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diff --git a/16408-h/16408-h.htm b/16408-h/16408-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f828c46 --- /dev/null +++ b/16408-h/16408-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,16292 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes, by Israel Zangwill</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right;} /* page numbers */ + .sidenote {width: 20%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em; margin-left: 1em; + float: right; clear: right; margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; background: #eeeeee; border: dashed 1px;} + + .bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + .bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + .bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + .br {border-right: solid 2px;} + .bbox {border: solid 2px;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .u {text-decoration: underline;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: super; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em;} + .poem span.i1 {display: block; margin-left: 1em;} + hr.full { width: 100%; } + pre {font-size: 8pt;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes, by +Israel Zangwill</h1> +<pre> +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 <a href = "https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes</p> +<p> The Grey Wig; Chassé-Croisé; The Woman Beater; The Eternal Feminine; The Silent Sisters; The Big Bow Mystery; Merely Mary Ann; The Serio-Comic Governess</p> +<p>Author: Israel Zangwill</p> +<p>Release Date: August 1, 2005 [eBook #16408]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREY WIG: STORIES AND NOVELETTES***</p> +<p> </p> +<h3>E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, M. M. Moffet, Mary Meehan,<br /> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (https://www.pgdp.net)</h3> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h1>The Grey Wig</h1> + +<h3>Stories and Novelettes</h3> + +<h2>By I. Zangwill</h2> + +<h3>Author of "The Mantle of Elijah" "Children of the Ghetto" etc., etc.</h3> + +<h3>1923</h3> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">TO MY MOTHER AND SISTERS<br /></span> +<span class="i0">THIS BOOK<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mainly a Study of Woman<br /></span> +<span class="i0">IS LOVINGLY DEDICATED<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="PREFATORY_NOTE" id="PREFATORY_NOTE"></a>PREFATORY NOTE</h2> + + +<p>This Volume embraces my newest and oldest work, and includes—for the +sake of uniformity of edition—a couple of shilling novelettes that are +out of print.</p> + +<p>I.Z.</p> + +<p>Mentone, +February, 1903.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> + +<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. --> + +<h3>CONTENTS</h3> +<p> +<a href="#THE_GREY_WIG">THE GREY WIG</a><br /> +<a href="#CHASSE-CROISE">CHASSÉ-CROISÉ</a><br /> +<a href="#THE_WOMAN_BEATER">THE WOMAN BEATER</a><br /> +<a href="#THE_ETERNAL_FEMININE">THE ETERNAL FEMININE</a><br /> +<a href="#THE_SILENT_SISTERS">THE SILENT SISTERS</a><br /> +<a href="#THE_BIG_BOW_MYSTERY">THE BIG BOW MYSTERY</a><br /> +<a href="#MERELY_MARY_ANN">MERELY MARY ANN</a><br /> +<a href="#THE_SERIO-COMIC_GOVERNESS">THE SERIO-COMIC GOVERNESS</a><br /> +</p> + +<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. --> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h1><a name="THE_GREY_WIG" id="THE_GREY_WIG"></a>THE GREY WIG</h1> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>Contents</h3> +<p> + + +<a href="#I">I</a><br /> +<a href="#II">II</a><br /> +<a href="#III">III</a><br /> +<a href="#IV">IV</a><br /> +<a href="#V">V</a><br /> +<a href="#VI">VI</a><br /> +<a href="#VII">VII</a><br /> +<a href="#VIII">VIII</a><br /> +<a href="#IX">IX</a><br /> +<a href="#X">X</a><br /> +<a href="#XI">XI</a><br /> +<a href="#XII">XII</a><br /> +<a href="#XIII">XIII</a><br /> +<a href="#XIV">XIV</a><br /> +<a href="#XV">XV</a><br /> +</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + + +<p>They both styled themselves "Madame," but only the younger of the old +ladies had been married. Madame Valière was still a <i>demoiselle</i>, but +as she drew towards sixty it had seemed more <i>convenable</i> to possess +a mature label. Certainly Madame Dépine had no visible matrimonial +advantages over her fellow-lodger at the Hôtel des Tourterelles, +though in the symmetrical cemetery of Montparnasse (Section 22) +wreaths of glass beads testified to a copious domesticity in the far +past, and a newspaper picture of a <i>chasseur d'Afrique</i> pinned over +her bed recalled—though only the uniform was the dead soldier's—the +son she had contributed to France's colonial empire. Practically it +was two old maids—or two lone widows—whose boots turned pointed toes +towards each other in the dark cranny of the rambling, fusty corridor +of the sky-floor. Madame Dépine was round, and grew dumpier with age; +"Madame" Valière was long, and grew slimmer. Otherwise their lives ran +parallel. For the true madame of the establishment you had to turn to +Madame la Propriétaire, with her buxom bookkeeper of a daughter and +her tame baggage-bearing husband. This full-blooded, jovial creature, +with her swart moustache, represented the only Parisian success of +three provincial lives, and, in her good-nature, had permitted her +decayed townswomen—at as low a rent as was compatible with +prudence—to shelter themselves under her roof and as near it as +possible. Her house being a profitable warren of American +art-students, tempered by native journalists and decadent poets, she +could, moreover, afford to let the old ladies off coffee and candles. +They were at liberty to prepare their own <i>déjeuner</i> in winter or to +buy it outside in summer; they could burn their own candles or sit in +the dark, as the heart in them pleased; and thus they were as cheaply +niched as any one in the gay city. <i>Rentières</i> after their meticulous +fashion, they drew a ridiculous but regular amount from the mysterious +coffers of the Crédit Lyonnais.</p> + +<p>But though they met continuously in the musty corridor, and even +dined—when they did dine—at the same <i>crémerie</i>, they never spoke to +each other. Madame la Propriétaire was the channel through which they +sucked each other's history, for though they had both known her in +their girlish days at Tonnerre, in the department of Yonne, they had +not known each other. Madame Valière (Madame Dépine learnt, and it +seemed to explain the frigidity of her neighbour's manner) still +trailed clouds of glory from the service of a Princess a quarter of a +century before. Her refusal to wink at the Princess's goings-on, her +austere, if provincial, regard for the convenances, had cost her +the place, and from these purpureal heights she had fallen lower and +lower, till she struck the attic of the Hôtel des Tourterelles.</p> + +<p>But even a haloed past does not give one a licence to annoy one's +neighbours. Madame Dépine felt resentfully, and she hated Madame +Valière as a haughty minion of royalty, who kept a cough, which barked +loudest in the silence of the night.</p> + +<p>"Why doesn't she go to the hospital, your Princess?" she complained to +Madame la Propriétaire.</p> + +<p>"Since she is able to nurse herself at home," the opulent-bosomed +hostess replied with a shrug.</p> + +<p>"At the expense of other people," Madame Dépine retorted bitterly. "I +shall die of her cough, I am sure of it."</p> + +<p>Madame showed her white teeth sweetly. "Then it is you who should go +to the hospital."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + + +<p>Time wrote wrinkles enough on the brows of the two old ladies, but +his frosty finger never touched their glossy brown hair, for both wore +wigs of nearly the same shade. These wigs were almost symbolic of +the evenness of their existence, which had got beyond the reach of +happenings. The Church calendar, so richly dyed with figures of saints +and martyrs, filled life with colour enough, and fast-days were almost +as welcome as feast-days, for if the latter warmed the general air, +the former cloaked economy with dignity. As for <i>Mardi Gras</i>, that +shook you up for weeks, even though you did not venture out of your +apartment; the gay serpentine streamers remained round one's soul as +round the trees.</p> + +<p>At intervals, indeed, secular excitements broke the even tenor. A +country cousin would call upon the important Parisian relative, and +be received, not in the little bedroom, but in state in the mustily +magnificent salon of the hotel—all gold mirrors and mouldiness—which +the poor country mouse vaguely accepted as part of the glories of +Paris and success. Madame Dépine would don her ponderous gold brooch, +sole salvage of her bourgeois prosperity; while, if the visitor were +for Madame Valière, that <i>grande dame</i> would hang from her yellow, +shrivelled neck the long gold chain and the old-fashioned watch, whose +hands still seemed to point to regal hours.</p> + +<p>Another break in the monotony was the day on which the lottery was +drawn—the day of the pagan god of Luck. What delicious hopes of +wealth flamed in these withered breasts, only to turn grey and cold +when the blank was theirs again, but not the less to soar up again, +with each fresh investment, towards the heaven of the hundred thousand +francs! But if ever Madame Dépine stumbled on Madame Valière buying a +section of a <i>billet</i> at the lottery agent's, she insisted on having +her own slice cut from another number. Fortune itself would be robbed +of its sweet if the "Princess" should share it. Even their common +failure to win a sou did not draw them from their freezing depths +of silence, from which every passing year made it more difficult to +emerge. Some greater conjuncture was needed for that.</p> + +<p>It came when Madame la Propriétaire made her <i>début</i> one fine morning +in a grey wig.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + + +<p>Hitherto that portly lady's hair had been black. But now, as suddenly +as darkness vanishes in a tropic dawn, it was become light. No gradual +approach of the grey, for the black had been equally artificial. The +wig is the region without twilight. Only in the swart moustache +had the grey crept on, so that perhaps the growing incongruity had +necessitated the sudden surrender to age.</p> + +<p>To both Madame Dépine and Madame Valière the grey wig came like a blow +on the heart.</p> + +<p>It was a grisly embodiment of their secret griefs, a tantalising +vision of the unattainable. To glide reputably into a grey wig had +been for years their dearest desire. As each saw herself getting older +and older, saw her complexion fade and the crow's-feet gather, and her +eyes grow hollow, and her teeth fall out and her cheeks fall in, +so did the impropriety of her brown wig strike more and more +humiliatingly to her soul. But how should a poor old woman ever +accumulate enough for a new wig? One might as well cry for the +moon—or a set of false teeth. Unless, indeed, the lottery—?</p> + +<p>And so, when Madame Dépine received a sister-in-law from Tonnerre, or +Madame Valière's nephew came up by the excursion train from that same +quiet and incongruously christened townlet, the Parisian personage +would receive the visitor in the darkest corner of the salon, with her +back to the light, and a big bonnet on her head—an imposing figure +repeated duskily in the gold mirrors. These visits, instead of +a relief, became a terror. Even a provincial knows it is not +<i>convenable</i> for an old woman to wear a brown wig. And Tonnerre kept +strict record of birthdays.</p> + +<p>Tears of shame and misery had wetted the old ladies' hired pillows, as +under the threat of a provincial visitation they had tossed sleepless +in similar solicitude, and their wigs, had they not been wigs, would +have turned grey of themselves. Their only consolation had been that +neither outdid the other, and so long as each saw the other's brown +wig, they had refrained from facing the dread possibility of having to +sell off their jewellery in a desperate effort of emulation. Gradually +Madame Dépine had grown to wear her wig with vindictive endurance, and +Madame Valière to wear hers with gentle resignation. And now, here +was Madame la Propriétaire, a woman five years younger and ten years +better preserved, putting them both to the public blush, drawing the +hotel's attention to what the hotel might have overlooked, in its long +habituation to their surmounting brownness.</p> + +<p>More morbidly conscious than ever of a young head on old shoulders, +the old ladies no longer paused at the bureau to exchange the news +with Madame or even with her black-haired bookkeeping daughter. No +more lounging against the newel under the carved torch-bearer, while +the journalist of the fourth floor spat at the Dreyfusites, and the +poet of the <i>entresol</i> threw versified vitriol at perfidious Albion. +For the first time, too—losing their channel of communication—they +grew out of touch with each other's microscopic affairs, and their +mutual detestation increased with their resentful ignorance. And so, +shrinking and silent, and protected as far as possible by their big +bonnets, the squat Madame Dépine and the skinny Madame Valière toiled +up and down the dark, fusty stairs of the Hôtel des Tourterelles, +often brushing against each other, yet sundered by icy infinities. And +the endurance on Madame Dépine's round face became more vindictive, +and gentler grew the resignation on the angular visage of Madame +Valière.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + + +<p>"<i>Tiens!</i> Madame Dépine, one never sees you now." Madame la +Propriétaire was blocking the threshold, preventing her exit. "I was +almost thinking you had veritably died of Madame Valière's cough."</p> + +<p>"One has received my rent, the Monday," the little old lady replied +frigidly.</p> + +<p>"<i>Oh! là! là!</i>" Madame waved her plump hands. "And La Valière, too, +makes herself invisible. What has then happened to both of you? Is it +that you are doing a penance together?"</p> + +<p>"Hist!" said Madame Dépine, flushing.</p> + +<p>For at this moment Madame Valière appeared on the pavement outside +bearing a long French roll and a bag of figs, which made an excellent +lunch at low water. Madame la Propriétaire, dominatingly bestriding +her doorstep, was sandwiched between the two old ladies, her wig +aggressively grey between the two browns. Madame Valière halted +awkwardly, a bronze blush mounting to match her wig. To be seen +by Madame Dépine carrying in her meagre provisions was humiliation +enough; to be juxtaposited with a grey wig was unbearable.</p> + +<p>"<i>Maman, maman</i>, the English monsieur will not pay two francs for +his dinner!" And the distressed bookkeeper, bill in hand, shattered +the trio.</p> + +<p>"And why will he not pay?" Fire leapt into the black eyes.</p> + +<p>"He says you told him the night he came that by arrangement he could +have his dinners for one franc fifty."</p> + +<p>Madame la Propriétaire made two strides towards the refractory English +monsieur. "<i>I</i> told you one franc fifty? For <i>déjeuner</i>, yes, as many +luncheons as you can eat. But for dinner? You eat with us as one of +the family, and <i>vin compris</i> and <i>café</i> likewise, and it should +be all for one franc fifty! <i>Mon Dieu!</i> it is to ruin oneself. Come +here." And she seized the surprised Anglo-Saxon by the wrist and +dragged him towards a painted tablet of prices that hung in a dark +niche of the hall. "I have kept this hotel for twenty years, I have +grown grey in the service of artists and students, and this is the +first time one has demanded dinner for one franc fifty!"</p> + +<p>"<i>She</i> has grown grey!" contemptuously muttered Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>"Grey? She!" repeated Madame Dépine, with no less bitterness. "It is +only to give herself the air of a <i>grande dame</i>!"</p> + +<p>Then both started, and coloured to the roots of their wigs. +Simultaneously they realised that they had spoken to each other.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + + +<p>As they went up the stairs together—for Madame Dépine had quite +forgotten she was going out—an immense relief enlarged their souls. +Merely to mention the grey wig had been a vent for all this morbid +brooding; to abuse Madame la Propriétaire into the bargain was to pass +from the long isolation into a subtle sympathy.</p> + +<p>"I wonder if she did say one franc fifty," observed Madame Valière, +reflectively.</p> + +<p>"Without doubt," Madame Dépine replied viciously. "And fifty centimes +a day soon mount up to a grey wig."</p> + +<p>"Not so soon," sighed Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>"But then it is not only one client that she cheats."</p> + +<p>"Ah! at that rate wigs fall from the skies," admitted Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>"Especially if one has not to give dowries to one's nieces," said +Madame Dépine, boldly.</p> + +<p>"And if one is mean on New Year's Day," returned Madame Valière, with +a shade less of mendacity.</p> + +<p>They inhaled the immemorial airlessness of the staircase as if they +were breathing the free air of the forests depicted on its dirty-brown +wall-paper. It was the new atmosphere of self-respect that they were +really absorbing. Each had at last explained herself and her brown wig to +the other. An immaculate honesty (that would scorn to overcharge fifty +centimes even to <i>un Anglais</i>), complicated with unwedded nieces in +one case, with a royal shower of New Year's gifts in the other, had +kept them from selfish, if seemly, hoary-headedness.</p> + +<p>"Ah! here is my floor," panted Madame Valière at length, with an air +of indicating it to a thorough stranger. "Will you not come into my +room and eat a fig? They are very healthy between meals."</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine accepted the invitation, and entering her own corner +of the corridor with a responsive air of foreign exploration, passed +behind the door through whose keyhole she had so often peered. Ah! no +wonder she had detected nothing abnormal. The room was a facsimile +of her own—the same bed with the same quilt over it and the same +crucifix above it, the same little table with the same books of +devotion, the same washstand with the same tiny jug and basin, the +same rusted, fireless grate. The wardrobe, like her own, was merely a +pair of moth-eaten tartan curtains, concealing both pegs and garments +from her curiosity. The only sense of difference came subtly from the +folding windows, below whose railed balcony showed another view of the +quarter, with steam-trams—diminished to toy trains—puffing past +to the suburbs. But as Madame Dépine's eyes roved from these to the +mantel-piece, she caught sight of an oval miniature of an elegant young +woman, who was jewelled in many places, and corresponded exactly with +her idea of a Princess!</p> + +<p>To disguise her access of respect, she said abruptly, "It must be very +noisy here from the steam-trams."</p> + +<p>"It is what I love, the bustle of life," replied Madame Valière, +simply.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Madame Dépine, impressed beyond masking-point, "I suppose +when one has had the habit of Courts—"</p> + +<p>Madame Valière shuddered unexpectedly. "Let us not speak of it. Take a +fig."</p> + +<p>But Madame Dépine persisted—though she took the fig. "Ah! those were +brave days when we had still an Emperor and an Empress to drive to the +Bois with their equipages and outriders. Ah, how pretty it was!"</p> + +<p>"But the President has also"—a fit of coughing interrupted Madame +Valière—"has also outriders."</p> + +<p>"But he is so bourgeois—a mere man of the people," said Madame +Dépine.</p> + +<p>"They are the most decent sort of folk. But do you not feel cold? I +will light a fire." She bent towards the wood-box.</p> + +<p>"No, no; do not trouble. I shall be going in a moment. I have a large +fire blazing in my room."</p> + +<p>"Then suppose we go and sit there," said poor Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>Poor Madame Dépine was seized with a cough, more protracted than any +of which she had complained.</p> + +<p>"Provided it has not gone out in my absence," she stammered at last. +"I will go first and see if it is in good trim."</p> + +<p>"No, no; it is not worth the trouble of moving." And Madame Valière +drew her street-cloak closer round her slim form. "But I have lived so +long in Russia, I forget people call this cold."</p> + +<p>"Ah! the Princess travelled far?" said Madame Dépine, eagerly.</p> + +<p>"Too far," replied Madame Valière, with a flash of Gallic wit. "But +who has told you of the Princess?"</p> + +<p>"Madame la Propriétaire, naturally."</p> + +<p>"She talks too much—she and her wig!"</p> + +<p>"If only she didn't imagine herself a powdered marquise in it! To see +her standing before the mirror in the salon!"</p> + +<p>"The beautiful spectacle!" assented Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>"Ah! but I don't forget—if she does—that her mother wheeled a +fruit-barrow through the streets of Tonnerre!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! yes, I knew you were from Tonnerre—dear Tonnerre!"</p> + +<p>"How did you know?"</p> + +<p>"Naturally, Madame la Propriétaire."</p> + +<p>"The old gossip!" cried Madame Dépine—"though not so old as +she feigns. But did she tell you of her mother, too, and the +fruit-barrow?"</p> + +<p>"I knew her mother—<i>une brave femme</i>."</p> + +<p>"I do not say not," said Madame Dépine, a whit disconcerted. +"Nevertheless, when one's mother is a merchant of the four seasons—"</p> + +<p>"Provided she sold fruit as good as this! Take another fig, I beg of +you."</p> + +<p>"Thank you. These are indeed excellent," said Madame Dépine. "She owed +all her good fortune to a <i>coup</i> in the lottery."</p> + +<p>"Ah! the lottery!" Madame Valière sighed. Before the eyes of both rose +the vision of a lucky number and a grey wig.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + + +<p>The acquaintanceship ripened. It was not only their common grievances +against fate and Madame la Propriétaire: they were linked by the sheer +physical fact that each was the only person to whom the other could +talk without the morbid consciousness of an eye scrutinising the +unseemly brown wig. It became quite natural, therefore, for Madame +Dépine to stroll into her "Princess's" room, and they soon slid into +dividing the cost of the fire. That was more than an economy, for +neither could afford a fire alone. It was an easy transition to the +discovery that coffee could be made more cheaply for two, and that +the same candle would light two persons, provided they sat in the same +room. And if they did not fall out of the habit of companionship even +at the <i>crémerie</i>, though "two portions for one" were not served, +their union at least kept the sexagenarians in countenance. Two brown +wigs give each other a moral support, are on the way to a fashion.</p> + +<p>But there was more than wigs and cheese-parings in their +<i>camaraderie</i>. Madame Dépine found a fathomless mine of edification +in Madame Valière's reminiscences, which she skilfully extracted from +her, finding the average ore rich with noble streaks, though the old +tirewoman had an obstinate way of harking back to her girlhood, which +made some delvings result in mere earth.</p> + +<p>On the Day of the Dead Madame Dépine emerged into importance, taking +her friend with her to the Cemetery Montparnasse to see the glass +flowers blooming immortally over the graves of her husband and +children. Madame Dépine paid the omnibus for both (inside places), and +felt, for once, superior to the poor "Princess," who had never known +the realities of love and death.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + + +<p>Two months passed. Another of Madame Valière's teeth fell out. Madame +Dépine's cheeks grew more pendulous. But their brown wigs remained as +fadeless as the cemetery flowers.</p> + +<p>One day they passed the hairdresser's shop together. It was indeed +next to the tobacconist's, so not easy to avoid, whenever one wanted +a stamp or a postcard. In the window, amid pendent plaits of divers +hues, bloomed two wax busts of females—the one young and coquettish +and golden-haired, the other aristocratic in a distinguished grey wig. +Both wore diamond rosettes in their hair and ropes of pearls round +their necks. The old ladies' eyes met, then turned away.</p> + +<p>"If one demanded the price!" said Madame Dépine (who had already done +so twice).</p> + +<p>"It is an idea!" agreed Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>"The day will come when one's nieces will be married."</p> + +<p>"But scarcely when New Year's Day shall cease to be," the "Princess" +sighed.</p> + +<p>"Still, one might win in the lottery!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! true. Let us enter, then."</p> + +<p>"One will be enough. You go." Madame Dépine rather dreaded the +<i>coiffeur</i>, whom intercourse with jocose students had made severe.</p> + +<p>But Madame Valière shrank back shyly. "No, let us both go." She added, +with a smile to cover her timidity, "Two heads are better than one."</p> + +<p>"You are right. He will name a lower price in the hope of two orders." +And, pushing the "Princess" before her like a turret of defence, +Madame Dépine wheeled her into the ladies' department.</p> + +<p>The <i>coiffeur</i>, who was washing the head of an American girl, looked +up ungraciously. As he perceived the outer circumference of Madame +Dépine projecting on either side of her turret, he emitted a glacial +"<i>Bon jour, mesdames.</i>"</p> + +<p>"Those grey wigs—" faltered Madame Valière</p> + +<p>"I have already told your friend." He rubbed the American head +viciously.</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine coloured. "But—but we are two. Is there no reduction on +taking a quantity?"</p> + +<p>"And why then? A wig is a wig. Twice a hundred francs are two hundred +francs."</p> + +<p>"One hundred francs for a wig!" said Madame Valière, paling. "I did +not pay that for the one I wear."</p> + +<p>"I well believe it, madame. A grey wig is not a brown wig."</p> + +<p>"But you just said a wig is a wig."</p> + +<p>The <i>coiffeur</i> gave angry rubs at the head, in time with his explosive +phrases. "You want real hair, I presume—and to your measure—and to +look natural—and <i>convenable</i>!" (Both old ladies shuddered at the +word.) "Of course, if you want it merely for private theatricals—"</p> + +<p>"Private theatricals!" repeated Madame Dépine, aghast.</p> + +<p>"A <i>comédienne's</i> wig I can sell you for a bagatelle. That passes at a +distance."</p> + +<p>Madame Valière ignored the suggestion. "But why should a grey wig cost +more than any other?"</p> + +<p>The <i>coiffeur</i> shrugged his shoulders. "Since there are less grey +hairs in the world—"</p> + +<p>"<i>Comment!</i>" repeated Madame Valière, in amazement.</p> + +<p>"It stands to reason," said the <i>coiffeur</i>. "Since most persons do +not live to be old—or only live to be bald." He grew animated, +professorial almost, seeing the weight his words carried to unthinking +bosoms. "And since one must provide a fine hair-net for a groundwork, +to imitate the flesh-tint of the scalp, and since each hair of the +parting must be treated separately, and since the natural wave of the +hair must be reproduced, and since you will also need a block for it +to stand on at nights to guard its shape—"</p> + +<p>"But since one has already blocks," interposed Madame Dépine.</p> + +<p>"But since a conscientious artist cannot trust another's block! +Represent to yourself also that the shape of the head does not remain +as fixed as the dome of the Invalides, and that—"</p> + +<p>"<i>Eh bien</i>, we will think," interrupted Madame Valière, with dignity.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + + +<p>They walked slowly towards the Hôtel des Tourterelles.</p> + +<p>"If one could share a wig!" Madame Dépine exclaimed suddenly.</p> + +<p>"It is an idea," replied Madame Valière. And then each stared +involuntarily at the other's head. They had shared so many things +that this new possibility sounded like a discovery. Pleasing pictures +flitted before their eyes—the country cousin received (on a Box +and Cox basis) by a Parisian old gentlewoman <i>sans peur</i> and <i>sans +reproche</i>; a day of seclusion for each alternating with a day of +ostentatious publicity.</p> + +<p>But the light died out of their eyes, as Madame Dépine recognised +that the "Princess's" skull was hopelessly long, and Madame Valière +recognised that Madame Dépine's cranium was hopelessly round. +Decidedly either head would be a bad block for the other's wig to +repose on.</p> + +<p>"It would be more sensible to acquire a wig together, and draw lots +for it," said Madame Dépine.</p> + +<p>The "Princess's" eyes rekindled. "Yes, and then save up again to buy +the loser a wig."</p> + +<p>"<i>Parfaitement</i>" said Madame Dépine. They had slid out of pretending +that they had large sums immediately available. Certain sums still +existed in vague stockings for dowries or presents, but these, of +course, could not be touched. For practical purposes it was understood +that neither had the advantage of the other, and that the few francs +a month by which Madame Dépine's income exceeded Madame Valière's were +neutralised by the superior rent she paid for her comparative immunity +from steam-trams. The accumulation of fifty francs apiece was thus a +limitless perspective.</p> + +<p>They discussed their budget. It was really almost impossible to cut +down anything. By incredible economies they saw their way to saving +a franc a week each. But fifty weeks! A whole year, allowing for +sickness and other breakdowns! Who can do penance for a whole year? +They thought of moving to an even cheaper hotel; but then in the +course of years Madame Valière had fallen three weeks behind with the +rent, and Madame Dépine a fortnight, and these arrears would have to +be paid up. The first council ended in despair. But in the silence of +the night Madame Dépine had another inspiration. If one suppressed the +lottery for a season!</p> + +<p>On the average each speculated a full franc a week, with scarcely +a gleam of encouragement. Two francs a week each—already the year +becomes six months! For six months one can hold out. Hardships shared +are halved, too. It will seem scarce three months. Ah, how good are +the blessed saints!</p> + +<p>But over the morning coffee Madame Valière objected that they might +win the whole hundred francs in a week!</p> + +<p>It was true; it was heartbreaking.</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine made a reckless reference to her brooch, but the +Princess had a gesture of horror. "And wear your heart on your shawl +when your friends come?" she exclaimed poetically. "Sooner my watch +shall go, since that at least is hidden in my bosom!"</p> + +<p>"Heaven forbid!" ejaculated Madame Dépine. "But if you sold the other +things hidden in your bosom!"</p> + +<p>"How do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"The Royal Secrets."</p> + +<p>The "Princess" blushed. "What are you thinking of?"</p> + +<p>"The journalist below us tells me that gossip about the great sells +like Easter buns."</p> + +<p>"He is truly below us," said Madame Valière, witheringly. "What! sell +one's memories! No, no; it would not be <i>convenable</i>. There are even +people living—"</p> + +<p>"But nobody would know," urged Madame Dépine.</p> + +<p>"One must carry the head high, even if it is not grey."</p> + +<p>It was almost a quarrel. Far below the steam-tram was puffing past. +At the window across the street a woman was beating her carpet with +swift, spasmodic thwacks, as one who knew the legal time was nearly +up. In the tragic silence which followed Madame Valière's rebuke, +these sounds acquired a curious intensity.</p> + +<p>"I prefer to sacrifice the lottery rather than honour," she added, in +more conciliatory accents.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + + +<p>The long quasi-Lenten weeks went by, and unflinchingly the two old +ladies pursued their pious quest of the grey wig. Butter had vanished +from their bread, and beans from their coffee. Their morning brew +was confected of charred crusts, and as they sipped it solemnly they +exchanged the reflection that it was quite equal to the coffee at the +<i>crémerie</i>. Positively one was safer drinking one's own messes. Figs, +no longer posing as a pastime of the palate, were accepted seriously +as <i>pièces de résistance</i>. The Spring was still cold, yet fires could +be left to die after breakfast. The chill had been taken off, and by +mid-day the sun was in its full power. Each sustained the other by +a desperate cheerfulness. When they took their morning walk in the +Luxembourg Gardens—what time the blue-aproned Jacques was polishing +their waxed floors with his legs for broom-handles—they went into +ecstasies over everything, drawing each other's attention to the +sky, the trees, the water. And, indeed, of a sunshiny morning it was +heartening to sit by the pond and watch the wavering sheet of beaten +gold water, reflecting all shades of green in a restless shimmer +against the shadowed grass around. Madame Valière always had a bit +of dry bread to feed the pigeons withal—it gave a cheerful sense of +superfluity, and her manner of sprinkling the crumbs revived Madame +Dépine's faded images of a Princess scattering New Year largess.</p> + +<p>But beneath all these pretences of content lay a hollow sense of +desolation. It was not the want of butter nor the diminished meat; it +was the total removal from life of that intangible splendour of hope +produced by the lottery ticket. Ah! every day was drawn blank now. +This gloom, this gnawing emptiness at the heart, was worse than either +had foreseen or now confessed. Malicious Fate, too, they felt, would +even crown with the <i>grand prix</i> the number they would have chosen. +But for the prospective draw for the Wig—which reintroduced the +aleatory—life would scarcely have been bearable.</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine's sister-in-law's visit by the June excursion train was +a not unexpected catastrophe. It only lasted a day, but it put back +the Grey Wig by a week, for Madame Choucrou had to be fed at Duval's, +and Madame Valière magnanimously insisted on being of the party: +whether to run parallel with her friend, or to carry off the +brown wig, she alone knew. Fortunately, Madame Choucrou was both +short-sighted and colour-blind. On the other hand, she liked a <i>petit +verre</i> with her coffee, and both at a separate restaurant. But never +had Madame Valière appeared to Madame Dépine's eyes more like the +"Princess," more gay and polished and debonair, than at this little +round table on the sunlit Boulevard. Little trills of laughter came +from the half-toothless gums; long gloved fingers toyed with the +liqueur glass or drew out the old-fashioned watch to see that Madame +Choucrou did not miss her train; she spent her sou royally on a hawked +journal. When they had seen Madame Choucrou off, she proposed to dock +meat entirely for a fortnight so as to regain the week. Madame Dépine +accepted in the same heroic spirit, and even suggested the elimination +of the figs: one could lunch quite well on bread and milk, now the +sunshine was here. But Madame Valière only agreed to a week's trial of +this, for she had a sweet tooth among the few in her gums.</p> + +<p>The very next morning, as they walked in the Luxembourg Gardens, +Madame Dépine's foot kicked against something. She stooped and saw a +shining glory—a five-franc piece!</p> + +<p>"What is it?" said Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>"Nothing," said Madame Dépine, covering the coin with her foot. "My +bootlace." And she bent down—to pick up the coin, to fumble at her +bootlace, and to cover her furious blush. It was not that she wished +to keep the godsend to herself,—one saw on the instant that <i>le bon +Dieu</i> was paying for Madame Choucrou,—it was an instantaneous dread +of the "Princess's" quixotic code of honour. La Valière was capable of +flying in the face of Providence, of taking the windfall to a <i>bureau +de police</i>. As if the inspector wouldn't stick to it himself! A +purse—yes. But a five-franc piece, one of a flock of sheep!</p> + +<p>The treasure-trove was added to the heap of which her stocking was +guardian, and thus honestly divided. The trouble, however, was that, +as she dared not inform the "Princess," she could not decently back +out of the meatless fortnight. Providence, as it turned out, was +making them gain a week. As to the figs, however, she confessed on the +third day that she hungered sore for them, and Madame Valière readily +agreed to make this concession to her weakness.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + + +<p>This little episode coloured for Madame Dépine the whole dreary period +that remained. Life was never again so depressingly definite; though +curiously enough the "Princess" mistook for gloom her steady earthward +glance, as they sauntered about the sweltering city. With anxious +solicitude Madame Valière would direct her attention to sunsets, to +clouds, to the rising moon; but heaven had ceased to have attraction, +except as a place from which five-francs fell, and as soon as the +"Princess's" eye was off her, her own sought the ground again. But +this imaginary need of cheering up Madame Dépine kept Madame Valière +herself from collapsing. At last, when the first red leaves began +to litter the Gardens and cover up possible coins, the francs in the +stocking approached their century.</p> + +<p>What a happy time was that! The privations were become second nature; +the weather was still fine. The morning Gardens were a glow of pink +and purple and dripping diamonds, and on some of the trees was the +delicate green of a second blossoming, like hope in the heart of age. +They could scarcely refrain from betraying their exultation to +the Hôtel des Tourterelles, from which they had concealed their +sufferings. But the polyglot population seething round its malodorous +stairs and tortuous corridors remained ignorant that anything was +passing in the life of these faded old creatures, and even on the +day of drawing lots for the Wig the exuberant hotel retained its +imperturbable activity.</p> + +<p>Not that they really drew lots. That was a figure of speech, difficult +to translate into facts. They preferred to spin a coin. Madame Dépine +was to toss, the "Princess" to cry <i>pile ou face</i>. From the stocking +Madame Dépine drew, naturally enough, the solitary five-franc piece. +It whirled in the air; the "Princess" cried <i>face</i>. The puff-puff of +the steam-tram sounded like the panting of anxious Fate. The great +coin fell, rolled, balanced itself between two destinies, then +subsided, <i>pile</i> upwards. The poor "Princess's" face grew even longer; +but for the life of her Madame Dépine could not make her own face +other than a round red glow, like the sun in a fog. In fact, she +looked so young at this supreme moment that the brown wig quite became +her.</p> + +<p>"I congratulate you," said Madame Valière, after the steam-tram had +become a far-away rumble.</p> + +<p>"Before next summer we shall have yours too," the winner reminded her +consolingly.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + + +<p>They had not waited till the hundred francs were actually in the +stocking. The last few would accumulate while the wig was making. As +they sat at their joyous breakfast the next morning, ere starting for +the hairdresser's, the casement open to the October sunshine, Jacques +brought up a letter for Madame Valière—an infrequent incident. +Both old women paled with instinctive distrust of life. And as the +"Princess" read her letter, all the sympathetic happiness died out of +her face.</p> + +<p>"What is the matter, then?" breathed Madame Dépine.</p> + +<p>The "Princess" recovered herself. "Nothing, nothing. Only my nephew +who is marrying."</p> + +<p>"Soon?"</p> + +<p>"The middle of next month."</p> + +<p>"Then you will need to give presents!"</p> + +<p>"One gives a watch, a bagatelle, and then—there is time. It is +nothing. How good the coffee is this morning!"</p> + +<p>They had not changed the name of the brew: it is not only in religious +evolutions that old names are a comfort.</p> + +<p>They walked to the hairdresser's in silence. The triumphal procession +had become almost a dead march. Only once was the silence broken.</p> + +<p>"I suppose they have invited you down for the wedding?" said Madame +Dépine.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>They walked on.</p> + +<p>The <i>coiffeur</i> was at his door, sunning his aproned stomach, and +twisting his moustache as if it were a customer's. Emotion overcame +Madame Dépine at the sight of him. She pushed Madame Valière into the +tobacconist's instead.</p> + +<p>"I have need of a stamp," she explained, and demanded one for five +centimes. She leaned over the counter babbling aimlessly to the +proprietor, postponing the great moment. Madame Valière lost the clue +to her movements, felt her suddenly as a stranger. But finally Madame +Dépine drew herself together and led the way into the <i>coiffeurs</i>. The +proprietor, who had reëntered his parlour, reëmerged gloomily.</p> + +<p>Madame Valière took the word. "We are thinking of ordering a wig."</p> + +<p>"Cash in advance, of course," said the <i>coiffeur</i>.