret--you don't mind if I call +you that, do you? I shall have to, in any event, because I like you so +tremendously now that we are not going to be married--you have no idea +what a night I spent." + +"I consider it most peculiar and unsympathetic of my hair not to have +turned gray. I thought you were going to have me, you see." + +Margaret was far to much astonished to be angry. + +"But last night!" she presently echoed, in candid surprise. "Why, last +night you didn't know I was poor!" + +He wagged a protesting forefinger. "That made no earthly difference," +he assured her. "Of course, it was the money--and in some degree the +moon--that induced me to make love to you. I acted on the impulse of +the moment; just for an instant, the novelty of doing a perfectly +sensible thing--and marrying money is universally conceded to come +under that head--appealed to me. So I did it. But all the time I was +in love with Kathleen Saumarez. Why, the moment I left you, I began to +realise that not even you--and you are quite the most fascinating and +generally adorable woman I ever knew, Margaret--I began to realise, I +say, that not even you could ever make me forget that fact. And I +was very properly miserable. It is extremely queer," Mr. Kennaston +continued, after an interval of meditation, "but falling in love +appears to be the one utterly inexplicable, utterly reasonless thing +one ever does in one's life. You can usually think of some more or +less plausible palliation for embezzlement, say, or for robbing a +cathedral or even for committing suicide--but no man can ever explain +how he happened to fall in love. He simply did it." + +Margaret nodded sagely. She knew. + +"Now you," Mr. Kennaston was pleased to say, "are infinitely more +beautiful, younger, more clever, and in every way more attractive than +Kathleen. I recognise these things clearly, but it does not appear, +somehow, to alter the fact that I am in love with her. I think I have +been in love with her all my life. We were boy and girl together, +Margaret, and--and I give you my word," Kennaston cried, with his +boyish flush, "I worship her! I simply cannot explain the perfectly +unreasonable way in which I worship her!" + +He was sincere. He loved Kathleen Saumarez as much as he was capable +of loving any one--almost as much as he loved to dilate on his own +peculiarities and emotions. + +Margaret's gaze was intent upon him. "Yet," she marvelled, "you made +love to me very tropically." + +With unconcealed pride, Mr. Kennaston assented. "Didn't I?" he said. +"I was in rather good form last night, I thought." + +"And you were actually prepared to marry me?" she asked--"even after +you knew I was poor?" + +"I couldn't very well back out," he submitted, and then cocked +his head on one side. "You see," he added, whimsically, "I was +sufficiently a conceited ass to fancy you cared a little for me. So, +of course, I was going to marry you and try to make you happy. But how +dear--oh, how unutterably dear it was of you, Margaret, to decline +to be made happy in any such fashion!" And Mr. Kennaston paused to +chuckle and to regard her with genuine esteem and affection. + +But still her candid eyes weighed him, and transparently found him +wanting. + +"You are thinking, perhaps, what an unutterable cad I have been?" he +suggested. + +"Yes--you are rather by way of being a cad, beautiful. But I can't +help liking you, somehow. I dare say it's because you're honest +with me. Nobody--nobody," Miss Hugonin lamented, a forlorn little +quiver in her voice, "_ever_ seemed to be honest with me except you, +and now I know you weren't. Oh, beautiful, aren't I ever to have any +real friends?" she pleaded, wistfully. + +Kennaston had meant a deal to her, you see; he had been the one +man she trusted. She had gloried in his fustian rhetoric, his glib +artlessness, his airy scorn of money; and now all this proved mere +pinchbeck. On a sudden, too, there woke in some bycorner of her heart +a queasy realisation of how near she had come to loving Kennaston. The +thought nauseated her. + +"My dear," he answered, kindly, "you will have any number of friends +now that you are poor. It was merely your money that kept you from +having any. You see," Mr. Kennaston went on, with somewhat the air of +one climbing upon his favourite hobby, "money is the only thing +that counts nowadays. In America, the rich are necessarily our only +aristocracy. It is quite natural. One cannot hope for an aristocracy +of intellect, if only for the reason that not one person in a thousand +has any; and birth does not count for much. Of course, it is quite +true that all of our remote ancestors came over with William the +Conqueror--I have sometimes thought that the number of steerage +passengers his ships would accommodate must have been little short of +marvellous--but it is equally true that the grandfathers of most of +our leisure class were either deserving or dishonest persons--who +either started life on a farm, and studied Euclid by the firelight and +did all the other priggish things they thought would look well in a +biography, or else met with marked success in embezzlement. So money, +after all, is our only standard; and when a woman is as rich as you +were yesterday she cannot hope for friends any more than the Queen +of England can. You could have plenty of flatterers, toadies, +sycophants--anything, in fine, but friends." + +"I don't believe it," said Margaret, half angrily--"not a word of it. +There _must_ be some honest people in the world who don't consider +that money is everything. You know there must be, beautiful!" + +The poet laughed. "That," said he, affably, "is poppycock. You are +repeating the sort of thing I said to you yesterday. I am honest now. +The best of us, Margaret, cannot help being impressed by the power of +money. It is the greatest power in the world, and we cannot--cannot +possibly--look upon rich people as being quite like us. We must +toady to them a bit, Margaret, whether we want to or not. The Eagle +intimidates us all." + +"I _hate_ him!" Miss Hugonin announced, with vehemence. + +Kennaston searched his pockets. After a moment he produced a dollar +bill and showed her the Eagle on it. + +"There," he said, gravely, "is the original of the Woods Eagle--the +Eagle that intimidates us all. Do you remember what Shakespeare--one +always harks back to Shakespeare to clinch an argument, because not +even our foremost actors have been able to conceal the fact that he +was, as somebody in Dickens acutely points out, 'a dayvilish clever +fellow'--do you remember. I say, what Shakespeare observes as to this +very Eagle?" + +Miss Hugonin shook her little head till it glittered in the sunlight +like a topaz. She cared no more for Shakespeare than the average woman +does, and she was never quite comfortable when he was alluded to. + + "He says," Mr. Kennaston quoted, solemnly: + "The Eagle suffers little birds to sing, + And is not careful what they mean thereby, + Knowing that with the shadow of his wing + He can at pleasure still their melody." + +"That's nonsense," said Margaret, calmly. "I haven't the _least_ idea +what you're talking about, and I don't believe you have either." + +He waved the dollar bill with a heroical gesture. "Here," he asserted, +"is the Eagle. And by the little birds, I have not a doubt he meant +charity and independence and kindliness and truth and the rest of the +standard virtues. That is quite as plausible as the interpretation of +the average commentator. The presence of money chills these little +birds--ah, it is lamentable, no doubt, but it is true." + +"I don't believe it," said Margaret--quite as if that settled the +question. + +But now his hobby, rowelled by opposition, was spurred to loftier +flights. + +"Ah, the power of these great fortunes America has bred is monstrous," +he suddenly cried. "And always they work for evil. If I were ever to +write a melodrama, Margaret, I could wish for no more thorough-paced +villain than a large fortune." Kennaston paused and laughed grimly. +"We cringe to the Eagle!" said he. "Eh, well, why not? The Eagle is +very powerful and very cruel. In the South yonder, the Eagle has +penned over a million children in his factories, where day by day he +drains the youth and health and very life out of their tired bodies; +in sweat-shops, men and women are toiling for the Eagle, giving their +lives for the pittance that he grudges them; in countless mines and +mills, the Eagle is trading human lives for coal and flour; in +Wall Street yonder, the Eagle is juggling as he will with life's +necessities--thieving from the farmer, thieving from the consumer, +thieving from the poor fools who try to play the Eagle's game, and +driving them at will to despair and ruin and death: look whither you +may, men die that the Eagle may grow fat. So the Eagle thrives, and +daily the rich grow richer and the poor grow poorer, and the end----" +Kennaston paused, staring into vacancy. "Eh, well," said he, with a +smile and a snap of his fingers, "the end rests upon the knees of +the gods. But there must need be an end some day. And meanwhile, you +cannot blame us if we cringe to the Eagle that is master of the world. +It is human nature to cringe to its master; and while human nature +is not always an admirable thing, it is, I believe, rather widely +distributed." + +Margaret did not return the smile. Like any sensible woman, she never +tolerated opinions that differed from her own. + +So she waved his preachment aside. "You're trying to be eloquent," was +her observation, "and you've only succeeded in being very silly and +tiresome. Go away, beautiful. You make me awfully tired, and I don't +care for you in the least. Go and talk to Kathleen. I shall be +here--on this very spot," Margaret added, with commendable precision +and an unaccountable increase of colour, "if--if any one should happen +to ask." + +Then Kennaston rose and laughed merrily. + +"You are quite delicious," he commented. "It will always be a +grief and a puzzle to me that I am not mad for love of you. It is +unreasonable of me," he complained, sadly, and shook his head, "but I +prefer Kathleen. And I am quite certain that somebody will ask where +you are. I shall describe to him the exact spot--" + +Mr. Kennaston paused, with a slight air of apology. + +"If I were you," he suggested, pleasantly, "I would move a +little--just a little--to the left. That will enable you to obtain to +a fuller extent the benefit of the sunbeam which is falling--quite +by accident, of course--upon your hair. You are perfectly right, +Margaret, in selecting that hedge as a background. Its sombre green +sets you off to perfection." + +He went away chuckling. He felt that Margaret must think him a devil +of a fellow. + +She didn't, though. + +"The _idea_ of his suspecting me of such unconscionable vanity!" she +said, properly offended. Then, "Anyhow, a man has no business to know +about such things," she continued, with rising indignation. "I believe +Felix Kennaston is as good a judge of chiffons as any woman. That's +effeminate, I think, and catty and absurd. I don't believe I ever +liked him--not really, that is. Now, what would Billy care about +sunbeams and backgrounds, I'd like to know! He'd never even notice +them. Billy is a _man_. Why, that's just what father said yesterday!" +Margaret cried, and afterward laughed happily. "I suppose old people +are right sometimes--but, dear, dear, they're terribly unreasonable at +others!" + +Having thus uttered the ancient, undying plaint of youth, Miss Hugonin +moved a matter of two inches to the left, and smiled, and waited +contentedly. It was barely possible some one might come that way; and +it is always a comfort to know that one is not exactly repulsive in +appearance. + +Also, there was the spring about her; and, chief of all, there was a +queer fluttering in her heart that was yet not unpleasant. In fine, +she was unreasonably happy for no reason at all. + +I believe the foolish poets call this feeling love and swear it +is divine; however, they will say anything for the sake of an +ear-tickling jingle. And while it is true that scientists have any +number of plausible and interesting explanations for this same +feeling, I am sorry to say I have forgotten them. + +I am compelled, then, to fall back upon those same unreliable, +irresponsible rhymesters, and to insist with them that a maid waiting +in the springtide for the man she loves is necessarily happy and very +rarely puzzles her head over the scientific reason for it. + + + +XXI + +But ten minutes later she saw Mr. Woods in the distance striding +across the sunlit terraces, and was seized with a conviction that +their interview was likely to prove a stormy one. There was an ominous +stiffness in his gait. + +"Oh, dear, dear!" Miss Hugonin wailed; "he's in a temper now, and +he'll probably be just as disagreeable as it's possible for any one +to be. I do wish men weren't so unreasonable! He looks exactly like a +big, blue-eyed thunder-cloud just now--just now, when I'm sure he has +every cause in the _world_ to be very much pleased--after all +I've done for him. He makes me awfully tired. I think he's _very +ungrateful_. I--I think I'm rather afraid." + +In fact, she was. Now that the meeting she had anticipated these +twelve hours past was actually at hand, there woke in her breast an +unreasoning panic. Miss Hugonin considered, and caught up her skirts, +and whisked into the summer-house, and there sat down in the darkest +corner and devoutly wished Mr. Woods in Crim Tartary, or Jericho, or, +in a word, any region other than the gardens of Selwoode. + +Billy came presently to the opening in the hedge and stared at the +deserted bench. He was undeniably in a temper. But, then, how becoming +it was! thought someone. + +"Miss Hugonin!" he said, coldly. + +Evidently (thought someone) he intends to be just as nasty as +possible. + +"Peggy!" said Mr. Woods, after a little. + +Perhaps (thought someone) he won't be _very_ nasty. + +"Dear Peggy!" said Mr. Woods, in his most conciliatory tone. + +Someone rearranged her hair complacently. + +But there was no answer, save the irresponsible chattering of the +birds, and with a sigh Billy turned upon his heel. + +Then, by the oddest chance in the world, Margaret coughed. + +I dare say it was damp in the summer-house; or perhaps it was caused +by some passing bronchial irritation; or perhaps, incredible as it may +seem, she coughed to show him where she was. But I scarcely think so, +because Margaret insisted afterward--very positively, too--that she +didn't cough at all. + + + +XXII + +"Well!" Mr. Woods observed, lengthening the word somewhat. + +In the intimate half-light of the summer-house, he loomed prodigiously +big. He was gazing downward in careful consideration of three fat +tortoise-shell pins and a surprising quantity of gold hair, which was +practically all that he could see of Miss Hugonin's person; for that +young lady had suddenly become a limp mass of abashed violet ruffles, +and had discovered new and irresistible attractions in the mosaics +about her feet. + +Billy's arms were crossed on his breast and his right hand caressed +his chin meditatively. By and bye, "I wonder, now," he reflected, +aloud, "if you can give any reason--any possible reason--why you +shouldn't be locked up in the nearest sanatorium?" + +"You needn't be rude, you know," a voice observed from the +neighbourhood of the ruffles, "because there isn't anything you can do +about it." + +Mr. Woods ventured a series of inarticulate observations. "But why?" +he concluded, desperately. "But why, Peggy?