</p> + +<p>"<i>Comment!</i>" cried Madame Valière, indignantly. "You do not trust my +friend!"</p> + +<p>"Madame Valière has moved in the best society," added Madame Dépine.</p> + +<p>"But you cannot expect me to do two hundred francs of work and then be +left planted with the wigs!"</p> + +<p>"But who said two hundred francs?" cried Madame Dépine. "It is only +one wig that we demand—to-day at least."</p> + +<p>He shrugged his shoulders. "A hundred francs, then."</p> + +<p>"And why should we trust you with one hundred francs?" asked Madame +Dépine. "You might botch the work."</p> + +<p>"Or fly to Italy," added the "Princess."</p> + +<p>In the end it was agreed he should have fifty down and fifty on +delivery.</p> + +<p>"Measure us, while we are here," said Madame Dépine. "I will bring you +the fifty francs immediately."</p> + +<p>"Very well," he murmured. "Which of you?"</p> + +<p>But Madame Valière was already affectionately untying Madame Dépine's +bonnet-strings. "It is for my friend," she cried. "And let it be as +<i>chic</i> and <i>convenable</i> as possible!"</p> + +<p>He bowed. "An artist remains always an artist."</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine removed her wig and exposed her poor old scalp, with +its thin, forlorn wisps and patches of grey hair, grotesque, almost +indecent, in its nudity. But the <i>coiffeur</i> measured it in sublime +seriousness, putting his tape this way and that way, while Madame +Valière's eyes danced in sympathetic excitement.</p> + +<p>"You may as well measure my friend too," remarked Madame Dépine, as +she reassumed her glossy brown wig (which seemed propriety itself +compared with the bald cranium).</p> + +<p>"What an idea!" ejaculated Madame Valière. "To what end?"</p> + +<p>"Since you are here," returned Madame Dépine, indifferently. "You may +as well leave your measurements. Then when you decide yourself—Is it +not so, monsieur?"</p> + +<p>The <i>coiffeur</i>, like a good man of business, eagerly endorsed the +suggestion. "Perfectly, madame."</p> + +<p>"But if one's head should change!" said Madame Valière, trembling with +excitement at the vivid imminence of the visioned wig.</p> + +<p>"<i>Souvent femme varie</i>, madame," said the <i>coiffeur</i>. "But it is the +inside, not the outside of the head."</p> + +<p>"But you said one is not the dome of the Invalides," Madame Valière +reminded him.</p> + +<p>"He spoke of our old blocks," Madame Dépine intervened hastily. "At +our age one changes no more."</p> + +<p>Thus persuaded, the "Princess" in her turn denuded herself of her +wealth of wig, and Madame Dépine watched with unsmiling satisfaction +the stretchings of tape across the ungainly cranium.</p> + +<p>"<i>C'est bien</i>," she said. "I return with your fifty francs on the +instant."</p> + +<p>And having seen her "Princess" safely ensconced in the attic, she +rifled the stocking, and returned to the <i>coiffeur</i>.</p> + +<p>When she emerged from the shop, the vindictive endurance had vanished +from her face, and in its place reigned an angelic exaltation.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + + +<p>Eleven days later Madame Valière and Madame Dépine set out on +the great expedition to the hairdresser's to try on the Wig. The +"Princess's" excitement was no less tense than the fortunate winner's. +Neither had slept a wink the night before, but the November morning +was keen and bright, and supplied an excellent tonic. They conversed +with animation on the English in Egypt, and Madame Dépine recalled the +gallant death of her son, the <i>chasseur</i>.</p> + +<p>The <i>coiffeur</i> saluted them amiably. Yes, mesdames, it was a beautiful +morning. The wig was quite ready. Behold it there—on its block.</p> + +<p>Madame Valière's eyes turned thither, then grew clouded, and returned +to Madame Dépine's head and thence back to the Grey Wig.</p> + +<p>"It is not this one?" she said dubiously.</p> + +<p>"<i>Mais, oui</i>." Madame Dépine was nodding, a great smile +transfiguring the emaciated orb of her face. The artist's eyes +twinkled.</p> + +<p>"But this will not fit you," Madame Valière gasped.</p> + +<p>"It is a little error, I know," replied Madame Dépine.</p> + +<p>"But it is a great error," cried Madame Valière, aghast. And her angry +gaze transfixed the <i>coiffeur</i>.</p> + +<p>"It is not his fault—I ought not to have let him measure you."</p> + +<p>"Ha! Did I not tell you so?" Triumph softened her anger. "He has mixed +up the two measurements!"</p> + +<p>"Yes. I suspected as much when I went in to inquire the other day; but +I was afraid to tell you, lest it shouldn't even fit <i>you</i>."</p> + +<p>"Fit <i>me</i>!" breathed Madame Valière.</p> + +<p>"But whom else?" replied Madame Dépine, impatiently, as she whipped +off the "Princess's" wig. "If only it fits you, one can pardon him. +Let us see. Stand still, <i>ma chère</i>," and with shaking hands she +seized the grey wig.</p> + +<p>"But—but—" The "Princess" was gasping, coughing, her ridiculous +scalp bare.</p> + +<p>"But stand still, then! What is the matter? Are you a little infant? +Ah! that is better. Look at yourself, then, in the mirror. But it is +perfect!" "A true Princess," she muttered beatifically to herself. +"Ah, how she will show up the fruit-vendor's daughter!"</p> + +<p>As the "Princess" gazed at the majestic figure in the mirror, crowned +with the dignity of age, two great tears trickled down her pendulous +cheeks.</p> + +<p>"I shall be able to go to the wedding," she murmured chokingly.</p> + +<p>"The wedding!" Madame Dépine opened her eyes. "What wedding?"</p> + +<p>"My nephew's, of course!"</p> + +<p>"Your nephew is marrying? I congratulate you. But why did you not tell +me?"</p> + +<p>"I did mention it. That day I had a letter!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! I seem to remember. I had not thought of it." Then briskly: +"Well, that makes all for the best again. Ah! I was right not to scold +<i>monsieur le coiffeur</i> too much, was I not?"</p> + +<p>"You are very good to be so patient," said Madame Valière, with a sob +in her voice.</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine shot her a dignified glance. "We will discuss our +affairs at home. Here it only remains to say whether you are satisfied +with the fit."</p> + +<p>Madame Valière patted the wig, as much in approbation as in +adjustment. "But it fits me to a miracle!"</p> + +<p>"Then we will pay our friend, and wish him <i>le bon jour</i>." She +produced the fifty francs—two gold pieces, well sounding, for which +she had exchanged her silver and copper, and two five-franc pieces. +"And <i>voilà</i>," she added, putting down a franc for <i>pourboire</i>, "we +are very content with the artist."</p> + +<p>The "Princess" stared at her, with a new admiration.</p> + +<p>"<i>Merci bien</i>," said the <i>coiffeur</i>, fervently, as he counted the +cash. "Would that all customers' heads lent themselves so easily to +artistic treatment!"</p> + +<p>"And when will my friend's wig be ready?" said the "Princess."</p> + +<p>"Madame Valière! What are you saying there? Monsieur will set to work +when I bring him the fifty francs."</p> + +<p>"<i>Mais non</i>, madame. I commence immediately. In a week it shall be +ready, and you shall only pay on delivery."</p> + +<p>"You are very good. But I shall not need it yet—not till the +winter—when the snows come," said Madame Dépine, vaguely. "<i>Bon +jour</i>, monsieur;" and, thrusting the old wig on the new block, and +both under her shawl, she dragged the "Princess" out of the shop. +Then, looking back through the door, "Do not lose the measurement, +monsieur," she cried. "One of these days!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> + + +<p>The grey wig soon showed its dark side. Its possession, indeed, +enabled Madame Valière to loiter on the more lighted stairs, or dawdle +in the hall with Madame la Propriétaire; but Madame Dépine was not +only debarred from these dignified domestic attitudes, but found a new +awkwardness in bearing Madame Valière company in their walks +abroad. Instead of keeping each other in countenance—<i>duoe contra +mundum</i>—they might now have served as an advertisement for the +<i>coiffeur</i> and the <i>convenable</i>. Before the grey wig—after the grey +wig.</p> + +<p>Wherefore Madame Dépine was not so very sorry when, after a few weeks +of this discomforting contrast, the hour drew near of the "Princess's" +departure for the family wedding; especially as she was only losing +her for two days. She had insisted, of course, that the savings for +the second wig were not to commence till the return, so that Madame +Valière might carry with her a present worthy of her position and her +port. They had anxious consultations over this present. Madame Dépine +was for a cheap but showy article from the Bon Marché; but Madame +Valière reminded her that the price-lists of this enterprising firm +knocked at the doors of Tonnerre. Something distinguished (in +silver) was her own idea. Madame Dépine frequently wept during these +discussions, reminded of her own wedding. Oh, the roundabouts at +Robinson, and that delicious wedding-lunch up the tree! One was gay +then, my dear.</p> + +<p>At last they purchased a tiny metal Louis Quinze timepiece for eleven +francs seventy-five centimes, congratulating themselves on the surplus +of twenty-five centimes from their three weeks' savings. Madame +Valière packed it with her impedimenta into the carpet-bag lent her by +Madame la Propriétaire. She was going by a night train from the Gare +de Lyon, and sternly refused to let Madame Dépine see her off.</p> + +<p>"And how would you go back—an old woman, alone in these dark November +nights, with the papers all full of crimes of violence? It is not +<i>convenable</i>, either."</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine yielded to the latter consideration; but as Madame +Valière, carrying the bulging carpet-bag, was crying "<i>La porte, s'il +vous plaît</i>" to the <i>concierge</i>, she heard Madame Dépine come tearing +and puffing after her like the steam-tram, and, looking back, saw +her breathlessly brandishing her gold brooch. "<i>Tiens!</i>" she panted, +fastening the "Princess's" cloak with it. "That will give thee an +air."</p> + +<p>"But—it is too valuable. Thou must not." They had never "thou'd" each +other before, and this enhanced the tremulousness of the moment.</p> + +<p>"I do not give it thee," Madame Dépine laughed through her tears. "<i>Au +revoir, mon amie</i>."</p> + +<p>"<i>Adieu, ma chérie!</i> I will tell my dear ones of my Paris comrade." +And for the first time their lips met, and the brown wig brushed the +grey.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> + + +<p>Madame Dépine had two drearier days than she had foreseen. She kept +to her own room, creeping out only at night, when, like all cats, all +wigs are grey. After an eternity of loneliness the third day dawned, +and she went by pre-arrangement to meet the morning train. Ah, how +gaily gleamed the kiosks on the boulevards through the grey mist! What +jolly red faces glowed under the cabmen's white hats! How blithely the +birds sang in the bird-shops!</p> + +<p>The train was late. Her spirits fell as she stood impatiently at the +barrier, shivering in her thin clothes, and morbidly conscious of all +those eyes on her wig. At length the train glided in unconcernedly, +and shot out a medley of passengers. Her poor old eyes strained +towards them. They surged through the gate in animated masses, but +Madame Valière's form did not disentangle itself from them, though +every instant she expected it to jump at her eyes. Her heart +contracted painfully—there was no "Princess." She rushed round to +another exit, then outside, to the gates at the end of the drive; she +peered into every cab even, as it rumbled past. What had happened? She +trudged home as hastily as her legs could bear her. No, Madame Valière +had not arrived.</p> + +<p>"They have persuaded her to stay another day," said Madame la +Propriétaire. "She will come by the evening train, or she will write."</p> + +<p>Madame Dépine passed the evening at the Gare de Lyon, and came home +heavy of heart and weary of foot. The "Princess" might still arrive +at midnight, though, and Madame Dépine lay down dressed in her bed, +waiting for the familiar step in the corridor. About three o'clock she +fell into a heavy doze, and woke in broad day. She jumped to her feet, +her overwrought brain still heavy with the vapours of sleep, and threw +open her door.</p> + +<p>"Ah! she has already taken in her boots," she thought confusedly. "I +shall be late for coffee." She gave her perfunctory knock, and turned +the door-handle. But the door would not budge.</p> + +<p>"Jacques! Jacques!" she cried, with a clammy fear at her heart. The +<i>garçon</i>, who was pottering about with pails, opened the door with his +key. An emptiness struck cold from the neat bed, the bare walls, the +parted wardrobe-curtains that revealed nothing. She fled down the +stairs, into the bureau.</p> + +<p>"Madame Valière is not returned?" she cried.</p> + +<p>Madame la Propriétaire shook her head.</p> + +<p>"And she has not written?"</p> + +<p>"No letter in her writing has come—for anybody."</p> + +<p>"<i>O mon Dieu!</i> She has been murdered. She <i>would</i> go alone by night."</p> + +<p>"She owes me three weeks' rent," grimly returned Madame la +Propriétaire.</p> + +<p>"What do you insinuate?" Madame Dépine's eyes flared.</p> + +<p>Madame la Propriétaire shrugged her shoulders. "I am not at my first +communion. I have grown grey in the service of lodgers. And this is +how they reward me." She called Jacques, who had followed uneasily in +Madame Dépine's wake. "Is there anything in the room?"</p> + +<p>"Empty as an egg-shell, madame."</p> + +<p>"Not even the miniature of her sister?"</p> + +<p>"Not even the miniature of her sister."</p> + +<p>"Of her sister?" repeated Madame Dépine.</p> + +<p>"Yes; did I never tell you of her? A handsome creature, but she threw +her bonnet over the mills."</p> + +<p>"But I thought that was the Princess."</p> + +<p>"The Princess, too. Her bonnet will also be found lying there."</p> + +<p>"No, no; I mean I thought the portrait was the Princess's."</p> + +<p>Madame la Propriétaire laughed. "She told you so?"</p> + +<p>"No, no; but—but I imagined so."</p> + +<p>"Without doubt, she gave you the idea. <i>Quelle farceuse!</i> I don't +believe there ever was a Princess. The family was always inflated."</p> + +<p>All Madame Dépine's world seemed toppling. Somehow her own mistake +added to her sense of having been exploited.</p> + +<p>"Still," said Madame la Propriétaire with a shrug, "it is only three +weeks' rent."</p> + +<p>"If you lose it, I will pay!" Madame Dépine had an heroic burst of +faith.</p> + +<p>"As you please. But I ought to have been on my guard. Where did she +take the funds for a grey wig?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, the brown wig!" cried Madame Dépine, joyfully. "She must have +left that behind, and any <i>coiffeur</i> will give you three weeks' rent +for that alone."</p> + +<p>"We shall see," replied Madame la Propriétaire, ambiguously.</p> + +<p>The trio mounted the stairs, and hunted high and low, disturbing the +peaceful spider-webs. They peered under the very bed. Not even the +old block was to be seen. As far as Madame Valière's own chattels were +concerned, the room was indeed "empty as an egg-shell."</p> + +<p>"She has carried it away with the three weeks' rent," sneered Madame +la Propriétaire. "In my own carpet-bag," she added with a terrible +recollection.</p> + +<p>"She wished to wear it at night against the hard back of the carriage, +and guard the other all glossy for the wedding." Madame Dépine +quavered pleadingly, but she could not quite believe herself.</p> + +<p>"The wedding had no more existence than the Princess," returned Madame +la Propriétaire, believing herself more and more.</p> + +<p>"Then she will have cheated me out of the grey wig from the first," +cried Madame Dépine, involuntarily. "And I who sacrificed myself to +her!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Comment!</i> It was your wig?"</p> + +<p>"No, no." She flushed and stammered. "But <i>enfin</i>—and then, oh, +heaven! my brooch!"</p> + +<p>"She has stolen your brooch?"</p> + +<p>Great tears rolled down the wrinkled, ashen cheeks. So this was +her reward for secretly instructing the <i>coiffeur</i> to make the +"Princess's" wig first. The Princess, indeed! Ah, the adventuress! She +felt choking; she shook her fist in the air. Not even the brooch to +show when her family came up from Tonnerre, to say nothing of the wig. +Was there a God in the world at all? Oh, holy Mother! No wonder the +trickstress would not be escorted to the station—she never went to +the station. No wonder she would not sell the royal secrets to the +journalist—there were none to sell. Oh! it was all of a piece.</p> + +<p>"If I were you I should go to the bureau of police!" said Madame la +Propriétaire.</p> + +<p>Yes, she would go; the wretch should be captured, should be haled to +gaol. Even her half of the Louis Quinze timepiece recurred to poor +Madame Dépine's brain.</p> + +<p>"Add that she has stolen my carpet-bag."</p> + +<p>The local bureau telegraphed first to Tonnerre.</p> + +<p>There had been the wedding, but no Madame Valière. She had accepted +the invitation, had given notice of her arrival; one had awaited the +midnight train. The family was still wondering why the rich aunt had +turned sulky at the last hour. But she was always an eccentric; a +capricious and haughty personage.</p> + +<p>Poor Madame Dépine's recurrent "My wig! my brooch!" reduced the +official mind to the same muddle as her own.</p> + +<p>"No doubt a sudden impulse of senescent kleptomania," said the +superintendent, sagely, when he had noted down for transference to +headquarters Madame Dépine's verbose and vociferous description of +the traits and garments of the runagate. "But we will do our best +to recover your brooch and your wig." Then, with a spasm of supreme +sagacity, "Without doubt they are in the carpet-bag."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XV" id="XV"></a>XV</h2> + + +<p>Madame Dépine left the bureau and wandered about in a daze. That +monster of ingratitude! That arch-adventuress, more vicious even than +her bejewelled sister! All the long months of more than Lenten +rigour recurred to her self-pitiful mood, that futile half-year of +semi-starvation. How Madame Valière must have gorged on the sly, the +rich eccentric! She crossed a bridge to the Ile de la Cité, and came +to the gargoyled portals of Notre Dame, and let herself be drawn +through the open door, and all the gloom and glory of the building +fell around her like a soothing caress. She dropped before an altar +and poured out her grief to the Mother of Sorrows. At last she arose, +and tottered up the aisle, and the great rose-window glowed like +the window of heaven. She imagined her husband and the dead children +looking through it. Probably they wondered, as they gazed down, why +her head remained so young.</p> + +<p>Ah! but she was old, so very old. Surely God would take her soon. How +should she endure the long years of loneliness and social ignominy?</p> + +<p>As she stumbled out of the Cathedral, the cold, hard day smote her +full in the face. People stared at her, and she knew it was at the +brown wig. But could they expect her to starve herself for a whole +year?</p> + +<p>"<i>Mon Dieu!</i> Starve yourselves, my good friends. At my age, one needs +fuel."</p> + +<p>She escaped from them, and ran, muttering, across the road, and almost +into the low grey shed.</p> + +<p>Ah! the Morgue! Blessed idea! That should be the end of her. A +moment's struggle, and then—the rose-window of heaven! Hell? No, no; +the Madonna would plead for her; she who always looked so beautiful, +so <i>convenable</i>.</p> + +<p>She would peep in. Let her see how she would look when they found her. +Would they clap a grey wig upon her, or expose her humiliation even in +death?</p> + +<p>"A-a-a-h!" A long scream tore her lips apart. There, behind the glass, +in terrible waxen peace, a gash on her forehead, lay the "Princess," +so uncanny-looking without any wig at all, that she would not +have recognised her but for that moment of measurement at the +hairdresser's. She fell sobbing before the cold glass wall of the +death-chamber. Ah, God! Her first fear had been right; her brooch had +but added to the murderer's temptation. And she had just traduced this +martyred saint to the police.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me, <i>ma chérie</i>, forgive me," she moaned, not even conscious +that the attendant was lifting her to her feet with professional +interest.</p> + +<p>For in that instant everything passed from her but the great yearning +for love and reconciliation, and for the first time a grey wig seemed +a petty and futile aspiration.</p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h1><a name="CHASSE-CROISE" id="CHASSE-CROISE"></a>CHASSÉ-CROISÉ</h1> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>Contents</h3> +<p> + + +<a href="#I_">I. SET TO PARTNERS</a><br /> +<a href="#II_">II. CHASSÉ</a><br /> +<a href="#III_">III. BALANCEZ</a><br /> +<a href="#IV_">IV. CROISÉ</a><br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h2><a name="I_" id="I_"></a>I</h2> + +<h3>SET TO PARTNERS</h3> + + +<p>"Oh, look, dear, there's that poor Walter Bassett."</p> + +<p>Amber Roan looked down from the roof of the drag at the crossing +restless shuttles, weaving with feminine woof and masculine warp +the multi-coloured web of Society in London's cricket Coliseum.</p> + +<p>"Where?" she murmured, her eye wandering over the little tract of +sunlit green between the coaches with their rival Eton and Harrow +favours. Before Lady Chelmer had time to bend her pink parasol a +little more definitely, a thunder of applause turned Amber Roan's +face back towards the wickets, with a piqued expression.</p> + +<p>"It's real mean," she said. "What have I missed now?"</p> + +<p>"Only a good catch," said the Hon. Tolshunt Darcy, whose eyes had +never faltered from her face.</p> + +<p>"My, that's just the one thing I've been dying for," she pouted +self-mockingly.</p> + +<p>"Poor Walter Bassett," Lady Chelmer repeated. "I knew his mother."</p> + +<p>"Where?" Amber asked again.</p> + +<p>"In Huntingdonshire, before the property went to Algy—"</p> + +<p>"No, no, Lady Chelmer; I mean, where is poor Walter Whatsaname now?"</p> + +<p>"Why, right here," said Lady Chelmer, involuntarily borrowing from the +vocabulary of her young American protégée.</p> + +<p>"Walter Bassett!" said the Hon. Tolshunt, languidly. "Isn't that the +chap that's always getting chucked out of Parliament?"</p> + +<p>"But his name doesn't sound Irish?" queried Amber.</p> + +<p>"What are you talking about, Amber!" cried Lady Chelmer. "Why, he +comes of a good old Huntingdon family. If he had been his own elder +brother, he'd have got in long ago."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you mean he never gets <i>into</i> Parliament," said Amber.</p> + +<p>"Serve him right. I believe he's one of those independent nuisances," +said the old Marquis of Woodham. "How is one ever to govern the +country, if every man is a party unto himself?" He said "one," but +only out of modesty; for having once accepted a minor post in a +Ministry that the Premier <i>in posse</i> had not succeeded in forming, he +had retained a Cabinet air ever since.</p> + +<p>"Well, the beggar will scarcely come up at Highmead for a third +licking," observed the Hon. Tolshunt.</p> + +<p>"No, poor Walter," said Lady Chelmer. "He thought he'd be sure to +get in this time, but he's quite crushed now. Wasn't it actually two +thousand votes less than last time?"</p> + +<p>"Two thousand and thirty-three," replied Lord Woodham, with +punctilious inaccuracy.</p> + +<p>Involuntarily Amber's eyes turned in search of the crushed candidate +whom she almost saw flattened beneath the 2033 votes, and whom it +would scarcely have been a surprise to find asquat under a carriage, +humbly assisting the footmen to pack the dirty plates. But before +she had time to decide which of the unlively men, loitering round +the carriages or helping stout old dowagers up slim iron ladders, +was sufficiently lugubrious to be identified as the martyr of the +ballot-box, she was absorbed by a tall, masterful figure, whose face +had the radiance of easeful success, and whose hands were clapping at +some nuance of style which had escaped the palms of the great circular +mob.</p> + +<p>"I can't see any Walter Bassett," she murmured absently.</p> + +<p>"Why, you are staring straight at him," said Lady Chelmer.</p> + +<p>Miss Roan did not reply, but her face was eloquent of her astonishment, +and when her face spoke, it was with that vivacity which is the American +accent of beauty. What wonder if the Hon. Tolshunt Darcy paid heed to it, +although he liked what it said less than the form of expression! As he +used to put it in after days, "She gave one look, and threw herself away +from the top of that drag." The more literal truth was that she drew +Walter Bassett up to the top of that drag.</p> + +<p>Lady Chelmer protested in vain that she could not halloo to the man.</p> + +<p>"You knew his mother," Amber replied. "And he's got no seat."</p> + +<p>"Quite symbolical! He, he, he!" and the old Marquis chuckled and +cackled in solitary amusement. "Let's offer him one," he went on, half +to enjoy the joke a little longer, half to utilise the opportunity of +bringing his Ministerial wisdom to bear upon this erratic young man.</p> + +<p>"I don't see where there's room," said the Hon. Tolshunt Darcy, +sulkily.</p> + +<p>"There's room on the front bench," cackled the Marquis, shaking his +sides.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't want you to roll off for him," said Miss Roan, who +treated Ministerial Marquises with a contempt that bred in them a +delightful sense of familiarity. "Tolshunt can sit opposite me—he's +stared at the cricket long enough."</p> + +<p>Tolshunt blushed with apparent irrelevance. But even the prospect +of staring at Amber more comfortably did not reconcile him to +displacement. "It's so awkward meeting a fellow who's had a tumble," +he grumbled. "It's like having to condole with a man fresh from a +funeral."</p> + +<p>"There doesn't seem much black about Walter Bassett," Amber laughed. +And at this moment—the dull end of a "maiden over"—the radiant +personage in question turned his head, and perceiving Lady Chelmer's +massive smile, acknowledged her recognition with respectful superiority, +whereupon her Ladyship beckoned him with her best parasol manner.</p> + +<p>"I want to introduce you to my friend, Miss Roan," she said, as he +climbed to her side.</p> + +<p>"I've been reading so much about you," said that young lady, with +a sweet smile. "But you shouldn't be so independent, you know, you +really shouldn't."</p> + +<p>He smiled back. "I'm only independent till they come to my way of +thinking."</p> + +<p>Lady Chelmer gasped. "Then you still have hopes of Highmead!"</p> + +<p>"I won a moral victory there each time, Lady Chelmer."</p> + +<p>"How so, sir?" put in the Marquis. "Your opponent increased the +Government majority—"</p> + +<p>"And my reputation. A tiresome twaddler. Unfortunately," and he smiled +again, "two moral victories are as bad as a defeat. On the other hand, +a defeat at a bye-election equals a victory at a general. You play a +solo—and on your own trumpet." A burst of cheering rounded off these +remarks. This time Amber did not even inquire what it indicated—she +was almost content to take it as an endorsement of Walter Bassett's +epigrams. But Lord Woodham eagerly improved the situation. "A fine +stroke that," he said, "but a batsman outside a team doesn't play the +game."</p> + +<p>"It will be a good time for the country, Lord Woodham," Mr. Bassett +returned quietly, "when people cease to regard the Parliamentary +session as a cricket match, one side trying to bowl over or catch out +the other. But then England always <i>has</i> been a sporting nation."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you allow some good in the old country," said Lady Chelmer, +pleased. "Look at the trouble we all take to come here to encourage +the dear boys;" and the words ended with a tired sigh.</p> + +<p>"Yes, of course, that is the side on which they need encouragement," +he rejoined drily. "Majuba was lost on the playing-field of Lord's."</p> + +<p>There was a moment of shocked surprise. Lady Chelmer, herself a martyr +to the religion of sport thus blasphemed—of which she understood +as little as of any other religion—hastily tried to pour tea on the +troubled waters. But they had been troubled too deeply. For full +eight minutes the top of the drag became a political platform for +Marquis-Ministerial denunciations of Mr. Gladstone, to a hail of +repartee from the profane young man.</p> + +<p>At the end of those eight minutes—when Lady Chelmer was at last able +to reinsinuate tea into the discussion—Miss Amber Roan realised with +a sudden shock that she had not "chipped in" once, and that "poor +Walter Bassett" had commanded her ear for all that time without +pouring into it a single compliment, or, indeed, addressing to it +any observation whatever. For the first time since her début in the +Milwaukee parlour at the age of five, this spoiled daughter of the +dollar had lost sight of herself. As they walked towards the tea-tent, +through the throng of clergymen and parasols and tanned men with +field-glasses, and young bloods and pretty girls, she noted uneasily +that his eyes wandered from her to these types of English beauty, +these flower-faces under witching hats. Indeed, he had led her out of +the way to plough past a row of open carriages. "The shortest cut," he +said, "is past the prettiest woman."</p> + +<p>But he had to face her at the tea-table, where she blocked his view of +the tables beyond and plied him with strawberries and smiles under the +sullen glances of the Hon. Tolshunt Darcy and the timid cough of her +chaperon.</p> + +<p>"I wonder you waste your time on the silly elections," she said. "We +don't take much stock in Senators in America."</p> + +<p>"It's just because M.P.'s are at such a discount that I want to get +in. In the realm of the blind the one-eyed is a king."</p> + +<p>"They must be blind not to let you in," she answered with equal +frankness.</p> + +<p>"No, they see too well, if you mean the voters. They've got their eye +on the price of their vote."</p> + +<p>"What!" she cried. "You can't buy votes in England!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, can't you—"</p> + +<p>"But I'm sure I read about it in the English histories—it was all +abolished."</p> + +<p>"A good many things were abolished by the Decalogue even earlier," +he replied grimly. "Half an hour before the poll closed I could have +bought a thousand votes at a shilling each."</p> + +<p>"Well, that seems reasonable enough," said Lady Chelmer.</p> + +<p>"It was beyond my pocket."</p> + +<p>"What! Fifty pounds?" cried Amber, incredulously.</p> + +<p>The blush that followed was hers, not his. "But what became of the +thousand votes?" she asked hurriedly.</p> + +<p>He laughed. "Half an hour before the poll closed they had gone down to +sixpence apiece—like fish that wouldn't keep."</p> + +<p>"My! And were they all wasted?"</p> + +<p>"No. My rival bought them up. <i>Vide</i> the newspapers—'the polling was +unusually heavy towards the close.'"</p> + +<p>"Really!" intervened Lady Chelmer. "Then at that rate you can unseat +him for bribery."</p> + +<p>"At that rate—or higher," he replied drily. "To unseat another is +even more expensive than to seat oneself."</p> + +<p>"Why, it seems all a question of money," said Miss Amber Roan, +naively.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="II_" id="II_"></a>II</h2> + +<h3>CHASSÉ</h3> + + +<p>Lady Chelmer was glad when the season came to an end and the dancing +mice had no longer to spin dizzyingly in their gilded cage. "The +Prisoner of Pleasure" was Walter Bassett's phrase for her. Even now +she was a convict on circuit. Some of the dungeons were in ancient +castles, from which Bassett was barred, but all of which opened to +Amber's golden keys, though only because Lady Chelmer knew how to turn +them. He, however, penetrated the ducal doors through the letter-box.</p> + +<p>The Hon. Tolshunt and Lord Woodham, in their apprehension of the +common foe, began to find each other endurable. If it was politics +that attracted her, Tolshunt felt he too could stoop to a career. As +for the Marquis, he began to meditate resuming office. Both had freely +hinted to her Ladyship that to give a millionaire bride to a man who +hadn't a penny savoured of Socialism.</p> + +<p>Galled by such terrible insinuations, Lady Chelmer had dared to sound +the girl.</p> + +<p>"I love his letters," gushed Amber, bafflingly. "He writes such cute +things."</p> + +<p>"He doesn't dress very well," said Lady Chelmer, feebly fighting.</p> + +<p>"Oh, of course, he doesn't bother as much as Tolly, who looks as if he +had been poured into his clothes—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, the mould of fashion," quoted Lady Chelmer, vaguely.</p> + +<p>An eruption of Walter Bassett in the Press did not tend to allay her +Ladyship's alarm, especially as Amber began to dally with the morning +paper and the evening.</p> + +<p>Opening a new People's Library at Highmead—in the absence abroad +of the successful candidate—he had contrived to set the newspapers +sneering. He had told the People that although they might temporarily +accept such gifts as "Capital's conscience-money," yet it was as much +the duty of the parish to supply light as to supply street-lamps; +which was considered both ungracious and unsound. The donor he +described as "a millionaire of means," which was considered wilfully +paradoxical by those who did not know how great capitals are locked up +in industries. But what worked up the Press most was his denunciation +of modern journalism, in malodorous comparison with the literature +this Library would bring the People. "The journalist," he said +tersely, "is Satan's secretary." No shorter cut to notoriety could +have been devised, for it was the "Silly Season," and Satan found +plenty of mischief for his idle hands to do.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you poor man!" Amber wrote Walter. "Why don't you say you were +thinking of America—yellow journalism, and all that? The yellow +is, of course, Satan's sulphur. You would hardly believe what his +secretaries have written even of poor little me! And you should see +the pictures of 'The Milwaukee Millionairess' in the Sunday numbers!"</p> + +<p>Walter Bassett did not reply regularly and punctually to Amber's +letters, and it was a novel sensation to the jaded beauty who had +often thrown aside masculine missives after a glance at the envelope, +to find herself eagerly shuffling her morning correspondence in the +hope of turning up a trump-card. A card, indeed, it often proved, +though never a postcard, and Amber meekly repaid it fourfold. She +found it delicious to pour herself out to him; it had the pleasure +of abandonment without its humiliation. Verbally, this was the least +flirtatious correspondence she had ever maintained with the opposite +sex.</p> + +<p>So when at last, towards the end of the holiday season, the pair met +in the flesh at a country house (Lady Chelmer still protests it was +a coincidence), Walter Bassett had no apprehension of danger, and his +expression of pleasure at the coincidence was unfeigned, for he felt +his correspondence would be lightened. In nothing did he feel the want +of pence more keenly than in his inability to keep a secretary for his +public work. "Money is time," he used to complain; "the millionaire is +your only Methuselah."</p> + +<p>The house had an old-world garden, and it was here they had their +first duologue. Amber had quickly discovered that Walter was +interested in the apiaries that lay at the foot of its slope, and so +he found her standing in poetic grace among the tall sweet-peas, with +their whites and pinks and faint purples, a basket of roses in one +hand and a pair of scissors in the other.</p> + +<p>As he came to her under the quaint trellised arch, "I always feel like +a croquet ball going through the hoop," he said.</p> + +<p>"But the ball is always driven," she said.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I dare say it has the illusion of freewill. Doubtless the pieces +in that chess game, which Eastern monarchs are said to play with human +figures, come to think they move of themselves. The knight chuckles as +he makes his tortuous jump at the queen, and the bishop swoops down on +the castle with holy joy."</p> + +<p>She came imperceptibly closer to him. "Then you don't think any of us +move of ourselves?"</p> + +<p>"One or two of us in each generation. They make the puppets dance."</p> + +<p>"You admire Bismarck, I see."</p> + +<p>"Yes. A pity he didn't emigrate to your country, like so many Germans."</p> + +<p>"Do you think we need him? But he couldn't have been President. You +must be born in America."</p> + +<p>"True. Then I shall remain on here."</p> + +<p>"You're terrible ambitious, Mr. Bassett."</p> + +<p>"Yes, terrible," he repeated mockingly.</p> + +<p>"Then come and help me pick blackberries," she said, and caught him by +his own love of the unexpected. They left the formal garden, and came +out into the rabbit-warren, and toiled up and down hillocks in search +of ripe bushes, paying, as Walter said, "many pricks to the pint." +And when Amber urged him to scramble to the back of tangled bushes, +through coils of bristling briars, "You were right," he laughed; "this +<i>is</i> terrible ambitious." The best of the blackberries plucked, Amber +began a new campaign against mushrooms, and had frequent opportunities +to rebuke his clumsiness in crumbling the prizes he uprooted. She +knelt at his side to teach him, and once laid her deft fingers +instructively upon his.</p> + +<p>And just at that moment he irritatingly discovered a dead mole, and +fell to philosophising upon it and its soft, velvet, dainty skin—as +if a girl's fingers were not softer and daintier! "Look at its poor +little pale-red mouth," he went on, "gaspingly open, as in surprise at +the strange great forces that had made and killed it."</p> + +<p>"I dare say it had a good time," said Amber, pettishly.</p> + +<p>After the harvest had been carried indoors they scarcely exchanged a +word till she found him watching the bees the next morning.</p> + +<p>"Are you interested in bees?" she inquired in tones of surprise.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said. "They are the most striking example of Nature's +Bismarckism—her habit of using her creatures to work her will through +their own. <i>Sic vos non vobis.</i>"</p> + +<p>"I learnt enough Latin at College to understand that," she said; "but +I don't see how one finds out anything by just watching them hover +over their hives. I've never even been able to find the queen bee. +Won't you come and see what beautiful woods there are behind the +house? Lady Chelmer is walking there, and I ought to be joining her."</p> + +<p>"You ought to be taking her an umbrella," he said coldly. Amber looked +up at the sky. Had it been blue, she would have felt it grey. As it +<i>was</i> grey, she felt it black.</p> + +<p>"Oh, if you're afraid of a drop of rain—" And Amber walked on +witheringly. It was a clever move.</p> + +<p>Walter followed in silence. Amber did not become aware of him till she +was in the middle of an embryonic footpath through tall bracken that +made way, courtseying, for the rare pedestrian.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" She gave a little scream. "I thought you were studying the +bees—or the moles."</p> + +<p>"I have only been studying your graceful back."</p> + +<p>"How mean! Behind my back!" She laughed, pleased. "I hope you haven't +discovered anything Bismarckian about my back."</p> + +<p>"Only in the sense that I followed it, and must follow—till the path +widens."</p> + +<p>"Ah, how you must hate following—you, so terrible ambitious."</p> + +<p>"The path will widen," he said composedly.</p> + +<p>She planted her feet firm on Mother Earth—as though it were literally +her own mother—and turned a mocking head over a tantalising shoulder. +"I shall stay still right here."</p> + +<p>He smiled maliciously. "And I, too; I follow you no farther."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you are just too cute," she said with a laugh of vexation and +pleasure. "You make me go on just to make you follow; but it is really +you that make me lead. That's what you mean by Bismarckism, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"You put it beautifully."</p> + +<p>She swung round to face him. "Is there nothing you admire but Force?"</p> + +<p>"Not Force—Power!"</p> + +<p>"What's the difference?"</p> + +<p>"Force is blind."</p> + +<p>"So is love," she said. "Do you scorn that?" And her smile was daring +and dazzling.</p> + +<p>Ere he could reply Nature outdid her in dazzlement, and superadded a +crash of thunder.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said, as though there had been no interruption. "I scorn +all that is blind—even this storm that may strike you and me. Ah! the +rain," as the great drops began to fall. "Poor Lady Chelmer—without +an umbrella."</p> + +<p>"We can shelter by these shrubs." In an instant she was crouching amid +the ferns on a carpet of autumn leaves, making space for him beside +her.</p> + +<p>"Thank you—I will stand," he said coldly. "But I don't know if you're +aware these are oak-shrubs."</p> + +<p>"What of it?"</p> + +<p>"I was only thinking of the Swiss proverb about lightning, 'Vor den +Eichen sollst du weichen.' We ought to make for the beeches."</p> + +<p>"I'm not going to leave my umbrella. I am sorry you won't accept a bit +of it." And she bent the tall ferns invitingly towards him.</p> + +<p>"I don't like cowering even before the rain," he laughed. "How it +brings out the beautiful earthy smell."</p> + +<p>"One enjoys the beautiful earthy smell the better for being nearer to +the earth."</p> + +<p>He did not reply.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you dear fool," she thought. Hadn't she had heaps of Power from +childhood—over her stern old father, over her weakling mother, over +her governesses, and later over the whole tribe of "the boys," and now +in Europe over Marquises and Honourables—and could it all compare in +intensity to this delicious, poignant sense of being caught up into +a masterful personality! No, not Power but Powerlessness was life's +central reality; not to turn with iron hand the great wheels of Fate, +but to faint at a dear touch, to be sucked up as a moth in the flame. +And for him, too, it were surely as sweet to leave this strenuous +quest for dominance, or to be content with dominating her alone. Oh, +she would bring him to clear vision, to live for nothing but her, even +as she asked for nothing but him.</p> + +<p>The harsh scream of a bluejay struck a discord through her reverie. +She remembered that he had yet to be won.</p> + +<p>"But didn't you tell me people can't get power without money?" she +said, forgetting the hiatus in the conversation.</p> + +<p>"Nor with it generally," he replied, without surprise. "Money is but +a lever. You cannot move the earth unless you have force and fulcrum, +too."</p> + +<p>"But I guess a man like you must get real mad to see so many levers +lying about idle."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I shall get on without a lever, like primitive man. I have +muscles."</p> + +<p>"But it seems too bad not to be able to afford machinery."</p> + +<p>"I shall be hand-made."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and by your own hand. But won't it be slow?"</p> + +<p>"It will be sure."</p> + +<p>Every one of his speeches rang like the stroke of a hammer. Yes, +indeed he had muscles.</p> + +<p>"But how much surer <i>with</i> money! You ought to turn your career into a +company. Surely it would pay a dividend to its promoters."</p> + +<p>"The directors would interfere."</p> + +<p>"You could be chairman—with a veto."</p> + +<p>He shook his head. "The rain is dripping through your umbrella. Don't +you think we might run to the house?"</p> + +<p>"It's only an old hat." It was fresh from Paris, broad-brimmed, +beautiful, and bewitching. "Why don't you find"—she smiled +nervously—"a millionaire of means?"</p> + +<p>"And what would be his reward?"</p> + +<p>"Just Virtue's. Won't you be a light to England? And isn't it the +duty of parishes and millionaires to supply light?" She was plucking +a fern-leaf to pieces.</p> + +<p>"Millionaires' minds don't run that way."</p> + +<p>"Not male millionaires, perhaps," she said, turning her face from him +so jerkily that she shook the oak-shrub and it became a shower-bath.</p> + +<p>He looked at her, slightly startled. It was the first emotion she had +ever provoked in him, and her heart beat faster.</p> + +<p>"I really do think it is giving over now," he said, gazing at her +sopping hat.</p> + +<p>'Twas as if he had shaken the shrub again and drenched her with cold +water. He was mocking her, her and her dollars and her love.</p> + +<p>"It is quite over," she said savagely, springing up, and growing +even angrier when she found the rain had really stopped, so that her +indignation sounded only like acquiescence. She strode ahead of him, +silent, through the wet bracken, her frock growing a limp rag as it +brushed aside the glistening ferns.</p> + +<p>As she struck the broader path to the house, the cackling laugh of a +goat chained to a roadside log followed her cynically. Where had she +heard this bleat before? Ah, yes, from the Marquis of Woodham.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="III_" id="III_"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>BALANCEZ</h3> + + +<p>Walter Bassett had spoken truly. He did not admire love—that blind +force. Women seemed to him delightfully aesthetic objects—to be +kept at a distance, however closely one embraced them. They were +unreasoning beings at the best, even when unbiassed by that supreme +prejudice—love.</p> + +<p>It was not his conception of the strong man that he must needs become +as water at some woman's touch and go dancing and babbling like a +sylvan brook. Women were the light of life—he was willing enough to +admit it, but one must be able to switch the light on and off at will. +All these were reasons for not falling in love—they were not reasons +for not marrying. And so, Amber being determined to marry him, there +was really less difficulty than if it had been necessary for him to +fall in love with her.</p> + +<p>It took, however, many letters and interviews, full of the subtlest +comedy, infinite advancing and retiring, and recrossing and bowing, +and courtesying and facing and half-turning, before this leap-year +dance could end in the solemn Wedding March.</p> + +<p>"You know," she said once, "how I should love the fun of seeing you +plough your way through all the mediocrities."</p> + +<p>"That is the means, not the end," he reminded her, rebukingly. "One +only wants the world to swallow one's pills for the world's sake."</p> + +<p>"I don't believe you," she said frankly. "Else you'd move mountains +to get the money for the pills, not turn up your nose at the mountain +when it comes to you."</p> + +<p>He laughed heartily. "What a delightful confusion of metaphors! I'm +sure you've got Irish blood somewhere."</p> + +<p>"Of course I have. Did I never tell you I am descended from the kings +of Ireland?"</p> + +<p>He took off his hat mockingly. "I salute Miss Brian Boru."</p> + +<p>"You're an awfully good fellow," he told her on a later occasion. "I +almost believe I'd take your money if you were not a woman." "If I +were not a woman I should not offer it to you—I should want a career +of my own."</p> + +<p>"And my career would content you?" he asked, touched.</p> + +<p>"Absolutely," she lied. "The interest I should take in it—wouldn't +that be sufficient interest on the loan?"</p> + +<p>"There is one thing you have taught me," he said slowly—"how +conventional I am! But every prejudice in me shrinks from your +proposition, much as I admire your manliness."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it could be put on more conventional lines—superficially," +she suggested in a letter that harked back to this conversation. "One +might go through conventional forms. That adorable Disraeli—I have +just been reading his letters. How right he was not to marry for +love!"</p> + +<p>The penultimate stage of the pre-nuptial comedy was reached in the +lobby of the Opera, while Society was squeezing to its carriage. It +was after the <i>Rheingold</i>, and poor Lady Chelmer could hardly keep +her eyes open, and actually dozed off as she leaned against a wall, in +patient martyrdom. Walter Bassett had been specially irritating, for +he had not come up to the box once, and everybody knows (as the Hon. +Tolshunt had said, with unwonted brilliance) the <i>Rheingold</i> is in +heavy bars.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know you admired Wagner so much," Amber said scathingly, as +Walter pushed through the grooms. "Such a rapt devotee!"</p> + +<p>"Wagner is the greatest man of the century. He alone has been able to +change London's dinner-hour."</p> + +<p>Amber could not help smiling. "Poor Lady Chelmer!" she said, nodding +towards the drowsing dowager. "Since half-past six!"</p> + +<p>"Is that our carriage?" said the "Prisoner of Pleasure," opening her +eyes.</p> + +<p>"No, dear—I guess we are some fifty behind. Tolly and the Marquis are +watching from the pavement."</p> + +<p>The poor lady sighed and went to sleep again.</p> + +<p>"Behold the compensations of poverty," observed Walter Bassett. +"The gallery-folk have to wait and squeeze before the opera; the +carriage-folk after the opera."</p> + +<p>"You forget the places they occupy <i>during</i> the opera. Poor Wagner! +What a fight! I wish I could have helped his career." And Amber set a +wistful smile in the becoming frame of her white hood.</p> + +<p>"The form of the career appears to be indifferent to you," he said, +with a little laugh.</p> + +<p>"As indifferent as the man," she replied, meeting his eyes calmly.</p> + +<p>The faint scent of her hair mingled with his pleasurable sense of her +frank originality. For the first time the bargain really appealed +to him. He could not but see that she was easily the fairest of that +crush of fair women, and to have her prostrated at the foot of his +career was more subtly delicious than to have her surrender to his +person. The ball was at his foot in surely the most tempting form that +a ball could take. And the fact that he must leave her hurriedly to +write the musical criticism that was the price of his stall, was not +calculated to diminish his appreciation of all the kingdoms of the +world which his temptress was showing him from her high mountain.</p> + +<p>"Alas! I must go and write a notice," he sighed.</p> + +<p>"Satan's Secretary?" she queried mischievously.</p> + +<p>He started. Had he not been just thinking of her as a Satan in skirts?</p> + +<p>"<i>En attendant</i> that I become Satan's master," he replied ambiguously, +as he raised his hat.</p> + +<p>"Oh, to drive off with him into the peace and solitude of Love—away +from the grinding paths of ambition," thought Amber, when the horses +pranced up.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IV_" id="IV_"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>CROISÉ</h3> + + +<p>"Women, not measures," said the reigning wit anent the administration +which Amber's Salon held together, and in which her husband occupied a +position quite disproportionate to his nominal office, and still +more so to the almost unparalleled brevity of his career as a private +member.</p> + +<p>Few, indeed, were the recalcitrants who could resist Amber's smiles, +or her still more seductive sulkiness. Walter Bassett's many enemies +declared that the young Cabinet Minister owed his career entirely to +his wife. His admirers indignantly pointed out that he had represented +Highmead for two sessions before he met Miss Roan. The germ of truth +in this was that he had stipulated to himself that he would not accept +the contract unless Amber, too, must admit "Value received," and in +contributing a career already self-launched, and a good old Huntingdon +name, his pride was satisfied. This, however, had wasted a year or +so, while the Government was getting itself turned out, and it never +entered his brain that his crushing victory at the General +Election could owe anything to a corner in votes—at five dollars a +head—secretly made by a fair American financier.</p> + +<p>It was in the thick of the season, and Amber had just said good-bye +to the Bishop, the last of her dinner-guests. "I always say grace when +the church goes," she laughed, as she turned to her budget of unread +correspondence and shuffled the letters, as in the old days, when she +hoped to draw a letter of Walter's. But her method had become more +scientific. Recognising the writers by their crests or mottoes, she +would arrange the letters in order of precedence, alleging it was +to keep her hand in, otherwise she would always be making the most +horrible mistakes in "your Mediæval British etiquette."</p> + +<p>"Who goes first to-night?" said her husband, watching her movements +from a voluptuous arm-chair.</p> + +<p>"Only Lady Chelmer," Amber yawned, as she broke the seal.</p> + +<p>"Didn't I see the scrawl of the Honourable Tolly?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, poor dear. I do so want to know if he is happy in British +Honduras. But he must take his turn."</p> + +<p>"If he had taken his turn," Walter laughed, "he never would have got +the appointment there."</p> + +<p>"No, poor dear; it was very good of you."</p> + +<p>"Of me?" Walter's tone was even more amused. His eyes roved round the +vast drawing-room, as if with the thought that he had as little to +do with its dignified grandeur. Then his gaze rested once more on his +wife; she seemed a delicious harmony of silks and flowers and creamy +flesh-tones.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Bassett," he said softly, lingering on the proprietorial term.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Walter," she said, not looking up from her letter.</p> + +<p>"Do you realise this is the first time we have been alone together +this month?"</p> + +<p>"No? Really?" She glanced up absently.</p> + +<p>"Never mind that muddle-headed old Chelmer. I dare say she only wants +another hundred or two." He came over, took the letter and her hand +with it. "I have a great secret to tell you."</p> + +<p>Now he had captured her attention as well as her hand. Her eyes +sparkled. "A Cabinet Secret?" she said.</p> + +<p>"Yes. At this moment every newspaper office is in a fever—to-morrow +all England will be ringing with the news. It is a thunderbolt."</p> + +<p>She started up, snatching her hand away, every nerve a-quiver with +excitement. "And you kept this from me all through dinner?"</p> + +<p>"I hadn't a chance, darling—I came straight from the scrimmage."</p> + +<p>"You won't gloss it over by calling me novel names. I hate stale +thunderbolts. You might have breathed a word in my ear."</p> + +<p>"I shall make amends by beginning with the part that is only for your +ear. Do you know what next Monday is?"</p> + +<p>"The day you address your constituents, of course. Oh, I see, this +thunderbolt is going to change your speech."</p> + +<p>"Is going to change my speech altogether. Next Monday is the seventh +anniversary of our wedding."</p> + +<p>"Is it? But what has that to do with your speech at Highmead?"</p> + +<p>"Everything." He smiled mysteriously, then went on softly, "Amber, do +you remember our honeymoon?"</p> + +<p>She smiled faintly. "Oh, I haven't quite forgotten."</p> + +<p>"If you had quite forgotten the misery of it, I should be glad."</p> + +<p>"I have quite forgotten."</p> + +<p>"You are kinder than I deserve. But I was so startled to find my +career was less to you than a kiss that I was more churlish than I +need have been. I even wished that you might have a child, so that you +might be taken up with it instead of with me."</p> + +<p>She blushed. "Yes, I dare say I showed my hand clumsily as soon as it +held all the aces."</p> + +<p>"Ah, Amber, you were an angel and I was a beast. How gallantly you +swallowed your disappointment in your bargain, how loyally you worked +heart and soul that I might gain my one ideal—Power!"</p> + +<p>"It was a labour of love," she said deprecatingly.</p> + +<p>"My noble Amber. But did you think, selfishly engrossed though I have +been with the Fight for Power, that this love-labour of yours was lost +on me? No, 'terrible ambitious' as I was, I could still see I got the +blackberries and you little more than the scratches, and the less you +began to press your claim upon my heart, the more my heart was opening +out with an answering passion. I began to watch the play of your eyes, +the shimmer of light across your cheek, the roguish pout of your lips, +the lock that strayed across your temple—as it is straying now."</p> + +<p>She pushed it back impatiently. "But what has all this to do with the +Cabinet Secret?"</p> + +<p>"Patience, darling! How much nicer to listen to you than to the +Opposition."</p> + +<p>"I shall be in the Opposition unless you get along faster."</p> + +<p>"That is what I want—your face opposite me always, instead of +bald-headed babblers. Ah, if you knew how often, of late, it has +floated before me in the House, reducing historic wrangles to +the rocking of children's boats in stormy ponds, accentuating the +ponderous futility." He took her hand again, and a great joy filled +him as he felt its gentle responsive pressure.</p> + +<p>"Ponderous, perhaps," she said, smiling faintly; "but not futile, +Walter."</p> + +<p>"Futile, so far as I am concerned, dearest. Ah, you are right. Love +is the only reality—everything else a game played with counters. What +are our winnings? A few cheers drowned in the roar that greets +the winning jockey, a few leading articles, stale as yesterday's +newspaper."</p> + +<p>"But the good to the masses—" she reminded him.</p> + +<p>"Don't mock me with my own phrases, darling. The masses have done me +more good than I can ever do them. Next Monday, dear Amber Roan, we'll +try our honeymoon over again." And his lips sought hers.</p> + +<p>She drew back. "Yes, yes, after the Speech. But now—the Secret!"</p> + +<p>"There will be no speech—that is the secret."</p> + +<p>She drew away from him altogether. "No speech!" she gasped.</p> + +<p>"None save to your adorable ear—and the moonlit waters. Woodham has +lent us his yacht—"</p> + +<p>"In the middle of a Cabinet Crisis?"</p> + +<p>"Which concerns me less than anybody." And he beamed happily.</p> + +<p>"Less than anybody?" she repeated.</p> + +<p>"Yes—since it is my resignation that makes the crisis."</p> + +<p>She fell back into a chair, white and trembling. "You have resigned!"</p> + +<p>"For ever. And now, hey for the great round, wonderful world! Don't +you hear our keel cutting the shimmering waters?"</p> + +<p>"No," she said savagely. "I hear only Woodham's mocking +laughter!... And it sounds like a goat bleating."</p> + +<p>"Darling!" he cried in amaze.</p> + +<p>"I told you not to 'darling' me. How dared you change our lives +without a word of consultation?"</p> + +<p>"Amber!" His voice was pained now. "I prepared a surprise for the +anniversary of our wedding. One can't consult about surprises."</p> + +<p>"Keep your quibbles for the House! But perhaps there is no House, +either."</p> + +<p>"Naturally. I have done with it all. I have written for the Chiltern +Hundreds."</p> + +<p>"You are mad, Walter. You must take it all back."</p> + +<p>"I can't, Amber. I have quarrelled hopelessly with the Party. The +Prime Minister will never forgive what I said at the Council to-day. +The luxury of speaking one's mind is expensive. I ought never to have +joined any Party. I am only fit to be Independent."</p> + +<p>"Independence leads nowhere." She rose angrily. "And this is to be the +end of your Career! The Career you married me for!"</p> + +<p>"I did wrong, Amber. But before one finds the true God, one worships +idols."</p> + +<p>"And what is the true God, pray?"</p> + +<p>"The one whose angel and minister you have always been, Amber"—he +lowered his voice reverently—"Love."</p> + +<p>"Love!" Her voice was bitter. "Any bench in the Park, any alley in +Highmead, swarms with Love." 'Twas as if Cæsar had skipped from his +imperial chariot to a sociable.</p> + +<p>All her childish passion for directing the life of the household, +all her girlish relish in keeping lovers in leading strings, all +that unconscious love of Power which—inversely—had attracted her +to Walter Bassett, and which had found so delightful a scope in her +political activities, leapt—now that her Salon was threatened with +extinction—into agonised consciousness of itself.</p> + +<p>Through this brilliant husband of hers, she had touched the destinies +of England, pulled the strings of Empire. Oh, the intoxication of the +fight—the fight for which she had seconded and sponged him! Oh, +the rapture of intriguing against his enemies—himself included—the +feminine triumph of managing Goodman Waverer or Badman Badgerer!</p> + +<p>And now—oh, she could no longer control her sobs!</p> + +<p>He tried to soothe her, to caress her, but she repulsed him.</p> + +<p>"Go to your yacht—to your miserable shimmering waters. I shall spend +my honeymoon here alone.... You discovered I was Irish."</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h1><a name="THE_WOMAN_BEATER" id="THE_WOMAN_BEATER"></a>THE WOMAN BEATER</h1> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>Contents</h3> + +<p> + + +<a href="#I.">I</a><br /> +<a href="#II.">II</a><br /> +<a href="#III.">III</a><br /> +<a href="#IV.">IV</a><br /> +<a href="#V.">V</a><br /> +<a href="#VI.">VI</a><br /> +</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2><a name="I." id="I."></a>I</h2> + + +<p>She came "to meet John Lefolle," but John Lefolle did not know he was +to meet Winifred Glamorys. He did not even know he was himself the +meeting-point of all the brilliant and beautiful persons, assembled in +the publisher's Saturday Salon, for although a youthful minor poet, he +was modest and lovable. Perhaps his Oxford tutorship was sobering. +At any rate his head remained unturned by his precocious fame, and +to meet these other young men and women—his reverend seniors on +the slopes of Parnassus—gave him more pleasure than the receipt of +"royalties." Not that his publisher afforded him much opportunity of +contrasting the two pleasures. The profits of the Muse went to provide +this room of old furniture and roses, this beautiful garden a-twinkle +with Japanese lanterns, like gorgeous fire-flowers blossoming under +the white crescent-moon of early June.</p> + +<p>Winifred Glamorys was not literary herself. She was better than +a poetess, she was a poem. The publisher always threw in a few +realities, and some beautiful brainless creature would generally be +found the nucleus of a crowd, while Clio in spectacles languished in a +corner. Winifred Glamorys, however, was reputed to have a tongue that +matched her eye; paralleling with whimsies and epigrams its freakish +fires and witcheries, and, assuredly, flitting in her white gown +through the dark balmy garden, she seemed the very spirit of +moonlight, the subtle incarnation of night and roses.</p> + +<p>When John Lefolle met her, Cecilia was with her, and the first +conversation was triangular. Cecilia fired most of the shots; she was +a bouncing, rattling beauty, chockful of confidence and high spirits, +except when asked to do the one thing she could do—sing! Then she +became—quite genuinely—a nervous, hesitant, pale little thing. +However, the suppliant hostess bore her off, and presently her rich +contralto notes passed through the garden, adding to its passion +and mystery, and through the open French windows, John could see her +standing against the wall near the piano, her head thrown back, her +eyes half-closed, her creamy throat swelling in the very abandonment +of artistic ecstasy.</p> + +<p>"What a charming creature!" he exclaimed involuntarily.</p> + +<p>"That is what everybody thinks, except her husband," Winifred laughed.</p> + +<p>"Is he blind then?" asked John with his cloistral <i>naïveté</i>.</p> + +<p>"Blind? No, love is blind. Marriage is never blind."</p> + +<p>The bitterness in her tone pierced John. He felt vaguely the passing +of some icy current from unknown seas of experience. Cecilia's voice +soared out enchantingly.</p> + +<p>"Then, marriage must be deaf," he said, "or such music as that would +charm it."</p> + +<p>She smiled sadly. Her smile was the tricksy play of moonlight among +clouds of faëry.</p> + +<p>"You have never been married," she said simply.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean that you, too, are neglected?" something impelled him to +exclaim.</p> + +<p>"Worse," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"It is incredible!" he cried. "You!"</p> + +<p>"Hush! My husband will hear you."</p> + +<p>Her warning whisper brought him into a delicious conspiracy with her. +"Which is your husband?" he whispered back.</p> + +<p>"There! Near the casement, standing gazing open-mouthed at Cecilia. +He always opens his mouth when she sings. It is like two toys moved by +the same wire."</p> + +<p>He looked at the tall, stalwart, ruddy-haired Anglo-Saxon. "Do you +mean to say he—?"</p> + +<p>"I mean to say nothing."</p> + +<p>"But you said—"</p> + +<p>"I said 'worse.'"</p> + +<p>"Why, what can be worse?"</p> + +<p>She put her hand over her face. "I am ashamed to tell you." How +adorable was that half-divined blush!</p> + +<p>"But you must tell me everything." He scarcely knew how he had leapt +into this <i>rôle</i> of confessor. He only felt they were "moved by the +same wire."</p> + +<p>Her head drooped on her breast. "He—beats—me."</p> + +<p>"What!" John forgot to whisper. It was the greatest shock his recluse +life had known, compact as it was of horror at the revelation, shamed +confusion at her candour, and delicious pleasure in her confidence.</p> + +<p>This fragile, exquisite creature under the rod of a brutal bully!</p> + +<p>Once he had gone to a wedding reception, and among the serious +presents some grinning Philistine drew his attention to an uncouth +club—"a wife-beater" he called it. The flippancy had jarred upon +John terribly: this intrusive reminder of the customs of the slums. It +grated like Billingsgate in a boudoir. Now that savage weapon recurred +to him—for a lurid instant he saw Winifred's husband wielding it. +Oh, abomination of his sex! And did he stand there, in his immaculate +evening dress, posing as an English gentleman? Even so might some +gentleman burglar bear through a salon his imperturbable swallow-tail.</p> + +<p>Beat a woman! Beat that essence of charm and purity, God's best gift +to man, redeeming him from his own grossness! Could such things +be? John Lefolle would as soon have credited the French legend that +English wives are sold in Smithfield. No! it could not be real that +this flower-like figure was thrashed.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say—?" he cried. The rapidity of her confidence alone +made him feel it all of a dreamlike unreality.</p> + +<p>"Hush! Cecilia's singing!" she admonished him with an unexpected +smile, as her fingers fell from her face.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you have been making fun of me." He was vastly relieved. "He +beats you—at chess—or at lawn-tennis?"</p> + +<p>"Does one wear a high-necked dress to conceal the traces of chess, or +lawn-tennis?"</p> + +<p>He had not noticed her dress before, save for its spiritual whiteness. +Susceptible though he was to beautiful shoulders, Winifred's +enchanting face had been sufficiently distracting. Now the thought +of physical bruises gave him a second spasm of righteous horror. That +delicate rose-leaf flesh abraded and lacerated!</p> + +<p>"The ruffian! Does he use a stick or a fist?"</p> + +<p>"Both! But as a rule he just takes me by the arms and shakes me like a +terrier. I'm all black and blue now."</p> + +<p>"Poor butterfly!" he murmured poetically.</p> + +<p>"Why did I tell you?" she murmured back with subtler poetry.</p> + +<p>The poet thrilled in every vein. "Love at first sight," of which he +had often read and often written, was then a reality! It could be +as mutual, too, as Romeo's and Juliet's. But how awkward that Juliet +should be married and her husband a Bill Sykes in broadcloth!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="II." id="II."></a>II</h2> + + +<p>Mrs. Glamorys herself gave "At Homes," every Sunday afternoon, and so, +on the morrow, after a sleepless night mitigated by perpended sonnets, +the love-sick young tutor presented himself by invitation at the +beautiful old house in Hampstead. He was enchanted to find his heart's +mistress set in an eighteenth-century frame of small-paned windows and +of high oak-panelling, and at once began to image her dancing minuets +and playing on virginals. Her husband was absent, but a broad band +of velvet round Winifred's neck was a painful reminder of his +possibilities. Winifred, however, said it was only a touch of sore +throat caught in the garden. Her eyes added that there was nothing in +the pathological dictionary which she would not willingly have caught +for the sake of those divine, if draughty moments; but that, alas! it +was more than a mere bodily ailment she had caught there.</p> + +<p>There were a great many visitors in the two delightfully quaint +rooms, among whom he wandered disconsolate and admired, jealous of her +scattered smiles, but presently he found himself seated by her side on +a "cosy corner" near the open folding-doors, with all the other guests +huddled round a violinist in the inner room. How Winifred had managed +it he did not know, but she sat plausibly in the outer room, awaiting +new-comers, and this particular niche was invisible, save to a +determined eye. He took her unresisting hand—that dear, warm hand, +with its begemmed artistic fingers, and held it in uneasy beatitude. +How wonderful! She—the beautiful and adored hostess, of whose +sweetness and charm he heard even her own guests murmur to one +another—it was her actual flesh-and-blood hand that lay in +his—thrillingly tangible. Oh, adventure beyond all merit, beyond +all hoping!</p> + +<p>But every now and then, the outer door facing them would open on some +new-comer, and John had hastily to release her soft magnetic fingers +and sit demure, and jealously overhear her effusive welcome to those +innocent intruders, nor did his brow clear till she had shepherded +them within the inner fold. Fortunately, the refreshments were in this +section, so that once therein, few of the sheep strayed back, and +the jiggling wail of the violin was succeeded by a shrill babble +of tongues and the clatter of cups and spoons. "Get me an ice, +please—strawberry," she ordered John during one of these forced +intervals in manual flirtation; and when he had steered laboriously +to and fro, he found a young actor beside her <i>their</i> hands dispart. He +stood over them with a sickly smile, while Winifred ate her ice. When +he returned from depositing the empty saucer, the player-fellow was +gone, and in remorse for his mad suspicion he stooped and reverently +lifted her fragrant finger-tips to his lips. The door behind his back +opened abruptly.</p> + +<p>"Good-by," she said, rising in a flash. The words had the calm +conventional cadence, and instantly extorted from him—amid all his +dazedness—the corresponding "Good-by." When he turned and saw it was +Mr. Glamorys who had come in, his heart leapt wildly at the +nearness of his escape. As he passed this masked ruffian, he nodded +perfunctorily and received a cordial smile. Yes, he was handsome and +fascinating enough externally, this blonde savage.</p> + +<p>"A man may smile and smile and be a villain," John thought. "I wonder +how he'd feel, if he knew I knew he beats women."</p> + +<p>Already John had generalised the charge. "I hope Cecilia will keep him +at arm's length," he had said to Winifred, "if only that she may not +smart for it some day."</p> + +<p>He lingered purposely in the hall to get an impression of the brute, +who had begun talking loudly to a friend with irritating bursts of +laughter, speciously frank-ringing. Golf, fishing, comic operas—ah, +the Boeotian! These were the men who monopolised the ethereal +divinities.</p> + +<p>But this brusque separation from his particular divinity was +disconcerting. How to see her again? He must go up to Oxford in the +morning, he wrote her that night, but if she could possibly let him +call during the week he would manage to run down again.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Oh, my dear, dreaming poet," she wrote to Oxford, "how could you +possibly send me a letter to be laid on the breakfast-table beside +<i>The Times</i>! With a poem in it, too. Fortunately my husband was in +a hurry to get down to the City, and he neglected to read my +correspondence. ('The unchivalrous blackguard,' John commented. 'But +what can be expected of a woman beater?') Never, never write to me +again at the house. A letter, care of Mrs. Best, 8A Foley Street, +W.C., will always find me. She is my maid's mother. And you must not +come here either, my dear handsome head-in-the-clouds, except to my +'At Homes,' and then only at judicious intervals. I shall be walking +round the pond in Kensington Gardens at four next Wednesday, unless +Mrs. Best brings me a letter to the contrary. And now thank you for +your delicious poem; I do not recognise my humble self in the dainty +lines, but I shall always be proud to think I inspired them. Will it +be in the new volume? I have never been in print before; it will be +a novel sensation. I cannot pay you song for song, only feeling for +feeling. Oh, John Lefolle, why did we not meet when I had still my +girlish dreams? Now, I have grown to distrust all men—to fear the +brute beneath the cavalier...."</p></div> + +<p>Mrs. Best did bring her a letter, but it was not to cancel the +appointment, only to say he was not surprised at her horror of the +male sex, but that she must beware of false generalisations. Life was +still a wonderful and beautiful thing—<i>vide</i> poem enclosed. He was +counting the minutes till Wednesday afternoon. It was surely a popular +mistake that only sixty went to the hour.</p> + +<p>This chronometrical reflection recurred to him even more poignantly in +the hour that he circumambulated the pond in Kensington Gardens. +Had she forgotten—had her husband locked her up? What could have +happened? It seemed six hundred minutes, ere, at ten past five she +came tripping daintily towards him. His brain had been reduced to +insanely devising problems for his pupils—if a man walks two strides +of one and a half feet a second round a lake fifty acres in area, +in how many turns will he overtake a lady who walks half as fast and +isn't there?—but the moment her pink parasol loomed on the horizon, +all his long misery vanished in an ineffable peace and uplifting. +He hurried, bare-headed, to clasp her little gloved hand. He had +forgotten her unpunctuality, nor did she remind him of it.</p> + +<p>"How sweet of you to come all that way," was all she said, and it was +a sufficient reward for the hours in the train and the six hundred +minutes among the nursemaids and perambulators. The elms were in their +glory, the birds were singing briskly, the water sparkled, the sunlit +sward stretched fresh and green—it was the loveliest, coolest moment +of the afternoon. John instinctively turned down a leafy avenue. +Nature and Love! What more could poet ask?</p> + +<p>"No, we can't have tea by the Kiosk," Mrs. Glamorys protested. "Of +course I love anything that savours of Paris, but it's become so +fashionable. There will be heaps of people who know me. I suppose +you've forgotten it's the height of the season. I know a quiet little +place in the High Street." She led him, unresisting but bemused, +towards the gate, and into a confectioner's. Conversation languished +on the way.</p> + +<p>"Tea," he was about to instruct the pretty attendant.</p> + +<p>"Strawberry ices," Mrs. Glamorys remarked gently. "And some of those +nice French cakes."</p> + +<p>The ice restored his spirits, it was really delicious, and he had +got so hot and tired, pacing round the pond. Decidedly Winifred was +a practical person and he was a dreamer. The pastry he dared not +touch—being a genius—but he was charmed at the gaiety with which +Winifred crammed cake after cake into her rosebud of a mouth. What an +enchanting creature! How bravely she covered up her life's tragedy!</p> + +<p>The thought made him glance at her velvet band—it was broader than +ever.</p> + +<p>"He has beaten you again!" he murmured furiously. Her joyous eyes +saddened, she hung her head, and her fingers crumbled the cake. "What +is his pretext?" he asked, his blood burning.</p> + +<p>"Jealousy," she whispered.</p> + +<p>His blood lost its glow, ran cold. He felt the bully's blows on his +own skin, his romance turning suddenly sordid. But he recovered his +courage. He, too, had muscles. "But I thought he just missed seeing me +kiss your hand."</p> + +<p>She opened her eyes wide. "It wasn't you, you darling old dreamer."</p> + +<p>He was relieved and disturbed in one.</p> + +<p>"Somebody else?" he murmured. Somehow the vision of the player-fellow +came up.</p> + +<p>She nodded. "Isn't it lucky he has himself drawn a red-herring across +the track? I didn't mind his blows—you were safe!" Then, with one of +her adorable transitions, "I am dreaming of another ice," she cried +with roguish wistfulness.</p> + +<p>"I was afraid to confess my own greediness," he said, laughing. He +beckoned the waitress. "Two more."</p> + +<p>"We haven't got any more strawberries," was her unexpected reply. +"There's been such a run on them to-day."</p> + +<p>Winifred's face grew overcast. "Oh, nonsense!" she pouted. To John the +moment seemed tragic.</p> + +<p>"Won't you have another kind?" he queried. He himself liked any kind, +but he could scarcely eat a second ice without her.</p> + +<p>Winifred meditated. "Coffee?" she queried.</p> + +<p>The waitress went away and returned with a face as gloomy as +Winifred's. "It's been such a hot day," she said deprecatingly. "There +is only one ice in the place and that's Neapolitan."</p> + +<p>"Well, bring two Neapolitans," John ventured.</p> + +<p>"I mean there is only one Neapolitan ice left."</p> + +<p>"Well, bring that. I don't really want one."</p> + +<p>He watched Mrs. Glamorys daintily devouring the solitary ice, and felt +a certain pathos about the parti-coloured oblong, a something of +the haunting sadness of "The Last Rose of Summer." It would make +a graceful, serio-comic triolet, he was thinking. But at the last +spoonful, his beautiful companion dislocated his rhymes by her sudden +upspringing.</p> + +<p>"Goodness gracious," she cried, "how late it is!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you're not leaving me yet!" he said. A world of things sprang to +his brain, things that he was going to say—to arrange. They had said +nothing—not a word of their love even; nothing but cakes and ices.</p> + +<p>"Poet!" she laughed. "Have you forgotten I live at Hampstead?" She +picked up her parasol. "Put me into a hansom, or my husband will be +raving at his lonely dinner-table."</p> + +<p>He was so dazed as to be surprised when the waitress blocked his +departure with a bill. When Winifred was spirited away, he remembered +she might, without much risk, have given him a lift to Paddington. He +hailed another hansom and caught the next train to Oxford. But he was +too late for his own dinner in Hall.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="III." id="III."></a>III</h2> + + +<p>He was kept very busy for the next few days, and could only exchange a +passionate letter or two with her. For some time the examination +fever had been raging, and in every college poor patients sat with wet +towels round their heads. Some, who had neglected their tutor all the +term, now strove to absorb his omniscience in a sitting.</p> + +<p>On the Monday, John Lefolle was good-naturedly giving a special +audience to a muscular dunce, trying to explain to him the political +effects of the Crusades, when there was a knock at the sitting-room +door, and the scout ushered in Mrs. Glamorys. She was bewitchingly +dressed in white, and stood in the open doorway, smiling—an +embodiment of the summer he was neglecting. He rose, but his tongue +was paralysed. The dunce became suddenly important—a symbol of the +decorum he had been outraging. His soul, torn so abruptly from history +to romance, could not get up the right emotion. Why this imprudence of +Winifred's? She had been so careful heretofore.</p> + +<p>"What a lot of boots there are on your staircase!" she said gaily.</p> + +<p>He laughed. The spell was broken. "Yes, the heap to be cleaned is +rather obtrusive," he said, "but I suppose it is a sort of tradition."</p> + +<p>"I think I've got hold of the thing pretty well now, sir." The dunce +rose and smiled, and his tutor realised how little the dunce had to +learn in some things. He felt quite grateful to him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, well, you'll come and see me again after lunch, won't you, if one +or two points occur to you for elucidation," he said, feeling vaguely +a liar, and generally guilty. But when, on the departure of the dunce, +Winifred held out her arms, everything fell from him but the sense of +the exquisite moment. Their lips met for the first time, but only for +an instant. He had scarcely time to realise that this wonderful thing +had happened before the mobile creature had darted to his book-shelves +and was examining a Thucydides upside down.</p> + +<p>"How clever to know Greek!" she exclaimed. "And do you really talk it +with the other dons?"</p> + +<p>"No, we never talk shop," he laughed. "But, Winifred, what made you +come here?"</p> + +<p>"I had never seen Oxford. Isn't it beautiful?"</p> + +<p>"There's nothing beautiful <i>here</i>," he said, looking round his sober +study.</p> + +<p>"No," she admitted; "there's nothing I care for here," and had left +another celestial kiss on his lips before he knew it. "And now you +must take me to lunch and on the river."</p> + +<p>He stammered, "I have—work."</p> + +<p>She pouted. "But I can't stay beyond to-morrow morning, and I want so +much to see all your celebrated oarsmen practising."</p> + +<p>"You are not staying over the night?" he gasped.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I am," and she threw him a dazzling glance.</p> + +<p>His heart went pit-a-pat. "Where?" he murmured.</p> + +<p>"Oh, some poky little hotel near the station. The swell hotels are +full."</p> + +<p>He was glad to hear she was not conspicuously quartered.