--in Heaven's name, what's +the meaning of all this?" + +She looked up. Billy was aware of two large blue stars; his heart +leapt; and then he recalled a pair of gray-green eyes that had +regarded him in much the same fashion not long ago, and he groaned. + +"I was unfair to you last night," she said, and the ring of her odd, +deep voice, and the richness and sweetness of it, moved him to faint +longing, to a sick heart-hunger. It was tremulous, too, and very +tender. "Yes, I was unutterably unfair, Billy. You asked me to marry +you when you thought I was a beggar, and--and Uncle Fred _ought_ to +have left you the money. It was on account of me that he didn't, you +know. I really owed it to you. And after the way I talked to you--so +long as I had the money--I--and, anyhow, its very disagreeable and +eccentric and _horrid_ of you to object to being rich!" Margaret +concluded, somewhat incoherently. + +She had not thought it would be like this. He seemed so stern. + +But, "Isn't that exactly like her?" Mr. Woods was demanding of his +soul. "She thinks she has been unfair to me--to me, whom she doesn't +care a button for, mind you. So she hands over a fortune to make up +for it, simply because that's the first means that comes to hand! Now, +isn't that perfectly unreasonable, and fantastic, and magnificent, and +incredible?--in short, isn't that Peggy all over? Why, God bless her, +her heart's bigger than a barn-door! Oh, it's no wonder that fellow +Kennaston was grinning just now when he sent me to her! He can afford +to grin." + +Aloud, he stated, "You're an angel, Peggy that's what you are. I've +always suspected it, and I'm glad to know it now for a fact. But in +this prosaic world not even angels are allowed to burn up wills for +recreation. Why, bless my soul, child, you--why, there's no telling +what trouble you might have gotten into!" + +Miss Hugonin pouted. "You needn't be such a grandfather," she +suggested, helpfully. + +"But it's a serious business," he insisted. At this point Billy began +to object to her pouting as distracting one's mind from the subject +under discussion. "It--why, it's----" + +"It's what?" she pouted, even more rebelliously. + +"Crimson," said Mr. Woods, considering--"oh, the very deepest, +duskiest crimson such as you can't get in tubes. It's a colour was +never mixed on any palette. It's--eh? Oh, I beg your pardon." + +"I think you ought to," said Margaret, primly. Nevertheless, she had +brightened considerably. + +"Of course," Mr. Woods continued with a fine colour, "I can't take the +money. That's absurd." + +"Is it?" she queried, idly. "Now, I wonder how you're going to help +yourself?" + +"Simplest thing in the world," he assured her. "You see this match, +don't you, Peggy? Well, now you're going to give me that paper I see +in that bag-thing at your waist, and I'm going to burn it till it's +all nice, soft, feathery ashes that can't ever be probated. And then +the first will, which is practically the same as the last, will be +allowed to stand, and I'll tell your father all about the affair, +because he ought to know, and you'll have to settle with those +colleges. And in that way," Mr. Woods submitted, "Uncle Fred's last +wishes will be carried out just as he expressed them, and there +needn't be any trouble--none at all. So give me the will, Peggy?" + +It is curious what a trivial matter love makes of felony. + +Margaret's heart sank. + +However, "Yes?" said she, encouragingly; "and what do you intend doing +afterward?--" + +"I--I shall probably live abroad," said Billy. "Cheaper, you know." + +[Illustration: "Miss Hugonin pouted. 'You needn't be such a +grandfather,' she suggested, helpfully"] + +And here (he thought) was an excellent, an undreamed-of opportunity to +inform her of his engagement. He had much better tell her now and have +done. Mr. Woods opened his mouth and looked at Margaret, and closed +it. Again she was pouting in a fashion that distracted one's mind. + +"That would be most unattractive," said Miss Hugonin, calmly. "You're +very stupid, Billy, to think of living abroad. Billy, I think you're +almost as stupid as I am. I've been very stupid, Billy. I thought I +liked Mr. Kennaston. I don't, Billy--not that way. I've just told him +so. I'm not--I'm not engaged to anybody now, Billy. But wasn't it +stupid of me to make such a mistake, Billy?" + +That was a very interesting mosaic there in the summer-house. + +"I don't understand," said Mr. Woods. His voice shook, and his hands +lifted a little toward her and trembled. + +Poor Billy dared not understand. Her eyes downcast, her foot tapping +the floor gently, Margaret was all one blush. She, too, was trembling +a little, and she was a little afraid and quite unutterably happy; and +outwardly she was very much the tiny lady of Oberon's court, very much +the coquette quintessentialised. + +It is pitiable that our proud Margaret should come to such a pass. Ah, +the men that you have flouted and scorned and bedeviled and mocked at, +Margaret--could they see you now, I think the basest of them could +not but pity and worship you. This man is bound in honour to another +woman; yet a little, and his lips will open--very dry, parched lips +they are now--and he will tell you, and your pride will drive you mad, +and your heart come near to breaking. + +"Don't you understand--oh, you silly Billy!" She was peeping at him +meltingly from under her lashes. + +"I--I'm imagining vain things," said Mr. Woods. "I--oh, Peggy, Peggy, +I think I must be going mad!" + +He stared hungrily at the pink, startled face that lifted toward his. +Ah, no, no, it could not be possible, this thing he had imagined for a +moment. He had misunderstood. + +And now just for a little (thought poor Billy) let my eyes drink in +those dear felicities of colour and curve, and meet just for a little +the splendour of those eyes that have the April in them, and rest just +for a little upon that sanguine, close-grained, petulant mouth; and +then I will tell her, and then I think that I must die. + +"Peggy----" he began, in a flattish voice. + +"They have evidently gone," said the voice of Mr. Kennaston; "yes, +those beautiful, happy young people have foolishly deserted the very +prettiest spot in the gardens. Let us sit here, Kathleen." + +"But I'm not an eavesdropper," Mr. Woods protested, half angrily. + +I fear Margaret was not properly impressed. + +"Please, Billy," she pleaded, in a shrill whisper, "please let's +listen. He's going to propose to her now, and you've no idea how +funny he is when he proposes. Oh, don't be so pokey, Billy--do let's +listen!" + +But Mr. Woods had risen with a strange celerity and was about to leave +the summer-house. + +Margaret pouted. Mrs. Saumarez and Mr. Kennaston were seated not +twenty feet from the summer-house, on the bench which Miss Hugonin had +just left. And when that unprincipled young woman finally rose to her +feet, it must be confessed that it was with a toss of the head and +with the reflection that while to listen wasn't honourable, it would +at least be very amusing. I grieve to admit it, but with Billy's +scruples she hadn't the slightest sympathy. + +Then Kennaston cried, suddenly: "Why, you're mad, Kathleen! Woods +wants to marry _you!_ Why, he's heels over head in love with Miss +Hugonin!" + +Miss Hugonin turned to Mr. Woods with a little intake of the breath. + +No, I shall not attempt to tell you what Billy saw in her countenance. +Timanthes-like, I drape before it the vines of the summer-house. For +a brief space I think we had best betake ourselves outside, +leaving Margaret in a very pitiable state of anger, and shame, and +humiliation, and heartbreak--leaving poor Billy with a heart that +ached, seeing the horror of him in her face. + + + +XXIII + +Mrs. Saumarez laughed bitterly. + +"No," she said, "Billy cared for me, you know, a long time ago. And +this morning he told me he still cared. Billy doesn't pretend to be +a clever man, you see, and so he can afford to practice some of the +brute virtues, such as constancy and fidelity." + +There was a challenging flame in her eyes, but Kennaston let the stab +pass unnoticed. To do him justice, he was thinking less of himself, +just now, than of how this news would affect Margaret; and his face +was very grave and strangely tender, for in his own fashion he loved +Margaret. + +"It's nasty, very nasty," he said, at length, in a voice that was +puzzled. "Yet I could have sworn yesterday----" Kennaston paused and +laughed lightly. "She was an heiress yesterday, and to-day she is +nobody. And Mr. Woods, being wealthy, can afford to gratify the +virtues you commend so highly and, with a fidelity that is most +edifying, return again to his old love. And she welcomes him--and the +Woods millions--with open arms. It is quite affecting, is it not, +Kathleen?" + +"You needn't be disagreeable," she observed. + +"My dear Kathleen, I assure you I am not angry. I am merely a little +sorry for human nature. I could have sworn Woods was honest. But +rogues all, rogues all, Kathleen! Money rules us in the end; and now +the parable is fulfilled, and Love the prodigal returns to make merry +over the calf of gold. Confess," Mr. Kennaston queried, with a smile, +"is it not strange an all-wise Creator should have been at pains to +fashion this brave world about us for little men and women such as +we to lie and pilfer in? Was it worth while, think you, to arch the +firmament above our rogueries, and light the ageless stars as candles +to display our antics? Let us be frank, Kathleen, and confess that +life is but a trivial farce ignobly played in a very stately temple." +And Mr. Kennaston laughed again. + +"Let us be frank!" Kathleen cried, with a little catch in her voice. +"Why, it isn't in you to be frank, Felix Kennaston! Your life is +nothing but a succession of poses--shallow, foolish poses meant +to hoodwink the world and at times yourself. For you do hoodwink +yourself, don't you, Felix?" she asked, eagerly, and gave him no time +to answer. She feared, you see, lest his answer might dilapidate the +one fortress she had been able to build about his honour. + +"And now," she went on, quickly, "you're trying to make me think you a +devil of a fellow, aren't you? And you're hinting that I've accepted +Billy because of his money, aren't you? Well, it is true that I +wouldn't marry him if he were poor. But he's very far from being poor. +And he cares for me. And I am fond of him. And so I shall marry him +and make him as good a wife as I can. So there!" + +Mrs. Saumarez faced him with an uneasy defiance. He was smiling oddly. + +"I have heard it rumoured in many foolish tales and jingling verses," +said Kennaston, after a little, "that a thing called love exists in +the world. And I have also heard, Kathleen, that it sometimes enters +into the question of marriage. It appears that I was misinformed." + +"No," she answered, slowly, "there is a thing called love. I think +women are none the better for knowing it. To a woman, it means to take +some man--some utterly commonplace man, perhaps--perhaps, only an idle +_poseur_ such as you are, Felix--and to set him up on a pedestal, and +to bow down and worship him; and to protest loudly, both to the world +and to herself, that in spite of all appearances her idol really +hasn't feet of clay, or that, at any rate, it is the very nicest clay +in the world. For a time she deceives herself, Felix. Then the idol +topples from the pedestal and is broken, and she sees that it is all +clay, Felix--clay through and through--and her heart breaks with it." + +Kennaston bowed his head. "It is true," said he; "that is the love of +women." + +"To a man," she went on, dully, "it means to take some woman--the +nearest woman who isn't actually deformed--and to make pretty speeches +to her and to make her love him. And after a while--" Kathleen +shrugged her shoulders drearily. "Why, after a while," said she, "he +grows tired and looks for some other woman." + +"It is true," said Kennaston--"yes, very true that some men love in +that fashion." + +There ensued a silence. It was a long silence, and under the tension +of it Kathleen's composure snapped like a cord that has been stretched +to the breaking point. + +"Yes, yes, yes!" she cried, suddenly; "that is how I have loved you +and that is how you've loved me, Felix Kennaston! Ah, Billy told me +what happened last night! And that--that was why I--" Mrs. Saumarez +paused and regarded him curiously. "You don't make a very noble +figure, just now, do you?" she asked, with careful deliberation. "You +were ready to sell yourself for Miss Hugonin's money, weren't you? And +now you must take her without the money. Poor Felix! Ah, you poor, +petty liar, who've over-reached yourself so utterly!" And again +Kathleen began to laugh, but somewhat shrilly, somewhat hysterically. + +"You are wrong," he said, with a flush. "It is true that I asked Miss +Hugonin to marry me. But she--very wisely, I dare say--declined." + +"Ah!" Kathleen said, slowly. Then--and it will not do to inquire too +closely into her logic--she spoke with considerable sharpness: "She's +a conceited little cat! I never in all my life knew a girl to be quite +so conceited as she is. Positively, I don't believe she thinks there's +a man breathing who's good enough for her!" + +Kennaston grinned. "Oh, Kathleen, Kathleen!" he said; "you are simply +delicious." + +And Mrs. Saumarez coloured prettily and tried to look severe and +could not, for the simple reason that, while she knew Kennaston to be +flippant and weak and unstable as water and generally worthless, yet +for some occult cause she loved him as tenderly as though he had been +a paragon of all the manly virtues. And I dare say that for many of us +it is by a very kindly provision of Nature that all women are created +capable of doing this illogical thing and that most of them do it +daily. + +"It is true," the poet said, at length, "that I have played no heroic +part. And I don't question, Kathleen, that I am all you think me. Yet, +such as I am, I love you. And such as I am, you love me, and it is I +that you are going to marry, and not that Woods person." + +"He's worth ten of you!" she cried, scornfully. + +"Twenty of me, perhaps," Mr. Kennaston assented, "but that isn't the +question. You don't love him, Kathleen. You are about to marry him for +his money. You are about to do what I thought to do yesterday. But you +won't, Kathleen. You know that I need you, my dear, and--unreasonably +enough, God knows--you love me." + +Mrs. Saumarez regarded him intently for a considerable space, and +during that space the Eagle warred in her heart with the one foe +he can never conquer. Love had a worthless ally; but Love fought +staunchly. + +By and bye, "Yes," she said, and her voice was almost sullen; "I love +you. I ought to love Billy, but I don't. I shall ask him to release me +from my engagement. And yes, I will marry you if you like." + +He raised her hand to his lips. "You are an angel," Mr. Kennaston was +pleased to say. + +"No," Mrs. Saumarez dissented, rather forlornly; "I'm simply a fool. +Otherwise, I wouldn't be about to marry you, knowing you as I do for +what you are--knowing that I haven't one chance in a hundred of any +happiness." + +"My dear," he said, and his voice was earnest, "you know at least that +what there is of good in me is at its best with you." + +"Yes, yes!" Kathleen cried, quickly. "That is so, isn't it, Felix? +And you do care for me, don't you? Felix, are you sure you care for +me--quite sure? And are you quite certain, Felix, that you never cared +so much for any one else?" + +Mr. Kennaston was quite certain. He proceeded to explain his feelings +toward her at some length. + +Kathleen listened with downcast eyes and almost cheated herself into +the belief that the man she loved was all that he should be. But at +the bottom of her heart she knew he wasn't. + +I think we may fairly pity her. + +Kennaston and Mrs. Saumarez chatted very amicably for some ten +minutes. At the end of that period, the twelve forty-five express +bellowing faintly in the distance recalled the fact that the morning +mail was in, and thereupon, in the very best of humours, they set +out for the house. I grieve to admit it, but Kathleen had utterly +forgotten Billy by this, and was no more thinking of him than she was +of the Man in the Iron Mask. + +She was with Kennaston, you see; and her thoughts, and glances, and +lips, and adoration were all given to his pleasuring, just as her life +would have been if its loss could have saved him from a toothache. He +strutted a little, and was a little grateful to her, and--to do +him justice--received the tribute she accorded him with perfect +satisfaction and equanimity. + + + +XXIV + +Margaret came out of the summer-house, Billy Woods followed her, in a +very moist state of perturbation. + +"Peggy----" said Mr. Woods. + +But Miss Hugonin was laughing. Clear as a bird-call, she poured forth +her rippling mimicry of mirth. They train women well in these matters. +To Margaret, just now, her heart seemed dead within her. Her lover was +proved unworthy. Her pride was shattered. She had loved this clumsy +liar yonder, had given up a fortune for him, dared all for him, had +(as the phrase runs) flung herself at his head. The shame of it was a +physical sickness, a nausea. But now, in this jumble of miseries, in +this breaking-up of the earth and the void heavens that surged about +her and would not be mastered, the girl laughed; and her laughter was +care-free and half-languid like that of a child who is thinking of +something else. Ah, yes, they train women well in these matters. + +At length Margaret said, in high, crisp accents: "Pardon me, but I +can't help being amused, Mr. Woods, by the way in which hard luck +dogs your footsteps. I think Fate must have some grudge against you, +Mr. Woods." + +"Peggy----" said Mr. Woods. + +"Pardon me," she interrupted him, her masculine little chin high in +the air, "but I wish you wouldn't call me that. It was well enough +when we were boy and girl together, Mr. Woods. But you've developed +since--ah, yes, you've developed into such a splendid actor, such a +consummate liar, such a clever scoundrel, Mr. Woods, that I scarcely +recognise you now." + +And there was not a spark of anger in the very darkest corner of +Billy's big, brave heart, but only pity--pity all through and through, +that sent little icy ticklings up and down his spine and turned his +breathing to great sobs. For she had turned full face to him and he +could see the look in her eyes. + +I think he has never forgotten it. Years after the memory of it would +come upon him suddenly and set hot drenching waves of shame and +remorse surging about his body--remorse unutterable that he ever hurt +his Peggy so deeply. For they were tragic eyes. Beneath them her +twitching mouth smiled bravely, but the mirth of her eyes was +monstrous. It was the mirth of a beaten woman, of a woman who has +known the last extreme of shame and misery and has learned to laugh at +it. Even now Billy Woods cannot quite forget. + +"Peggy," said he, brokenly, "ah, dear, dear Peggy, listen to me!" + +"Why, have you thought of a plausible lie so soon?" she queried, +sweetly. "Dear me, Mr. Woods, what is the use of explaining things? It +is very simple. You wanted to marry me last night because I was rich. +And when I declined the honour, you went back to your old love. Oh, +it's very simple, Mr. Woods! It's a pity, though--isn't it?--that all +your promptness went for nothing. Why, dear me, you actually managed +to propose before breakfast, didn't you? I should have thought that +such eagerness would have made an impression on Kathleen--oh, a most +favourable impression. Too bad it hasn't!" + +"Listen!" said Billy. "Ah, you're forcing me to talk like a cad, +Peggy, but I can't see you suffer--I can't! Kathleen misunderstood +what I said to her. I--I didn't mean to propose to her, Peggy. It was +a mistake, I tell you. It's you I love--just you. And when I asked you +to marry me last night--why, I thought the money was mine, Peggy. +I'd never have asked you if I hadn't thought that. I--ah, you don't +believe me, you don't believe me, Peggy, and before God, I'm telling +you the simple truth! Why, I hadn't ever seen that last will, Peggy! +It was locked up in that centre place in the desk, you remember. +Why--why, you yourself had the keys to it, Peggy. Surely, you +remember, dear?" And Billy's voice shook and skipped whole octaves as +he pleaded with her, for he knew she did not believe him and he could +not endure the horror of her eyes. + +But Margaret shook her head; and as aforetime the twitching lips +continued to laugh beneath those tragic eyes. Ah, poor little lady of +Elfland! poor little Undine, with a soul wakened to suffering! + +"Clumsy, very clumsy!" she rebuked him. "I see that you are accustomed +to prepare your lies in advance, Mr. Woods. As an extemporaneous liar +you are very clumsy. Men don't propose by mistake except in farces. +And while we are speaking of farces, don't you think it time to drop +that one of your not knowing about that last will?" + +"The farce!" Billy stammered. "You--why, you saw me when I found it!" + +"Ah, yes, I saw you when you pretended to find it. I saw you when you +pretended to unlock that centre place. But now, of course, I know it +never was locked. I'm very careless about locking things, Mr. Woods. +Ah, yes, that gave you a beautiful opportunity, didn't it? So, when +you were rummaging through my desk--without my permission, by the way, +but that's a detail--you found both wills and concocted your little +comedy? That was very clever. Oh, you think you're awfully smooth, +don't you, Billy Woods? But if you had been a bit more daring, don't +you see, you could have suppressed the last one and taken the money +without being encumbered by me? That was rather clumsy of you, wasn't +it?" Suave, gentle, sweet as honey was the speech of Margaret as she +lifted her face to his, but her eyes were tragedies. + +"Ah!" said Billy. "Ah--yes--you think--that." He was very careful in +articulating his words, was Billy, and afterward he nodded his head +gravely. The universe had somehow suffered an airy dissolution like +that of Prospero's masque--Selwoode and its gardens, the great globe +itself, "the cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, the solemn +temples" were all as vanished wraiths. There was only Peggy left-- +Peggy with that unimaginable misery in her eyes that he must drive +away somehow. If that was what she thought, there was no way for him +to prove it wasn't so. + +"Why, dear me, Mr. Woods," she retorted, carelessly, "what else could +I think?" + +Here Mr. Woods blundered. + +"Ah, think what you will, Peggy!" he cried, his big voice cracking and +sobbing and resonant with pain. "Ah, my dear, think what you will, but +don't grieve for it, Peggy! Why, if I'm all you say I am, that's no +reason you should suffer for it! Ah, don't, Peggy! In God's name, +don't! I can't bear it, dear," he pleaded with her, helplessly. + +Billy was suffering, too. But her sorrow was the chief of his, and +what stung him now to impotent anger was that she must suffer and he +be unable to help her--for, ah, how willingly, how gladly, he would +have borne all poor Peggy's woes upon his own broad shoulders. + +But none the less, he had lost an invaluable opportunity to hold his +tongue. + +"Suffer! I suffer!" she mocked him, languidly; and then, like a +banjo-string, the tension snapped, and she gave a long, angry gasp, +and her wrath flamed. + +"Upon my word, you're the most conceited man I ever knew in my life! +You think I'm in love with you! With you! Billy Woods, I wouldn't wipe +my feet on you if you were the last man left on earth! I hate you, I +loathe you, I detest you, I despise you! Do you hear me?--I hate you. +What do I care if you _are_ a snob, and a cad, and a fortune-hunter, +and a forger, and--well, I don't care! Perhaps you haven't ever +forged anything yet, but I'm quite sure you would if you ever got an +opportunity. You'd be delighted to do it. Yes, you would--you're just +the sort of man who _revels_ in crime. I love you! Why, that's the +best joke I've heard for a long time. I'm only sorry for you, Billy +Woods--_sorry_ because Kathleen has thrown you over--sorry, do you +understand? Yes, since you're so fond of skinny women, I think it's a +great pity she wouldn't have you. Don't talk to me!