</p> + +<p>"So many people have come down already for Commem," he said. "I +suppose they are anxious to see the Generals get their degrees. But +hadn't we better go somewhere and lunch?"</p> + +<p>They went down the stone staircase, past the battalion of boots, and +across the quad. He felt that all the windows were alive with +eyes, but she insisted on standing still and admiring their ivied +picturesqueness. After lunch he shamefacedly borrowed the dunce's +punt. The necessities of punting, which kept him far from her, and +demanded much adroit labour, gradually restored his self-respect, and +he was able to look the uncelebrated oarsmen they met in the eyes, +except when they were accompanied by their parents and sisters, which +subtly made him feel uncomfortable again. But Winifred, piquant under +her pink parasol, was singularly at ease, enraptured with the changing +beauty of the river, applauding with childish glee the wild flowers on +the banks, or the rippling reflections in the water.</p> + +<p>"Look, look!" she cried once, pointing skyward. He stared upwards, +expecting a balloon at least. But it was only "Keats' little rosy +cloud," she explained. It was not her fault if he did not find the +excursion unreservedly idyllic.</p> + +<p>"How stupid," she reflected, "to keep all those nice boys cooped up +reading dead languages in a spot made for life and love."</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid they don't disturb the dead languages so much as you +think," he reassured her, smiling. "And there will be plenty of +love-making during Commem."</p> + +<p>"I am so glad. I suppose there are lots of engagements that week."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes—but not one per cent come to anything."</p> + +<p>"Really? Oh, how fickle men are!"</p> + +<p>That seemed rather question-begging, but he was so thrilled by +the implicit revelation that she could not even imagine feminine +inconstancy, that he forebore to draw her attention to her inadequate +logic.</p> + +<p>So childish and thoughtless indeed was she that day that nothing would +content her but attending a "Viva," which he had incautiously informed +her was public.</p> + +<p>"Nobody will notice us," she urged with strange unconsciousness of her +loveliness. "Besides, they don't know I'm not your sister."</p> + +<p>"The Oxford intellect is sceptical," he said, laughing. "It cultivates +philosophical doubt."</p> + +<p>But, putting a bold face on the matter, and assuming a fraternal air, +he took her to the torture-chamber, in which candidates sat dolefully +on a row of chairs against the wall, waiting their turn to come before +the three grand inquisitors at the table. Fortunately, Winifred and he +were the only spectators; but unfortunately they blundered in at +the very moment when the poor owner of the punt was on the rack. The +central inquisitor was trying to extract from him information about +à Becket, almost prompting him with the very words, but without +penetrating through the duncical denseness. John Lefolle breathed more +freely when the Crusades were broached; but, alas, it very soon became +evident that the dunce had by no means "got hold of the thing." As the +dunce passed out sadly, obviously ploughed, John Lefolle suffered more +than he. So conscience-stricken was he that, when he had accompanied +Winifred as far as her hotel, he refused her invitation to come in, +pleading the compulsoriness of duty and dinner in Hall. But he could +not get away without promising to call in during the evening.</p> + +<p>The prospect of this visit was with him all through dinner, at once +tempting and terrifying. Assuredly there was a skeleton at his +feast, as he sat at the high table, facing the Master. The venerable +portraits round the Hall seemed to rebuke his romantic waywardness. In +the common-room, he sipped his port uneasily, listening as in a daze +to the discussion on Free Will, which an eminent stranger had stirred +up. How academic it seemed, compared with the passionate realities +of life. But somehow he found himself lingering on at the academic +discussion, postponing the realities of life. Every now and again, he +was impelled to glance at his watch; but suddenly murmuring, "It is +very late," he pulled himself together, and took leave of his learned +brethren. But in the street the sight of a telegraph office drew his +steps to it, and almost mechanically he wrote out the message: "Regret +detained. Will call early in morning."</p> + +<p>When he did call in the morning, he was told she had gone back to +London the night before on receipt of a telegram. He turned away with +a bitter pang of disappointment and regret.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IV." id="IV."></a>IV</h2> + + +<p>Their subsequent correspondence was only the more amorous. The reason +she had fled from the hotel, she explained, was that she could not +endure the night in those stuffy quarters. He consoled himself with +the hope of seeing much of her during the Long Vacation. He did see +her once at her own reception, but this time her husband wandered +about the two rooms. The cosy corner was impossible, and they could +only manage to gasp out a few mutual endearments amid the buzz and +movement, and to arrange a <i>rendezvous</i> for the end of July. When the +day came, he received a heart-broken letter, stating that her husband +had borne her away to Goodwood. In a postscript she informed him that +"Quicksilver was a sure thing." Much correspondence passed without +another meeting being effected, and he lent her five pounds to pay a +debt of honour incurred through her husband's "absurd confidence in +Quicksilver." A week later this horsey husband of hers brought her on +to Brighton for the races there, and hither John Lefolle flew. But her +husband shadowed her, and he could only lift his hat to her as they +passed each other on the Lawns. Sometimes he saw her sitting pensively +on a chair while her lord and thrasher perused a pink sporting-paper. +Such tantalising proximity raised their correspondence through the +Hove Post Office to fever heat. Life apart, they felt, was impossible, +and, removed from the sobering influences of his cap and gown, John +Lefolle dreamed of throwing everything to the winds. His literary +reputation had opened out a new career. The Winifred lyrics alone had +brought in a tidy sum, and though he had expended that and more +on despatches of flowers and trifles to her, yet he felt this +extravagance would become extinguished under daily companionship, +and the poems provoked by her charms would go far towards their daily +maintenance. Yes, he could throw up the University. He would rescue +her from this bully, this gentleman bruiser. They would live openly +and nobly in the world's eye. A poet was not even expected to be +conventional.</p> + +<p>She, on her side, was no less ardent for the great step. She raged +against the world's law, the injustice by which a husband's cruelty +was not sufficient ground for divorce. "But we finer souls must take +the law into our own hands," she wrote. "We must teach society +that the ethics of a barbarous age are unfitted for our century of +enlightenment." But somehow the actual time and place of the elopement +could never get itself fixed. In September her husband dragged her to +Scotland, in October after the pheasants. When the dramatic day was +actually fixed, Winifred wrote by the next post deferring it for +a week. Even the few actual preliminary meetings they planned for +Kensington Gardens or Hampstead Heath rarely came off. He lived in a +whirling atmosphere of express letters of excuse, and telegrams that +transformed the situation from hour to hour. Not that her passion in +any way abated, or her romantic resolution really altered: it was only +that her conception of time and place and ways and means was dizzily +mutable.</p> + +<p>But after nigh six months of palpitating negotiations with the +adorable Mrs. Glamorys, the poet, in a moment of dejection, penned +the prose apophthegm, "It is of no use trying to change a changeable +person."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="V." id="V."></a>V</h2> + + +<p>But at last she astonished him by a sketch plan of the elopement, so +detailed, even to band-boxes and the Paris night route <i>viâ</i> Dieppe, +that no further room for doubt was left in his intoxicated soul, and +he was actually further astonished when, just as he was putting his +handbag into the hansom, a telegram was handed to him saying: "Gone +to Homburg. Letter follows."</p> + +<p>He stood still for a moment on the pavement in utter distraction. What +did it mean? Had she failed him again? Or was it simply that she had +changed the city of refuge from Paris to Homburg? He was about to name +the new station to the cabman, but then, "letter follows." Surely that +meant that he was to wait for it. Perplexed and miserable, he +stood with the telegram crumpled up in his fist. What a ridiculous +situation! He had wrought himself up to the point of breaking with the +world and his past, and now—it only remained to satisfy the cabman!</p> + +<p>He tossed feverishly all night, seeking to soothe himself, but really +exciting himself the more by a hundred plausible explanations. He was +now strung up to such a pitch of uncertainty that he was astonished +for the third time when the "letter" did duly "follow."</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Dearest," it ran, "as I explained in my telegram, my husband became +suddenly ill"—("if she had only put that in the telegram," he +groaned)—"and was ordered to Homburg. Of course it was impossible to +leave him in this crisis, both for practical and sentimental reasons. +You yourself, darling, would not like me to have aggravated his +illness by my flight just at this moment, and thus possibly have his +death on my conscience." ("Darling, you are always right," he said, +kissing the letter.) "Let us possess our souls in patience a little +longer. I need not tell you how vexatious it will be to find myself +nursing him in Homburg—out of the season even—instead of the +prospect to which I had looked forward with my whole heart and soul. +But what can one do? How true is the French proverb, 'Nothing happens +but the unexpected'! Write to me immediately <i>Poste Restante</i>, that I +may at least console myself with your dear words."</p></div> + +<p>The unexpected did indeed happen. Despite draughts of Elizabethbrunnen +and promenades on the Kurhaus terrace, the stalwart woman beater +succumbed to his malady. The curt telegram from Winifred gave no +indication of her emotions. He sent a reply-telegram of sympathy with +her trouble. Although he could not pretend to grieve at this sudden +providential solution of their life-problem, still he did sincerely +sympathise with the distress inevitable in connection with a death, +especially on foreign soil.</p> + +<p>He was not able to see her till her husband's body had been brought +across the North Sea and committed to the green repose of the old +Hampstead churchyard. He found her pathetically altered—her face wan +and spiritualised, and all in subtle harmony with the exquisite black +gown. In the first interview, he did not dare speak of their love at +all. They discussed the immortality of the soul, and she quoted George +Herbert. But with the weeks the question of their future began to +force its way back to his lips.</p> + +<p>"We could not decently marry before six months," she said, when +definitely confronted with the problem.</p> + +<p>"Six months!" he gasped.</p> + +<p>"Well, surely you don't want to outrage everybody," she said, pouting.</p> + +<p>At first he was outraged himself. What! She who had been ready +to flutter the world with a fantastic dance was now measuring her +footsteps. But on reflection he saw that Mrs. Glamorys was right once +more. Since Providence had been good enough to rescue them, why should +they fly in its face? A little patience, and a blameless happiness lay +before them. Let him not blind himself to the immense relief he +really felt at being spared social obloquy. After all, a poet could be +unconventional in his <i>work</i>—he had no need of the practical outlet +demanded for the less gifted.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VI." id="VI."></a>VI</h2> + + +<p>They scarcely met at all during the next six months—it had, +naturally, in this grateful reaction against their recklessness, +become a sacred period, even more charged with tremulous emotion +than the engagement periods of those who have not so nearly scorched +themselves. Even in her presence he found a certain pleasure in +combining distant adoration with the confident expectation of +proximity, and thus she was restored to the sanctity which she had +risked by her former easiness. And so all was for the best in the best +of all possible worlds.</p> + +<p>When the six months had gone by, he came to claim her hand. She was +quite astonished. "You promised to marry me at the end of six months," +he reminded her.</p> + +<p>"Surely it isn't six months already," she said.</p> + +<p>He referred her to the calendar, recalled the date of her husband's +death.</p> + +<p>"You are strangely literal for a poet," she said. "Of course I <i>said</i> +six months, but six months doesn't mean twenty-six weeks by the clock. +All I meant was that a decent period must intervene. But even to +myself it seems only yesterday that poor Harold was walking beside me +in the Kurhaus Park." She burst into tears, and in the face of them he +could not pursue the argument.</p> + +<p>Gradually, after several interviews and letters, it was agreed that +they should wait another six months.</p> + +<p>"She <i>is</i> right," he reflected again. "We have waited so long, we may +as well wait a little longer and leave malice no handle."</p> + +<p>The second six months seemed to him much longer than the first. The +charm of respectful adoration had lost its novelty, and once again +his breast was racked by fitful fevers which could scarcely calm +themselves even by conversion into sonnets. The one point of repose +was that shining fixed star of marriage. Still smarting under +Winifred's reproach of his unpoetic literality, he did not intend to +force her to marry him exactly at the end of the twelve-month. But he +was determined that she should have no later than this exact date +for at least "naming the day." Not the most punctilious stickler for +convention, he felt, could deny that Mrs. Grundy's claim had been paid +to the last minute.</p> + +<p>The publication of his new volume—containing the Winifred lyrics—had +served to colour these months of intolerable delay. Even the reaction +of the critics against his poetry, that conventional revolt against +every second volume, that parrot cry of over-praise from the very +throats that had praised him, though it pained and perplexed him, +was perhaps really helpful. At any rate, the long waiting was over at +last. He felt like Jacob after his years of service for Rachel.</p> + +<p>The fateful morning dawned bright and blue, and, as the towers of +Oxford were left behind him he recalled that distant Saturday when +he had first gone down to meet the literary lights of London in his +publisher's salon. How much older he was now than then—and yet +how much younger! The nebulous melancholy of youth, the clouds of +philosophy, had vanished before this beautiful creature of sunshine +whose radiance cut out a clear line for his future through the +confusion of life.</p> + +<p>At a florist's in the High Street of Hampstead he bought a costly +bouquet of white flowers, and walked airily to the house and rang the +bell jubilantly. He could scarcely believe his ears when the maid told +him her mistress was not at home. How dared the girl stare at him so +impassively? Did she not know by what appointment—on what errand—he +had come? Had he not written to her mistress a week ago that he would +present himself that afternoon?</p> + +<p>"Not at home!" he gasped. "But when will she be home?"</p> + +<p>"I fancy she won't be long. She went out an hour ago, and she has an +appointment with her dressmaker at five."</p> + +<p>"Do you know in what direction she'd have gone?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, she generally walks on the Heath before tea."</p> + +<p>The world suddenly grew rosy again. "I will come back again," he said. +Yes, a walk in this glorious air—heathward—would do him good.</p> + +<p>As the door shut he remembered he might have left the flowers, but he +would not ring again, and besides, it was, perhaps, better he should +present them with his own hand, than let her find them on the hall +table. Still, it seemed rather awkward to walk about the streets with +a bouquet, and he was glad, accidentally to strike the old Hampstead +Church, and to seek a momentary seclusion in passing through its +avenue of quiet gravestones on his heathward way.</p> + +<p>Mounting the few steps, he paused idly a moment on the verge of this +green "God's-acre" to read a perpendicular slab on a wall, and his +face broadened into a smile as he followed the absurdly elaborate +biography of a rich, self-made merchant who had taught himself to +read. "Reader, go thou and do likewise," was the delicious bull at the +end. As he turned away, the smile still lingering about his lips, he +saw a dainty figure tripping down the stony graveyard path, and though +he was somehow startled to find her still in black, there was no +mistaking Mrs. Glamorys. She ran to meet him with a glad cry, which +filled his eyes with happy tears.</p> + +<p>"How good of you to remember!" she said, as she took the bouquet from +his unresisting hand, and turned again on her footsteps. He followed +her wonderingly across the uneven road towards a narrow aisle of +graves on the left. In another instant she had stooped before a +shining white stone, and laid his bouquet reverently upon it. As he +reached her side, he saw that his flowers were almost lost in the vast +mass of floral offerings with which the grave of the woman beater was +bestrewn.</p> + +<p>"How good of you to remember the anniversary," she murmured again.</p> + +<p>"How could I forget it?" he stammered, astonished. "Is not this the +end of the terrible twelve-month?"</p> + +<p>The soft gratitude died out of her face. "Oh, is <i>that</i> what you were +thinking of?"</p> + +<p>"What else?" he murmured, pale with conflicting emotions.</p> + +<p>"What else! I think decency demanded that this day, at least, should +be sacred to his memory. Oh, what brutes men are!" And she burst into +tears.</p> + +<p>His patient breast revolted at last. "You said <i>he</i> was the brute!" he +retorted, outraged.</p> + +<p>"Is that your chivalry to the dead? Oh, my poor Harold, my poor +Harold!"</p> + +<p>For once her tears could not extinguish the flame of his anger. "But +you told me he beat you," he cried.</p> + +<p>"And if he did, I dare say I deserved it. Oh, my darling, my darling!" +She laid her face on the stone and sobbed.</p> + +<p>John Lefolle stood by in silent torture. As he helplessly watched her +white throat swell and fall with the sobs, he was suddenly struck by +the absence of the black velvet band—the truer mourning she had worn +in the lifetime of the so lamented. A faint scar, only perceptible to +his conscious eye, added to his painful bewilderment.</p> + +<p>At last she rose and walked unsteadily forward. He followed her in +mute misery. In a moment or two they found themselves on the outskirts +of the deserted heath. How beautiful stretched the gorsy rolling +country! The sun was setting in great burning furrows of gold and +green—a panorama to take one's breath away. The beauty and peace of +Nature passed into the poet's soul.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me, dearest," he begged, taking her hand.</p> + +<p>She drew it away sharply. "I cannot forgive you. You have shown +yourself in your true colours."</p> + +<p>Her unreasonableness angered him again. "What do you mean? I only came +in accordance with our long-standing arrangement. You have put me off +long enough."</p> + +<p>"It is fortunate I did put you off long enough to discover what you +are."</p> + +<p>He gasped. He thought of all the weary months of waiting, all the long +comedy of telegrams and express letters, the far-off flirtations of +the cosy corner, the baffled elopement to Paris. "Then you won't marry +me?"</p> + +<p>"I cannot marry a man I neither love nor respect."</p> + +<p>"You don't love me!" Her spontaneous kiss in his sober Oxford study +seemed to burn on his angry lips.</p> + +<p>"No, I never loved you."</p> + +<p>He took her by the arms and turned her round roughly. "Look me in the +face and dare to say you have never loved me."</p> + +<p>His memory was buzzing with passionate phrases from her endless +letters. They stung like a swarm of bees. The sunset was like +blood-red mist before his eyes.</p> + +<p>"I have never loved you," she said obstinately.</p> + +<p>"You—!" His grasp on her arms tightened. He shook her.</p> + +<p>"You are bruising me," she cried.</p> + +<p>His grasp fell from her arms as though they were red-hot. He had +become a woman beater.</p> + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + + +<h1><a name="THE_ETERNAL_FEMININE" id="THE_ETERNAL_FEMININE"></a>THE ETERNAL FEMININE</h1> + + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + + + + + +<p>He wore a curious costume, representing the devil carrying off his +corpse; but I recognised him at once as the lesser lion of a London +evening party last season. Then he had just returned from a Polar +expedition, and wore the glacier of civilisation on his breast. +To-night he was among the maddest of the mad, dancing savagely with +the Bacchantes of the Latin Quarter at the art students' ball, and +some of his fellow-Americans told me that he was the best marine +painter in the <i>atelier</i> which he had joined. More they did not pause +to tell me, for they were anxious to celebrate this night of nights, +when, in that fine spirit of equality born of belonging to two +Republics, the artist lowers himself to the level of his model.</p> + +<p>The young Arctic explorer, so entirely at home in this more tropical +clime, had relapsed into respectability when I spoke to him. He was +sitting at a supper-table smoking a cigarette, and gazing somewhat +sadly—it seemed to me—at the pandemoniac phantasmagoria of screaming +dancers, the glittering cosmopolitan chaos that multiplied itself +riotously in the mirrored walls of the great flaring ball-room, where +under-dressed women, waving many-coloured paper lanterns, rode on the +shoulders of grotesquely clad men prancing to joyous music. For some +time he had been trying hard to get some one to take the money for +his supper; but the frenzied waiters suspected he was clamouring for +something to eat, and would not be cajoled into attention.</p> + +<p>Moved by an impulse of mischief, I went up to him and clapped him on +his corpse, which he wore behind.</p> + +<p>There was a death-mask of papier-maché on the back of his head with +appropriate funereal drapings down the body.</p> + +<p>"I'll take your money," I said.</p> + +<p>He started, and turned his devil upon me. The face was made +Mephistophelian, and the front half of him wore scarlet.</p> + +<p>"Thanks," he said, laughing roguishly, when he recognised me. "It's +darned queer that Paris should be the place where they refuse to take +the devil's money."</p> + +<p>I suggested smilingly that it was the corpse they fought shy of.</p> + +<p>"I guess not," he retorted. "It's dead men's money that keeps this +place lively. I wish I'd had the chance of some anyhow; but a rolling +stone gathers no moss, they say—not even from graveyards, I suppose."</p> + +<p>He spoke disconsolately, in a tone more befitting the back than the +front of him, and quite out of accord with the reckless revelry around +him.</p> + +<p>"Oh! you'll make lots of money with your pictures," I said heartily.</p> + +<p>He shook his head. "That's the chap who's going to scoop in the +dollars," he said, indicating a brawny Frenchman attired in a blanket +that girdled his loins, and black feathers that decorated his hair. +"That fellow's got the touch of Velasquez. You should see the portrait +he's doing for the Salon."</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't see much art in his costume, anyhow," I retorted. +"Yours is an inspiration of genius."</p> + +<p>"Yes; so prophetic, don't you know," he replied modestly. "But you +are not the only one who has complimented me. To it I owe the proudest +moment of my life—when I shook hands with a European prince." And he +laughed with returning merriment.</p> + +<p>"Indeed!" I exclaimed. "With which?"</p> + +<p>"Ah! I see your admiration for my rig is mounting. No; it wasn't with +the Prince of Wales—confess your admiration is going down already. +Come, you shall guess. <i>Je vous le donne en trois</i>."</p> + +<p>After teasing me a little he told me it was the Kronprinds of Denmark. +"At the <i>Kunstner Karneval</i> in Copenhagen," he explained briefly. His +front face had grown sad again.</p> + +<p>"Did you study art in Copenhagen?" I inquired.</p> + +<p>"Yes, before I joined that expedition," he said. "It was from there I +started."</p> + +<p>"Yes, of course," I replied. "I remember now. It was a Danish +expedition. But what made you chuck up your studies so suddenly?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! I don't know. I guess I was just about sick of most things. My +stars! Look at that little gypsy-girl dancing the can-can; isn't she +fresh? Isn't she wonderful? How awful to think she'll be used up in a +year or two!"</p> + +<p>"I suppose there was a woman—the eternal feminine," I said, sticking +him to the point, for I was more interested in him than in the +seething saturnalia, our common sobriety amid which seemed somehow +to raise our casual acquaintanceship to the plane of confidential +friendship.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I suppose there was a woman," he echoed in low tones. "The +eternal feminine!" And a strange unfathomable light leapt into his +eyes, which he raised slightly towards the gilded ceiling, where +countless lustres glittered.</p> + +<p>"Deceived you, eh?" I said lightly.</p> + +<p>His expression changed. "Deceived me, as you say," he murmured, with +a faint, sad smile, that made me conjure up a vision of a passionate +lovely face with cruel eyes.</p> + +<p>"Won't you tell me about it?" I asked, as I tendered him a fresh +cigarette, for while we spoke his half-smoked one had been snatched +from his mouth by a beautiful Mænad, who whirled off puffing it.</p> + +<p>"I reckon you'll be making copy out of it," he said, his smile growing +whimsical.</p> + +<p>"If it's good enough," I replied candidly. "That's why I am here."</p> + +<p>"What a lovely excuse! But there's nothing in my affair to make a +story of."</p> + +<p>I smiled majestically.</p> + +<p>"You stick to your art—leave me to manage mine." And I put a light to +his cigarette.</p> + +<p>"Ah, but you'll be disappointed this time, I warrant," he said +laughingly, as the smoke circled round his diabolically handsome face. +Then, becoming serious again, he went on: "It's so terribly plebeian, +yet it all befell through that very <i>Kunstner Karneval</i>. I was telling +you of when I first wore this composite costume which gained me the +smile of royalty. It was a very swell affair, of course, not a bit +like this, but it was given in hell."</p> + +<p>"In hell!" I cried, startled.</p> + +<p>"Yes. <i>Underverden</i> they call it in their lingo. The ball-room +of the palace (the <i>Palaeet</i>, an old disused mansion) was got up to +represent the infernal regions—you tumble?—and everybody had to +dress appropriately. That was what gave me the idea of this costume. +The staircase up which you entered was made the mouth of a great +dragon, and as you trod on the first step his eye gleamed blazes and +brimstone. There were great monsters all about, and dark grottoes +radiating around; and when you took your dame into one of them, your +tread flooded them with light. If, however, the cavalier modestly +conducted his mistress into one of the lighted caves, virtue was +rewarded by instantaneous darkness."</p> + +<p>"That was really artistic," I said, laughing.</p> + +<p>"You bet! The artists spent any amount of money over the affair. The +whole of Hades bristled with ingenious devices in every corner. I had +got a couple of tickets, and had designed the dress of my best girl, +as well as my own, and the morning before (there being little work +done in the studios that day, as you may well imagine) I called upon +her to see her try it on. To my chagrin I found she was down with +influenza, or something of that sort appropriate to the bitter winter +we were having. And it did freeze that year, by Jove!—so hard that +Denmark and Sweden were united—to their mutual disgust, I fancy—by +a broad causeway of ice. I remember, as I walked back from the girl's +house towards the town along the Langelinie, my mortification was +somewhat allayed by the picturesque appearance of the Sound, in whose +white expanse boats of every species and colour were embedded, looking +like trapped creatures unable to stir oar or sail. But as I left the +Promenade and came into the narrow old streets of the town, with their +cobblestones and their quaint, many-windowed houses, my ill-humour +returned. I had had some trouble in getting the second ticket, and now +it looked as if I should get left. I went over in my mind the girls I +could ask, and what with not caring more for one than for another, and +not knowing which were booked already, and what with the imminence of +the ball, I felt the little brains I had getting addled in my head. +At last, in sheer despair, I had what is called a happy thought. I +resolved to ask the first girl of my acquaintance I met in my walk. +Instantly my spirits rose like a thermometer in a Turkish bath. The +clouds of irresolution rolled away, and the touch of adventure made my +walk joyous again. I peered eagerly into every female face I met, but +it was not till I approached the market-place that I knew my fate. +Then, turning a corner, I came suddenly and violently face to face +with Fröken Jensen."</p> + +<p>He paused and relit his cigarette, and the maddening music of brass +instruments and brazen creatures, which his story had shut out, +crashed again upon my ears. "I reckon if you were telling this, you'd +stop here," he said, "and put down 'to be continued in our next.'" +There seemed a trace of huskiness in his flippant tones, as if he were +trying to keep under some genuine emotion.</p> + +<p>"Never you mind," I returned, smiling. "You're not a writer, anyhow, +so just keep straight on."</p> + +<p>"Well, Fröken Jensen was absolutely the ugliest girl I have seen in +all my globe-trottings.... On second thoughts, that is the place to +stop, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Not at all; it's only in long novels one stops for refreshment. So +go ahead, and—I say—do cut your interruptions <i>à la</i> Fielding and +Thackeray. <i>C'est vieux jeu</i>."</p> + +<p>"All right, don't get mad. Fröken Jensen had the most irregular +and ungainly features that ever crippled a woman's career; her nose +was—But no! I won't describe her, poor girl. She was about twenty-six +years old, but one of those girls whose years no one counts, who are +old maids at seventeen. Well, you can fancy what a fix I was in. It +was no good pretending to myself that I hadn't seen her, for we nearly +bowled each other over—she was coming along quick trot with a basket +on her arm—and it seemed kind of shuffling to back out of my promise +to her, though she didn't know anything about it. It was like betting +with yourself and wanting to cheat yourself when you lost. I felt I +should never trust myself again, if I turned welsher—that's the word, +isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"It's like Jephtha," I said. "He swore, you know, he would sacrifice +the first creature that he saw on his triumphant return from the wars, +and his daughter came out and had to be sacrificed."</p> + +<p>"Thank you for the compliment," he said, with a grimace. "But I'm not +up in the classics, so the comparison didn't strike me. But what did +strike me, after the first moment of annoyance, was the humour of the +situation. I turned and walked beside her—under cover of an elaborate +apology for my dashing behaviour. She seemed quite concerned at my +regret, and insisted that it was she that had dashed—it was +her marketing-day, and she was late. You must know she kept a +boarding-house for art and university students, and it was there that +I had made her acquaintance, when I went to dine once or twice with +a studio chum who was quartered there. I had never exchanged two +sentences with her before, as you can well imagine. She was not +inviting to the artistic eye; indeed, I rather wondered how my friend +could tolerate her at the head of the table, till he jestingly told +me it was reckoned off the bill. The place was indeed suited to +the student's pocket. But this morning I was surprised at the +sprightliness of her share in the dialogue of mutual apologies. Her +mind seemed as alert as her step, her voice was pleasing and gentle, +and there was a refreshing gaiety in her attitude towards the situation.</p> + +<p>"'But I am quite sure it was <i>my</i> fault,' I wound up rather lamely +at last, 'and, if you will allow me to make you amends, I shall be +pleased to send you a ticket for the ball to-morrow night.'</p> + +<p>"She stood still. 'For the <i>Kunstner Karneval</i>!' she cried eagerly, +while her poor absurd face lit up.</p> + +<p>"'Yes, Fröken; and I shall be happy to escort you there if you will +give me the pleasure.'</p> + +<p>"She looked at me with sudden suspicion—the idea that I was chaffing +her must have crossed her mind. I felt myself flushing furiously, +feeling somehow half-guilty by my secret thoughts of her a few moments +ago. We had arrived at the <i>Amagertorv</i>—the market-place—and I +recollect getting a sudden impression of the quaint stalls and +the picturesque <i>Amager</i>-women—one with a preternaturally hideous +face—and the frozen canal in the middle, with the ice-bound +fruit-boats from the islands, and the red sails of the Norwegian +boats, and the Egyptian architecture of Thorwaldsen's Museum in the +background, making up my mind to paint it all, in the brief instant +before I added in my most convincing tones, 'The Kronprinds will be +there.'</p> + +<p>"Her incredulous expression became tempered by wistfulness, and with +an inspiration I drew out the ticket and thrust it into her hand. I +saw her eyes fill with tears as she turned her head away and examined +some vegetables.</p> + +<p>"'You will excuse me,' she said presently, holding the ticket limply +in her hand, 'but I fear it is impossible for me to accept your kind +invitation. You see I have so much to do, and my children will be so +uncomfortable without me.'</p> + +<p>"'Your children will be at the ball to a man,' I retorted.</p> + +<p>"'But I haven't any fancy costume,' she pleaded, and tendered me the +ticket back. It struck me—almost with a pang—that her hand was bare +of glove, and the work-a-day costume she was wearing was ill adapted to +the rigour of the weather.</p> + +<p>"'Oh! Come anyhow,' I said. 'Ordinary evening dress. Of course, you +will need a mask.'</p> + +<p>"I saw her lip twitch at this unfortunate way of putting it, and +hastened to affect unconsciousness of my blunder.</p> + +<p>"'<i>She</i> wouldn't,' I added with feigned jocularity, nodding towards +the preternaturally hideous <i>Amager</i>-woman.</p> + +<p>"'Poor old thing,' she said gently. 'I shall be sorry when she dies.'</p> + +<p>"'Why?' I murmured.</p> + +<p>"'Because then I shall be the ugliest woman in Copenhagen,' she +answered gaily.</p> + +<p>"Something in that remark sent a thrill down my backbone—there seemed +an infinite pathos and lovableness in her courageous recognition of +facts. It dispensed me from the painful necessity of pretending to be +unaware of her ugliness—nay, gave it almost a <i>cachet</i>—made it as +possible a topic of light conversation as beauty itself. I pressed her +more fervently to come, and at last she consented, stipulating only +that I should call for her rather late, after she had quite finished +her household duties and the other boarders had gone off to the ball.</p> + +<p>"Well, I took her to the ball (it was as brilliant and gay as this +without being riotous), and—will you believe it?—she made quite a +little sensation. With a black domino covering her impossible face, +and a simple evening dress, she looked as <i>distinguée</i> as my best girl +would have done. Her skin was good, and her figure, freed from the +distracting companionship of her face, was rather elegant, while the +lively humour of her conversation had now fair play. She danced well, +too, with a natural grace. I believe she enjoyed her incog. almost as +much as the ball, and I began to feel quite like a fairy godmother who +was giving poor little Cinderella an outing, and to regret that I had +not the power to make her beautiful for ever, or at least to make life +one eternal fancy ball, at which silk masks might veil the horrors of +reality. I dare say, too, she got a certain kudos through dancing +so much with me, for, as I have told you <i>ad nauseam</i>, this lovely +costume of mine was the hit of the evening, and the Kronprinds asked +for the honour of an introduction to me. It was rather funny—the +circuitous etiquette. I had to be first introduced to his +<i>aide-de-camp</i>. This was done through an actress of the Kongelige +Theatre, with whom I had been polking (he knew all the soubrettes, +that <i>aide-de-camp</i>!). Then he introduced me to the Kronprinds, and +I held out my hand and shook his royal paw heartily. He was very +gracious to me, learning I was an American, and complimented me on +my dress and my dancing, and I answered him affably; and the natives, +gathered round at a respectful distance, eyed me with reverent +curiosity. But at last, when the music struck up again, I said, +'Excuse me, I am engaged for this waltz!' and hurried off to dance +with my Cinderella, much to the amazement of the Danes, who wondered +audibly what mighty foreign potentate His Royal Highness had been +making himself agreeable to."</p> + +<p>"It was plain enough," I broke in. "His Satanic Majesty, of course."</p> + +<p>"I am glad you interrupted me," he said, "for you give me an opening +to state that the Kronprinds has nothing to do with the story. You, of +course, would have left him out; but I am only an amateur, and I get +my threads mixed."</p> + +<p>"Shut up!" I cried. "I mean—go on."</p> + +<p>"Oh, well, perhaps, he <i>has</i> got a little to do with the story, after +all; for after that, Fröken Jensen became more important—sharing in +my reflected glory—or, perhaps, now I come to think of it, it was +only then that she became important. Anyway, important she was; +and, among others, Axel Larson—who was got up as an ancient Gallic +warrior, to show off his fine figure—came up and asked me to +introduce him. I don't think I should have done so ordinarily, for he +was the filthiest-mouthed fellow in the <i>atelier</i>—a great swaggering +Don Juan Baron Munchausen sort of chap, handsome enough in his raffish +way—a tall, stalwart Swede, blue-eyed and yellow-haired. But the +fun of the position was that Axel Larson was one of my Cinderella's +'children,' so I could not resist introducing him formally to 'Fröken +Jensen.' His happy air of expectation was replaced by a scowl of +surprise and disgust.</p> + +<p>"'What, thou, Ingeborg!' he cried.</p> + +<p>"I could have knocked the man down. The familiar <i>tutoiement</i>, the +Christian name—these, perhaps, he had a right to use; but nothing +could justify the contempt of his tone. It reminded me disagreeably +of the ugliness I had nigh forgotten. I felt Ingeborg's arm tremble in +mine.</p> + +<p>"'Yes, it is I, Herr Larson,' she said, with her wonted gentleness, +and almost apologetically. 'This gentleman was good enough to bring +me.' She spoke as if her presence needed explanation—with the +timidity of one shut out from the pleasures of life. I could feel +her poor little heart fluttering wildly, and knew that her face was +alternating from red to white beneath the mask.</p> + +<p>"Axel Larson shot a swift glance of surprise at me, which was followed +by a more malicious bolt. 'I congratulate you, Ingeborg,' he said, +'on the property you seem to have come into.' It was a clever <i>double +entente</i>—the man was witty after his coarse fashion—but the sarcasm +scarcely stung either of us. I, of course, had none of the motives +the cad imagined; and as for Ingeborg, I fancy she thought he alluded +merely to the conquest of myself, and was only pained by the fear I +might resent so ludicrous a suggestion. Having thrown the shadow +of his cynicism over our innocent relation, Axel turned away highly +pleased with himself, rudely neglecting to ask Ingeborg for a dance. I +felt like giving him 'Hail Columbia,' but I restrained myself.</p> + +<p>"Some days after this—in response to Ingeborg's grateful anxiety to +return my hospitality—I went to dine with her 'children.' I found +Axel occupying the seat of honour, and grumbling at the soup and the +sauces like a sort of autocrat of the dinner-table, and generally +making things unpleasant. I had to cling to my knife and fork so as +not to throw the water-bottle at his head. Ingeborg presided meekly +over the dishes, her ugliness more rampant than ever after the +illusion of the mask. I remembered now he had been disagreeable when I +had dined there before, though, not being interested in Ingeborg then, +I had not resented his ill-humour, contenting myself with remarking to +my friend that I understood now why the Danes disliked the Swedes so +much—a generalisation that was probably as unjust as most of one's +judgments of other peoples. After dinner I asked her why she tolerated +the fellow. She flushed painfully and murmured that times were hard. +I protested that she could easily get another boarder to replace him, +but she said Axel Larson had been there so long—nearly two years—and +was comfortable, and knew the ways of the house, and it would be very +discourteous to ask him to go. I insisted that rather than see +her suffer I would move into Larson's room myself, but she urged +tremulously that she didn't suffer at all from his rudeness, it was +only his surface-manner; it deceived strangers, but there was a good +heart underneath, as who could know better than she? Besides, he was +a genius with the brush, and everybody knew well that geniuses were +bears. And, finally, she could not afford to lose boarders—there were +already two vacancies.</p> + +<p>"It ended—as I dare say you have guessed—by my filling up one of +those two vacancies, partly to help her pecuniarily, partly to act +as a buffer between her and the swaggering Swede. He was quite +flabbergasted by my installation in the house, and took me aside in +the <i>atelier</i> and asked me if Ingeborg had really come into any money. +I was boiling over, but I kept the lid on by main force, and answered +curtly that Ingeborg had a heart of gold. He laughed boisterously, +and said one could not raise anything on that; adding, with an air of +authority, that he believed I spoke the truth, for it was not likely +the hag would have kept anything from her oldest boarder. 'I dare say +the real truth is,' he wound up, 'that you are hard up, like me, and +want to do the thing cheap.'</p> + +<p>"'I wasn't aware you were hard up,' I said, for I had seen him often +enough flaunting it in the theatres and restaurants.</p> + +<p>"'Not for luxuries,' he retorted with a guffaw, 'but for +necessities—yes. And there comes in the value of our domestic +eyesore. Why, I haven't paid her a <i>skilling</i> for six months!'</p> + +<p>"I thought of poor Ingeborg's thin winter attire, and would have liked +to reply with my fist, only the reply didn't seem quite logical. It +was not my business, after all; but I thought I understood now why +Ingeborg was so reluctant to part with him—it is the immemorial +fallacy of economical souls to throw good money after bad; though when +I saw the patience with which she bore his querulous complaints and +the solicitude with which she attended to his wants, I sometimes +imagined he had some secret hold over her. Often I saw her cower +and flush piteously, as with terror, before his insolent gaze. But I +decided finally his was merely the ascendency of the strong over +the weak—of the bully over his victims, who serve him more loyally +because he kicks them. The bad-tempered have the best of it in this +vile world. I cannot tell you how I grew to pity that poor girl. +Living in her daily presence, I marked the thousand and one trials +of which her life was made up, all borne with the same sweetness and +good-humour. I discovered that she had a bed-ridden mother, whom she +kept in the attic, and whom she stole up to attend to fifty times a +day, sitting with her when her work was done and the moonlight on the +Sound tempted one to be out enjoying one's youth. Alone she managed +and financed the entire establishment, aided only by a little +maid-of-all-work, just squeezing out a scanty living for herself +and her mother. If ever there was an angel on earth it was Ingeborg +Jensen. I tell you, when I see the angels of the Italian masters I +feel they are all wrong: I don't want flaxen-haired cherubs to give +me an idea of heaven in this hell of a world. I just want to see good +honest faces, full of suffering and sacrifice, and if ever I paint an +angel its phiz shall have the unflinching ugliness of Ingeborg Jensen, +God bless her! To be near her was to live in an atmosphere of purity +and pity and tenderness, and everything that is sweet and sacred."</p> + +<p>As he spoke I became suddenly aware that the gas-lights were paling, +and glancing towards the window on my left I saw the splendour of the +sunrise breaking fresh and clear over the city of diabolical night, +where in the sombre eastern sky—</p> + +<p>"God made himself an awful rose of dawn."</p> + +<p>A breath of coolness and purity seemed to waft into the feverish +ball-room; a ray of fresh morning sunlight. I looked curiously at the +young artist. He seemed transfigured. I could scarcely realise that +an hour ago he had been among the rowdiest of the <i>Comus</i> crew, whose +shrieks and laughter still rang all around us. Even his duplex costume +seemed to have grown subtly symbolical, the diabolical part typical +of all that is bestial and selfish in man, the death-mask speaking +silently of renunciation and the peace of the tomb. He went on, after +a moment of emotion: "They say that pity is akin to love, but I am not +sure that I ever loved her, for I suppose that love involves passion, +and I never arrived at that. I only came to feel that I wanted to be +with her always, to guard her, to protect her, to work for her, to +suffer for her if need be, to give her life something of the joy and +sweetness that God owed her. I felt I wasn't much use in the world, +and that would be something to do. And so one day—though not without +much mental tossing, for we are curiously, complexly built, and I +dreaded ridicule and the long years of comment from unsympathetic +strangers—I asked her to be my wife. Her surprise, her agitation, was +painful to witness. But she was not incredulous, as before; she had +learned to know that I respected her.</p> + +<p>"Nevertheless, her immediate impulse was one of refusal.</p> + +<p>"'It cannot be,' she said, and her bosom heaved spasmodically.</p> + +<p>"I protested that it could and would be, but she shook her head.</p> + +<p>"'You are very kind to me! God bless you!' she said. 'You have always +been kind to me. But you do not love me.'</p> + +<p>"I assured her I did, and in that moment I dare say I spoke the truth. +For in that moment of her reluctance and diffidence to snatch at +proffered joy, when the suggestion of rejection made her appear doubly +precious, she seemed to me the most adorable creature in the world.</p> + +<p>"But still she shook her head. 'No one can love me,' she said sadly.</p> + +<p>"I took her hand in mute protestation, but she withdrew it gently.</p> + +<p>"'I cannot be your wife,' she persisted.</p> + +<p>"'Why not, Ingeborg?' I asked passionately.</p> + +<p>"She hesitated, panting and colouring painfully, then—the words are +echoing in my brain—she answered softly, '<i>Jeg kan ikke elske Dem</i>' +(I cannot love you).</p> + +<p>"It was like a shaft of lightning piercing me, rending and +illuminating. In my blind conceit the obverse side of the question had +never presented itself to me. I had taken it for granted I had only to +ask to be jumped at. But now, in one great flash of insight, I seemed +to see everything plain.</p> + +<p>"'You love Axel Larson!' I cried chokingly, as I thought of all the +insults he had heaped upon her in her presence, all the sneers and +vile jocosities of which she had been the butt behind her back, +in return for the care she had lavished upon his comfort, for her +pinching to make both ends meet without the money he should have +contributed.</p> + +<p>"She did not reply. The tears came into her eyes, she let her head +droop on her heaving breast. As in those visions that are said to +come to the dying, I saw Axel Larson feeding day by day at her board, +brutally conscious of her passion, yet not deigning even to sacrifice +her to it; I saw him ultimately leave the schools and the town to +carry his clever brush to the welcome of a wider world, without a word +or a thought of thanks for the creature who had worshipped and waited +upon him hand and foot; and then I saw her life from day to day unroll +its long monotonous folds, all in the same pattern, all drab duty and +joyless sacrifice, and hopeless undying love.</p> + +<p>"I took her hand again in a passion of pity. She understood my +sympathy, and the hot tears started from her eyes and rolled down her +poor wan cheeks. And in that holy moment I saw into the inner heaven +of woman's love, which purifies and atones for the world. The eternal +feminine!"</p> + +<p>The sentimental young artist ceased, and buried his devil's face in +his hands. I looked around and started. We were alone in the abandoned +supper-room. The gorgeously grotesque company was seated in a gigantic +circle upon the ball-room floor furiously applauding the efforts of +two sweetly pretty girls who were performing the celebrated <i>danse du +ventre</i>.</p> + +<p>"The eternal feminine!" I echoed pensively.</p> + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + + + + +<h1><a name="THE_SILENT_SISTERS" id="THE_SILENT_SISTERS"></a>THE SILENT SISTERS</h1> + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + + + +<p>They had quarrelled in girlhood, and mutually declared their +intention never to speak to each other again, wetting and drying their +forefingers to the accompaniment of an ancient childish incantation, +and while they lived on the paternal farm they kept their foolish oath +with the stubbornness of a slow country stock, despite the alternate +coaxing and chastisement of their parents, notwithstanding the +perpetual everyday contact of their lives, through every vicissitude +of season and weather, of sowing and reaping, of sun and shade, of joy +and sorrow.</p> + +<p>Death and misfortune did not reconcile them, and when their father +died and the old farm was sold up, they travelled to London in the +same silence, by the same train, in search of similar situations. +Service separated them for years, though there was only a stone's +throw between them. They often stared at each other in the streets.</p> + +<p>Honor, the elder, married a local artisan, and two and a half years +later, Mercy, the younger, married a fellow-workman of Honor's +husband. The two husbands were friends, and often visited each other's +houses, which were on opposite sides of the same sordid street, and +the wives made them welcome. Neither Honor nor Mercy suffered an +allusion to their breach; it was understood that their silence must be +received in silence. Each of the children had a quiverful of children +who played and quarrelled together in the streets and in one another's +houses, but not even the street affrays and mutual grievances of the +children could provoke the mothers to words. They stood at their doors +in impotent fury, almost bursting with the torture of keeping their +mouths shut against the effervescence of angry speech. When either +lost a child the other watched the funeral from her window, dumb as +the mutes.</p> + +<p>The years rolled on, and still the river of silence flowed between their +lives. Their good looks faded, the burden of life and child-bearing was +heavy upon them. Grey hairs streaked their brown tresses, then brown +hairs streaked their grey tresses. The puckers of age replaced the +dimples of youth. The years rolled on, and Death grew busy among the +families. Honor's husband died, and Mercy lost a son, who died a week +after his wife. Cholera took several of the younger children. But the +sisters themselves lived on, bent and shrivelled by toil and sorrow, even +more than by the slow frost of the years.</p> + +<p>Then one day Mercy took to her death-bed. An internal disease, too +long neglected, would carry her off within a week. So the doctor told +Jim, Mercy's husband.</p> + +<p>Through him, the news travelled to Honor's eldest son, who still lived +with her. By the evening it reached Honor.</p> + +<p>She went upstairs abruptly when her son told her, leaving him +wondering at her stony aspect. When she came down she was bonneted and +shawled. He was filled with joyous amaze to see her hobble across the +street and for the first time in her life pass over her sister Mercy's +threshold.</p> + +<p>As Honor entered the sick-room, with pursed lips, a light leapt into +the wasted, wrinkled countenance of the dying creature. She raised +herself slightly in bed, her lips parted, then shut tightly, and her +face darkened.</p> + +<p>Honor turned angrily to Mercy's husband, who hung about impotently. +"Why did you let her run down so low?" she said.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know," the old man stammered, taken aback by her presence +even more than by her question. "She was always a woman to say nothin'."</p> + +<p>Honor put him impatiently aside and examined the medicine bottle on +the bedside table.</p> + +<p>"Isn't it time she took her dose?"</p> + +<p>"I dessay."</p> + +<p>Honor snorted wrathfully. "What's the use of a man?" she inquired, as +she carefully measured out the fluid and put it to her sister's lips, +which opened to receive it, and then closed tightly again.</p> + +<p>"How is your wife feeling now?" Honor asked after a pause.</p> + +<p>"How are you, now, Mercy?" asked the old man awkwardly.</p> + +<p>The old woman shook her head. "I'm a-goin' fast, Jim," she grumbled +weakly, and a tear of self-pity trickled down her parchment cheek.</p> + +<p>"What rubbidge she do talk!" cried Honor, sharply. "Why d'ye stand +there like a tailor's dummy? Why don't you tell her to cheer up?"</p> + +<p>"Cheer up, Mercy," quavered the old man, hoarsely.</p> + +<p>But Mercy groaned instead, and turned fretfully on her other side, +with her face to the wall.</p> + +<p>"I'm too old, I'm too old," she moaned, "this is the end o' me."</p> + +<p>"Did you ever hear the like?" Honor asked Jim, angrily, as she +smoothed his wife's pillow. "She was always conceited about her age, +settin' herself up as the equals of her elders, and here am I, her +elder sister, as carried her in my arms when I was five and she was +two, still hale and strong, and with no mind for underground for many +a day. Nigh three times her age I was once, mind you, and now she has +the imperence to talk of dyin' before me."</p> + +<p>She took off her bonnet and shawl. "Send one o' the kids to tell my +boy I'm stayin' here," she said, "and then just you get 'em all to +bed—there's too much noise about the house."</p> + +<p>The children, who were orphaned grandchildren of the dying woman, were +sent to bed, and then Jim himself was packed off to refresh himself +for the next day's labours, for the poor old fellow still doddered +about the workshop.</p> + +<p>The silence of the sick-room spread over the whole house. About ten +o'clock the doctor came again and instructed Honor how to alleviate +the patient's last hours. All night long she sat watching her dying +sister, hand and eye alert to anticipate every wish. No word broke the +awful stillness.</p> + +<p>The first thing in the morning, Mercy's married daughter, the only +child of hers living in London, arrived to nurse her mother. But Honor +indignantly refused to be dispossessed.</p> + +<p>"A nice daughter you are," she said, "to leave your mother lay a day +and a night without a sight o' your ugly face."</p> + +<p>"I had to look after the good man, and the little 'uns," the daughter +pleaded.</p> + +<p>"Then what do you mean by desertin' them now?" the irate old woman +retorted. "First you deserts your mother, and then your husband and +children. You must go back to them as needs your care. I carried your +mother in my arms before you was born, and if she wants anybody else +now to look after her, let her just tell me so, and I'll be off in a +brace o' shakes."</p> + +<p>She looked defiantly at the yellow, dried-up creature in the bed. +Mercy's withered lips twitched, but no sound came from them. Jim, +strung up by the situation, took the word. "You can't do no good up +here, the doctor says. You might look after the kids downstairs a bit, +when you can spare an hour, and I've got to go to the shop. I'll send +you a telegraph if there's a change," he whispered to the daughter, +and she, not wholly discontented to return to her living interests, +kissed her mother, lingered a little, and then stole quietly away.</p> + +<p>All that day the old women remained together in solemn silence, broken +only by the doctor's visit. He reported that Mercy might last a couple +of days more. In the evening Jim replaced his sister-in-law, who slept +perforce. At midnight she reappeared and sent him to bed. The sufferer +tossed about restlessly. At half-past two she awoke, and Honor fed her +with some broth, as she would have fed a baby. Mercy, indeed, looked +scarcely bigger than an infant, and Honor only had the advantage of +her by being puffed out with clothes. A church clock in the distance +struck three. Then the silence fell deeper. The watcher drowsed, the +lamp flickered, tossing her shadow about the walls as if she, too, +were turning feverishly from side to side. A strange ticking made +itself heard in the wainscoting. Mercy sat up with a scream of terror. +"Jim!" she shrieked, "Jim!"</p> + +<p>Honor started up, opened her mouth to cry "Hush!" then checked +herself, suddenly frozen.</p> + +<p>"Jim," cried the dying woman, "listen! Is that the death spider?"</p> + +<p>Honor listened, her blood curdling. Then she went towards the door +and opened it. "Jim," she said, in low tones, speaking towards the +landing, "tell her it's nothing, it's only a mouse. She was always a +nervous little thing." And she closed the door softly, and pressing +her trembling sister tenderly back on the pillow, tucked her up snugly +in the blanket.</p> + +<p>Next morning, when Jim was really present, the patient begged +pathetically to have a grandchild with her in the room, day and night. +"Don't leave me alone again," she quavered, "don't leave me alone with +not a soul to talk to." Honor winced, but said nothing.</p> + +<p>The youngest child, who did not have to go to school, was brought—a +pretty little boy with brown curls, which the sun, streaming through +the panes, turned to gold. The morning passed slowly. About noon Mercy +took the child's hand, and smoothed his curls.</p> + +<p>"My sister Honor had golden curls like that," she whispered.</p> + +<p>"They were in the family, Bobby," Honor answered. "Your granny had +them, too, when she was a girl."</p> + +<p>There was a long pause. Mercy's eyes were half-glazed. But her vision +was inward now.</p> + +<p>"The mignonette will be growin' in the gardens, Bobby," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Bobby, and the heart's-ease," said Honor, softly. "We lived in +the country, you know, Bobby."</p> + +<p>"There is flowers in the country," Bobby declared gravely.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and trees," said Honor. "I wonder if your granny remembers when +we were larruped for stealin' apples."</p> + +<p>"Ay, that I do, Bobby, he, he," croaked the dying creature, with a +burst of enthusiasm. "We was a pair o' tomboys. The farmer he ran +after us cryin' 'Ye! ye!' but we wouldn't take no gar. He, he, he!"</p> + +<p>Honor wept at the laughter. The native idiom, unheard for half a +century, made her face shine under the tears. "Don't let your granny +excite herself, Bobby. Let me give her her drink." She moved the boy +aside, and Mercy's lips automatically opened to the draught.</p> + +<p>"Tom was wi' us, Bobby," she gurgled, still vibrating with amusement, +"and he tumbled over on the heather. He, he!"</p> + +<p>"Tom is dead this forty year, Bobby," whispered Honor.</p> + +<p>Mercy's head fell back, and an expression of supreme exhaustion came +over the face. Half an hour passed. Bobby was called down to dinner. +The doctor had been sent for. The silent sisters were alone. Suddenly +Mercy sat up with a jerk.</p> + +<p>"It be growin' dark, Tom," she said hoarsely, "'haint it time to call +the cattle home from the ma'shes?"</p> + +<p>"She's talkin' rubbidge again," said Honor, chokingly. "Tell her she's +in London, Bobby."</p> + +<p>A wave of intelligence traversed the sallow face. Still sitting up, +Mercy bent towards the side of the bed. "Ah, is Honor still there? +Kiss me—Bobby." Her hands groped blindly. Honor bent down and the old +women's withered lips met.</p> + +<p>And in that kiss Mercy passed away into the greater Silence.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<h1><a name="THE_BIG_BOW_MYSTERY" id="THE_BIG_BOW_MYSTERY"></a>THE BIG BOW MYSTERY</h1> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>Contents</h3> + +<p> +<a href="#I__">I</a><br /> +<a href="#II__">II</a><br /> +<a href="#III__">III</a><br /> +<a href="#IV__">IV</a><br /> +<a href="#V__">V</a><br /> +<a href="#VI__">VI</a><br /> +<a href="#VII__">VII</a><br /> +<a href="#VIII__">VIII</a><br /> +<a href="#IX__">IX</a><br /> +<a href="#X__">X</a><br /> +<a href="#XI__">XI</a><br /> +<a href="#XII__">XII</a><br /> +</p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h2><a name="I__" id="I__"></a>I</h2> + + +<p>On a memorable morning of early December, London opened its eyes on a +frigid grey mist. There are mornings when King Fog masses his molecules +of carbon in serried squadrons in the city, while he scatters them +tenuously in the suburbs; so that your morning train may bear you from +twilight to darkness. But to-day the enemy's manoeuvring was more +monotonous. From Bow even unto Hammersmith there draggled a dull, +wretched vapour, like the wraith of an impecunious suicide come into a +fortune immediately after the fatal deed. The barometers and thermometers +had sympathetically shared its depression, and their spirits (when they +had any) were low. The cold cut like a many-bladed knife.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump, of 11 Glover Street, Bow, was one of the few persons in +London whom fog did not depress. She went about her work quite as +cheerlessly as usual. She had been among the earliest to be aware of the +enemy's advent, picking out the strands of fog from the coils of darkness +the moment she rolled up her bedroom blind and unveiled the sombre +picture of the winter morning. She knew that the fog had come to stay for +the day at least, and that the gas-bill for the quarter was going to beat +the record in high-jumping. She also knew that this was because she had +allowed her new gentleman lodger, Mr. Arthur Constant, to pay a fixed sum +of a shilling a week for gas, instead of charging him a proportion of the +actual account for the whole house. The meteorologists might have saved +the credit of their science if they had reckoned with Mrs. Drabdump's +next gas-bill when they predicted the weather and made "Snow" the +favourite, and said that "Fog" would be nowhere. Fog was everywhere, yet +Mrs. Drabdump took no credit to herself for her prescience. Mrs. Drabdump +indeed took no credit for anything, paying her way along doggedly, and +struggling through life like a wearied swimmer trying to touch the +horizon. That things always went as badly as she had foreseen did not +exhilarate her in the least.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump was a widow. Widows are not born but made, else you might +have fancied Mrs. Drabdump had always been a widow. Nature had given her +that tall, spare form, and that pale, thin-lipped, elongated, hard-eyed +visage, and that painfully precise hair, which are always associated with +widowhood in low life. It is only in higher circles that women can lose +their husbands and yet remain bewitching. The late Mr. Drabdump had +scratched the base of his thumb with a rusty nail, and Mrs. Drabdump's +foreboding that he would die of lockjaw had not prevented her wrestling +day and night with the shadow of Death, as she had wrestled with it +vainly twice before, when Katie died of diphtheria and little Johnny of +scarlet fever. Perhaps it is from overwork among the poor that Death has +been reduced to a shadow.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump was lighting the kitchen fire. She did it very +scientifically, as knowing the contrariety of coal and the anxiety of +flaming sticks to end in smoke unless rigidly kept up to the mark. +Science was a success as usual; and Mrs. Drabdump rose from her knees +content, like a Parsee priestess who had duly paid her morning devotions +to her deity. Then she started violently, and nearly lost her balance. +Her eye had caught the hands of the clock on the mantel. They pointed to +fifteen minutes to seven. Mrs. Drabdump's devotion to the kitchen fire +invariably terminated at fifteen minutes past six. What was the matter +with the clock?</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump had an immediate vision of Snoppet, the neighbouring +horologist, keeping the clock in hand for weeks and then returning it +only superficially repaired and secretly injured more vitally "for the +good of the trade." The evil vision vanished as quickly as it came, +exorcised by the deep boom of St. Dunstan's bells chiming the +three-quarters. In its place a great horror surged. Instinct had failed; +Mrs. Drabdump had risen at half-past six instead of six. Now she +understood why she had been feeling so dazed and strange and sleepy. +She had overslept herself.</p> + +<p>Chagrined and puzzled, she hastily set the kettle over the crackling +coal, discovering a second later that she had overslept herself because +Mr. Constant wished to be woke three-quarters of an hour earlier than +usual, and to have his breakfast at seven, having to speak at an early +meeting of discontented tram-men. She ran at once, candle in hand, to his +bedroom. It was upstairs. All "upstairs" was Arthur Constant's domain, +for it consisted of but two mutually independent rooms. Mrs. Drabdump +knocked viciously at the door of the one he used for a bedroom, crying, +"Seven o'clock, sir. You'll be late, sir. You must get up at once." The +usual slumbrous "All right" was not forthcoming; but, as she herself had +varied her morning salute, her ear was less expectant of the echo. She +went downstairs, with no foreboding save that the kettle would come off +second best in the race between its boiling and her lodger's dressing.</p> + +<p>For she knew there was no fear of Arthur Constant's lying deaf to +the call of Duty—temporarily represented by Mrs. Drabdump. He was +a light sleeper, and the tram-conductors' bells were probably ringing +in his ears, summoning him to the meeting. Why Arthur Constant, +B.A.—white-handed and white-shirted, and gentleman to the very purse of +him—should concern himself with tram-men, when fortune had confined his +necessary relations with drivers to cabmen at the least, Mrs. Drabdump +could not quite make out. He probably aspired to represent Bow in +Parliament; but then it would surely have been wiser to lodge with a +landlady who possessed a vote by having a husband alive. Nor was there +much practical wisdom in his wish to black his own boots (an occupation +in which he shone but little), and to live in every way like a Bow +working man. Bow working men were not so lavish in their patronage of +water, whether existing in drinking-glasses, morning tubs, or laundress's +establishments. Nor did they eat the delicacies with which Mrs. Drabdump +supplied him, with the assurance that they were the artisan's appanage. +She could not bear to see him eat things unbefitting his station. Arthur +Constant opened his mouth and ate what his landlady gave him, not first +deliberately shutting his eyes according to the formula, the rather +pluming himself on keeping them very wide open. But it is difficult for +saints to see through their own halos; and in practice an aureola about +the head is often indistinguishable from a mist.</p> + +<p>The tea to be scalded in Mr. Constant's pot, when that cantankerous +kettle should boil, was not the coarse mixture of black and green sacred +to herself and Mr. Mortlake, of whom the thoughts of breakfast now +reminded her. Poor Mr. Mortlake, gone off without any to Devonport, +somewhere about four in the fog-thickened darkness of a winter night! +Well, she hoped his journey would be duly rewarded, that his perks would +be heavy, and that he would make as good a thing out of the "travelling +expenses" as rival labour leaders roundly accused him of to other +people's faces. She did not grudge him his gains, nor was it her business +if, as they alleged, in introducing Mr. Constant to her vacant rooms, his +idea was not merely to benefit his landlady. He had done her an uncommon +good turn, queer as was the lodger thus introduced. His own apostleship +to the sons of toil gave Mrs. Drabdump no twinges of perplexity. Tom +Mortlake had been a compositor; and apostleship was obviously a +profession better paid and of a higher social status. Tom Mortlake—the +hero of a hundred strikes—set up in print on a poster, was unmistakably +superior to Tom Mortlake setting up other men's names at a case. Still, +the work was not all beer and skittles, and Mrs. Drabdump felt that Tom's +latest job was not enviable.</p> + +<p>She shook his door as she passed it on her way back to the kitchen, but +there was no response. The street door was only a few feet off down the +passage, and a glance at it dispelled the last hope that Tom had +abandoned the journey. The door was unbolted and unchained, and the only +security was the latch-key lock. Mrs. Drabdump felt a whit uneasy, +though, to give her her due, she never suffered as much as most good +housewives do from criminals who never come. Not quite opposite, but +still only a few doors off, on the other side of the street, lived the +celebrated ex-detective Grodman, and, illogically enough, his presence in +the street gave Mrs. Drabdump a curious sense of security, as of a +believer living under the shadow of the fane. That any human being of ill +odour should consciously come within a mile of the scent of so famous a +sleuth-hound seemed to her highly improbable. Grodman had retired (with a +competence) and was only a sleeping dog now; still, even criminals would +have sense enough to let him lie.</p> + +<p>So Mrs. Drabdump did not really feel that there had been any danger, +especially as a second glance at the street door showed that Mortlake had +been thoughtful enough to slip the loop that held back the bolt of the +big lock. She allowed herself another throb of sympathy for the labour +leader whirling on his dreary way towards Devonport Dockyard. Not that he +had told her anything of his journey, beyond the town; but she knew +Devonport had a Dockyard because Jessie Dymond—Tom's sweetheart—once +mentioned that her aunt lived near there, and it lay on the surface that +Tom had gone to help the dockers, who were imitating their London +brethren. Mrs. Drabdump did not need to be told things to be aware of +them. She went back to prepare Mr. Constant's superfine tea, vaguely +wondering why people were so discontented nowadays. But when she brought +up the tea and the toast and the eggs to Mr. Constant's sitting-room +(which adjoined his bedroom, though without communicating with it), Mr. +Constant was not sitting in it. She lit the gas, and laid the cloth; then +she returned to the landing and beat at the bedroom door with an +imperative palm. Silence alone answered her. She called him by name and +told him the hour, but hers was the only voice she heard, and it sounded +strangely to her in the shadows of the staircase. Then, muttering, "Poor +gentleman, he had the toothache last night; and p'r'aps he's only just +got a wink o' sleep. Pity to disturb him for the sake of them grizzling +conductors. I'll let him sleep his usual time," she bore the tea-pot +downstairs with a mournful, almost poetic, consciousness that soft-boiled +eggs (like love) must grow cold.</p> + +<p>Half-past seven came—and she knocked again. But Constant slept on.</p> + +<p>His letters, always a strange assortment, arrived at eight, and a +telegram came soon after. Mrs. Drabdump rattled his door, shouted, and at +last put the wire under it. Her heart was beating fast enough now, though +there seemed to be a cold, clammy snake curling round it. She went +downstairs again and turned the handle of Mortlake's room, and went in +without knowing why. The coverlet of the bed showed that the occupant had +only lain down in his clothes, as if fearing to miss the early train. She +had not for a moment expected to find him in the room; yet somehow the +consciousness that she was alone in the house with the sleeping Constant +seemed to flash for the first time upon her, and the clammy snake +tightened its folds round her heart.</p> + +<p>She opened the street door, and her eye wandered nervously up and down. +It was half-past eight. The little street stretched cold and still in the +grey mist, blinking bleary eyes at either end, where the street lamps +smouldered on. No one was visible for the moment, though smoke was rising +from many of the chimneys to greet its sister mist. At the house of the +detective across the way the blinds were still down and the shutters up. +Yet the familiar, prosaic aspect of the street calmed her. The bleak air +set her coughing; she slammed the door to, and returned to the kitchen to +make fresh tea for Constant, who could only be in a deep sleep. But the +canister trembled in her grasp. She did not know whether she dropped it +or threw it down, but there was nothing in the hand that battered again +a moment later at the bedroom door. No sound within answered the clamour +without. She rained blow upon blow in a sort of spasm of frenzy, scarce +remembering that her object was merely to wake her lodger, and almost +staving in the lower panels with her kicks. Then she turned the handle +and tried to open the door, but it was locked. The resistance recalled +her to herself—she had a moment of shocked decency at the thought that +she had been about to enter Constant's bedroom. Then the terror came over +her afresh. She felt that she was alone in the house with a corpse. She +sank to the floor, cowering; with difficulty stifling a desire to scream. +Then she rose with a jerk and raced down the stairs without looking +behind her, and threw open the door and ran out into the street, only +pulling up with her hand violently agitating Grodman's door-knocker. In a +moment the first-floor window was raised—the little house was of the +same pattern as her own—and Grodman's full fleshy face loomed through +the fog in sleepy irritation from under a nightcap. Despite its scowl the +ex-detective's face dawned upon her like the sun upon an occupant of the +haunted chamber.</p> + +<p>"What in the devil's the matter?" he growled. Grodman was not an early +bird, now that he had no worms to catch. He could afford to despise +proverbs now, for the house in which he lived was his, and he lived in it +because several other houses in the street were also his, and it is well +for the landlord to be about his own estate in Bow, where poachers often +shoot the moon. Perhaps the desire to enjoy his greatness among his early +cronies counted for something, too, for he had been born and bred at Bow, +receiving when a youth his first engagement from the local police +quarters, whence he had drawn a few shillings a week as an amateur +detective in his leisure hours.</p> + +<p>Grodman was still a bachelor. In the celestial matrimonial bureau a +partner might have been selected for him, but he had never been able +to discover her. It was his one failure as a detective. He was a +self-sufficing person, who preferred a gas stove to a domestic; but in +deference to Glover Street opinion he admitted a female factotum between +ten A.M. and ten P.M., and, equally in deference to Glover Street +opinion, excluded her between ten P.M. and ten A.M.</p> + +<p>"I want you to come across at once," Mrs. Drabdump gasped. "Something has +happened to Mr. Constant."</p> + +<p>"What! Not bludgeoned by the police at the meeting this morning, I hope?"</p> + +<p>"No, no! He didn't go. He is dead."</p> + +<p>"Dead?" Grodman's face grew very serious now.</p> + +<p>"Yes. Murdered!"</p> + +<p>"What?" almost shouted the ex-detective. "How? When? Where? Who?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. I can't get to him. I have beaten at his door. He does not +answer."</p> + +<p>Grodman's face lit up with relief.</p> + +<p>"You silly woman! Is that all? I shall have a cold in my head. Bitter +weather. He's dog-tired after yesterday—processions, three speeches, +kindergarten, lecture on 'the moon,' article on cooperation. That's his +style." It was also Grodman's style. He never wasted words.</p> + +<p>"No," Mrs. Drabdump breathed up at him solemnly, "he's dead."</p> + +<p>"All right; go back. Don't alarm the neighbourhood unnecessarily. Wait +for me. Down in five minutes." Grodman did not take this Cassandra of the +kitchen too seriously. Probably he knew his woman. His small, bead-like +eyes glittered with an almost amused smile as he withdrew them from +Mrs. Drabdump's ken, and shut down the sash with a bang. The poor woman +ran back across the road and through her door, which she would not +close behind her. It seemed to shut her in with the dead. She waited in +the passage. After an age—seven minutes by any honest clock—Grodman +made his appearance, looking as dressed as usual, but with unkempt +hair and with disconsolate side-whisker. He was not quite used to that +side-whisker yet, for it had only recently come within the margin of +cultivation. In active service Grodman had been clean-shaven, like all +members of <i>the</i> profession—for surely your detective is the most +versatile of actors. Mrs. Drabdump closed the street door quietly, and +pointed to the stairs, fear operating like a polite desire to give him +precedence. Grodman ascended, amusement still glimmering in his eyes. +Arrived on the landing he knocked peremptorily at the door, crying, "Nine +o'clock, Mr. Constant; nine o'clock!" When he ceased there was no other +sound or movement. His face grew more serious. He waited, then knocked, +and cried louder. He turned the handle but the door was fast. He tried to +peer through the keyhole, but it was blocked. He shook the upper panels, +but the door seemed bolted as well as locked. He stood still, his face +set and rigid, for he liked and esteemed the man.</p> + +<p>"Ay, knock your loudest," whispered the pale-faced woman. "You'll not +wake him now."</p> + +<p>The grey mist had followed them through the street door, and hovered +about the staircase, charging the air with a moist sepulchral odour.</p> + +<p>"Locked and bolted," muttered Grodman, shaking the door afresh.</p> + +<p>"Burst it open," breathed the woman, trembling violently all over, and +holding her hands before her as if to ward off the dreadful vision. +Without another word, Grodman applied his shoulder to the door, and made +a violent muscular effort. He had been an athlete in his time, and the +sap was yet in him. The door creaked, little by little it began to +give, the woodwork enclosing the bolt of the lock splintered, the panels +bent inwards, the large upper bolt tore off its iron staple; the door +flew back with a crash. Grodman rushed in.</p> + +<p>"My God!" he cried. The woman shrieked. The sight was too terrible.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Within a few hours the jubilant newsboys were shrieking "Horrible Suicide +in Bow," and <i>The Moon</i> poster added, for the satisfaction of those too +poor to purchase, "A Philanthropist Cuts His Throat."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="II__" id="II__"></a>II</h2> + + +<p>But the newspapers were premature. Scotland Yard refused to prejudice the +case despite the penny-a-liners. Several arrests were made, so that the +later editions were compelled to soften "Suicide" into "Mystery." The +people arrested were a nondescript collection of tramps. Most of them had +committed other offences for which the police had not arrested them. One +bewildered-looking gentleman gave himself up (as if he were a riddle), +but the police would have none of him, and restored him forthwith to his +friends and keepers. The number of candidates for each new opening in +Newgate is astonishing.</p> + +<p>The full significance of this tragedy of a noble young life cut short +had hardly time to filter into the public mind, when a fresh sensation +absorbed it. Tom Mortlake had been arrested the same day at Liverpool on +suspicion of being concerned in the death of his fellow-lodger. The news +fell like a bombshell upon a land in which Tom Mortlake's name was a +household word. That the gifted artisan orator, who had never shrunk upon +occasion from launching red rhetoric at society, should actually have +shed blood seemed too startling, especially as the blood shed was not +blue, but the property of a lovable young middle-class idealist, who had +now literally given his life to the Cause. But this supplementary +sensation did not grow to a head, and everybody (save a few labour +leaders) was relieved to hear that Tom had been released almost +immediately, being merely subpoenaed to appear at the inquest. In an +interview which he accorded to the representative of a Liverpool paper +the same afternoon, he stated that he put his arrest down entirely to the +enmity and rancour entertained towards him by the police throughout the +country. He had come to Liverpool to trace the movements of a friend +about whom he was very uneasy, and he was making anxious inquiries at the +docks to discover at what times steamers left for America, when the +detectives stationed there had, in accordance with instructions from +headquarters, arrested him as a suspicious-looking character. "Though," +said Tom, "they must very well have known my phiz, as I have been +sketched and caricatured all over the shop. When I told them who I was +they had the decency to let me go. They thought they'd scored off me +enough, I reckon. Yes, it certainly <i>is</i> a strange coincidence that I +might actually have had something to do with the poor fellow's death, +which has cut me up as much as anybody; though if they had known I had +just come from the 'scene of the crime,' and actually lived in the house, +they would probably have—let me alone." He laughed sarcastically. "They +are a queer lot of muddle-heads, are the police. Their motto is, 'First +catch your man, then cook the evidence.' If you're on the spot you're +guilty because you're there, and if you're elsewhere you're guilty +because you have gone away. Oh, I know them! If they could have seen +their way to clap me in quod, they'd ha' done it. Luckily I know the +number of the cabman who took me to Euston before five this morning."