--she _is_ skinny. +I guess I know. She's as skinny as a beanpole. She's skinnier than I +ever imagined it possible for anybody--_anybody_--to be. And she +pads and rouges till I think it's disgusting, and not half--not +_one-half_--of her hair belongs to her, and that half is dyed. But, +of course, if you like that sort of thing, there's no accounting for +tastes, and I'm sure I'm very sorry for you, even though personally I +_don't_ care for skinny women. I hate 'em! And I hate you, too, Billy +Woods!" + +She stamped her foot, did Margaret. You must bear with her, for her +heart is breaking now, and if she has become a termagant it is because +her shamed pride has driven her mad. Bear with her, then, a little +longer. + +Billy tried to bear with her, for in part he understood. + +"Peggy," said he, very gently, "you're wrong." + +"Yes, I dare say!" she snapped at him. + +"We won't discuss Kathleen, if you please. But you're wrong about the +will. I've told you the whole truth about that, but I don't blame you +for not believing me, Peggy--ah, no, not I. There seems to be a curse +upon Uncle Fred's money. It brings out the worst of all of us. It has +changed even you, Peggy--and not for the better, Peggy. You've become +distrustful. You--ah, well, we won't discuss that now. Give me the +will, my dear, and I'll burn it before your eyes. That ought to show +you, Peggy, that you're wrong." Billy was very white-lipped as he +ended, for the Woods temper is a short one. + +But she had an arrow left for him. "Give it to you! And do you think +I'd trust you with it, Billy Woods?" + +"Peggy!--ah, Peggy, I hadn't deserved that. Be just, at least, to me," +poor Billy begged of her. + +Which was an absurd thing to ask of an angry woman. + +"Yes, I _do_ know what you'd do with it! You'd take it right off and +have it probated or executed or whatever it is they do to wills, and +turn me straight out in the gutter. That's just what you're _longing_ +to do this very moment. Oh, I know, Billy Woods--I know what a temper +you've got, and I know you're keeping quiet now simply because you +know that's the most exasperating thing you can possibly do. I +wouldn't have such a disposition as you've got for the world. You've +absolutely _no_ control over your temper--not a bit of it. You're +_vile_, Billy Woods! Oh, I _hate_ you! Yes, you've made me cry, and I +suppose you're very proud of yourself. _Aren't_ you proud? Don't stand +staring at me like a stuck pig, but answer me when I talk to you! +Aren't you _proud_ of making me cry? Aren't you? Ah, don't talk to +me--don't talk to _me_, I tell you! I don't wish to hear a word you've +got to say. I _hate_ you. And you shan't have the money, that's flat." + +"I don't want it," said Billy. "I've been trying to tell you for the +last, half-hour I don't want it. In God's name, why can't you talk +like a sensible woman, Peggy?" I am afraid that Mr. Woods, too, was +beginning to lose his temper. + +"That's right--swear at me! It only needed that. You do want the +money, and when you say you don't you're lying--lying--_lying_, do you +understand? You all want my money. Oh, dear, _dear!_" Margaret wailed, +and her great voice was shaken to its depths and its sobbing was the +long, hopeless sobbing of a violin, as she flung back her tear-stained +face, and clenched her little hands tight at her sides; "why _can't_ +you let me alone? You're all after my money--you, and Mr. Kennaston, +and Mr. Jukesbury, and all of you! Why _can't_ you let me alone? Ever +since I've had it you've hunted me as if I'd been a wild beast. God +help me, I haven't had a moment's peace, a moment's rest, a, moment's +quiet, since Uncle Fred died. They all want my money--everybody wants +my money! Oh, Billy, Billy, why _can't_ they let me alone?" + +"Peggy----" said he. + +But she interrupted him. "Don't talk to _me_, Billy Woods! Don't you +_dare_ talk to me. I told you I didn't wish to hear a word you had to +say, didn't I? Yes, you all want my money. And you shan't have it. +It's mine. Uncle Fred left it to me. It's mine, I tell you. I've got +the greatest thing in the world--money! And I'll keep it. Ah, I hate +you all--every one of you--but I'll make you cringe to me. I'll make +you _all_ cringe, do you hear, because I've got the money you're ready +to sell your paltry souls for! Oh, I'll make you cringe most of all, +Billy Woods! I'm rich, do you hear?--rich--_rich_! Wouldn't you be +glad to marry the rich Margaret Hugonin, Billy? Ah, haven't you +schemed hard for that? You'd be glad to do it, wouldn't you? You'd +give your dirty little soul for that, wouldn't you, Billy? Ah, what a +cur you are! Well, some day perhaps I'll buy you just as I would any +other cur. Wouldn't you be glad if I did, Billy? Beg for it, Billy! +Beg, sir! Beg!" And Margaret flung back her head again, and laughed +shrilly, and held up her hand before him as one holds a lump of sugar +before a pug-dog. + +In Selwoode I can fancy how the Eagle screamed his triumph. + +But Billy's face was ashen. + +"Before God!" he said, between his teeth, "loving you as I do, I +wouldn't marry you now for all the wealth in the world! The money has +ruined you--ruined you, Peggy." + +For a little she stared at him. By and bye, "I dare say it has," she +said, in a strangely sober tone. "I've been scolding like a fishwife. +I beg your pardon, Mr. Woods--not for what I've said, because I meant +every _word_ of it, but I beg your pardon for saying it. Don't come +with me, please." + +Blindly she turned from him. Her shoulders had the droop of an old +woman's. Margaret was wearied now, weary with the weariness of death. + +For a while Mr. Woods stared after the tired little figure that +trudged straight onward in the sunlight, stumbling as she went. Then a +pleached walk swallowed her, and Mr. Woods groaned. + +"Oh, Peggy, Peggy!" he said, in bottomless compassion; "oh, my poor +little Peggy! How changed you are!" + +Afterward Mr. Woods sank down upon the bench and buried his face in +his hands. He sat there for a long time. I don't believe he thought +of anything very clearly. His mind was a turgid chaos of misery; and +about him the birds shrilled and quavered and carolled till the air +was vibrant with their trilling. One might have thought they choired +in honour of the Eagle's triumph, in mockery of poor Billy. + +Then Mr. Woods raised his head with a queer, alert look. Surely he had +heard a voice--the dearest of all voices. + +"Billy!" it wailed; "oh, Billy, _Billy_!" + + + +XXV + +For at the height of this particularly mischancy posture of affairs +the meddlesome Fates had elected to dispatch Cock-eye Flinks to serve +as our _deus ex machina_. And just as in the comedy the police turn +up in the nick of time to fetch Tartuffe to prison, or in the tragedy +Friar John manages to be detained on his journey to Mantua and thus +bring about that lamentable business in the tomb of the Capulets, so +Mr. Flinks now happens inopportunely to arrive upon our lesser stage. + +Faithfully to narrate how Cock-eye Flinks chanced to be at Selwoode +were a task of magnitude. That gentleman travelled very quietly; and +for the most part, he journeyed incognito under a variety of aliases +suggested partly by a fertile imagination and in part by prudential +motives. For his notions of proprietary rights were deplorably vague, +and his acquaintance with the police, in consequence, extensive. And +finally, that he was now at Selwoode was not in the least his fault, +but all the doing of an N. & O. brakesman, who had in uncultured +argument, reinforced by a coupling-pin, persuaded Mr. Flinks to +disembark from the northern freight on the night previous. + +Mr. Flinks, then, sat leaning against a tree in the gardens of +Selwoode, some thirty feet from the wall that stands between Selwoode +and Gridlington, and nursed his pride and foot, both injured in that +high debate of last evening, and with a jackknife rounded off the top +of a substantial staff designed to alleviate his present lameness. +Meanwhile, he tempered his solitude with music, whistling melodiously +the air of a song that pertained to the sacredness of home and of a +white-haired mother. + +Subsequently to Cock-eye Flinks (as the playbill has it), enter a +vision in violet ruffles. + +Wide-eyed, she came upon him in her misery, steadily trudging toward +an unknown goal. I think he startled her a bit. Indeed, it must be +admitted that Mr. Flinks, while a man of undoubted talent in his +particular line of business, was, like many of your great geniuses, in +outward aspect unprepossessing and misleading; for whereas he looked +like a very shiftless and very dirty tramp, he was as a matter of fact +as vile a rascal as ever pawned a swinish soul for whiskey. + +"What are you doing here?" said Margaret, sharply. "Don't you know +this is private property?" + +To his feet rose Cock-eye Flinks. "Lady," said he, with humbleness, +"you wouldn't be hard on a poor workingman, would you? It ain't my +fault I'm here, lady--at least, it ain't rightly my fault. I just +climbed over the wall to rest a minute--just a minute, lady, in the +shade of these beautiful trees. I ain't a-hurting nobody by that, +lady, I hope." + +"Well, you had no business to do it," Miss Hugonin pointed out, "and +you can just climb right back." Then she regarded him more intently, +and her face softened somewhat. "What's the matter with your foot?" +she demanded. + +"Brakesman," said Mr. Flinks, briefly. "Threw me off a train. He +struck me cruel hard, he did, and me a poor workingman trying to make +my way to New York, lady, where my poor old mother's dying, lady, and +me out of a job. Ah, it's a hard, hard world, lady--and me her only +son--and he struck me cruel, cruel hard, he did, but I forgive him for +it, lady. Ah, lady, you're so beautiful I know you're got a kind, good +heart, lady. Can't you do something for a poor workingman, lady, with +a poor dying mother--and a poor, sick wife," Mr. Flinks added as a +dolorous afterthought; and drew nearer to her and held out one hand +appealingly. + +Petheridge Jukesbury had at divers times pointed out to her the evils +of promiscuous charity, and these dicta Margaret parroted glibly +enough, to do her justice, so long as there was no immediate question +of dispensing alms. But for all that the next whining beggar would +move her tender heart, his glib inventions playing upon it like a +fiddle, and she would give as recklessly as though there were no +such things in the whole wide world as soup-kitchens and organised +charities and common-sense. "Because, you know," she would afterward +salve her conscience, "I _couldn't_ be sure he didn't need it, whereas +I was _quite_ sure I didn't." + +Now she wavered for a moment. "You didn't say you had a wife before," +she suggested. + +"An invalid," sighed Mr. Flinks--"a helpless invalid, lady. And six +small children probably crying for bread at this very moment. Ah, +lady, think what my feelings must be to hear 'em cry in vain--think +what I must suffer to know that I summoned them cherubs out of Heaven +into this here hard, hard world, lady, and now can't do by 'em +properly!" And Cock-eye Flinks brushed away a tear which I, for one, +am inclined to regard as a particularly ambitious flight of his +imagination. + +Promptly Margaret opened the bag at her waist and took out her purse. +"Don't!" she pleaded. "Please don't! I--I'm upset already. Take this, +and please--oh, _please_, don't spend it in getting drunk or gambling +or anything horrid," Miss Hugonin implored him. "You all do, and it's +so selfish of you and so discouraging." + +Mr. Flinks eyed the purse hungrily. Such a fat purse! thought Cock-eye +Plinks. And there ain't nobody within a mile of here, neither. You are +not to imagine that Mr. Flinks was totally abandoned; his vices were +parochial, restrained for the most part by a lively apprehension of +the law. But now the spell of the Eagle was strong upon him. + +"Lady," said Mr. Flinks, twisting in his grimy hand the bill she had +given him--and there, too, the Eagle flaunted in his vigour and +heartened him, "lady, that ain't much for you to give. Can't you do a +little better than that by a poor workingman, lady?" + +A very unpleasant-looking person, Mr. Cock-eye Flinks. Oh, a +peculiarly unpleasant-looking person to be a model son and a loving +husband and a tender father. Margaret was filled with a vague alarm. + +But she was brave, was Margaret. "No," said she, very decidedly, "I +shan't give you another cent. So you climb right over that wall and go +straight back where you belong." + +The methods of Mr. Flinks, I regret to say, were somewhat more crude +than those of Mesdames Haggage and Saumarez and Messieurs Kennaston +and Jukesbury. + +"Cheese it!" said Mr. Flinks, and flung away his staff and drew very +near to her. "Gimme that money, do you hear!" + +"Don't you dare touch me!" she panted; "ah, don't you _dare_!" + +"Aw, hell!" said Mr. Flinks, disgustedly, and his dirty hands were +upon her, and his foul breath reeked in her face. + +In her hour of need Margaret's heart spoke. + +"Billy!" she wailed; "oh, Billy, _Billy_!" + + * * * * * + +He came to her--just as he would have scaled Heaven to come to her, +just as he would have come to her in the nethermost pit of Hell if she +had called. Ah, yes, Billy Woods came to her now in her peril, and +I don't think that Mr. Flinks particularly relished the look upon +Billy's face as he ran through the gardens, for Billy was furiously +moved. + +Cock-eye Flinks glanced back at the wall behind him. Ten feet high, +and the fellow ain't far off. Cock-eye Flinks caught up his staff, and +as Billy closed upon him, struck him full on the head. Again and again +he struck him. It was a sickening business. + +Billy had stopped short. For an instant he stood swaying on his feet, +a puzzled face showing under the trickling blood. Then he flung out +his hands a little, and they flapped loosely at the wrists, like +wet clothes hung in the wind to dry, and Billy seemed to crumple up +suddenly, and slid down upon the grass in an untidy heap. + +"Ah-h-h!" said Mr. Flinks. He drew back and stared stupidly at that +sprawling flesh which just now had been a man, and was seized with +uncontrollable shuddering. "Ah-h-h!" said Mr. Flinks, very quietly. + +And Margaret went mad. The earth and the sky dissolved