</p> + +<p>"If they clapped you in quod," the interviewer reported himself as +facetiously observing, "the prisoners would be on strike in a week."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but there would be so many blacklegs ready to take their places," +Mortlake flashed back, "that I'm afraid it 'ould be no go. But do excuse +me. I am so upset about my friend. I'm afraid he has left England, and I +have to make inquiries; and now there's poor Constant gone—horrible! +horrible! and I'm due in London at the inquest. I must really run away. +Good-by. Tell your readers it's all a police grudge."</p> + +<p>"One last word, Mr. Mortlake, if you please. Is it true that you were +billed to preside at a great meeting of clerks at St. James's Hall +between one and two to-day to protest against the German invasion?"</p> + +<p>"Whew! so I was. But the beggars arrested me just before one, when I was +going to wire, and then the news of poor Constant's end drove it out of +my head. What a nuisance! Lord, how troubles do come together! Well, +good-by, send me a copy of the paper."</p> + +<p>Tom Mortlake's evidence at the inquest added little beyond this to the +public knowledge of his movements on the morning of the Mystery. The +cabman who drove him to Euston had written indignantly to the papers to +say that he picked up his celebrated fare at Bow Railway Station at about +half-past four A.M., and the arrest was a deliberate insult to democracy, +and he offered to make an affidavit to that effect, leaving it dubious to +which effect. But Scotland Yard betrayed no itch for the affidavit in +question, and No. 2138 subsided again into the obscurity of his rank. +Mortlake—whose face was very pale below the black mane brushed back from +his fine forehead—gave his evidence in low, sympathetic tones. He had +known the deceased for over a year, coming constantly across him in their +common political and social work, and had found the furnished rooms for +him in Glover Street at his own request, they just being to let when +Constant resolved to leave his rooms at Oxford House in Bethnal Green, +and to share the actual life of the people. The locality suited the +deceased, as being near the People's Palace. He respected and admired +the deceased, whose genuine goodness had won all hearts. The deceased +was an untiring worker; never grumbled, was always in fair spirits, +regarded his life and wealth as a sacred trust to be used for the benefit +of humanity. He had last seen him at a quarter past nine P.M. on the +day preceding his death. He (witness) had received a letter by the last +post which made him uneasy about a friend. He went up to consult deceased +about it. Deceased was evidently suffering from toothache, and was fixing +a piece of cotton-wool in a hollow tooth, but he did not complain. +Deceased seemed rather upset by the news he brought, and they both +discussed it rather excitedly.</p> + +<p>By a JURYMAN: Did the news concern him?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: Only impersonally. He knew my friend, and was keenly +sympathetic when one was in trouble.</p> + +<p>CORONER: Could you show the jury the letter you received?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: I have mislaid it, and cannot make out where it has got to. If +you, sir, think it relevant or essential, I will state what the trouble +was.</p> + +<p>CORONER: Was the toothache very violent?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: I cannot tell. I think not, though he told me it had disturbed +his rest the night before.</p> + +<p>CORONER: What time did you leave him?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: About twenty to ten.</p> + +<p>CORONER: And what did you do then?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: I went out for an hour or so to make some inquiries. Then I +returned, and told my landlady I should be leaving by an early train +for—for the country.</p> + +<p>CORONER: And that was the last you saw of the deceased?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE (with emotion): The last.</p> + +<p>CORONER: How was he when you left him?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: Mainly concerned about my trouble.</p> + +<p>CORONER: Otherwise you saw nothing unusual about him?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: Nothing.</p> + +<p>CORONER: What time did you leave the house on Tuesday morning?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: At about five-and-twenty minutes past four.</p> + +<p>CORONER: Are you sure that you shut the street door?</p> + +<p>MORTLAKE: Quite sure. Knowing my landlady was rather a timid person, I +even slipped the bolt of the big lock, which was usually tied back. It +was impossible for any one to get in, even with a latch-key.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump's evidence (which, of course, preceded his) was more +important, and occupied a considerable time, unduly eked out by +Drabdumpian padding. Thus she not only deposed that Mr. Constant had the +toothache, but that it was going to last about a week; in tragi-comic +indifference to the radical cure that had been effected. Her account of +the last hours of the deceased tallied with Mortlake's, only that she +feared Mortlake was quarrelling with him over something in the letter +that came by the nine o'clock post. Deceased had left the house a little +after Mortlake, but had returned before him, and had gone straight to +his bedroom. She had not actually seen him come in, having been in the +kitchen, but she heard his latch-key, followed by his light step up the +stairs.</p> + +<p>A JURYMAN: How do you know it was not somebody else? (<i>Sensation, of +which the juryman tries to look unconscious</i>.)</p> + +<p>WITNESS: He called down to me over the banisters, and says in his +sweetish voice, "Be hextra sure to wake me at a quarter to seven, Mrs. +Drabdump, or else I shan't get to my tram meeting." (<i>Juryman +collapses</i>.)</p> + +<p>CORONER: And did you wake him?</p> + +<p>MRS. DRABDUMP (breaking down): Oh, my lud, how can you ask?</p> + +<p>CORONER: There, there, compose yourself. I mean did you try to wake him?</p> + +<p>MRS. DRABDUMP: I have taken in and done for lodgers this seventeen years, +my lud, and have always gave satisfaction; and Mr. Mortlake, he wouldn't +ha' recommended me otherwise, though I wish to Heaven the poor gentleman +had never—</p> + +<p>CORONER: Yes, yes, of course. You tried to rouse him?</p> + +<p>But it was some time before Mrs. Drabdump was sufficiently calm to +explain that, though she had overslept herself, and though it would have +been all the same anyhow, she <i>had</i> come up to time. Bit by bit the +tragic story was forced from her lips—a tragedy that even her telling +could not make tawdry. She told with superfluous detail how—when Mr. +Grodman broke in the door—she saw her unhappy gentleman-lodger lying on +his back in bed, stone dead, with a gaping red wound in his throat; how +her stronger-minded companion calmed her a little by spreading a +handkerchief over the distorted face; how they then looked vainly about +and under the bed for any instrument by which the deed could have been +done, the veteran detective carefully making a rapid inventory of the +contents of the room, and taking notes of the precise position and +condition of the body before anything was disturbed by the arrival of +gapers or bunglers; how she had pointed out to him that both the windows +were firmly bolted to keep out the cold night air; how, having noted this +down with a puzzled, pitying shake of the head, he had opened the window +to summon the police, and espied in the fog one Denzil Cantercot, whom he +called, and told to run to the nearest police-station and ask them to +send on an inspector and a surgeon; how they both remained in the room +till the police arrived, Grodman pondering deeply the while and making +notes every now and again, as fresh points occurred to him, and asking +her questions about the poor, weak-headed young man. Pressed as to what +she meant by calling the deceased "weak-headed," she replied that some of +her neighbours wrote him begging letters, though, Heaven knew, they were +better off than herself, who had to scrape her fingers to the bone for +every penny she earned. Under further pressure from Mr. Talbot, who was +watching the inquiry on behalf of Arthur Constant's family, Mrs. Drabdump +admitted that the deceased had behaved like a human being, nor was there +anything externally eccentric or queer in his conduct. He was always +cheerful and pleasant spoken, though certainly soft—God rest his soul. +No; he never shaved, but wore all the hair that Heaven had given him.</p> + +<p>By a JURYMAN: She thought deceased was in the habit of locking his door +when he went to bed. Of course, she couldn't say for certain. (Laughter.) +There was no need to bolt the door as well. The bolt slid upwards, and +was at the top of the door. When she first let lodgings, her reasons for +which she seemed anxious to publish, there had only been a bolt, but a +suspicious lodger, she would not call him a gentleman, had complained +that he could not fasten his door behind him, and so she had been put to +the expense of having a lock made. The complaining lodger went off soon +after without paying his rent. (Laughter.) She had always known he would.</p> + +<p>The CORONER: Was deceased at all nervous?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: No, he was a very nice gentleman. (A laugh.)</p> + +<p>CORONER: I mean did he seem afraid of being robbed?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: No, he was always goin' to demonstrations. (Laughter.) I told +him to be careful. I told him I lost a purse with 3s. 2d. myself on +Jubilee Day.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump resumed her seat, weeping vaguely.</p> + +<p>The CORONER: Gentlemen, we shall have an opportunity of viewing the room +shortly.</p> + +<p>The story of the discovery of the body was retold, though more +scientifically, by Mr. George Grodman, whose unexpected resurgence into +the realm of his early exploits excited as keen a curiosity as the +reappearance "for this occasion only" of a retired prima donna. His +book, <i>Criminals I have Caught</i>, passed from the twenty-third to the +twenty-fourth edition merely on the strength of it. Mr. Grodman stated +that the body was still warm when he found it. He thought that death was +quite recent. The door he had had to burst was bolted as well as locked. +He confirmed Mrs. Drabdump's statement about the windows; the chimney +was very narrow. The cut looked as if done by a razor. There was no +instrument lying about the room. He had known the deceased about a month. +He seemed a very earnest, simple-minded young fellow, who spoke a great +deal about the brotherhood of man. (The hardened old man-hunter's voice +was not free from a tremor as he spoke jerkily of the dead man's +enthusiasms.) He should have thought the deceased the last man in the +world to commit suicide.</p> + +<p>Mr. DENZIL CANTERCOT was next called: He was a poet. (Laughter.) He was +on his way to Mr. Grodman's house to tell him he had been unable to do +some writing for him because he was suffering from writer's cramp, when +Mr. Grodman called to him from the window of No. 11 and asked him to run +for the police. No, he did not run; he was a philosopher. (Laughter.) He +returned with them to the door, but did not go up. He had no stomach for +crude sensations. (Laughter.) The grey fog was sufficiently unbeautiful +for him for one morning. (Laughter.)</p> + +<p>Inspector HOWLETT said: About 9.45 on the morning of Tuesday, 4th +December, from information received, he went with Sergeant Runnymede +and Dr. Robinson to 11 Glover Street, Bow, and there found the dead body +of a young man, lying on his back with his throat cut. The door of the +room had been smashed in, and the lock and the bolt evidently forced. The +room was tidy. There were no marks of blood on the floor. A purse full of +gold was on the dressing-table beside a big book. A hip-bath, with cold +water, stood beside the bed, over which was a hanging bookcase. There was +a large wardrobe against the wall next to the door. The chimney was very +narrow. There were two windows, one bolted. It was about eighteen feet to +the pavement. There was no way of climbing up. No one could possibly have +got out of the room, and then bolted the doors and windows behind him; +and he had searched all parts of the room in which any one might have +been concealed. He had been unable to find any instrument in the room in +spite of exhaustive search, there being not even a penknife in the +pockets of the clothes of the deceased, which lay on a chair. The house +and the back yard, and the adjacent pavement, had also been fruitlessly +searched.</p> + +<p>Sergeant RUNNYMEDE made an identical statement, saving only that <i>he</i> had +gone with Dr. Robinson and Inspector Howlett.</p> + +<p>Dr. ROBINSON, divisional surgeon, said: "The deceased was lying on his +back, with his throat cut. The body was not yet cold, the abdominal +region being quite warm. Rigor mortis had set in in the lower jaw, neck, +and upper extremities. The muscles contracted when beaten. I inferred +that life had been extinct some two or three hours, probably not longer, +it might have been less. The bed-clothes would keep the lower part warm +for some time. The wound, which was a deep one, was five and a half +inches from right to left across the throat to a point under the left +ear. The upper portion of the windpipe was severed, and likewise the +jugular vein. The muscular coating of the carotid artery was divided. +There was a slight cut, as if in continuation of the wound, on the thumb +of the left hand. The hands were clasped underneath the head. There was +no blood on the right hand. The wound could not have been self-inflicted. +A sharp instrument had been used, such as a razor. The cut might have +been made by a left-handed person. No doubt death was practically +instantaneous. I saw no signs of a struggle about the body or the room. +I noticed a purse on the dressing-table, lying next to Madame Blavatsky's +big book on Theosophy. Sergeant Runnymede drew my attention to the fact +that the door had evidently been locked and bolted from within."</p> + +<p>By a JURYMAN: I do not say the cuts could not have been made by a +right-handed person. I can offer no suggestion as to how the inflictor +of the wound got in or out. Extremely improbable that the cut was +self-inflicted. There was little trace of the outside fog in the room.</p> + +<p>Police constable Williams said he was on duty in the early hours of the +morning of the 4th inst. Glover Street lay within his beat. He saw or +heard nothing suspicious. The fog was never very dense, though nasty to +the throat. He had passed through Glover Street about half-past four. He +had not seen Mr. Mortlake or anybody else leave the house.</p> + +<p>The Court here adjourned, the coroner and the jury repairing in a body to +11 Glover Street, to view the house and the bedroom of the deceased. And +the evening posters announced "The Bow Mystery Thickens."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="III__" id="III__"></a>III</h2> + + +<p>Before the inquiry was resumed, all the poor wretches in custody had been +released on suspicion that they were innocent; there was not a single +case even for a magistrate. Clues, which at such seasons are gathered by +the police like blackberries off the hedges, were scanty and unripe. +Inferior specimens were offered them by bushels, but there was not a +good one among the lot. The police could not even manufacture a clue.</p> + +<p>Arthur Constant's death was already the theme of every hearth, +railway-carriage, and public-house. The dead idealist had points +of contact with so many spheres. The East-end and the West-end alike +were moved and excited, the Democratic Leagues and the Churches, the +Doss-houses and the Universities. The pity of it! And then the +impenetrable mystery of it!</p> + +<p>The evidence given in the concluding portion of the investigation was +necessarily less sensational. There were no more witnesses to bring the +scent of blood over the coroner's table; those who had yet to be heard +were merely relatives and friends of the deceased, who spoke of him as he +had been in life. His parents were dead, perhaps happily for them; his +relatives had seen little of him, and had scarce heard as much about him +as the outside world. No man is a prophet in his own country, and, even +if he migrates, it is advisable for him to leave his family at home. His +friends were a motley crew; friends of the same friend are not +necessarily friends of one another. But their diversity only made the +congruity of the tale they had to tell more striking. It was the tale of +a man who had never made an enemy even by benefiting him, nor lost a +friend even by refusing his favours; the tale of a man whose heart +overflowed with peace and goodwill to all men all the year round; of a +man to whom Christmas came not once, but three hundred and sixty-five +times a year; it was the tale of a brilliant intellect, who gave up to +mankind what was meant for himself, and worked as a labourer in the +vineyard of humanity, never crying that the grapes were sour; of a man +uniformly cheerful and of good courage, living in that forgetfulness of +self which is the truest antidote to despair. And yet there was not quite +wanting the note of pain to jar the harmony and make it human. Richard +Elton, his chum from boyhood, and vicar of Somerton, in Midlandshire, +handed to the coroner a letter received from the deceased about ten +days before his death, containing some passages which the coroner read +aloud:—"Do you know anything of Schopenhauer? I mean anything beyond the +current misconceptions? I have been making his acquaintance lately. He is +an agreeable rattle of a pessimist; his essay on 'The Misery of Mankind' +is quite lively reading. At first his assimilation of Christianity and +Pessimism (it occurs in his essay on 'Suicide') dazzled me as an +audacious paradox. But there is truth in it. Verily the whole creation +groaneth and travaileth, and man is a degraded monster, and sin is over +all. Ah, my friend, I have shed many of my illusions since I came to this +seething hive of misery and wrongdoing. What shall one man's life—a +million men's lives—avail against the corruption, the vulgarity, and the +squalor of civilisation? Sometimes I feel like a farthing rushlight in +the Hall of Eblis. Selfishness is so long and life so short. And the +worst of it is that everybody is so beastly contented. The poor no more +desire comfort than the rich culture. The woman, to whom a penny school +fee for her child represents an appreciable slice of her income, is +satisfied that the rich we shall always have with us.</p> + +<p>"The real old Tories are the paupers in the Workhouse. The radical +working men are jealous of their own leaders, and the leaders are jealous +of one another. Schopenhauer must have organised a Labour Party in his +salad days. And yet one can't help feeling that he committed suicide as a +philosopher by not committing it as a man. He claims kinship with Buddha, +too; though Esoteric Buddhism at least seems spheres removed from the +philosophy of 'the Will and the Idea.' What a wonderful woman Madame +Blavatsky must be! I can't say I follow her, for she is up in the clouds +nearly all the time, and I haven't as yet developed an astral body. Shall +I send you on her book? It is fascinating.... I am becoming quite a +fluent orator. One soon gets into the way of it. The horrible thing is +that you catch yourself saying things to lead up to 'Cheers' instead of +sticking to the plain realities of the business. Lucy is still doing the +galleries in Italy. It used to pain me sometimes to think of my darling's +happiness when I came across a flat-chested factory-girl. Now I feel her +happiness is as important as a factory-girl's."</p> + +<p>Lucy, the witness explained, was Lucy Brent, the betrothed of the +deceased. The poor girl had been telegraphed for, and had started for +England. The witness stated that the outburst of despondency in this +letter was almost a solitary one, most of the letters in his possession +being bright, buoyant, and hopeful. Even this letter ended with a +humorous statement of the writer's manifold plans and projects for the +New Year. The deceased was a good Churchman.</p> + +<p>CORONER: Was there any private trouble in his own life to account for the +temporary despondency?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: Not so far as I am aware. His financial position was +exceptionally favourable.</p> + +<p>CORONER: There had been no quarrel with Miss Brent?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: I have the best authority for saying that no shadow of +difference had ever come between them.</p> + +<p>CORONER: Was the deceased left-handed?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: Certainly not. He was not even ambidexter.</p> + +<p>A JURYMAN: Isn't Shoppinhour one of the infidel writers, published by the +Freethought Publication Society?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: I do not know who publishes his books.</p> + +<p>The JURYMAN (a small grocer and big raw-boned Scotchman, rejoicing in the +name of Sandy Sanderson and the dignities of deaconry and membership of +the committee of the Bow Conservative Association): No equeevocation, +sir. Is he not a secularist, who has lectured at the Hall of Science?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: No, he is a foreign writer—(Mr. Sanderson was heard to thank +heaven for this small mercy)—who believes that life is not worth living.</p> + +<p>The JURYMAN: Were you not shocked to find the friend of a meenister +reading such impure leeterature?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: The deceased read everything. Schopenhauer is the author of a +system of philosophy, and not what you seem to imagine. Perhaps you +would like to inspect the book? (Laughter.)</p> + +<p>The JURYMAN: I would na' touch it with a pitchfork. Such books should be +burnt. And this Madame Blavatsky's book—what is that? Is that also +pheelosophy?</p> + +<p>WITNESS: No. It is Theosophy. (Laughter.)</p> + +<p>Mr. Allan Smith, secretary of the Tram-men's Union, stated that he had +had an interview with the deceased on the day before his death, when he +(the deceased) spoke hopefully of the prospects of the movement, and +wrote him out a check for ten guineas for his Union. Deceased promised to +speak at a meeting called for a quarter past seven A.M. the next day.</p> + +<p>Mr. Edward Wimp, of the Scotland Yard Detective Department, said that the +letters and papers of the deceased threw no light upon the manner of his +death, and they would be handed back to the family. His Department had +not formed any theory on the subject.</p> + +<p>The coroner proceeded to sum up the evidence. "We have to deal, +gentlemen," he said, "with a most incomprehensible and mysterious case, +the details of which are yet astonishingly simple. On the morning of +Tuesday, the 4th inst., Mrs. Drabdump, a worthy hard-working widow, who +lets lodgings at 11 Glover Street, Bow, was unable to arouse the +deceased, who occupied the entire upper floor of the house. Becoming +alarmed, she went across to fetch Mr. George Grodman, a gentleman known +to us all by reputation, and to whose clear and scientific evidence we +are much indebted, and got him to batter in the door. They found the +deceased lying back in bed with a deep wound in his throat. Life had only +recently become extinct. There was no trace of any instrument by which +the cut could have been effected: there was no trace of any person who +could have effected the cut. No person could apparently have got in or +out. The medical evidence goes to show that the deceased could not have +inflicted the wound himself. And yet, gentlemen, there are, in the nature +of things, two—and only two—alternative explanations of his death. +Either the wound was inflicted by his own hand, or it was inflicted by +another's. I shall take each of these possibilities separately. First, +did the deceased commit suicide? The medical evidence says deceased was +lying with his hands clasped behind his head. Now the wound was made from +right to left, and terminated by a cut on the left thumb. If the deceased +had made it he would have had to do it with his right hand, while his +left hand remained under his head—a most peculiar and unnatural position +to assume. Moreover, in making a cut with the right hand, one would +naturally move the hand from left to right. It is unlikely that the +deceased would move his right hand so awkwardly and unnaturally, unless, +of course, his object was to baffle suspicion. Another point is that on +this hypothesis, the deceased would have had to replace his right hand +beneath his head. But Dr. Robinson believes that death was instantaneous. +If so, deceased could have had no time to pose so neatly. It is just +possible the cut was made with the left hand, but then the deceased was +right-handed. The absence of any signs of a possible weapon undoubtedly +goes to corroborate the medical evidence. The police have made an +exhaustive search in all places where the razor or other weapon or +instrument might by any possibility have been concealed, including the +bed-clothes, the mattress, the pillow, and the street into which it might +have been dropped. But all theories involving the wilful concealment of +the fatal instrument have to reckon with the fact or probability that +death was instantaneous, also with the fact that there was no blood about +the floor. Finally, the instrument used was in all likelihood a razor, +and the deceased did not shave, and was never known to be in possession +of any such instrument. If, then, we were to confine ourselves to the +medical and police evidence, there would, I think, be little hesitation +in dismissing the idea of suicide. Nevertheless, it is well to forget the +physical aspect of the case for a moment and to apply our minds to an +unprejudiced inquiry into the mental aspect of it. Was there any reason +why the deceased should wish to take his own life? He was young, wealthy, +and popular, loving and loved; life stretched fair before him. He had no +vices. Plain living, high thinking, and noble doing were the three +guiding stars of his life. If he had had ambition, an illustrious public +career was within his reach. He was an orator of no mean power, a +brilliant and industrious man. His outlook was always on the future—he +was always sketching out ways in which he could be useful to his +fellow-men. His purse and his time were ever at the command of whosoever +could show fair claim upon them. If such a man were likely to end his own +life, the science of human nature would be at an end. Still, some of the +shadows of the picture have been presented to us. The man had his moments +of despondency—as which of us has not? But they seem to have been few +and passing. Anyhow, he was cheerful enough on the day before his death. +He was suffering, too, from toothache. But it does not seem to have been +violent, nor did he complain. Possibly, of course, the pain became very +acute in the night. Nor must we forget that he may have overworked +himself, and got his nerves into a morbid state. He worked very hard, +never rising later than half-past seven, and doing far more than the +professional 'labour leader.' He taught, and wrote, as well as spoke and +organised. But on the other hand all witnesses agreed that he was looking +forward eagerly to the meeting of tram-men on the morning of the 4th +inst. His whole heart was in the movement. Is it likely that this was the +night he would choose for quitting the scene of his usefulness? Is it +likely that if he had chosen it, he would not have left letters and a +statement behind, or made a last will and testament? Mr. Wimp has found +no possible clue to such conduct in his papers. Or is it likely he would +have concealed the instrument? The only positive sign of intention is the +bolting of his door in addition to the usual locking of it, but one +cannot lay much stress on that. Regarding the mental aspects alone, the +balance is largely against suicide; looking at the physical aspects, +suicide is well-nigh impossible. Putting the two together, the case +against suicide is all but mathematically complete. The answer, then, to +our first question, Did the deceased commit suicide? is, that he did +not."</p> + +<p>The coroner paused, and everybody drew a long breath. The lucid +exposition had been followed with admiration. If the coroner had stopped +now, the jury would have unhesitatingly returned a verdict of "murder." +But the coroner swallowed a mouthful of water and went on:—</p> + +<p>"We now come to the second alternative—was the deceased the victim of +homicide? In order to answer that question in the affirmative it is +essential that we should be able to form some conception of the modus +operandi. It is all very well for Dr. Robinson to say the cut was made by +another hand; but in the absence of any theory as to how the cut could +possibly have been made by that other hand, we should be driven back to +the theory of self-infliction, however improbable it may seem to medical +gentlemen. Now, what are the facts? When Mrs. Drabdump and Mr. Grodman +found the body it was yet warm, and Mr. Grodman, a witness fortunately +qualified by special experience, states that death had been quite recent. +This tallies closely enough with the view of Dr. Robinson, who, examining +the body about an hour later, put the time of death at two or three hours +before, say seven o'clock. Mrs. Drabdump had attempted to wake the +deceased at a quarter to seven, which would put back the act to a little +earlier. As I understand from Dr. Robinson, that it is impossible to fix +the time very precisely, death may have very well taken place several +hours before Mrs. Drabdump's first attempt to wake deceased. Of course, +it may have taken place between the first and second calls, as he may +merely have been sound asleep at first; it may also not impossibly have +taken place considerably earlier than the first call, for all the +physical data seem to prove. Nevertheless, on the whole, I think we shall +be least likely to err if we assume the time of death to be half-past +six. Gentlemen, let us picture to ourselves No. 11 Glover Street, at +half-past six. We have seen the house; we know exactly how it is +constructed. On the ground floor a front room tenanted by Mr. Mortlake, +with two windows giving on the street, both securely bolted; a back room +occupied by the landlady; and a kitchen. Mrs. Drabdump did not leave her +bedroom till half-past six, so that we may be sure all the various doors +and windows have not yet been unfastened; while the season of the year is +a guarantee that nothing had been left open. The front door, through +which Mr. Mortlake has gone out before half-past four, is guarded by the +latch-key lock and the big lock. On the upper floor are two rooms—a +front room used by deceased for a bedroom, and a back room which he used +as a sitting-room. The back room has been left open, with the key inside, +but the window is fastened. The door of the front room is not only locked +but bolted. We have seen the splintered mortice and the staple of the +upper bolt violently forced from the woodwork and resting on the pin. The +windows are bolted, the fasteners being firmly fixed in the catches. The +chimney is too narrow to admit of the passage of even a child. This room, +in fact, is as firmly barred in as if besieged. It has no communication +with any other part of the house. It is as absolutely self-centred and +isolated as if it were a fort in the sea or a log-hut in the forest. Even +if any strange person is in the house, nay, in the very sitting-room of +the deceased, he cannot get into the bedroom, for the house is one built +for the poor, with no communication between the different rooms, so that +separate families, if need be, may inhabit each. Now, however, let us +grant that some person has achieved the miracle of getting into the front +room, first floor, 18 feet from the ground. At half-past six, or +thereabouts, he cuts the throat of the sleeping occupant. How is he then +to get out without attracting the attention of the now roused landlady? +But let us concede him that miracle, too. How is he to go away and yet +leave the doors and windows locked and bolted from within? This is a +degree of miracle at which my credulity must draw the line. No, the room +had been closed all night—there is scarce a trace of fog in it. No one +could get in or out. Finally, murders do not take place without motive. +Robbery and revenge are the only conceivable motives. The deceased had +not an enemy in the world; his money and valuables were left untouched. +Everything was in order. There were no signs of a struggle. The answer, +then, to our second inquiry, Was the deceased killed by another person? +is, that he was not.</p> + +<p>"Gentlemen, I am aware that this sounds impossible and contradictory. +But it is the facts that contradict themselves. It seems clear that the +deceased did not commit suicide. It seems equally clear that the deceased +was not murdered. There is nothing for it, therefore, gentlemen, but to +return a verdict tantamount to an acknowledgment of our incompetence to +come to any adequately grounded conviction whatever as to the means or +the manner by which the deceased met his death. It is the most +inexplicable mystery in all my experience." (Sensation.)</p> + +<p>The FOREMAN (after a colloquy with Mr. Sandy Sanderson): We are not +agreed, sir. One of the jurors insists on a verdict of "Death from +visitation by the act of God."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IV__" id="IV__"></a>IV</h2> + + +<p>But Sandy Sanderson's burning solicitude to fix the crime flickered +out in the face of opposition, and in the end he bowed his head to the +inevitable "open verdict." Then the floodgates of inkland were opened, +and the deluge pattered for nine days on the deaf coffin where the poor +idealist mouldered. The tongues of the Press were loosened, and the +leader-writers revelled in recapitulating the circumstances of "The +Big Bow Mystery," though they could contribute nothing but adjectives +to the solution. The papers teemed with letters—it was a kind of Indian +summer of the silly season. But the editors could not keep them out, nor +cared to. The mystery was the one topic of conversation everywhere—it +was on the carpet and the bare boards alike, in the kitchen and the +drawing-room. It was discussed with science or stupidity, with aspirates +or without. It came up for breakfast with the rolls, and was swept off +the supper-table with the last crumbs.</p> + +<p>No. 11 Glover Street, Bow, remained for days a shrine of pilgrimage. The +once sleepy little street buzzed from morning till night. From all parts +of the town people came to stare up at the bedroom window and wonder with +a foolish face of horror. The pavement was often blocked for hours +together, and itinerant vendors of refreshment made it a new market +centre, while vocalists hastened thither to sing the delectable ditty of +the deed without having any voice in the matter. It was a pity the +Government did not erect a toll-gate at either end of the street. But +Chancellors of the Exchequer rarely avail themselves of the more obvious +expedients for paying off the National Debt.</p> + +<p>Finally, familiarity bred contempt, and the wits grew facetious at the +expense of the Mystery. Jokes on the subject appeared even in the comic +papers.</p> + +<p>To the proverb, "You must not say Bo to a goose," one added, "or else she +will explain you the Mystery." The name of the gentleman who asked +whether the Bow Mystery was not 'arrowing shall not be divulged. There +was more point in "Dagonet's" remark that, if he had been one of the +unhappy jurymen, he should have been driven to "suicide." A professional +paradox-monger pointed triumphantly to the somewhat similar situation in +"the murder in the Rue Morgue," and said that Nature had been +plagiarising again—like the monkey she was—and he recommended Poe's +publishers to apply for an injunction. More seriously, Poe's solution +was re-suggested by "Constant Reader" as an original idea. He thought +that a small organ-grinder's monkey might have got down the chimney with +its master's razor, and, after attempting to shave the occupant of the +bed, have returned the way it came. This idea created considerable +sensation, but a correspondent with a long train of letters draggling +after his name pointed out that a monkey small enough to get down so +narrow a flue would not be strong enough to inflict so deep a wound. This +was disputed by a third writer, and the contest raged so keenly about the +power of monkeys' muscles that it was almost taken for granted that a +monkey was the guilty party. The bubble was pricked by the pen of "Common +Sense," who laconically remarked that no traces of soot or blood had been +discovered on the floor, or on the nightshirt, or the counterpane. The +<i>Lancet's</i> leader on the Mystery was awaited with interest. It said: "We +cannot join in the praises that have been showered upon the coroner's +summing up. It shows again the evils resulting from having coroners who +are not medical men. He seems to have appreciated but inadequately the +significance of the medical evidence. He should certainly have directed +the jury to return a verdict of murder on that. What was it to do with +him that he could see no way by which the wound could have been inflicted +by an outside agency? It was for the police to find how that was done. +Enough that it was impossible for the unhappy young man to have inflicted +such a wound, and then to have strength and will power enough to hide the +instrument and to remove perfectly every trace of his having left the bed +for the purpose." It is impossible to enumerate all the theories +propounded by the amateur detectives, while Scotland Yard religiously +held its tongue. Ultimately the interest on the subject became confined +to a few papers which had received the best letters. Those papers that +couldn't get interesting letters stopped the correspondence and sneered +at the "sensationalism" of those that could. Among the mass of fantasy +there were not a few notable solutions, which failed brilliantly, like +rockets posing as fixed stars. One was that in the obscurity of the fog +the murderer had ascended to the window of the bedroom by means of a +ladder from the pavement. He had then with a diamond cut one of the panes +away, and effected an entry through the aperture. On leaving he fixed in +the pane of glass again (or another which he had brought with him) and +thus the room remained with its bolts and locks untouched. On its being +pointed out that the panes were too small, a third correspondent showed +that that didn't matter, as it was only necessary to insert the hand and +undo the fastening, when the entire window could be opened, the process +being reversed by the murderer on leaving. This pretty edifice of glass +was smashed by a glazier, who wrote to say that a pane could hardly be +fixed in from only one side of a window frame, that it would fall out +when touched, and that in any case the wet putty could not have escaped +detection. A door panel sliced out and replaced was also put forward, and +as many trap-doors and secret passages were ascribed to No. 11 Glover +Street, as if it were a mediæval castle. Another of these clever theories +was that the murderer was in the room the whole time the police were +there—hidden in the wardrobe. Or he had got behind the door when Grodman +broke it open, so that he was not noticed in the excitement of the +discovery, and escaped with his weapon at the moment when Grodman and +Mrs. Drabdump were examining the window fastenings.</p> + +<p>Scientific explanations also were to hand to explain how the assassin +locked and bolted the door behind him. Powerful magnets outside the door +had been used to turn the key and push the bolt within. Murderers armed +with magnets loomed on the popular imagination like a new microbe. There +was only one defect in this ingenious theory—the thing could not be +done. A physiologist recalled the conjurers who swallow swords—by an +anatomical peculiarity of the throat—and said that the deceased might +have swallowed the weapon after cutting his own throat. This was too much +for the public to swallow. As for the idea that the suicide had been +effected with a penknife or its blade, or a bit of steel, which had then +got buried in the wound, not even the quotation of Shelley's line:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it,"</p></div> + +<p>could secure it a moment's acceptance. The same reception was accorded +to the idea that the cut had been made with a candle-stick (or other +harmless necessary bedroom article) constructed like a sword stick. +Theories of this sort caused a humorist to explain that the deceased had +hidden the razor in his hollow tooth! Some kind friend of Messrs. +Maskelyne and Cook suggested that they were the only persons who could +have done the deed, as no one else could get out of a locked cabinet. But +perhaps the most brilliant of these flashes of false fire was the +facetious, yet probably half-seriously meant letter that appeared in the +<i>Pell Mell Press</i> under the heading of</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED</p> + +<p>"Sir,—You will remember that when the Whitechapel murders were agitating +the universe, I suggested that the district coroner was the assassin. My +suggestion has been disregarded. The coroner is still at large. So is the +Whitechapel murderer. Perhaps this suggestive coincidence will incline +the authorities to pay more attention to me this time. The problem seems +to be this. The deceased could not have cut his own throat. The deceased +could not have had his throat cut for him. As one of the two must have +happened, this is obvious nonsense. As this is obvious nonsense I am +justified in disbelieving it. As this obvious nonsense was primarily put +in circulation by Mrs. Drabdump and Mr. Grodman, I am justified in +disbelieving <i>them</i>. In short, sir, what guarantee have we that the whole +tale is not a cock-and-bull story, invented by the two persons who first +found the body? What proof is there that the deed was not done by these +persons themselves, who then went to work to smash the door and break the +locks and the bolts, and fasten up all the windows before they called the +police in?—I enclose my card, and am, sir, yours truly,</p> + +<p>"ONE WHO LOOKS THROUGH HIS OWN SPECTACLES."</p></div> + +<p>"[Our correspondent's theory is not so audaciously original as he seems +to imagine. Has he not looked through the spectacles of the people who +persistently suggested that the Whitechapel murderer was invariably +the policeman who found the body? <i>Somebody</i> must find the body, if it is +to be found at all.—Ed. P.M.P.]"</p> + +<p>The editor had reason to be pleased that he inserted this letter, for it +drew the following interesting communication from the great detective +himself:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"THE BIG BOW MYSTERY SOLVED</p> + +<p>"Sir,—I do not agree with you that your correspondent's theory lacks +originality. On the contrary, I think it is delightfully original. In +fact it has given me an idea. What that idea is I do not yet propose to +say, but if 'One who looks through his own spectacles' will favour me +with his name and address I shall be happy to inform him a little before +the rest of the world whether his germ has borne any fruit. I feel he is +a kindred spirit, and take this opportunity of saying publicly that I was +extremely disappointed at the unsatisfactory verdict. The thing was a +palpable assassination; an open verdict has a tendency to relax the +exertions of Scotland Yard. I hope I shall not be accused of immodesty, +or of making personal reflections, when I say that the Department has had +several notorious failures of late. It is not what it used to be. Crime +is becoming impertinent. It no longer knows its place, so to speak. It +throws down the gauntlet where once it used to cower in its fastnesses. +I repeat, I make these remarks solely in the interest of law and order. +I do not for one moment believe that Arthur Constant killed himself, and +if Scotland Yard satisfies itself with that explanation, and turns on its +other side and goes to sleep again, then, sir, one of the foulest and +most horrible crimes of the century will for ever go unpunished. My +acquaintance with the unhappy victim was but recent; still, I saw and +knew enough of the man to be certain (and I hope I have seen and known +enough of other men to judge) that he was a man constitutionally +incapable of committing an act of violence, whether against himself or +anybody else. He would not hurt a fly, as the saying goes. And a man of +that gentle stamp always lacks the active energy to lay hands on himself. +He was a man to be esteemed in no common degree, and I feel proud to be +able to say that he considered me a friend. I am hardly at the time of +life at which a man cares to put on his harness again; but, sir, it is +impossible that I should ever know a day's rest till the perpetrator of +this foul deed is discovered. I have already put myself in communication +with the family of the victim, who, I am pleased to say, have every +confidence in me, and look to me to clear the name of their unhappy +relative from the semi-imputation of suicide. I shall be pleased if any +one who shares my distrust of the authorities, and who has any clue +whatever to this terrible mystery or any plausible suggestion to offer, +if, in brief, any 'One who looks through his own spectacles' will +communicate with me. If I were asked to indicate the direction in which +new clues might be most usefully sought, I should say, in the first +instance, anything is valuable that helps us to piece together a complete +picture of the manifold activities of the man in the East-end. He entered +one way or another into the lives of a good many people; is it true that +he nowhere made enemies? With the best intentions a man may wound or +offend; his interference may be resented; he may even excite jealousy. A +young man like the late Mr. Constant could not have had as much practical +sagacity as he had goodness. Whose corns did he tread on? The more we +know of the last few months of his life the more we shall know of the +manner of his death. Thanking you by anticipation for the insertion of +this letter in your valuable columns, I am, sir, yours truly,</p> + +<p>"George Grodman.</p> + +<p>"46 Glover Street, Bow.</p> + +<p>"P. S.—Since writing the above lines, I have, by the kindness of Miss +Brent, been placed in possession of a most valuable letter, probably the +last letter written by the unhappy gentleman. It is dated Monday, 3 +December, the very eve of the murder, and was addressed to her at +Florence, and has now, after some delay, followed her back to London +where the sad news unexpectedly brought her. It is a letter couched, on +the whole, in the most hopeful spirit, and speaks in detail of his +schemes. Of course there are things in it not meant for the ears of the +public, but there can be no harm in transcribing an important passage:—</p> + +<p>"'You seem to have imbibed the idea that the East-end is a kind of +Golgotha, and this despite that the books out of which you probably got +it are carefully labelled "Fiction." Lamb says somewhere that we think of +the "Dark Ages" as literally without sunlight, and so I fancy people like +you, dear, think of the "East-end" as a mixture of mire, misery, and +murder. How's that for alliteration? Why, within five minutes' walk of me +there are the loveliest houses, with gardens back and front, inhabited by +very fine people and furniture. Many of my university friends' mouths +would water if they knew the income of some of the shopkeepers in the +High Road.</p> + +<p>"'The rich people about here may not be so fashionable as those in +Kensington and Bayswater, but they are every bit as stupid and +materialistic. I don't deny, Lucy, I <i>do</i> have my black moments, and +I do sometimes pine to get away from all this to the lands of sun and +lotus-eating. But, on the whole, I am too busy even to dream of dreaming. +My real black moments are when I doubt if I am really doing any good. But +yet on the whole my conscience or my self-conceit tells me that I am. If +one cannot do much with the mass, there is at least the consolation of +doing good to the individual. And, after all, is it not enough to have +been an influence for good over one or two human souls? There are quite +fine characters hereabout—especially in the women—natures capable not +only of self-sacrifice, but of delicacy of sentiment. To have learnt to +know of such, to have been of service to one or two of such—is not this +ample return? I could not get to St. James's Hall to hear your friend's +symphony at the Henschel concert. I have been reading Mme. Blavatsky's +latest book, and getting quite interested in occult philosophy. +Unfortunately I have to do all my reading in bed, and I don't find the +book as soothing a soporific as most new books. For keeping one awake I +find Theosophy as bad as toothache....'"</p></div> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"The Big Bow Mystery Solved</p> + +<p>"Sir,—I wonder if any one besides myself has been struck by the +incredible bad taste of Mr. Grodman's letter in your last issue. That he, +a former servant of the Department, should publicly insult and run it +down can only be charitably explained by the supposition that his +judgment is failing him in his old age. In view of this letter, are the +relatives of the deceased justified in entrusting him with any private +documents? It is, no doubt, very good of him to undertake to avenge one +whom he seems snobbishly anxious to claim as a friend; but, all things +considered, should not his letter have been headed 'The Big Bow Mystery +Shelved'? I enclose my card, and am, sir,</p> + +<p>"Your obedient servant,</p> + +<p>"Scotland Yard."</p></div> + +<p>George Grodman read this letter with annoyance, and crumpling up the +paper, murmured scornfully, "Edward Wimp!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="V__" id="V__"></a>V</h2> + + +<p>"Yes, but what will become of the Beautiful?" said Denzil Cantercot.</p> + +<p>"Hang the Beautiful!" said Peter Crowl, as if he were on the committee of +the Academy. "Give me the True."</p> + +<p>Denzil did nothing of the sort. He didn't happen to have it about him.</p> + +<p>Denzil Cantercot stood smoking a cigarette in his landlord's shop, and +imparting an air of distinction and an agreeable aroma to the close +leathery atmosphere. Crowl cobbled away, talking to his tenant without +raising his eyes. He was a small, big-headed, sallow, sad-eyed man, with +a greasy apron. Denzil was wearing a heavy overcoat with a fur collar. +He was never seen without it in public during the winter. In private he +removed it and sat in his shirt sleeves. Crowl was a thinker, or thought +he was—which seems to involve original thinking anyway. His hair was +thinning rapidly at the top, as if his brain was struggling to get as +near as possible to the realities of things. He prided himself on having +no fads. Few men are without some foible or hobby; Crowl felt almost +lonely at times in his superiority. He was a Vegetarian, a Secularist, a +Blue Ribbonite, a Republican, and an Anti-tobacconist. Meat was a fad. +Drink was a fad. Religion was a fad. Monarchy was a fad. Tobacco was a +fad. "A plain man like me," Crowl used to say, "can live without fads." +"A plain man" was Crowl's catchword. When of a Sunday morning he stood +on Mile-end Waste, which was opposite his shop—and held forth to the +crowd on the evils of kings, priests, and mutton chops, the "plain man" +turned up at intervals like the "theme" of a symphonic movement. "I am +only a plain man and I want to know." It was a phrase that sabred the +spider-webs of logical refinement, and held them up scornfully on the +point. When Crowl went for a little recreation in Victoria Park on Sunday +afternoons, it was with this phrase that he invariably routed the +supernaturalists. Crowl knew his Bible better than most ministers, and +always carried a minutely printed copy in his pocket, dog's-eared to mark +contradictions in the text. The second chapter of Jeremiah says one +thing; the first chapter of Corinthians says another. Two contradictory +statements <i>may</i> both be true, but "I am only a plain man, and I want to +know." Crowl spent a large part of his time in setting "the word against +the word." Cock-fighting affords its votaries no acuter pleasure than +Crowl derived from setting two texts by the ears. Crowl had a +metaphysical genius which sent his Sunday morning disciples frantic +with admiration, and struck the enemy dumb with dismay. He had +discovered, for instance, that the Deity could not move, owing to already +filling all space. He was also the first to invent, for the confusion of +the clerical, the crucial case of a saint dying at the Antipodes +contemporaneously with another in London. Both went skyward to heaven, +yet the two travelled in directly opposite directions. In all eternity +they would never meet. Which, then, got to heaven? Or was there no such +place? "I am only a plain man, and I want to know."</p> + +<p>Preserve us our open spaces; they exist to testify to the incurable +interest of humanity in the Unknown and the Misunderstood. Even 'Arry is +capable of five minutes' attention to speculative theology, if 'Arriet +isn't in a 'urry.</p> + +<p>Peter Crowl was not sorry to have a lodger like Denzil Cantercot, who, +though a man of parts and thus worth powder and shot, was so hopelessly +wrong on all subjects under the sun. In only one point did Peter Crowl +agree with Denzil Cantercot—he admired Denzil Cantercot secretly. When +he asked him for the True—which was about twice a day on the average—he +didn't really expect to get it from him. He knew that Denzil was a poet.</p> + +<p>"The Beautiful," he went on, "is a thing that only appeals to men like +you. The True is for all men. The majority have the first claim. Till +then you poets must stand aside. The True and the Useful—that's what we +want. The Good of Society is the only test of things. Everything stands +or falls by the Good of Society."</p> + +<p>"The Good of Society!" echoed Denzil, scornfully. "What's the good of +Society? The Individual is before all. The mass must be sacrificed to the +Great Man. Otherwise the Great Man will be sacrificed to the mass. +Without great men there would be no art. Without art life would be a +blank."</p> + +<p>"Ah, but we should fill it up with bread and butter," said Peter Crowl.</p> + +<p>"Yes, it is bread and butter that kills the Beautiful," said Denzil +Cantercot, bitterly. "Many of us start by following the butterfly through +the verdant meadows, but we turn aside—"</p> + +<p>"To get the grub," chuckled Peter, cobbling away.</p> + +<p>"Peter, if you make a jest of everything, I'll not waste my time on you."</p> + +<p>Denzil's wild eyes flashed angrily. He shook his long hair. Life was very +serious to him. He never wrote comic verse intentionally.</p> + +<p>There are three reasons why men of genius have long hair. One is, that +they forget it is growing. The second is, that they like it. The third +is, that it comes cheaper; they wear it long for the same reason that +they wear their hats long.</p> + +<p>Owing to this peculiarity of genius, you may get quite a reputation for +lack of twopence. The economic reason did not apply to Denzil, who could +always get credit with the profession on the strength of his appearance. +Therefore, when street arabs vocally commanded him to get his hair cut, +they were doing no service to barbers. Why does all the world watch over +barbers and conspire to promote their interests? Denzil would have told +you it was not to serve the barbers, but to gratify the crowd's +instinctive resentment of originality. In his palmy days Denzil had been +an editor, but he no more thought of turning his scissors against himself +than of swallowing his paste. The efficacy of hair has changed since the +days of Samson, otherwise Denzil would have been a Hercules instead of a +long, thin, nervous man, looking too brittle and delicate to be used even +for a pipe-cleaner. The narrow oval of his face sloped to a pointed, +untrimmed beard. His linen was reproachable, his dingy boots were down at +heel, and his cocked hat was drab with dust. Such are the effects of a +love for the Beautiful.</p> + +<p>Peter Crowl was impressed with Denzil's condemnation of flippancy, and he +hastened to turn off the joke.</p> + +<p>"I'm quite serious," he said. "Butterflies are no good to nothing or +nobody; caterpillars at least save the birds from starving."</p> + +<p>"Just like your view of things, Peter," said Denzil. "Good morning, +madam." This to Mrs. Crowl, to whom he removed his hat with elaborate +courtesy.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Crowl grunted and looked at her husband with a note of interrogation +in each eye. For some seconds Crowl stuck to his last, endeavouring not +to see the question. He shifted uneasily on his stool. His wife coughed +grimly. He looked up, saw her towering over him, and helplessly shook his +head in a horizontal direction. It was wonderful how Mrs. Crowl towered +over Mr. Crowl, even when he stood up in his shoes. She measured half an +inch less. It was quite an optical illusion.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Crowl," said Mrs. Crowl, "then I'll tell him."</p> + +<p>"No, no, my dear, not yet," faltered Peter, helplessly; "leave it to me."</p> + +<p>"I've left it to you long enough. You'll never do nothing. If it was a +question of provin' to a lot of chuckleheads that Jollygee and Genesis, +or some other dead and gone Scripture folk that don't consarn no mortal +soul, used to contradict each other, your tongue'ud run thirteen to the +dozen. But when it's a matter of takin' the bread out o' the mouths o' +your own children, you ain't got no more to say for yourself than a +lamp-post. Here's a man stayin' with you for weeks and weeks—eatin' and +drinkin' the flesh off your bones—without payin' a far—"</p> + +<p>"Hush, hush, mother; it's all right," said poor Crowl, red as fire.</p> + +<p>Denzil looked at her dreamily. "Is it possible you are alluding to me, +Mrs. Crowl?" he said.</p> + +<p>"Who then should I be alludin' to, Mr. Cantercot? Here's seven weeks come +and gone, and not a blessed 'aypenny have I—"</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Crowl," said Denzil, removing his cigarette from his mouth +with a pained air, "why reproach <i>me</i> for <i>your</i> neglect?"</p> + +<p>"<i>My</i> neglect! I like that!"</p> + +<p>"I don't," said Denzil more sharply. "If you had sent me in the bill you +would have had the money long ago. How do you expect me to think of these +details?"</p> + +<p>"We ain't so grand down here. People pays their way—they don't get no +<i>bills</i>" said Mrs. Crowl, accentuating the word with infinite scorn.</p> + +<p>Peter hammered away at a nail, as though to drown his spouse's voice.</p> + +<p>"It's three pounds fourteen and eightpence, if you're so anxious to +know," Mrs. Crowl resumed. "And there ain't a woman in the Mile End Road +as 'ud a-done it cheaper, with bread at fourpence threefarden a quartern +and landlords clamburin' for rent every Monday morning almost afore the +sun's up and folks draggin' and slidderin' on till their shoes is only +fit to throw after brides and Christmas comin' and sevenpence a week for +schoolin'!"</p> + +<p>Peter winced under the last item. He had felt it coming—like Christmas. +His wife and he parted company on the question of Free Education. Peter +felt that, having brought nine children into the world, it was only fair +he should pay a penny a week for each of those old enough to bear +educating. His better half argued that, having so many children, they +ought in reason to be exempted. Only people who had few children could +spare the penny. But the one point on which the cobbler-sceptic of the +Mile End Road got his way was this of the fees. It was a question of +conscience, and Mrs. Crowl had never made application for their +remission, though she often slapped her children in vexation instead. +They were used to slapping, and when nobody else slapped them they +slapped one another. They were bright, ill-mannered brats, who pestered +their parents and worried their teachers, and were as happy as the Road +was long.</p> + +<p>"Bother the school fees!" Peter retorted, vexed. "Mr. Cantercot's not +responsible for your children."</p> + +<p>"I should hope not, indeed, Mr. Crowl," Mrs. Crowl said sternly. "I'm +ashamed of you." And with that she flounced out of the shop into the +back parlour.</p> + +<p>"It's all right," Peter called after her soothingly. "The money'll be all +right, mother."</p> + +<p>In lower circles it is customary to call your wife your mother; in +somewhat superior circles it is the fashion to speak of her as "the +wife," as you speak of "the Stock Exchange," or "the Thames," without +claiming any peculiar property. Instinctively men are ashamed of being +moral and domesticated.</p> + +<p>Denzil puffed his cigarette, unembarrassed. Peter bent attentively over +his work, making nervous stabs with his awl. There was a long silence. An +organ-grinder played a waltz outside, unregarded; and, failing to annoy +anybody, moved on. Denzil lit another cigarette. The dirty-faced clock on +the wall chimed twelve.</p> + +<p>"What do you think," said Crowl, "of Republics?"</p> + +<p>"They are low," Denzil replied. "Without a Monarch there is no visible +incarnation of Authority."</p> + +<p>"What! do you call Queen Victoria visible?"</p> + +<p>"Peter, do you want to drive me from the house? Leave frivolousness to +women, whose minds are only large enough for domestic difficulties. +Republics are low. Plato mercifully kept the poets out of his. Republics +are not congenial soil for poetry."</p> + +<p>"What nonsense! If England dropped its fad of Monarchy and became a +Republic to-morrow, do you mean to say that—?"</p> + +<p>"I mean to say there would be no Poet Laureate to begin with."</p> + +<p>"Who's fribbling now, you or me, Cantercot? But I don't care a +button-hook about poets, present company always excepted. I'm only a +plain man, and I want to know where's the sense of givin' any one person +authority over everybody else?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's what Tom Mortlake used to say. Wait till you're in power, +Peter, with trade-union money to control, and working men bursting to +give you flying angels and to carry you aloft, like a banner, huzzahing."</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's because he's head and shoulders above 'em already," said +Crowl, with a flash in his sad grey eyes. "Still, it don't prove that I'd +talk any different. And I think you're quite wrong about his being +spoilt. Tom's a fine fellow—a man every inch of him, and that's a good +many. I don't deny he has his weaknesses, and there was a time when he +stood in this very shop and denounced that poor dead Constant. 'Crowl,' +said he, 'that man'll do mischief. I don't like these kid-glove +philanthropists mixing themselves up in practical labour disputes they +don't understand.'"</p> + +<p>Denzil whistled involuntarily. It was a piece of news.</p> + +<p>"I dare say," continued Crowl, "he's a bit jealous of anybody's +interference with his influence. But in this case the jealousy did wear +off, you see, for the poor fellow and he got quite pals, as everybody +knows. Tom's not the man to hug a prejudice. However, all that don't +prove nothing against Republics. Look at the Czar and the Jews. I'm only +a plain man, but I wouldn't live in Russia not for—not for all the +leather in it! An Englishman, taxed as he is to keep up his Fad of +Monarchy, is at least king in his own castle, whoever bosses it at +Windsor. Excuse me a minute, the missus is callin'."</p> + +<p>"Excuse <i>me</i> a minute. I'm going, and I want to say before I go—I feel +it only right you should know at once—that after what has passed to-day +I can never be on the same footing here as in the—shall I say +pleasant?—days of yore."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, Cantercot. Don't say that; don't say that!" pleaded the little +cobbler.</p> + +<p>"Well, shall I say unpleasant, then?"</p> + +<p>"No, no, Cantercot. Don't misunderstand me. Mother has been very much put +to it lately to rub along. You see she has such a growing family. It +grows—daily. But never mind her. You pay whenever you've got the money."</p> + +<p>Denzil shook his head. "It cannot be. You know when I came here first I +rented your top room and boarded myself. Then I learnt to know you. We +talked together. Of the Beautiful. And the Useful. I found you had no +soul. But you were honest, and I liked you. I went so far as to take my +meals with your family. I made myself at home in your back parlour. But +the vase has been shattered (I do not refer to that on the mantel-piece), +and though the scent of the roses may cling to it still, it can be pieced +together—nevermore." He shook his hair sadly and shambled out of the +shop. Crowl would have gone after him, but Mrs. Crowl was still calling, +and ladies must have the precedence in all polite societies.</p> + +<p>Cantercot went straight—or as straight as his loose gait permitted—to +46 Glover Street, and knocked at the door. Grodman's factotum opened it. +She was a pock-marked person, with a brickdust complexion and a +coquettish manner.</p> + +<p>"Oh! Here we are again!" she said vivaciously.</p> + +<p>"Don't talk like a clown," Cantercot snapped. "Is Mr. Grodman in?"</p> + +<p>"No, you've put him out," growled the gentleman himself, suddenly +appearing in his slippers. "Come in. What the devil have you been doing +with yourself since the inquest? Drinking again?"</p> + +<p>"I've sworn off. Haven't touched a drop since—"</p> + +<p>"The murder?"</p> + +<p>"Eh?" said Denzil Cantercot, startled. "What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"What I say. Since December 4. I reckon everything from that murder, now, +as they reckon longitude from Greenwich."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Denzil Cantercot.</p> + +<p>"Let me see. Nearly a fortnight. What a long time to keep away from +Drink—and Me."</p> + +<p>"I don't know which is worse," said Denzil, irritated. "You both steal +away my brains."</p> + +<p>"Indeed?" said Grodman, with an amused smile. "Well, it's only petty +pilfering, after all. What's put salt on your wounds?"</p> + +<p>"The twenty-fourth edition of my book."</p> + +<p>"<i>Whose</i> book?"</p> + +<p>"Well, <i>your</i> book. You must be making piles of money out of <i>Criminals I +have Caught</i>."</p> + +<p>"'Criminals <i>I</i> have Caught,'" corrected Grodman. "My dear Denzil, how +often am I to point out that <i>I</i> went through the experiences that make +the backbone of my book, not <i>you</i>? In each case <i>I</i> cooked the +criminal's goose. Any journalist could have supplied the dressing."</p> + +<p>"The contrary. The journeymen of journalism would have left the truth +naked. You yourself could have done that—for there is no man to beat +you at cold, lucid, scientific statement. But I idealised the bare +facts and lifted them into the realm of poetry and literature. The +twenty-fourth edition of the book attests my success."</p> + +<p>"Rot! The twenty-fourth edition was all owing to the murder. Did you do +that?"</p> + +<p>"You take one up so sharply, Mr. Grodman," said Denzil, changing his +tone.</p> + +<p>"No—I've retired," laughed Grodman.</p> + +<p>Denzil did not reprove the ex-detective's flippancy. He even laughed a +little.</p> + +<p>"Well, give me another fiver, and I'll cry 'quits.' I'm in debt."</p> + +<p>"Not a penny. Why haven't you been to see me since the murder? I had to +write that letter to the <i>Pell Mell Press</i> myself. You might have earned +a crown."</p> + +<p>"I've had writer's cramp, and couldn't do your last job. I was coming to +tell you so on the morning of the—"</p> + +<p>"Murder. So you said at the inquest."</p> + +<p>"It's true."</p> + +<p>"Of course. Weren't you on your oath? It was very zealous of you to get +up so early to tell me. In which hand did you have this cramp?"</p> + +<p>"Why, in the right of course."</p> + +<p>"And you couldn't write with your left?"</p> + +<p>"I don't think I could even hold a pen."</p> + +<p>"Or any other instrument, mayhap. What had you been doing to bring it +on?"</p> + +<p>"Writing too much. That is the only possible cause."</p> + +<p>"Oh! I didn't know. Writing what?"</p> + +<p>Denzil hesitated. "An epic poem."</p> + +<p>"No wonder you're in debt. Will a sovereign get you out of it?"</p> + +<p>"No; it wouldn't be the least use to me."</p> + +<p>"Here it is, then."</p> + +<p>Denzil took the coin and his hat.</p> + +<p>"Aren't you going to earn it, you beggar? Sit down and write something +for me."</p> + +<p>Denzil got pen and paper, and took his place.</p> + +<p>"What do you want me to write?"</p> + +<p>"Your Epic Poem."</p> + +<p>Denzil started and flushed. But he set to work. Grodman leaned back in +his arm-chair and laughed, studying the poet's grave face.</p> + +<p>Denzil wrote three lines and paused.</p> + +<p>"Can't remember any more? Well, read me the start."</p> + +<p>Denzil read:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Of man's first disobedience and the fruit<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Brought death into the world—"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"Hold on!" cried Grodman. "What morbid subjects you choose, to be sure!"</p> + +<p>"Morbid! Why, Milton chose the same subject!"</p> + +<p>"Blow Milton. Take yourself off—you and your Epics."</p> + +<p>Denzil went. The pock-marked person opened the street door for him.</p> + +<p>"When am I to have that new dress, dear?" she whispered coquettishly.</p> + +<p>"I have no money, Jane," he said shortly.</p> + +<p>"You have a sovereign."</p> + +<p>Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the door viciously. Grodman +overheard their whispers, and laughed silently. His hearing was acute. +Jane had first introduced Denzil to his acquaintance about two years ago, +when he spoke of getting an amanuensis, and the poet had been doing odd +jobs for him ever since. Grodman argued that Jane had her reasons. +Without knowing them, he got a hold over both. There was no one, he felt, +he could not get a hold over. All men—and women—have something to +conceal, and you have only to pretend to know what it is. Thus Grodman, +who was nothing if not scientific.</p> + +<p>Denzil Cantercot shambled home thoughtfully, and abstractedly took his +place at the Crowl dinner-table.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VI__" id="VI__"></a>VI</h2> + + +<p>Mrs. Crowl surveyed Denzil Cantercot so stonily and cut him his beef so +savagely that he said grace when the dinner was over. Peter fed his +metaphysical genius on tomatoes. He was tolerant enough to allow his +family to follow their Fads; but no savoury smells ever tempted him to be +false to his vegetable loves. Besides, meat might have reminded him too +much of his work. There is nothing like leather, but Bow beefsteaks +occasionally come very near it.</p> + +<p>After dinner Denzil usually indulged in poetic reverie. But to-day he did +not take his nap. He went out at once to "raise the wind." But there +was a dead calm everywhere. In vain he asked for an advance at the office +of the <i>Mile End Mirror</i>, to which he contributed scathing leaderettes +about vestrymen. In vain he trudged to the City and offered to write the +<i>Ham and Eggs Gazette</i> an essay on the modern methods of bacon-curing. +Denzil knew a great deal about the breeding and slaughtering of pigs, +smoke-lofts and drying processes, having for years dictated the policy of +the <i>New Pork Herald</i> in these momentous matters. Denzil also knew a +great deal about many other esoteric matters, including weaving machines, +the manufacture of cabbage leaves and snuff, and the inner economy of +drain-pipes. He had written for the trade papers since boyhood. But there +is great competition on these papers. So many men of literary gifts know +all about the intricate technicalities of manufactures and markets, and +are eager to set the trade right. Grodman perhaps hardly allowed +sufficiently for the step backwards that Denzil made when he devoted his +whole time for months to <i>Criminals I have Caught</i>. It was as damaging as +a debauch. For when your rivals are pushing forwards, to stand still is +to go back.</p> + +<p>In despair Denzil shambled toilsomely to Bethnal Green. He paused before +the window of a little tobacconist's shop, wherein was displayed a +placard announcing</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"PLOTS FOR SALE."</p></div> + +<p>The announcement went on to state that a large stock of plots was to be +obtained on the premises—embracing sensational plots, humorous plots, +love plots, religious plots, and poetic plots; also complete manuscripts, +original novels, poems, and tales. Apply within.</p> + +<p>It was a very dirty-looking shop, with begrimed bricks and blackened +woodwork. The window contained some musty old books, an assortment of +pipes and tobacco, and a large number of the vilest daubs unhung, painted +in oil on Academy boards, and unframed. These were intended for +landscapes, as you could tell from the titles. The most expensive was +"Chingford Church," and it was marked IS. 9d. The others ran from 6d. to +IS. 3d., and were mostly representations of Scottish scenery—a loch with +mountains in the background, with solid reflections in the water and a +tree in the foreground. Sometimes the tree would be in the background. +Then the loch would be in the foreground. Sky and water were intensely +blue in all. The name of the collection was "Original oil-paintings done +by hand." Dust lay thick upon everything, as if carefully shovelled on; +and the proprietor looked as if he slept in his shop-window at night +without taking his clothes off. He was a gaunt man with a red nose, long +but scanty black locks covered by a smoking-cap, and a luxuriant black +moustache. He smoked a long clay pipe, and had the air of a broken-down +operatic villain.</p> + +<p>"Ah, good afternoon, Mr. Cantercot," he said, rubbing his hands, half +from cold, half from usage; "what have you brought me?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing," said Denzil, "but if you will lend me a sovereign I'll do you +a stunner."</p> + +<p>The operatic villain shook his locks, his eyes full of pawky cunning. "If +you did it after that, it <i>would</i> be a stunner."</p> + +<p>What the operatic villain did with these plots, and who bought them, +Cantercot never knew nor cared to know. Brains are cheap to-day, and +Denzil was glad enough to find a customer.</p> + +<p>"Surely you've known me long enough to trust me," he cried.</p> + +<p>"Trust is dead," said the operatic villain, puffing away.</p> + +<p>"So is Queen Anne," cried the irritated poet. His eyes took a dangerous +hunted look. Money he must have. But the operatic villain was inflexible. +No plot, no supper.</p> + +<p>Poor Denzil went out flaming. He knew not where to turn. Temporarily he +turned on his heel again and stared despairingly at the shop-window. +Again he read the legend</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"PLOTS FOR SALE."</p></div> + +<p>He stared so long at this that it lost its meaning. When the sense of the +words suddenly flashed upon him again, they bore a new significance. He +went in meekly, and borrowed fourpence of the operatic villain. Then he +took the 'bus for Scotland Yard. There was a not ill-looking servant girl +in the 'bus. The rhythm of the vehicle shaped itself into rhymes in his +brain. He forgot all about his situation and his object. He had never +really written an epic—except "Paradise Lost"—but he composed lyrics +about wine and women and often wept to think how miserable he was. But +nobody ever bought anything of him, except articles on bacon-curing or +attacks on vestrymen. He was a strange, wild creature, and the wench felt +quite pretty under his ardent gaze. It almost hypnotised her, though, and +she looked down at her new French kid boots to escape it.</p> + +<p>At Scotland Yard Denzil asked for Edward Wimp. Edward Wimp was +not on view. Like kings and editors, detectives are difficult of +approach—unless you are a criminal, when you cannot see anything +of them at all. Denzil knew of Edward Wimp, principally because of +Grodman's contempt for his successor. Wimp was a man of taste and +culture. Grodman's interests were entirely concentrated on the problems +of logic and evidence. Books about these formed his sole reading; for +<i>belles lettres</i> he cared not a straw. Wimp, with his flexible intellect, +had a great contempt for Grodman and his slow, laborious, ponderous, +almost Teutonic methods. Worse, he almost threatened to eclipse the +radiant tradition of Grodman by some wonderfully ingenious bits of +workmanship. Wimp was at his greatest in collecting circumstantial +evidence; in putting two and two together to make five. He would collect +together a number of dark and disconnected data and flash across them the +electric light of some unifying hypothesis in a way which would have +done credit to a Darwin or a Faraday. An intellect which might have +served to unveil the secret workings of nature was subverted to the +protection of a capitalistic civilisation.</p> + +<p>By the assistance of a friendly policeman, whom the poet magnetised into +the belief that his business was a matter of life and death, Denzil +obtained the great detective's private address. It was near King's Cross. +By a miracle Wimp was at home in the afternoon. He was writing when +Denzil was ushered up three pairs of stairs into his presence, but he got +up and flashed the bull's-eye of his glance upon the visitor.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Denzil Cantercot, I believe," said Wimp.</p> + +<p>Denzil started. He had not sent up his name, merely describing himself as +a gentleman.</p> + +<p>"That is my name," he murmured.</p> + +<p>"You were one of the witnesses at the inquest on the body of the late +Arthur Constant. I have your evidence there." He pointed to a file. "Why +have you come to give fresh evidence?"</p> + +<p>Again Denzil started, flushing in addition this time. "I want money," he +said, almost involuntarily.</p> + +<p>"Sit down." Denzil sat. Wimp stood.</p> + +<p>Wimp was young and fresh-coloured. He had a Roman nose, and was smartly +dressed. He had beaten Grodman by discovering the wife Heaven meant for +him. He had a bouncing boy, who stole jam out of the pantry without any +one being the wiser. Wimp did what work he could do at home in a secluded +study at the top of the house. Outside his chamber of horrors he was the +ordinary husband of commerce. He adored his wife, who thought poorly of +his intellect but highly of his heart. In domestic difficulties Wimp was +helpless. He could not tell even whether the servant's "character" was +forged or genuine. Probably he could not level himself to such petty +problems. He was like the senior wrangler who has forgotten how to do +quadratics, and has to solve equations of the second degree by the +calculus.</p> + +<p>"How much money do you want?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"I do not make bargains," Denzil replied, his calm come back by this +time. "I came here to tender you a suggestion. It struck me that you +might offer me a fiver for my trouble. Should you do so, I shall not +refuse it."</p> + +<p>"You shall not refuse it—if you deserve it."</p> + +<p>"Good. I will come to the point at once. My suggestion concerns—Tom +Mortlake."</p> + +<p>Denzil threw out the name as if it were a torpedo. Wimp did not move.</p> + +<p>"Tom Mortlake," went on Denzil, looking disappointed, "had a sweetheart." +He paused impressively.</p> + +<p>Wimp said, "Yes?"</p> + +<p>"Where is that sweetheart now?"</p> + +<p>"Where, indeed?"</p> + +<p>"You know about her disappearance?"</p> + +<p>"You have just informed me of it."</p> + +<p>"Yes, she is gone—without a trace. She went about a fortnight before Mr. +Constant's murder."</p> + +<p>"Murder? How do you know it was murder?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Grodman says so," said Denzil, startled again.</p> + +<p>"H'm! Isn't that rather a proof that it was suicide? Well, go on."</p> + +<p>"About a fortnight before the suicide, Jessie Dymond disappeared. So they +tell me in Stepney Green, where she lodged and worked."</p> + +<p>"What was she?"</p> + +<p>"She was a dressmaker. She had a wonderful talent. Quite fashionable +ladies got to know of it. One of her dresses was presented at Court. I +think the lady forgot to pay for it; so Jessie's landlady said."</p> + +<p>"Did she live alone?"</p> + +<p>"She had no parents, but the house was respectable."</p> + +<p>"Good-looking, I suppose?"</p> + +<p>"As a poet's dream."</p> + +<p>"As yours, for instance?"</p> + +<p>"I am a poet; I dream."</p> + +<p>"You dream you are a poet. Well, well! She was engaged to Mortlake?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes! They made no secret of it. The engagement was an old one. When +he was earning 36s. a week as a compositor, they were saving up to buy a +home. He worked at Railton and Hockes who print the <i>New Pork Herald</i>. I +used to take my 'copy' into the comps' room, and one day the Father of +the Chapel told me all about 'Mortlake and his young woman.' Ye gods! How +times are changed! Two years ago Mortlake had to struggle with my +calligraphy—now he is in with all the nobs, and goes to the 'At Homes' +of the aristocracy."</p> + +<p>"Radical M.P.'s," murmured Wimp, smiling.