in many +floating specks and then went red--red like that heap yonder. The +veneer of civilisation peeled, fell from her like snow from a shaken +garment. The primal beast woke and flicked aside the centuries' work. +She was the Cave-woman who had seen the death of her mate--the brute +who had been robbed of her mate. + +"Damn you! _Damn_ you!" she screamed, her voice high, flat, quite +unhuman; "ah, God in Heaven damn you!" With inarticulate bestial cries +she fell upon the man who had killed Billy, and her violet fripperies +fluttered, her impotent little hands beat at him, tore at him. She was +fearless, shameless, insane. She only knew that Billy was dead. + +With an oath the man flung her from him and turned on his heel. She +fell to coaxing the heap in the grass to tell her that he forgave +her--to open his eyes--to stop bloodying her dress--to come to +luncheon... + +A fly settled on Billy's face and came in his zig-zag course to the +red stream trickling from his nostrils, and stopped short. She brushed +the carrion thing away, but it crawled back drunkenly. She touched it +with her finger, and the fly would not move. On a sudden, every nerve +in her body began to shake and jerk like a flag snapping in the wind. + + + +XXVI + +Some ten minutes afterward, as the members of the house-party sat +chatting on the terrace before Selwoode, there came among them a mad +woman in violet trappings that were splotched with blood. + +"Did you know that Billy was dead?" she queried, smilingly. "Oh, yes, +a man killed Billy just now. Wasn't it too bad? Billy was such a nice +boy, you know. I--I think it's very sad. I think it's the saddest +thing I ever knew of in my life." + +Kathleen Saumarez was the first to reach her. But she drew back +quickly. + +"No, ah, no!" she said, with a little shudder. "You didn't love Billy. +He loved you, and you didn't love him. Oh, Kathleen, Kathleen, how +_could_ you help loving Billy? He was such a nice boy. I--I'm rather +sorry he's dead." + +Then she stood silent, picking at her dress thoughtfully and still +smiling. Afterward, for the first and only time in history, Miss +Hugonin fainted--fainted with an anxious smile. + +Petheridge Jukesbury caught her as she fell, and began to blubber like +a whipped schoolboy as he stood there holding her in his arms. + + + +XXVII + +But Billy was not dead. There was still a feeble, jerky fluttering in +his big chest when Colonel Hugonin found him. His heart still moved, +but under the Colonel's hand its stirrings were vague and aimless as +those of a captive butterfly. + +The Colonel had seen dead men and dying men before this; and as he +bent over the boy he loved he gave a convulsive sob, and afterward +buried his face in his hands. + +Then--of all unlikely persons in the world--it was Petheridge +Jukesbury who rose to meet the occasion. + +His suavity and blandness forgotten in the presence of death, he +mounted with confident alacrity to heights of greatness. Masterfully, +he overrode them all. He poured brandy between Billy's teeth. Then he +ordered the ladies off to bed, and recommended to Mr. Kennaston--when +that gentleman spoke of a clergyman--a far more startling destination. + +For, "It is far from my intention," said Mr. + +Jukesbury, "to appear lacking in respect to the cloth, but--er--just +at present I am inclined to think we are in somewhat greater need of a +mattress and a doctor and--ah--the exercise of a little common-sense. +The gentleman is--er--let us hope, in no immediate danger." + +"How dare you suggest such a thing, sir?" thundered Petheridge +Jukesbury. "Didn't you see that poor girl's face? I tell you I'll be +damned if he dies, sir!" + +And I fancy the recording angel heard him, and against a list of wordy +cheats registered that oath to his credit. + +It was Petheridge Jukesbury, then, who stalked into Mrs. Haggage's +apartments and appropriated her mattress as the first at hand, and +afterward waddled through the gardens bearing it on his fat shoulders, +and still later lifted Billy upon it as gently as a woman could have. +But it was the hatless Colonel on his favourite Black Bess ("Damn your +motor-cars!" the Colonel was wont to say; "I consider my appearance +sufficiently unprepossessing already, sir, without my arriving in +Heaven in fragments and stinking of gasoline!") who in Fairhaven town, +some quarter of an hour afterward, leaped Dr. Jeal's garden fence, and +subsequently bundled the doctor into his gig; and again yet later it +was the Colonel who stood fuming upon the terrace with Dr. Jeal on his +way to Selwoode indeed, but still some four miles from the mansion +toward which he was urging his staid horse at its liveliest gait. + +Kennaston tried to soothe him. But the Colonel clamoured to the +heavens. Kennaston he qualified in various ways. And as for Dr. Jeal, +he would hold him responsible--"personally, sir"--for the consequences +of his dawdling in this fashion--"Damme, sir, like a damn' snail with +a wooden leg!" + +"I am afraid," said Kennaston, gravely, "that the doctor will be of +very little use when he does arrive." + +There was that in his face which made the Colonel pause in his +objurgations. + +"Sir," said the Colonel, "what--do--you--mean?" He found articulation +somewhat difficult. + +"In your absence," Kennaston answered, "Mr. Jukesbury, who it +appears knows something of medicine, has subjected Mr. Woods to an +examination. It--it would be unkind to deceive you----" + +"Come to the point, sir," the Colonel interrupted him. "What--do +you--mean?" + +"I mean," said Felix Kennaston, sadly, "that--he is afraid--Mr. Woods +will never recover consciousness." + +Colonel Hugonin stared at him. The skin of his flabby, wrinkled old +throat was working convulsively. + +Then, "You're wrong, sir," the Colonel said. "Billy _shan't_ die. Damn +Jukesbury! Damn all doctors, too, sir! I put my trust in my God, sir, +and not in a box of damn' sugar-pills, sir. And I tell you, sir, _that +boy is not going to die_." + +Afterward he turned and went into Selwoode defiantly. + + + +XXVIII + +In the living-hall the Colonel found Margaret, white as paper, with +purple lips that timidly smiled at him. + +"Why ain't you in bed?" the old gentleman demanded, with as great an +affectation of sternness as he could muster. To say the truth, it was +not much; for Colonel Hugonin, for all his blustering optimism, was +sadly shaken now. + +"Attractive," said Margaret, "I was, but I couldn't stay there. My--my +brain won't stop working, you see," she complained, wearily. "There's +a thin little whisper in the back of it that keeps telling me about +Billy, and what a liar he is, and what nice eyes he has, and how +poor Billy is dead. It keeps telling me that, over and over again, +attractive. It's such a tiresome, silly little whisper. But he is +dead, isn't he? Didn't Mr. Kennaston tell me just now that he was +dead?--or was it the whisper, attractive?" + +The Colonel coughed. "Kennaston--er--Kennaston's a fool," he declared, +helplessly. "Always said he was a fool. We'll have Jeal in presently." + +"No--I remember now--Mr. Kennaston said Billy would die very soon. You +don't like people to disagree with you, do you, attractive? Of course, +he will die, for the man hit him very, _very_ hard. I'm sorry Billy is +going to die, though, even if he is such a liar!" + +"Don't!" said the Colonel, hoarsely; "don't, daughter! I don't know +what there is between you and Billy, but you're wrong. Oh, you're very +hopelessly wrong! Billy's the finest boy I know." + +Margaret shook her head in dissent. + +"No, he's a very contemptible liar," she said, disinterestedly, "and +that is what makes it so queer that I should care for him more than I +do for anything else in the world. Yes, it's very queer." + +Then Margaret went into the room opening into the living-hall, where +Billy Woods lay unconscious, pallid, breathing stertorously. And the +Colonel stared after her. + +"Oh, my God, my God!" groaned the poor Colonel; "why couldn't it have +been I? Why couldn't it have been I that ain't wanted any longer? +She'd never have grieved like that for me!" + +And indeed, I don't think she would have. + +For to Margaret there had come, as, God willing, there comes to every +clean-souled woman, the time to put away all childish things, and all +childish memories, and all childish ties, if need be, to follow one +man only, and cleave to him, and know his life and hers to be knit up +together, past severance, in a love that death itself may not affright +nor slay. + + + +XXIX + +She sat silent in one corner of the darkened room. It was the bedroom +that Frederick R. Woods formerly occupied--on the ground floor of +Selwoode, opening into the living-hall--to which they had carried +Billy. + +Jukesbury had done what he could. In the bed lay Billy Woods, swathed +in hot blankets, with bottles of hot water set to his feet. Jukesbury +had washed his face clean of that awful red, and had wrapped bandages +of cracked ice about his head and propped it high with pillows. It +was little short of marvellous to see the pursy old hypocrite going +cat-footed about the room on his stealthy ministrations, replenishing +the bandages, forcing spirits of ammonia between Billy's teeth, +fighting deftly and confidently with death. + +Billy still breathed. + +The Colonel came and went uneasily. The clock on the mantel ticked. +Margaret brooded in a silence that was only accentuated by that +horrible wheezing, gurgling, tremulous breathing in the bed yonder. +Would the doctor never come! + +She was curiously conscious of her absolute lack of emotion. + +But always the interminable thin whispering in the back of her head +went on and on. "Oh, if he had only died four years ago! Oh, if he had +only died the dear, clean-minded, honest boy I used to know! When that +noise stops he will be dead. And then, perhaps, I shall be able to +cry. Oh, if he had only died four years ago!" + +And then _da capo_. On and on ran the interminable thin whispering as +Margaret waited for death to come to Billy. Billy looked so old now, +under his many bandages. Surely he must be very, very near death. + +Suddenly, as Jukesbury wrapped new bandages about his forehead, Billy +opened his eyes and, without further movement, smiled placidly up at +him. + +"Hello, Jukesbury," said Billy Woods, "where's my armour?" + +Jukesbury, too, smiled. "The man is bringing it downstairs now," he +answered, quietly. + +"Because," Billy went on, fretfully, "I don't propose to miss the +Trojan war. The princes orgulous with high blood chafed, you know, are +all going to be there, and I don't propose to miss it." + +Behind his fat back, Petheridge Jukesbury waved a cautioning hand at +Margaret, who had risen from her chair. + +"But it is very absurd," Billy murmured, in the mere ghost of a voice, +"because men don't propose by mistake except in farces. Somebody told +me that, but I can't remember who, because I am a misogynist. That is +a Greek word, and I would explain it to Peggy, if she would only give +me a chance, but she can't because she has those seventeen hundred +and fifty thousand children to look after. There must be some way to +explain to her, though, because where there's a will there is always +a way, and there were three wills. Uncle Fred should not have left so +many wills--who would have thought the old man had so much ink in him? +But I will be a very great painter, Uncle Fred, and make her sorry for +the way she has treated me, and _then_ Kathleen will understand I was +talking about Peggy." + +His voice died away, and Margaret sat with wide eyes listening for it +again. Would the doctor never come! + +Billy was smiling and picking at the sheets. + +"But Peggy is so rich," the faint voice presently complained--"so +beastly rich! There is gold in her hair, and if you will look very +closely you will see that her lashes were pure gold until she dipped +them in the ink-pot. Besides, she expects me to sit up and beg for +lumps of sugar, and I _never_ take sugar in my coffee. And Peggy +doesn't drink coffee at all, so I think it is very unfair, especially +as Teddy Anstruther drinks like a fish and she is going to marry him. +Peggy, why won't you marry me? You know I've always loved you, Peggy, +and now I can tell you so because Uncle Fred has left me all his +money. You think a great deal about money, Peggy. You said it was the +greatest thing in the world. And it must be, because it is the only +thing--the _only_ thing, Peggy--that has been strong enough to keep +us apart. A part is never greater than the whole, Peggy, but I will +explain about that when you open that desk. There are sharks in it. +Aren't there, Peggy?--_aren't_ there?" + +His voice had risen to a querulous tone. Gently the fat old man +restrained him. + +"Yes," said Petheridge Jukesbury; "dear me, yes. Why, dear me, of +course." + +But his warning hand held Margaret back--Margaret, who stood with big +tears trickling down her cheeks. + +"Dearer than life itself," Billy assented, wearily, "but before God, +loving you as I do, I wouldn't marry you now for all the wealth in the +world. I forget why, but all the world is a stage, you know, and they +don't use stages now, but only railroads. Is that why you rail at me +so, Peggy? That is a joke. You ought to laugh at my jokes, because I +love you, but I can't ever, ever tell you so because you are rich. A +rich man cannot pass through a needle's eye. Oh, Peggy, Peggy, I love +your eyes, but they're so _big_, Peggy!" + +So Billy Woods lay still and babbled ceaselessly. But through all his +irrelevant talk, as you may see a tributary stream pulse unsullied +in a muddied river, ran the thought of Peggy--of Peggy, and of her +cruelty, and of her beauty, and of the money that stood between them. + +And Margaret, who could never have believed him in his senses, +listened and knew that in his delirium, the rudder of his thoughts +snapped, he could not but speak truth. As she crouched in the corner +of the room, her face buried in an arm-chair, her gold hair half +loosened, her shoulders monotonously heaving, she wept gently, +inaudibly, almost happily. + +Almost happily. Billy was dying, but she knew now, past any doubting, +that he loved her. The dear, clean-minded, honest boy had come +back to her, and she could love him now without shame, and there was +only herself to be loathed. + +[Illustration: "Regarded them with alert eyes."] + +Then the door opened. Then, with Colonel Hugonin, came Martin Jeal--a +wisp of a man like a November leaf--and regarded them from under his +shaggy white hair with alert eyes. + +"Hey, what's this?" said Dr. Jeal. "Eh, yes! Eh--yes!" he meditated, +slowly. "Most irregular. You must let us have the room, Miss Hugonin." + +In the hall she waited. Hope! ah, of course, there was no hope! the +thin little whisper told her. + +By and bye, though--after centuries of waiting--the three men came +into the hall. + +"Miss Hugonin," said Dr. Jeal, with a strange kindness in his voice, +"I don't think we shall need you again. I am happy to tell you, +though, that the patient is doing nicely--very nicely indeed." + +Margaret clutched his arm. "You--you mean----" + +"I mean," said Dr. Jeal, "that there is no fracture. A slight +concussion of the brain, madam, and--so far as I can see--no signs of +inflammation. Barring accidents, I think we'll have that young man out +of bed in a week. Thanks," he added, "to Mr.--er--Jukesbury here whose +prompt action was, under Heaven, undoubtedly the means of staving off +meningitis and probably--indeed, more than probably--the means +of saving Mr. Woods's life. It was splendid, sir, splendid! No +doctor--why, God bless my soul!" + +For Miss Hugonin had thrown her arms about Petheridge Jukesbury's neck +and had kissed him vigorously. + +"You beautiful child!" said Miss Hugonin. + +"Er--Jukesbury," said the Colonel, mysteriously, "there's a little +cognac in the cellar that--er--" The Colonel jerked his thumb across +the hallway with the air of a conspirator. "Eh?" said the Colonel. + +"Why--er--yes," said Mr. Jukesbury. "Why--ah--yes, I think I might." + +They went across the hall together. The Colonel's hand rested +fraternally on Petheridge Jukesbury's shoulder. + + + +XXX + +The next day there was a general exodus from Selwoode, and Margaret's +satellites dispersed upon their divers ways. Selwoode, as they +understood it, was no longer hers; and they knew Billy Woods well +enough to recognise that from Selwoode's new master there were no +desirable pickings to be had such as the philanthropic crew had +fattened on these four years past. So there came to them, one and all, +urgent telegrams or insistent letters or some equally unanswerable +demand for their presence elsewhere, such as are usually prevalent +among our guests in very dull or very troublous times. + +Miss Hugonin smiled a little bitterly. She considered that the scales +had fallen from her eyes, and flattered herself that she was by way of +becoming a bit of a misanthrope; also, I believe, there was a note +concerning the hollowness of life and the worthlessness of society in +general. In a word, Margaret fell back upon the extreme cynicism and +world-weariness of twenty-three, and assured herself that she despised +everybody, whereas, as a matter of fact, she never in her life +succeeded in disliking anything except mice and piano-practice, and, +for a very little while, Billy Woods; and this for the very excellent +reason that the gods had fashioned her solely to the end that she +might love all mankind, and in return be loved by humanity in general +and adored by that portion of it which inhabits trousers. + +But, "The rats always desert a sinking ship," said Miss Hugonin, with +the air of one delivering a particularly original sentiment. "They +make me awfully tired, and I don't care for them in the least. But +Petheridge Jukesbury is a _dear_, and I may be poor now, but I _did_ +try to do good with the money when I had it, and _anyhow_, Billy is +going to get well." + +And, after all, that was the one thing that really mattered, though of +course Billy would always despise her. He would be quite right, too, +the girl thought humbly. + +But the conventionalities of life are more powerful than even youthful +cynicism and youthful heart-break. Prior to devoting herself to a +loveless life and the commonplaces of the stoic's tub, Miss Hugonin +was compelled by the barest decency to bid her guests Godspeed. + +And Adele Haggage kissed her for the first time in her life. She had +been a little awed by Miss Hugonin, the famous heiress--a little +jealous of her, I dare say, on account of Hugh Van Orden--but now she +kissed her very heartily in farewell, and said, "Don't forget you are +to come to us as soon as _possible_," and was beyond any question +perfectly sincere in saying it. + +And Hugh Van Orden almost dragged Margaret under the main stairway, +and, far from showing any marked abhorrence to her in her present +state of destitution, implored her with tears in his eyes to marry him +at once, and to bring the Colonel to live with them for the rest of +his natural existence. + +For, "It's damned impertinent of me, of course," Mr. Van Orden readily +conceded, "and I suppose I ought to beg your pardon for mentioning it, +but I _do_ love you to a perfectly unlimited extent. It's playing the +very deuce with my polo, Miss Hugonin, and as for my appetite--why, +if you won't have me," cried Hugh, in desperation, "I--I really, you +know, I don't believe I'll _ever_ be able to eat anything!" + +When Margaret refused him--for the sixth time, I think--I won't swear +that she didn't kiss him under the dark stairway. And if she did, he +was a nice boy, and he deserved it. + +And as for Sarah Ellen Haggage, that unreverend old parasite brought +her a blank cheque signed with her name, and mentioned quite a goodly +sum as the extent to which Margaret might go for necessary expenses. + +"For you'll need it," she said, and rubbed her nose reflectively. +"Moving is the very deuce for wasting money, because so many little +things keep cropping up. Now, remember, a quarter is quite enough to +give _any_ man for moving a trunk. And there's no earthly sense in +your taking a cab, Margaret--the street-car will bring you within a +block of our door. These little trifles count, dear. And don't let +Celestine pack your things, because she's abominably careless. Let +Marie do it--and don't tip her. Give her an old hat. And if I were +you, I would certainly consult a lawyer about the legality of that +idiotic will. I remember distinctly hearing that Mr. Woods was very +eccentric in his last days, and I haven't a doubt he was raving mad +when, he left all his money to a great, strapping, long-legged young +fellow, who is perfectly capable of taking care of himself. Getting +better, is he? Well, I suppose I'm glad to hear it, but he'd much +better have stayed in Paris--where, I remember distinctly hearing, he +led the most dissipated and immoral life, my dear--instead of coming +over here and upsetting everything." And again Mrs. Haggage rubbed her +nose--indignantly. + +"He _didn't_!" said Margaret. "And I _can't_ take your money, +beautiful! And I don't see how we can possibly come to stay with you." + +"Don't you argue with me!" Mrs. Haggage exhorted her. "I'm not in any +temper to be argued with. I've spent the morning sewing bias +stripes in a bias skirt--something which from a moral-ruining and +resolution-overthrowing standpoint simply knocks the spots off Job. +You'll take that money, and you'll come to me as soon as you can, +and--God bless you, my dear!" + +And again Margaret was kissed. Altogether, it was a very osculatory +morning for Miss Hugonin. + +Mr. Jukesbury's adieus, however, were more formal; and--I am sorry to +say it--the old fellow went away wondering if the rich Mr. Woods might +not conceivably be very grateful to the man who had saved his life and +evince his gratitude in some agreeable and substantial form. + +Mrs. Saumarez and Mr. Kennaston, also, were somewhat unenthusiastic in +their parting. Kennaston could not feel quite at ease with Margaret, +brazen it as he might with devil-may-carish flippancy; and Kathleen +had by this an inkling as to how matters stood between Margaret and +Billy, and was somewhat puzzled thereat, and loved the former in +consequence no more than any Christian female is compelled to love the +woman who, either unconsciously or with deliberation, purloins her +ancient lover. A woman rarely forgives the man who has ceased to care +for her; and rarelier still can she pardon the woman who has dared +succeed her in his affections. + +And besides, they were utterly engrossed with one another, and utterly +happy, and utterly selfish with the immemorial selfishness of lovers, +who cannot for a moment conceive that the whole world is not somehow +benefited by their happiness and does not await with breathless +interest the outcome of their bickerings with the blind bow-god, and +from this providential delusion derive a meritorious and comfortable +glow. So Mrs. Saumarez and Mr. Kennaston parted from Margaret with +kindness, it is true, but not without awkwardness. + +And that was the man that almost she had loved! thought Margaret, as +she gazed on the whirl of dust left by their carriage-wheels. Gone +with a few perfunctory words of sympathy! + +And for my part, I think that the base Indian who threw a pearl away +worth more than all his tribe was, in comparison with Felix Kennaston, +a shrewd and long-headed man. If you had given _me_ his chances, +Margaret ... but this, however, is highly digressive. + +The Colonel, standing beside her, used language that was unrefined. +His aspirations as to the future of Mr. Kennaston and Mr. Jukesbury, +it appeared, were both lurid and unfriendly. + +"But why, attractive?" queried his daughter. + +"May they be qualified with such and such adjectives!" desired the +Colonel, fervently. "They tried to lend me money--wouldn't hear of +my not taking it! In case of necessity.' Bah!" said the Colonel, and +shook his fist after the retreating carriages. "May they be qualified +with such and such adjectives!" + +How happily she laughed! "And you're swearing at them!" she pouted. +"Oh, my dear, my dear, how hard you are on all my little friends!" + +"Of course I am," said the Colonel, stoutly. "They've deprived me of +the pleasure of despising 'em. It was worth double the money, I tell +you! I never objected to any men quite so much. And now they've gone +and behaved decently with the deliberate purpose of annoying me! Oh!" +cried the Colonel, and shook an immaculate, withered old hand toward +the spring sky, "may they be qualified with such and such adjectives!" + +And that, so far as we are concerned, was the end of Margaret's +satellites. + +My dear Mrs. Grundy, may one point the somewhat obvious moral? I thank +you, madam, for your long-suffering kindness. Permit me, then, to +vault toward my moral over the shoulders of a greater man. + +Among the papers left by one Charles Dickens--a novelist who is +obsolete now because he "wallows naked in the pathetic" and was +frequently guilty of a very vulgar sort of humour that actually made +people laugh, which, as we now know, is not the purpose of humour--a +novelist who incessantly "caricatured Nature" and by these inartistic +and underhand methods created characters that are more real to us than +the folk we jostle in the street and (God knows!) far more vital and +worthy of attention than the folk who "cannot read Dickens"--you will +find, I say, a note of an idea which he never afterward developed, +running to this effect: "Full length portrait of his lordship, +surrounded by worshippers. Sensible men enough, agreeable men enough, +independent men enough in a certain way; but the moment they begin +to circle round my lord, and to shine with a borrowed light from +his lordship, heaven and earth, how mean and subservient! What a +competition and outbidding of each other in servility!" + +And this, with "my lord" and "his lordship" erased to make way for the +word "money," is my moral. The folk who have just left Selwoode were +honest enough as honesty goes nowadays; kindly as any of us dare +be who have our own way to make among very stalwart and determined +rivals; generous as any man may venture to be in a world where +the first of every month finds the butcher and the baker and the +candlestick-maker rapping at the door with their little bills: but +they cringed to money. It was very wrong of them, my dear lady, and in +extenuation I can only plead that they could no more help cringing to +money than you or I can help it. + +This is very crude and very cynical, but unfortunately it is true. + +We always cringe to money; which is humiliating. And the sun always +rises at an hour when sensible people are abed and have not the least +need for its services; which is foolish. And what you and I, my dear +madam, are to do about rectifying either one of these vexatious +circumstances, I am sure I don't know. + +We can, at least, be honest. Let us, then, console ourselves at will +with moral observations concerning the number of pockets in a shroud +and the difficulty of a rich man's entering into the kingdom of +Heaven; but with an humble and reverent heart, let us admit that, in +the world we know, money rules. Its presence awes us. And if we are +quite candid we must concede that we very unfeignedly envy and admire +the rich; we must grant that money confers a certain distinction on a +man, be he the veriest ass that ever heehawed a platitude, and that we +cannot but treat him accordingly, you and I. + +You are friendly, of course, with your poor cousins; you are delighted +to have them drop in to dinner, and liberal enough with the claret +when they do; but when the magnate comes, there is a magnum of +champagne, and an extra lamp in the drawing-room, and--I blush to +write it--a far more agreeable hostess at the head of the table. Dives +is such good company, you see. And speaking for my own sex, I defy any +honest fellow to lay his hand upon his waistcoat and swear that it +doesn't give him a distinct thrill of pleasure to be seen in public +with a millionaire. Daily we truckle in the Eagle's shadow--the shadow +that lay so heavily across Selwoode. With the Eagle himself and with +the Eagle's work in the world--the grim, implacable, ruthless work +that hourly he goes about--our little comedy has naught to do; +Schlemihl-like, we deal but in shadows. Even the shadow of the Eagle +is a terrible thing--a shadow that, as Felix Kennaston has told you, +chills faith, and charity, and independence, and kindliness, and +truth, and--alas--even common honesty. + +But this is both cynical and digressive. + + + +XXXI + +Dr. Jeal, better than his word, had Billy Woods out of bed in five +days. To Billy they were very long and very dreary days, and to +Margaret very long and penitential ones. But Colonel Hugonin enjoyed +them thoroughly; for, as he feelingly and frequently observed, it is +an immense consolation to any man to reflect that his home no longer +contains "more damn' foolishness to the square inch than any other +house in the United States." + +On all sides they sought for Cock-eye Flinks. But they never found +him, and to this day they have never found him. The Fates having +played their pawn, swept it from the board, and Cock-eye Flinks +disappeared in Clotho's capacious pocket. + +All this time the young people saw nothing of one another. On this +point Jeal was adamantean. + +"In a sick-room," he vehemently declared, "a woman is well enough, but +_the_ woman is the devil and all. I've told that young man plainly, +sir, that he doesn't see your daughter till he gets well--and, by +George, sir, he'll get well now just in order to see her. Nature is +the only doctor who ever cures anybody, Colonel; we humans, for +all our pill-boxes and lancets, can only prompt her--and devilish +demoralising advice we generally give her, too," he added, with a +chuckle. + +"Peggy!" + +This was the first observation of Mr. Woods when he came to his +senses. He swore feebly when Peggy was denied to him. He pleaded. He +scolded. He even threatened, as a last resort, to get out of bed and +go in immediate search of her; and in return, Jeal told him very +affably that it was far less difficult to manage a patient in a +straight-jacket than one out of it, and that personally nothing would +please him so much as a plausible pretext for clapping Mr. Woods into +one of 'em. Jeal had his own methods in dealing with the fractious. + +Then Billy clamoured for Colonel Hugonin, and subsequently the Colonel +came in some bewilderment to his daughter's rooms. + +"Billy says that will ain't to be probated," he informed her, testily. +"I'm to make sure it ain't probated till he gets well. You're to give +me your word you'll do nothing further in the matter till Billy gets +well. That's his message, and I'd like to know what the devil this +infernal nonsense means. I ain't a Fenian nor yet a Guy Fawkes, +daughter, and in consequence I'm free to confess I don't care for all +this damn mystery and shilly-shallying. But that's the message." + +Miss Hugonin debated with herself. "That I will do nothing further in +the matter till Billy gets well," she repeated, reflectively. "Yes, I +suppose I'll have to promise it, but you can tell him for me that I +consider he is _horrid_, and just as obstinate and selfish as he can +_possibly_ be. Can you remember that, attractive?" + +"Yes, thank you," said the Colonel. "I can remember it, but I ain't +going to. Nice sort of message to send a sick man, ain't it? I don't +know what's gotten into you, Margaret--no, begad, I don't! I think +you're possessed of seventeen devils. And now," the old gentleman +demanded, after an awkward pause, "are you or are you not going to +tell me what all this mystery is about?" + +"I can't," Miss Hugonin protested. "It--it's a secret, attractive." + +"It ain't," said the Colonel, flatly--"it's some more damn +foolishness." And he went away in a fret and using language. + + + +XXXII + +Left to herself, Miss Hugonin meditated. + +Miss Hugonin was in her kimono. + +And oh, Madame Chrysastheme! oh, Madame Butterfly! Oh, Mimosa San, and +Pitti Sing, and Yum Yum, and all ye vaunted beauties of Japan! if you +could have seen her in that garb! Poor little ladies of the Orient, +how hopelessly you would have wrung your henna-stained fingers! Poor +little Ichabods of the East, whose glory departed irretrievably when +she adopted this garment, I tremble to think of the heart-burnings and +palpitations and hari-karis that would have ensued. + +It was pink--the pink of her cheeks to a shade. And scattered about it +were birds, and butterflies, and snaky, emaciated dragons, with backs +like saw-teeth, and prodigious fangs, and claws, and very curly tails, +such as they breed in Nankeen plates and used to breed on packages of +fire-crackers--all done in gold, the gold of her hair. Moreover, one +might catch a glimpse of her neck--which was a manifest favour of the +gods--and about it mysterious, lacy white things intermingling with +divers tiny blue ribbons. I saw her in it once--by accident. + +And now I fancy, as she stood rigid with indignation, her cheeks +flushed, it must have been a heady spectacle to note how their +shell-pink repeated the pink of her fantastic garment like a chromatic +echo; and how her sunny hair, a thought loosened, a shade dishevelled, +clung heavily about her face, a golden snare for eye and heart; and +how her own eyes, enormous, cerulean--twin sapphires such as in the +old days might have ransomed a brace of emperors--grew wistful like a +child's who has been punished and does not know exactly why; and how +her petulant mouth quivered and the long black lashes, golden at the +roots, quivered, too--ah, yes, it must have been a heady spectacle. + +"_Now_," she announced, "I see plainly what he intends doing. He is +going to destroy that will, and burden me once more with a large and +influential fortune. I don't want it, and I won't take it, and he +might just as well understand that in the very beginning. I don't care +if Uncle Fred did leave it to me--I didn't ask him to, did I? Besides, +he was a very foolish old man--if he had left the money to Billy +_everything_ would have been all right. That's always the way--my +dolls are invariably stuffed with sawdust, and I _never_ have a dear +gazelle to glad me with his dappled hide, but when he comes to know me +well he falls upon the buttered side--or something to that effect. I +hate poetry, anyhow--it's so mushy!" + +And this from the Miss Hugonin who a week ago was interested in the +French _decadents_ and partial to folk-songs from the Romaic! I think +we may fairly deduce that the reign of Felix Kennaston is over. The +king is dead; and Margaret's thoughts and affections and her very +dreams have fallen loyally to crying, Long live the king--his Majesty +Billy the First. + +"Oh!" said Margaret, with an indignant gasp, what time her eyebrows +gesticulated, "I think Billy Woods is a meddlesome _piece_!--that's +what I think! Does he suppose that after waiting all this time for the +only man in the world who can keep me interested for four hours on +a stretch and send my pulse up to a hundred and make me feel those +thrilly thrills I've always longed for--does he suppose that now +I'm going to pay any attention to his silly notions about wills and +things? He's abominably selfish! I shan't!" + +Margaret moved across the room, shimmering, rustling, glittering like +a fairy in a pantomime. Then, to consider matters at greater ease, she +curled up on a divan in much the attitude of a tiny Cleopatra riding +at anchor on a carpeted Cydnus. + +"Billy thinks I want the money--bless his boots! He thinks I'm a +stuck-up, grasping, purse-proud little pig, and he has every right +to think so after the way I talked to him, though he ought to have +realised I was in a temper about Kathleen Saumarez and have paid no +attention to what I said. And he actually attempted to reason with +me! If he'd had _any_ consideration for my feelings, he'd have simply +smacked me and made me behave--however, he's a man, and all men are +selfish, and _she's_ a skinny old thing, and I _never_ had any use for +her. Bother her lectures! I never understood a word of them, and I +don't believe she does, either. Women's clubs are _all_ silly, and I +think the women who belong to them are _all_ bold-faced jigs! If +they had any sense, they'd stay at home and take care of the babies, +instead of messing with philanthropy, and education, and theosophy, +and anything else that they can't make head or tail of. And they call +that being cultured! Culture!--I hate the word! I don't want to be +cultured--I want to be happy." + +This, you will observe, was, in effect, a sweeping recantation of +every ideal Margaret had ever boasted. But Love is a canny pedagogue, +and of late he had instructed Miss Hugonin in a variety of matters. + +"Before God, loving you as I do, I wouldn't marry you for all the +wealth in the world," she repeated, with a little shiver. "Even in his +delirium he said that. But I _know_ now that he loves me. And I know +that I adore him. And if this were a sensible world, I'd walk right in +there and explain things and ask him to marry me, and then it wouldn't +matter in the least who had the money. But I can't, because it +wouldn't be proper. Bother propriety!--but bothering it doesn't do +any good. As long as I have the money, Billy will never come near me, +because of the idiotic way I talked to him. And he's bent on my taking +the money simply because it happens to belong to me. I consider that +a very silly reason. I'll _make_ Billy Woods take the money, and +I'll make him see that I'm _not_ a little pig, and that I trust him +implicitly. And I think I'm quite justified in using a little--we'll +call it diplomacy--because otherwise he'd go back to France or some +other objectionable place, and we'd both be _very_ unhappy." + +Margaret began to laugh softly. "I've given him my word that I'll +do nothing further in the matter till he gets well. And I won't. +_But_----" + +Miss Hugonin rose from the divan with a gesture of sweeping back her +hair. And then--oh, treachery of tortoise-shell! oh, the villainy of +those little gold hair-pins!--the fat twisted coils tumbled loose +and slowly unravelled themselves, and her pink-and-white face, +half-eclipsed, showed a delectable wedge between big, odourful, +crinkly, ponderous masses of hair. It clung about her, a heavy cloak, +all shimmering gold like the path of sunset over the June sea. And +Margaret, looking at herself in the mirror, laughed, and appeared +perfectly content with what she saw there. + +"But," said she, "if the Fates are kind to me--and I sometimes think +I _have_ a pull with the gods--I'll make you happy, Billy Woods, in +spite of yourself." + +The mirror flashed back a smile. Margaret was strangely interested in +the mirror. + +"She has ringlets in her hair," sang Margaret happily--a low, +half-hushed little song. She held up a strand of it to demonstrate +this fact. + +"There's a dimple in her chin"--and, indeed, there was. And a dimple +in either cheek, too. + +For a long time afterward she continued to smile at the mirror. I am +afraid Kathleen Saumarez was right. She was a vain little cat, was +Margaret. + +But, barring a rearrangement of the cosmic scheme, I dare say maids +will continue to delight in their own comeliness so long as mirrors +speak truth. Let us, then, leave Miss Hugonin to this innocent +diversion. The staidest of us are conscious of a brisk elation at +sight of a pretty face; and surely no considerate person will deny its +owner a portion of the pleasure that daily she accords the beggar at +the street-corner. + + + +XXXIII + +We are credibly informed that Time travels in divers paces with divers +persons--the statement being made by a lady who may be considered to +speak with some authority, having triumphantly withstood the ravages +of Chronos for a matter of three centuries. But I doubt if even the +insolent sweet wit of Rosalind could have devised a fitting simile for +Time's gait at Selwoode those five days that Billy lay abed. Margaret +could not but marvel at the flourishing proportion attained by the +hours in those sunlit spring days; and at dinner, say, her thoughts +harking back to luncheon, recalled it by a vigorous effort as an +affair of the dim yester-years--a mere blurred memory, faint and vague +as a Druidical tenet or a Merovingian squabble. + +But the time passed for all that; and eventually--it was just before +dusk--she came, with Martin Jeal's permission, into the room where +Billy was. And beside the big open fireplace, where a wood fire +chattered companionably, sat a very pallid Billy, a rather thin Billy, +with a great many bandages about his head. + +You may depend upon it, Margaret was not looking her worst that +afternoon. By actual count, Celestine had done her hair six times +before reaching an acceptable result. + +And, "Yes, Celestine, you may get out that pale yellow dress. No, +beautiful, the one with the black satin stripes on the bodice--because +I don't want my hair cast completely in the shade, do I? Now, let me +see--black feather, gloves, large pompadour, _and_ a sweet smile. No, +I don't want a fan--that's a Lydia Languish trade-mark. And _two_ silk +skirts rustling like the deadest leaves imaginable. Yes, I think that +will do. And if you can't hook up my dress without pecking and pecking +at me like that, I'll probably go stark, _staring_ crazy, Celestine, +and then you'll be sorry. No, it isn't a bit tight--are you perfectly +certain there's no powder behind my ears, Celestine? Now, _please_ try +to fasten the collar without pulling all my hair down. Ye-es, I think +that will do, Celestine. Well, it's very nice of you to say so, but I +don't believe I much fancy myself in yellow, after all." + +Equipped and armed for conquest, then, she came into the room with a +very tolerable affectation of unconcern. Altogether, it was a quite +effective entrance. + +"I've been for a little drive, Billy," she mendaciously informed him. +"That's how you happen to have the opportunity of seeing me in all my +nice new store-clothes. Aren't you pleased, Billy? No, don't you dare +get up!" Margaret stood across the room, peeling off her gloves and +regarding him on the whole with disapproval. "They've been starving +you," she pensively reflected. "As soon as that Jeal person goes away, +I shall have six little beefsteaks cooked and see to it personally +that you eat every one of them. And I'll cook a cherry pie--quick as +a cat can wink her eye--won't I, Billy? That Jeal person is a decided +nuisance," said Miss Hugonin, as she stabbed her hat rather viciously +with two hat-pins and then laid it aside on a table. + +Billy Woods was looking up at her forlornly. It hurt her to see the +love and sorrow in his face. But oh, how avidly his soul drank in the +modulations of that longed-for voice--a voice that was honey and gold +and velvet and all that is most sweet and rich and soft in the world. + +"Peggy," said he, plunging at the heart of things, "where's that +will?" + +Miss Hugonin kicked forward a little foot-stool to the other side of +the fire, and sat down and complacently smoothed out her skirts. + +"I knew it!" said she. "I never saw such a one-idea'd person in my +life. I knew that would be the very first thing you would ask for, +Billy Woods, because you're such an obstinate, stiffnecked _donkey_. +Very well!"--and Margaret tossed her head--"here's Uncle Fred's will, +then, and you can do _exactly_ as you like with it, and _now_ I hope +you're satisfied!" And Margaret handed him the long envelope which lay +in her lap. + +Mr. Woods promptly opened it. + +"That," Miss Hugonin commented, "is what I term very unladylike +behaviour on your part." + +"You evidently don't trust me, Billy Woods. Very well! I don't care! +Read it carefully--very carefully, and make quite sure I haven't been +dabbling in forgery of late--besides, it's so good for your eyes, you +know, after being hit over the head," Margaret suggested, cheerfully. + +Billy chuckled. "That's true," said he, "but I know Uncle Fred's fist +well enough without having to read it all. Candidly, Peggy, I _had_ to +look at it, because I--well, I didn't quite trust you, Peggy. And +now we're going to burn this interesting paper, you and I." "Wait!" +Margaret cried. "Ah, wait, just a moment, Billy!" + +He glanced up at her in surprise, the paper still poised in his hand. + +She sat with head drooped forward, her masculine little chin thrust +out eagerly, her candid eyes transparently appraising him. + +"Why are you going to burn it, Billy?" + +"Why?" Mr. Woods, repeated, thoughtfully. "Well, for a variety of +reasons. First is, that Uncle Fred really did leave his money to you, +and burning this is the only way of making sure you get it. Why, I +thought you wanted me to burn it! Last time I saw you--" + +"I was in a temper," said Margaret, haughtily. "You ought to have seen +that." + +"Yes, I--er--noticed it," Mr. Woods admitted, with some dryness; "but +it wasn't only temper. You've grown accustomed to the money. You'd +miss it now--miss the pleasure it gives you, miss the power it gives +you. You'd never be content to go back to the old life now. Why, +Peggy, you yourself told me you thought money the greatest thing in +the world! It has changed you, Peggy, this--ah, well!" said Billy, "we +won't talk about that. I'm going to burn it because that's the only +honourable thing to do. Ready, Peggy?" + +"It may be honourable, but it's _extremely_ silly," Margaret +temporised, "and for my part, I'm very, very glad God had run out of a +sense of honour when He created the woman." + +"Phrases don't alter matters. Ready, Peggy?" + +"Ah, no, phrases don't alter matters!" she assented, with a quick lift +of speech. "You're going to destroy that will, Billy Woods, simply +because you think I'm a horrid, mercenary, selfish _pig_. You think I +couldn't give up the money--you think I couldn't be happy without it. +Well, you have every right to think so, after the way I've behaved. +But why not tell me that is the real reason?" + +Billy raised his hand in protest. "I--I think you might miss it," he +conceded. "Yes, I think you would miss it." + +"Listen!" said Margaret, quickly. "The money is yours now--by my act. +You say you--care for me. If I am the sort of woman you think me--I +don't say I am, and I don't say I'm not--but thinking me that sort of +woman, don't you think I'd--I'd marry you for the asking if you kept +the money? Don't you think you're losing every chance of me by burning +that will? Oh, I'm not standing on conventionalities now! Don't you +think that, Billy?" + +She was tempting him to the uttermost; and her heart was sick with +fear lest he might yield. This was the Eagle's last battle; and +recreant Love fought with the Eagle against poor Billy, who had only +his honour to help him. + +Margaret's face was pale as she bent toward him, her lips parted a +little, her eyes glinting eerily in the firelight. The room was dark +now save in the small radius of its amber glow; beyond that was +darkness where panels and brasses blinked. + +"Yes," said Billy, gravely--"forgive me if I'm wrong, dear, but--I +do think that. But you see you don't care for me, Peggy. In the +summer-house I thought for a moment--ah, well, you've shown in a +hundred ways that you don't care--and I wouldn't have you come to me, +not caring. So I'm going to burn the paper, dear." + +Margaret bowed her head. Had she ever known happiness before? + +"It is not very flattering to me," she said, "but it shows that +you--care--a great deal. You care enough to--let me go. Ah--yes. You +may burn it now, Billy." + +And promptly he tossed it into the flames. For a moment it lay +unharmed; then the edges caught and crackled and blazed, and their +heads drew near together as they watched it burn. + +There (thought Billy) is the end! Ah, ropes, daggers, and poisons! +there is the end! Oh, Peggy. Peggy, if you could only have loved me! +if only this accursed money hadn't spoiled you so utterly! Billy was +quite properly miserable over it. + +But he raised his head with a smile. "And now," said he--and not +without a little, little bitterness; "if I have any right to advise +you, Peggy, I--I think I'd be more careful in the future as to how I +used the money. You've tried to do good with it, I know. But every +good cause has its parasites. Don't trust entirely to the Haggages and +Jukesburys, Peggy, and--and don't desert the good ship Philanthropy +because there are a few barnacles on it, dear." + +"You make me awfully tired," Miss Hugonin observed, as she rose to her +feet. "How do you suppose I'm going to do anything for Philanthropy or +any other cause when I haven't a penny in the world? You see, you've +just burned the last will Uncle Fred ever made--the one that left +everything to me. The one in your favour was probated or proved or +whatever they call it a week ago." I think Billy was surprised. + +She stood over him, sharply outlined against the darkness, clasping +her hands tightly just under her chin, ludicrously suggestive of a +pre-Raphaelitish saint. In the firelight her hair was an aureole; and +her gown, yellow with multitudinous tiny arabesques of black velvet, +echoed the glow of her hair to a shade. The dancing flames made of her +a flickering little yellow wraith. And oh, the quaint tenderness of +her eyes!--oh, the hint of faint, nameless perfume she diffused! thus +ran the meditations of Billy's dizzied brain. + +"Listen! I told you I burned the other will. I started to burn it. But +I was afraid to, because I didn't know what they could do to me if I +did. So I put it away in my little handkerchief-box--and if you'd had +a _grain_ of sense you'd have noticed the orris on it. And you made me +promise not to take any steps in the matter till you got well. I knew +you would. So I had already sent that second will--sent it before I +promised you--to Hunston Wyke--he's my lawyer now, you know--and I've +heard from him, and he has probated it." + +Billy was making various irrelevant sounds. + +"And I brought that other will to you, and if you didn't choose to +examine it more carefully I'm sure it wasn't my fault. I kept my word +like a perfect gentleman and took no step _whatever_ in the matter. +I didn't say a word when before my eyes you stripped me of my entire +worldly possessions--you know I didn't. You burned it up yourself, +Billy Woods--of your own free will and accord--and now Selwoode and +all that detestable money belongs to _you_, and I'm sure I'd like to +know what you are going to do about it. So _there_!" + +Margaret faced him defiantly. Billy was in a state of considerable +perturbation. + +"Why have you done this?" he asked, slowly. But a lucent +something--half fear, half gladness--was wakening in Billy's eyes. + +And her eyes answered him. But her tongue was far less veracious. + +"Because you thought I was a _pig_! Because you couldn't make +allowances for a girl who for four years has seen nothing but money +and money-worshippers and the power of money! Because I wanted +your--your respect, Billy. And you thought I couldn't give it up! Very +well!" Miss Hugonin waved her hand airily toward the hearth. "Now I +hope you know better. _Don't you dare get up, Billy Woods!_" + +But I think nothing short of brute force could have kept Mr. Woods +from her. + +"Peggy," he babbled--"ah, forgive me if I'm a presumptuous ass--but +was it because you knew I couldn't ask you to marry me so long as you +had the money?" + +She dallied with her bliss. Margaret was on the other side of the +table. + +"Why--why, of course it wasn't!" she panted. "What nonsense!" + +"Look at me, Peggy!" + +"I don't want to! You look like a fright with your head all tied up." + +"Peggy ... this exercise is bad for an invalid." + +"I--oh, please sit down! _Please_, Billy! It is bad for you." + +"Not until you tell me----" + +"But I _don't!_... Oh, you make me _awfully_ tired." + +"Peggy, don't you dare stamp your foot at me!... Peggy!" + +"_Please_ sit down! Now ... well, there's my hand, stupid, if you +_will_ be silly. Now sit down here--so, with your head leaned back on +this nice little cushion because it's good for your poor head--and +I'll sit on this nice little footstool and be quite, quite honest. No, +you must lean back--I don't care if you can't see me, I'd much rather +you couldn't. Well, the truth is--no, you _must_ lean back--the truth +is--I've loved you all my life, Billy Woods, and--no, not _yet_, +Billy--and if you hadn't been the stupidest beautiful in the universe +you'd have seen it long ago. You--you needn't--lean back--any longer, +Billy ... Oh, Billy, why _didn't_ you shave?" + +"She _is_ skinny, isn't she, Billy?" + +"Now, Peggy, you mustn't abuse Kathleen. She's a friend of mine." + +"Well, I know she's a friend of yours, but that doesn't prevent her +being skinny, does it?" + +"Now, Peggy--" + +"Please, Billy! _Please_ say she's skinny!" + +"Er--well, she's a bit thin, perhaps." + +"You angel!" + +"And you're quite sure you've forgiven me for doubting you?" + +"And you've forgiven _me?_" + +"Bless you, Peggy, I never doubted you! I've been too busy loving +you." + +"It seems to me as if it had been--_always_." + +"Why, didn't we love one another in Carthage, Peggy?" + +"I think it was in Babylon, Billy." + +"And will love one another----?" + +"Forever and ever, dear. You've been to seek a wife, Billy boy." + +"And oh, the dimple in her chin..." + + * * * * * + +Ah, well! There was a deal of foolish prattle there in the +firelight--delectable prattle, irresponsible as the chattering of +birds after a storm. And I fancy that the Eagle's shadow is lifted +from Selwoode, now that Love has taken up his abode there. + +THE END + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Eagle's Shadow, by James Branch Cabell + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EAGLE'S SHADOW *** + +***** This file should be named 10882.txt or 10882.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/8/8/10882/ + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Bradley Norton and PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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