</p> + +<p>"While I am still barred from the dazzling drawing-rooms, where beauty +and intellect foregather. A mere artisan! A manual labourer!" Denzil's +eyes flashed angrily. He rose with excitement. "They say he always <i>was</i> +a jabberer in the composing-room, and he has jabbered himself right out +of it and into a pretty good thing. He didn't have much to say about the +crimes of capital when he was set up to second the toast of 'Railton and +Hockes' at the beanfeast."</p> + +<p>"Toast and butter, toast and butter," said Wimp, genially. "I shouldn't +blame a man for serving the two together, Mr. Cantercot."</p> + +<p>Denzil forced a laugh. "Yes; but consistency's <i>my</i> motto. I like to see +the royal soul immaculate, unchanging, immovable by fortune. Anyhow, when +better times came for Mortlake the engagement still dragged on. He did +not visit her so much. This last autumn he saw very little of her."</p> + +<p>"How do you know?"</p> + +<p>"I—I was often in Stepney Green. My business took me past the house of +an evening. Sometimes there was no light in her room. That meant she was +downstairs gossiping with the landlady."</p> + +<p>"She might have been out with Tom?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir; I knew Tom was on the platform somewhere or other. He was +working up to all hours organising the eight hours' working movement."</p> + +<p>"A very good reason for relaxing his sweethearting."</p> + +<p>"It was. He never went to Stepney Green on a week night."</p> + +<p>"But you always did."</p> + +<p>"No—not every night."</p> + +<p>"You didn't go in?"</p> + +<p>"Never. She wouldn't permit my visits. She was a girl of strong +character. She always reminded me of Flora Macdonald."</p> + +<p>"Another lady of your acquaintance?"</p> + +<p>"A lady I know better than the shadows who surround me, who is more real +to me than the women who pester me for the price of apartments. Jessie +Dymond, too, was of the race of heroines. Her eyes were clear blue, two +wells with Truth at the bottom of each. When I looked into those eyes my +own were dazzled. They were the only eyes I could never make dreamy." He +waved his hand as if making a pass with it. "It was she who had the +influence over me."</p> + +<p>"You knew her, then?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes. I knew Tom from the old <i>New Pork Herald</i> days, and when I +first met him with Jessie hanging on his arm he was quite proud to +introduce her to a poet. When he got on he tried to shake me off."</p> + +<p>"You should have repaid him what you borrowed."</p> + +<p>"It—it—was only a trifle," stammered Denzil.</p> + +<p>"Yes, but the world turns on trifles," said the wise Wimp.</p> + +<p>"The world is itself a trifle," said the pensive poet. "The Beautiful +alone is deserving of our regard."</p> + +<p>"And when the Beautiful was not gossiping with her landlady, did she +gossip with you as you passed the door?"</p> + +<p>"Alas, no! She sat in her room reading, and cast a shadow—"</p> + +<p>"On your life?"</p> + +<p>"No; on the blind."</p> + +<p>"Always one shadow?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir. Once or twice, two."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you had been drinking."</p> + +<p>"On my life, not. I have sworn off the treacherous wine-cup."</p> + +<p>"That's right. Beer is bad for poets. It makes their feet shaky. Whose +was the second shadow?"</p> + +<p>"A man's."</p> + +<p>"Naturally. Mortlake's, perhaps."</p> + +<p>"Impossible. He was still striking eight hours."</p> + +<p>"You found out whose shadow? You didn't leave a shadow of doubt?"</p> + +<p>"No; I waited till the substance came out."</p> + +<p>"It was Arthur Constant."</p> + +<p>"You are a magician! You—you terrify me. Yes, it was he."</p> + +<p>"Only once or twice, you say?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't keep watch over them."</p> + +<p>"No, no, of course not. You only passed casually. I understand you +thoroughly."</p> + +<p>Denzil did not feel comfortable at the assertion.</p> + +<p>"What did he go there for?" Wimp went on.</p> + +<p>"I don't know. I'd stake my soul on Jessie's honour."</p> + +<p>"You might double your stake without risk."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I might! I would! You see her with my eyes."</p> + +<p>"For the moment they are the only ones available. When was the last time +you saw the two together?"</p> + +<p>"About the middle of November."</p> + +<p>"Mortlake knew nothing of the meetings?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Perhaps he did. Mr. Constant had probably enlisted her in +his social mission work. I knew she was one of the attendants at the big +children's tea in the Great Assembly Hall early in November. He treated +her quite like a lady. She was the only attendant who worked with her +hands."</p> + +<p>"The others carried the cups on their feet, I suppose."</p> + +<p>"No; how could that be? My meaning is that all the other attendants were +real ladies, and Jessie was only an amateur, so to speak. There was no +novelty for her in handing kids cups of tea. I dare say she had helped +her landlady often enough at that—there's quite a bushel of brats below +stairs. It's almost as bad as at friend Crowl's. Jessie was a real brick. +But perhaps Tom didn't know her value. Perhaps he didn't like Constant to +call on her, and it led to a quarrel. Anyhow, she's disappeared, like the +snowfall on the river. There's not a trace. The landlady, who was such a +friend of hers that Jessie used to make up her stuff into dresses for +nothing, tells me that she's dreadfully annoyed at not having been left +the slightest clue to her late tenant's whereabouts."</p> + +<p>"You have been making inquiries on your own account apparently?"</p> + +<p>"Only of the landlady. Jessie never even gave her the week's notice, but +paid her in lieu of it, and left immediately. The landlady told me I +could have knocked her down with a feather. Unfortunately, I wasn't there +to do it, or I should certainly have knocked her down for not keeping her +eyes open better. She says if she had only had the least suspicion +beforehand that the minx (she dared to call Jessie a minx) was going, +she'd have known where, or her name would have been somebody else's. And +yet she admits that Jessie was looking ill and worried. Stupid old hag!"</p> + +<p>"A woman of character," murmured the detective.</p> + +<p>"Didn't I tell you so?" cried Denzil, eagerly. "Another girl would have +let out that she was going. But no, not a word. She plumped down the +money and walked out. The landlady ran upstairs. None of Jessie's things +were there. She must have quietly sold them off, or transferred them to +the new place. I never in my life met a girl who so thoroughly knew her +own mind or had a mind so worth knowing. She always reminded me of the +Maid of Saragossa."</p> + +<p>"Indeed! And when did she leave?"</p> + +<p>"On the l9th of November."</p> + +<p>"Mortlake of course knows where she is?"</p> + +<p>"I can't say. Last time I was at the house to inquire—it was at the end +of November—he hadn't been seen there for six weeks. He wrote to her, of +course, sometimes—the landlady knew his writing."</p> + +<p>Wimp looked Denzil straight in the eyes, and said, "You mean, of course, +to accuse Mortlake of the murder of Mr. Constant?"</p> + +<p>"N-n-no, not at all," stammered Denzil, "only you know what Mr. Grodman +wrote to the <i>Pell Mell</i>. The more we know about Mr. Constant's life the +more we shall know about the manner of his death. I thought my +information would be valuable to you, and I brought it."</p> + +<p>"And why didn't you take it to Mr. Grodman?"</p> + +<p>"Because I thought it wouldn't be valuable to <i>me</i>."</p> + +<p>"You wrote <i>Criminals I have Caught</i>?"</p> + +<p>"How—how do you know that?" Wimp was startling him to-day with a +vengeance.</p> + +<p>"Your style, my dear Mr. Cantercot. The unique, noble style."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I was afraid it would betray me," said Denzil. "And since you know, +I may tell you that Grodman's a mean curmudgeon. What does he want with +all that money and those houses—a man with no sense of the Beautiful? +He'd have taken my information, and given me more kicks than ha'pence for +it, so to speak."</p> + +<p>"Yes, he is a shrewd man after all. I don't see anything valuable in your +evidence against Mortlake."</p> + +<p>"No!" said Denzil in a disappointed tone, and fearing he was going to be +robbed. "Not when Mortlake was already jealous of Mr. Constant, who was a +sort of rival organiser, unpaid! A kind of blackleg doing the work +cheaper—nay, for nothing."</p> + +<p>"Did Mortlake tell you he was jealous?" said Wimp, a shade of sarcastic +contempt piercing through his tones.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes! He said to me, 'That man will work mischief. I don't like your +kid-glove philanthropists meddling in matters they don't understand.'"</p> + +<p>"Those were his very words?"</p> + +<p>"His <i>ipsissima verba</i>."</p> + +<p>"Very well. I have your address in my files. Here is a sovereign for +you."</p> + +<p>"Only one sovereign! It's not the least use to me."</p> + +<p>"Very well. It's of great use to me. I have a wife to keep."</p> + +<p>"I haven't," said Denzil, with a sickly smile, "so perhaps I can manage +on it after all." He took his hat and the sovereign.</p> + +<p>Outside the door he met a rather pretty servant just bringing in some tea +to her master. He nearly upset her tray at sight of her. She seemed more +amused at the <i>rencontre</i> than he.</p> + +<p>"Good afternoon, dear," she said coquettishly. "You might let me have +that sovereign. I do so want a new Sunday bonnet."</p> + +<p>Denzil gave her the sovereign, and slammed the hall-door viciously when +he got to the bottom of the stairs. He seemed to be walking arm-in-arm +with the long arm of coincidence. Wimp did not hear the duologue. He was +already busy on his evening's report to headquarters. The next day Denzil +had a body-guard wherever he went. It might have gratified his vanity had +he known it. But to-night he was yet unattended, so no one noted that he +went to 46 Glover Street, after the early Crowl supper. He could not help +going. He wanted to get another sovereign. He also itched to taunt +Grodman. Not succeeding in the former object, he felt the road open for +the second.</p> + +<p>"Do you still hope to discover the Bow murderer?" he asked the old +bloodhound.</p> + +<p>"I can lay my hand on him now," Grodman announced curtly.</p> + +<p>Denzil hitched his chair back involuntarily. He found conversation with +detectives as lively as playing at skittles with bombshells. They got on +his nerves terribly, these undemonstrative gentlemen with no sense of the +Beautiful.</p> + +<p>"But why don't you give him up to justice?" he murmured.</p> + +<p>"Ah—it has to be proved yet. But it is only a matter of time."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Denzil, "and shall I write the story for you?"</p> + +<p>"No. You will not live long enough."</p> + +<p>Denzil turned white. "Nonsense! I am years younger than you," he gasped.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Grodman, "but you drink so much."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VII__" id="VII__"></a>VII</h2> + + +<p>When Wimp invited Grodman to eat his Christmas plum-pudding at King's +Cross, Grodman was only a little surprised. The two men were always +overwhelmingly cordial when they met, in order to disguise their mutual +detestation. When people really like each other, they make no concealment +of their mutual contempt. In his letter to Grodman, Wimp said that he +thought it might be nicer for him to keep Christmas in company than in +solitary state. There seems to be a general prejudice in favour of +Christmas numbers, and Grodman yielded to it. Besides, he thought that a +peep at the Wimp domestic interior would be as good as a pantomime. He +quite enjoyed the fun that was coming, for he knew that Wimp had not +invited him out of mere "peace and goodwill."</p> + +<p>There was only one other guest at the festive board. This was Wimp's +wife's mother's mother, a lady of sweet seventy. Only a minority of +mankind can obtain a grandmother-in-law by marrying, but Wimp was not +unduly conceited. The old lady suffered from delusions. One of them was +that she was a centenarian. She dressed for the part. It is extraordinary +what pains ladies will take to conceal their age. Another of Wimp's +grandmother-in-law's delusions was that Wimp had married to get her into +the family. Not to frustrate his design, she always gave him her company +on high-days and holidays. Wilfred Wimp—the little boy who stole the +jam—was in great form at the Christmas dinner. The only drawback to his +enjoyment was that its sweets needed no stealing. His mother presided +over the platters, and thought how much cleverer Grodman was than her +husband. When the pretty servant who waited on them was momentarily out +of the room, Grodman had remarked that she seemed very inquisitive. This +coincided with Mrs. Wimp's own convictions, though Mr. Wimp could never +be brought to see anything unsatisfactory or suspicious about the girl, +not even though there were faults in spelling in the "character" with +which her last mistress had supplied her.</p> + +<p>It was true that the puss had pricked up her ears when Denzil Cantercot's +name was mentioned. Grodman saw it, and watched her, and fooled Wimp to +the top of his bent. It was, of course, Wimp who introduced the poet's +name, and he did it so casually that Grodman perceived at once that he +wished to pump him. The idea that the rival bloodhound should come to him +for confirmation of suspicions against his own pet jackal was too funny. +It was almost as funny to Grodman that evidence of some sort should be +obviously lying to hand in the bosom of Wimp's hand-maiden; so obviously +that Wimp could not see it. Grodman enjoyed his Christmas dinner, secure +that he had not found a successor after all. Wimp, for his part, +contemptuously wondered at the way Grodman's thought hovered about Denzil +without grazing the truth. A man constantly about him, too!</p> + +<p>"Denzil is a man of genius," said Grodman. "And as such comes under the +heading of Suspicious Characters. He has written an Epic Poem and read it +to me. It is morbid from start to finish. There is 'death' in the third +line. I dare say you know he polished up my book?" Grodman's artlessness +was perfect.</p> + +<p>"No. You surprise me," Wimp replied. "I'm sure he couldn't have done much +to it. Look at your letter in the Pell Mell. Who wants more polish and +refinement than that showed?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, I didn't know you did me the honour of reading that."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes; we both read it," put in Mrs. Wimp. "I told Mr. Wimp it was +very clever and cogent. After that quotation from the letter to the poor +fellow's <i>fiancée</i> there could be no more doubt but that it was murder. +Mr. Wimp was convinced by it too, weren't you, Edward?"</p> + +<p>Edward coughed uneasily. It was a true statement, and therefore an +indiscreet. Grodman would plume himself terribly. At this moment Wimp +felt that Grodman had been right in remaining a bachelor. Grodman +perceived the humour of the situation, and wore a curious, sub-mocking +smile.</p> + +<p>"On the day I was born," said Wimp's grand-mother-in-law, "over a hundred +years ago, there was a babe murdered."—Wimp found himself wishing it had +been she. He was anxious to get back to Cantercot. "Don't let us talk +shop on Christmas Day," he said, smiling at Grodman. "Besides, murder +isn't a very appropriate subject."</p> + +<p>"No, it ain't," said Grodman. "How did we get on to it? Oh, yes—Denzil +Cantercot. Ha! ha! ha! That's curious, for since Denzil revised +<i>Criminals I have Caught</i>, his mind's running on nothing but murders. +A poet's brain is easily turned."</p> + +<p>Wimp's eye glittered with excitement and contempt for Grodman's +blindness. In Grodman's eye there danced an amused scorn of Wimp; to the +outsider his amusement appeared at the expense of the poet.</p> + +<p>Having wrought his rival up to the highest pitch, Grodman slyly and +suddenly unstrung him.</p> + +<p>"How lucky for Denzil!" he said, still in the same naive, facetious +Christmasy tone, "that he can prove an alibi in this Constant affair."</p> + +<p>"An alibi!" gasped Wimp. "Really?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes. He was with his wife, you know. She's my woman of all work, +Jane. She happened to mention his being with her."</p> + +<p>Jane had done nothing of the kind. After the colloquy he had overheard, +Grodman had set himself to find out the relation between his two +employees. By casually referring to Denzil as "your husband," he so +startled the poor woman that she did not attempt to deny the bond. Only +once did he use the two words, but he was satisfied. As to the alibi, he +had not yet troubled her; but to take its existence for granted would +upset and discomfort Wimp. For the moment that was triumph enough for +Wimp's guest.</p> + +<p>"Par," said Wilfred Wimp, "what's a alleybi? A marble?"</p> + +<p>"No, my lad," said Grodman, "it means being somewhere else when you're +supposed to be somewhere."</p> + +<p>"Ah, playing truant," said Wilfred, self-consciously; his schoolmaster +had often proved an alibi against him. "Then Denzil will be hanged."</p> + +<p>Was it a prophecy? Wimp accepted it as such; as an oracle from the gods +bidding him mistrust Grodman. Out of the mouths of little children +issueth wisdom; sometimes even when they are not saying their lessons.</p> + +<p>"When I was in my cradle, a century ago," said Wimp's grandmother-in-law, +"men were hanged for stealing horses."</p> + +<p>They silenced her with snapdragon performances.</p> + +<p>Wimp was busy thinking how to get at Grodman's factotum.</p> + +<p>Grodman was busy thinking how to get at Wimp's domestic.</p> + +<p>Neither received any of the usual messages from the Christmas Bells.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The next day was sloppy and uncertain. A thin rain drizzled languidly. +One can stand that sort of thing on a summer Bank Holiday; one expects +it. But to have a bad December Bank Holiday is too much of a bad thing. +Some steps should surely be taken to confuse the weather clerk's +chronology. Once let him know that Bank Holiday is coming, and he writes +to the company for more water. To-day his stock seemed low, and he was +dribbling it out; at times the wintry sun would shine in a feeble, +diluted way, and though the holiday-makers would have preferred to take +their sunshine neat, they swarmed forth in their myriads whenever there +was a ray of hope. But it was only dodging the raindrops; up went the +umbrellas again, and the streets became meadows of ambulating mushrooms.</p> + +<p>Denzil Cantercot sat in his fur overcoat at the open window, looking at +the landscape in watercolours. He smoked an after-dinner cigarette, and +spoke of the Beautiful. Crowl was with him. They were in the first floor +front, Crowl's bedroom, which, from its view of the Mile End Road, was +livelier than the parlour with its outlook on the backyard. Mrs. Crowl +was an anti-tobacconist as regards the best bedroom; but Peter did not +like to put the poet or his cigarette out. He felt there was something in +common between smoke and poetry, over and above their being both Fads. +Besides, Mrs. Crowl was sulking in the kitchen. She had been arranging +for an excursion with Peter and the children to Victoria Park. (She had +dreamed of the Crystal Palace, but Santa Claus had put no gifts in the +cobbler's shoes.) Now she could not risk spoiling the feather in her +bonnet. The nine brats expressed their disappointment by slapping one +another on the staircases. Peter felt that Mrs. Crowl connected him in +some way with the rainfall, and was unhappy. Was it not enough that he +had been deprived of the pleasure of pointing out to a superstitious +majority the mutual contradictions of Leviticus and the Song of Solomon? +It was not often that Crowl could count on such an audience.</p> + +<p>"And you still call Nature Beautiful?" he said to Denzil, pointing to the +ragged sky and the dripping eaves. "Ugly old scare-crow!"</p> + +<p>"Ugly she seems to-day," admitted Denzil. "But what is Ugliness but a +higher form of Beauty? You have to look deeper into it to see it; such +vision is the priceless gift of the few. To me this wan desolation of +sighing rain is lovely as the sea-washed ruins of cities."</p> + +<p>"Ah, but you wouldn't like to go out into it," said Peter Crowl. As he +spoke the drizzle suddenly thickened into a torrent.</p> + +<p>"We do not always kiss the woman we love."</p> + +<p>"Speak for yourself, Denzil. I'm only a plain man, and I want to know if +Nature isn't a Fad. Hallo, there goes Mortlake! Lord, a minute of this +will soak him to the skin."</p> + +<p>The labour leader was walking along with bowed head. He did not seem to +mind the shower. It was some seconds before he even heard Crowl's +invitation to him to take shelter. When he did hear it he shook his head.</p> + +<p>"I know I can't offer you a drawing-room with duchesses stuck about it," +said Peter, vexed.</p> + +<p>Tom turned the handle of the shop door and went in. There was nothing +in the world which now galled him more than the suspicion that he was +stuck-up and wished to cut old friends. He picked his way through the +nine brats who clung affectionately to his wet knees, dispersing them +finally by a jet of coppers to scramble for. Peter met him on the stairs +and shook his hand lovingly and admiringly, and took him into Mrs. +Crowl's bedroom.</p> + +<p>"Don't mind what I say, Tom. I'm only a plain man, and my tongue will say +what comes uppermost! But it ain't from the soul, Tom, it ain't from the +soul," said Peter, punning feebly, and letting a mirthless smile play +over his sallow features. "You know Mr. Cantercot, I suppose? The Poet."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes; how do you do, Tom?" cried the Poet. "Seen the <i>New Pork +Herald</i> lately? Not bad, those old times, eh?"</p> + +<p>"No," said Tom, "I wish I was back in them."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, nonsense," said Peter, in much concern. "Look at the good you +are doing to the working man. Look how you are sweeping away the Fads. +Ah, it's a grand thing to be gifted, Tom. The idea of your chuckin' +yourself away on a composin'-room! Manual labour is all very well for +plain men like me, with no gift but just enough brains to see into the +realities of things—to understand that we've got no soul and no +immortality, and all that—and too selfish to look after anybody's +comfort but my own and mother's and the kids'. But men like you and +Cantercot—it ain't right that you should be peggin' away at low material +things. Not that I think Cantercot's gospel any value to the masses. The +Beautiful is all very well for folks who've got nothing else to think of, +but give me the True. You're the man for my money, Mortlake. No reference +to the funds, Tom, to which I contribute little enough, Heaven knows; +though how a <i>place</i> can know anything, Heaven alone knows. <i>You</i> give us +the Useful, Tom; that's what the world wants more than the Beautiful."</p> + +<p>"Socrates said that the Useful <i>is</i> the Beautiful," said Denzil.</p> + +<p>"That may be," said Peter, "but the Beautiful ain't the Useful."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" said Denzil. "What about Jessie—I mean Miss Dymond? There's +a combination for you. She always reminds me of Grace Darling. How <i>is</i> +she, Tom?"</p> + +<p>"She's dead!" snapped Tom.</p> + +<p>"What?" Denzil turned as white as a Christmas ghost.</p> + +<p>"It was in the papers," said Tom; "all about her and the lifeboat."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you mean Grace Darling," said Denzil, visibly relieved. "I meant +Miss Dymond."</p> + +<p>"You needn't be so interested in her," said Tom surlily. "She don't +appreciate it. Ah, the shower is over. I must be going."</p> + +<p>"No, stay a little longer, Tom," pleaded Peter.</p> + +<p>"I see a lot about you in the papers, but very little of your dear old +phiz now. I can't spare the time to go and hear you. But I really must +give myself a treat. When's your next show?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I am always giving shows," said Tom, smiling a little. "But my next +big performance is on the twenty-first of January, when that picture of +poor Mr. Constant is to be unveiled at the Bow Break o' Day Club. They +have written to Gladstone and other big pots to come down. I do hope the +old man accepts. A non-political gathering like this is the only occasion +we could both speak at, and I have never been on the same platform with +Gladstone."</p> + +<p>He forgot his depression and ill-temper in the prospect, and spoke with +more animation.</p> + +<p>"No, I should hope not, Tom," said Peter. "What with his Fads about the +Bible being a Rock, and Monarchy being the right thing, he is a most +dangerous man to lead the Radicals. He never lays his axe to the root of +anything—except oak trees."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Cantycot!" It was Mrs. Crowl's voice that broke in upon the tirade. +"There's a <i>gentleman</i> to see you." The astonishment Mrs. Crowl put into +the "gentleman" was delightful. It was almost as good as a week's rent to +her to give vent to her feelings. The controversial couple had moved away +from the window when Tom entered, and had not noticed the immediate +advent of another visitor who had spent his time profitably in listening +to Mrs. Crowl before asking to see the presumable object of his visit.</p> + +<p>"Ask him up if it's a friend of yours, Cantercot," said Peter. It was +Wimp. Denzil was rather dubious as to the friendship, but he preferred to +take Wimp diluted. "Mortlake's upstairs," he said; "will you come up and +see him?"</p> + +<p>Wimp had intended a duologue, but he made no objection, so he, too, +stumbled through the nine brats to Mrs. Crowl's bedroom. It was a queer +quartette. Wimp had hardly expected to find anybody at the house on +Boxing Day, but he did not care to waste a day. Was not Grodman, too, on +the track? How lucky it was that Denzil had made the first overtures, +so that he could approach him without exciting suspicion.</p> + +<p>Mortlake scowled when he saw the detective. He objected to the police—on +principle. But Crowl had no idea who the visitor was, even when told his +name. He was rather pleased to meet one of Denzil's high-class friends, +and welcomed him warmly. Probably he was some famous editor, which would +account for his name stirring vague recollections. He summoned the eldest +brat and sent him for beer (people would have their Fads), and not +without trepidation called down to "Mother" for glasses. "Mother" +observed at night (in the same apartment) that the beer money might have +paid the week's school fees for half the family.</p> + +<p>"We were just talking of poor Mr. Constant's portrait, Mr. Wimp," said +the unconscious Crowl; "they're going to unveil it, Mortlake tells me, on +the twenty-first of next month at the Bow Break o' Day Club."</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Wimp, elate at being spared the trouble of manoeuvring the +conversation; "mysterious affair that, Mr. Crowl."</p> + +<p>"No; it's the right thing," said Peter. "There ought to be some memorial +of the man in the district where he worked and where he died, poor chap." +The cobbler brushed away a tear.</p> + +<p>"Yes, it's only right," echoed Mortlake, a whit eagerly. "He was a noble +fellow, a true philanthropist—the only thoroughly unselfish worker I've +ever met."</p> + +<p>"He was that," said Peter; "and it's a rare pattern is unselfishness. +Poor fellow, poor fellow. He preached the Useful, too. I've never met his +like. Ah, I wish there was a heaven for him to go to!" He blew his nose +violently with a red pocket-handkerchief.</p> + +<p>"Well, he's there, if there <i>is</i>," said Tom.</p> + +<p>"I hope he is," added Wimp, fervently; "but I shouldn't like to go there +the way he did."</p> + +<p>"You were the last person to see him, Tom, weren't you?" said Denzil.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no," answered Tom, quickly. "You remember he went out after me; at +least, so Mrs. Drabdump said at the inquest."</p> + +<p>"That last conversation he had with you, Tom," said Denzil. "He didn't +say anything to you that would lead you to suppose—"</p> + +<p>"No, of course not!" interrupted Mortlake, impatiently.</p> + +<p>"Do you really think he was murdered, Tom?" said Denzil.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Wimp's opinion on that point is more valuable than mine," +replied Tom, testily. "It may have been suicide. Men often get sick +of life—especially if they are bored," he added meaningly.</p> + +<p>"Ah, but you were the last person known to be with him," said Denzil.</p> + +<p>Crowl laughed. "Had you there, Tom."</p> + +<p>But they did not have Tom there much longer, for he departed, looking +even worse-tempered than when he came. Wimp went soon after, and Crowl +and Denzil were left to their interminable argumentation concerning the +Useful and the Beautiful.</p> + +<p>Wimp went West. He had several strings (or cords) to his bow, and he +ultimately found himself at Kensal Green Cemetery. Being there, he went +down the avenues of the dead to a grave to note down the exact date of a +death. It was a day on which the dead seemed enviable. The dull, sodden +sky, the dripping, leafless trees, the wet, spongy soil, the reeking +grass—everything combined to make one long to be in a warm, comfortable +grave away from the leaden <i>ennuis</i> of life. Suddenly the detective's +keen eye caught sight of a figure that made his heart throb with sudden +excitement. It was that of a woman in a grey shawl and a brown bonnet, +standing before a railed-in grave. She had no umbrella. The rain plashed +mournfully upon her, but left no trace on her soaking garments. Wimp +crept up behind her, but she paid no heed to him. Her eyes were lowered +to the grave, which seemed to be drawing them towards it by some strange +morbid fascination. His eyes followed hers. The simple headstone bore the +name, "Arthur Constant."</p> + +<p>Wimp tapped her suddenly on the shoulder.</p> + +<p>"How do you do, Mrs. Drabdump?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump went deadly white. She turned round, staring at Wimp +without any recognition.</p> + +<p>"You remember me, surely," he said; "I've been down once or twice to your +place about that poor gentleman's papers." His eye indicated the grave.</p> + +<p>"Lor! I remember you now," said Mrs. Drabdump.</p> + +<p>"Won't you come under my umbrella? You must be drenched to the skin."</p> + +<p>"It don't matter, sir. I can't take no hurt. I've had the rheumatics this +twenty year."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump shrank from accepting Wimp's attentions, not so much +perhaps because he was a man as because he was a gentleman. Mrs. Drabdump +liked to see the fine folks keep their place, and not contaminate their +skirts by contact with the lower castes. "It's set wet, it'll rain right +into the new year," she announced. "And they say a bad beginnin' makes a +worse endin'." Mrs. Drabdump was one of those persons who give you the +idea that they just missed being born barometers.</p> + +<p>"But what are you doing in this miserable spot, so far from home?" +queried the detective.</p> + +<p>"It's Bank Holiday," Mrs. Drabdump reminded him in tones of acute +surprise. "I always make a hexcursion on Bank Holiday."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VIII__" id="VIII__"></a>VIII</h2> + + +<p>The New Year drew Mrs. Drabdump a new lodger. He was an old gentleman +with a long grey beard. He rented the rooms of the late Mr. Constant, and +lived a very retired life. Haunted rooms—or rooms that ought to be +haunted if the ghosts of those murdered in them had any self-respect—are +supposed to fetch a lower rent in the market. The whole Irish problem +might be solved if the spirits of "Mr. Balfour's victims" would only +depreciate the value of property to a point consistent with the support +of an agricultural population. But Mrs. Drabdump's new lodger paid so +much for his rooms that he laid himself open to a suspicion of a special +interest in ghosts. Perhaps he was a member of the Psychical Society. +The neighbourhood imagined him another mad philanthropist, but as he did +not appear to be doing any good to anybody it relented and conceded his +sanity. Mortlake, who occasionally stumbled across him in the passage, +did not trouble himself to think about him at all. He was too full +of other troubles and cares. Though he worked harder than ever, the +spirit seemed to have gone out of him. Sometimes he forgot himself in +a fine rapture of eloquence—lashing himself up into a divine resentment +of injustice or a passion of sympathy with the sufferings of his +brethren—but mostly he plodded on in dull, mechanical fashion. He still +made brief provincial tours, starring a day here and a day there, and +everywhere his admirers remarked how jaded and overworked he looked. +There was talk of starting a subscription to give him a holiday on the +Continent—a luxury obviously unobtainable on the few pounds allowed +him per week. The new lodger would doubtless have been pleased to +subscribe, for he seemed quite to like occupying Mortlake's chamber the +nights he was absent, though he was thoughtful enough not to disturb the +hard-worked landlady in the adjoining room by unseemly noise. Wimp was +always a quiet man.</p> + +<p>Meantime the twenty-first of the month approached, and the East-end was +in excitement. Mr. Gladstone had consented to be present at the ceremony +of unveiling the portrait of Arthur Constant, presented by an unknown +donor to the Bow Break o' Day Club, and it was to be a great function. +The whole affair was outside the lines of party politics, so that even +Conservatives and Socialists considered themselves justified in pestering +the committee for tickets. To say nothing of ladies! As the committee +desired to be present themselves, nine-tenths of the applications for +admission had to be refused, as is usual on these occasions. The +committee agreed among themselves to exclude the fair sex altogether as +the only way of disposing of their womankind, who were making speeches +as long as Mr. Gladstone's. Each committeeman told his sisters, female +cousins, and aunts, that the other committeemen had insisted on divesting +the function of all grace; and what could a man do when he was in a +minority of one?</p> + +<p>Crowl, who was not a member of the Break o' Day Club, was particularly +anxious to hear the great orator whom he despised; fortunately Mortlake +remembered the cobbler's anxiety to hear himself, and on the eve of the +ceremony sent him a ticket. Crowl was in the first flush of possession +when Denzil Cantercot returned, after a sudden and unannounced absence +of three days. His clothes were muddy and tattered, his cocked hat was +deformed, his cavalier beard was matted, and his eyes were bloodshot. +The cobbler nearly dropped the ticket at the sight of him. "Hallo, +Cantercot!" he gasped. "Why, where have you been all these days?"</p> + +<p>"Terribly busy!" said Denzil. "Here, give me a glass of water. I'm dry as +the Sahara."</p> + +<p>Crowl ran inside and got the water, trying hard not to inform Mrs. Crowl +of their lodger's return. "Mother" had expressed herself freely on the +subject of the poet during his absence, and not in terms which would have +commended themselves to the poet's fastidious literary sense. Indeed, she +did not hesitate to call him a sponger and a low swindler, who had run +away to avoid paying the piper. Her fool of a husband might be quite sure +he would never set eyes on the scoundrel again. However, Mrs. Crowl was +wrong. Here was Denzil back again. And yet Mr. Crowl felt no sense of +victory. He had no desire to crow over his partner and to utter that +"See! didn't I tell you so?" which is a greater consolation than religion +in most of the misfortunes of life. Unfortunately, to get the water, +Crowl had to go to the kitchen; and as he was usually such a temperate +man, this desire for drink in the middle of the day attracted the +attention of the lady in possession. Crowl had to explain the situation. +Mrs. Crowl ran into the shop to improve it. Mr. Crowl followed in dismay, +leaving a trail of spilt water in his wake.</p> + +<p>"You good-for-nothing, disreputable scare-crow, where have—"</p> + +<p>"Hush, mother. Let him drink. Mr. Cantercot is thirsty."</p> + +<p>"Does he care if my children are hungry?"</p> + +<p>Denzil tossed the water greedily down his throat almost at a gulp, as if +it were brandy.</p> + +<p>"Madam," he said, smacking his lips, "I do care. I care intensely. Few +things in life would grieve me more deeply than to hear that a child, a +dear little child—the Beautiful in a nutshell—had suffered hunger. You +wrong me." His voice was tremulous with the sense of injury. Tears stood +in his eyes.</p> + +<p>"Wrong you? I've no wish to <i>wrong</i> you," said Mrs. Crowl. "I should like +to <i>hang</i> you."</p> + +<p>"Don't talk of such ugly things," said Denzil, touching his throat +nervously.</p> + +<p>"Well, what have you been doin' all this time?"</p> + +<p>"Why, what should I be doing?"</p> + +<p>"How should I know what became of you? I thought it was another murder."</p> + +<p>"What!" Denzil's glass dashed to fragments on the floor. "What do you +mean?"</p> + +<p>But Mrs. Crowl was glaring too viciously at Mr. Crowl to reply. He +understood the message as if it were printed. It ran: "You have broken +one of my best glasses. You have annihilated threepence, or a week's +school fees for half the family." Peter wished she would turn the +lightning upon Denzil, a conductor down whom it would run innocuously. +He stooped down and picked up the pieces as carefully as if they were +cuttings from the Koh-i-noor. Thus the lightning passed harmlessly over +his head and flew towards Cantercot.</p> + +<p>"What do I mean?" Mrs. Crowl echoed, as if there had been no interval. "I +mean that it would be a good thing if you <i>had</i> been murdered."</p> + +<p>"What unbeautiful ideas you have to be sure!" murmured Denzil.</p> + +<p>"Yes; but they'd be useful," said Mrs. Crowl, who had not lived with +Peter all these years for nothing. "And if you haven't been murdered, +what <i>have</i> you been doing?"</p> + +<p>"My dear, my dear," put in Crowl, deprecatingly, looking up from his +quadrupedal position like a sad dog, "you are not Cantercot's keeper."</p> + +<p>"Oh, ain't I?" flashed his spouse. "Who else keeps him, I should like to +know?"</p> + +<p>Peter went on picking up the pieces of the Koh-i-noor.</p> + +<p>"I have no secrets from Mrs. Crowl," Denzil explained courteously. "I +have been working day and night bringing out a new paper. Haven't had a +wink of sleep for three nights."</p> + +<p>Peter looked up at his bloodshot eyes with respectful interest.</p> + +<p>"The capitalist met me in the street—an old friend of mine—I was +overjoyed at the <i>rencontre</i> and told him the idea I'd been brooding over +for months, and he promised to stand all the racket."</p> + +<p>"What sort of a paper?" said Peter.</p> + +<p>"Can you ask? To what do you think I've been devoting my days and nights +but to the cultivation of the Beautiful?"</p> + +<p>"Is that what the paper will be devoted to?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. To the Beautiful."</p> + +<p>"I know," snorted Mrs. Crowl, "with portraits of actresses."</p> + +<p>"Portraits? Oh, no!" said Denzil. "That would be the True, not the +Beautiful."</p> + +<p>"And what's the name of the paper?" asked Crowl.</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's a secret, Peter. Like Scott, I prefer to remain anonymous."</p> + +<p>"Just like your Fads. I'm only a plain man, and I want to know where the +fun of anonymity comes in. If I had any gifts, I should like to get the +credit. It's a right and natural feeling to my thinking."</p> + +<p>"Unnatural, Peter; unnatural. We're all born anonymous, and I'm for +sticking close to Nature. Enough for me that I disseminate the Beautiful. +Any letters come during my absence, Mrs. Crowl?"</p> + +<p>"No," she snapped. "But a gent named Grodman called. He said you hadn't +been to see him for some time, and looked annoyed to hear you'd +disappeared. How much have you let <i>him</i> in for?"</p> + +<p>"The man's in <i>my</i> debt," said Denzil, annoyed. "I wrote a book for him +and he's taken all the credit for it, the rogue! My name doesn't appear +even in the Preface. What's that ticket you're looking so lovingly at, +Peter?"</p> + +<p>"That's for to-night—the unveiling of Constant's portrait. Gladstone +speaks. Awful demand for places."</p> + +<p>"Gladstone!" sneered Denzil. "Who wants to hear Gladstone? A man who's +devoted his life to pulling down the pillars of Church and State."</p> + +<p>"A man who's devoted his whole life to propping up the crumbling Fads of +Religion and Monarchy. But, for all that, the man has his gifts, and I'm +burnin' to hear him."</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't go out of my way an inch to hear him," said Denzil; and went +up to his room, and when Mrs. Crowl sent him up a cup of nice strong tea +at tea-time, the brat who bore it found him lying dressed on the bed, +snoring unbeautifully.</p> + +<p>The evening wore on. It was fine frosty weather. The Whitechapel Road +swarmed with noisy life, as though it were a Saturday night. The stars +flared in the sky like the lights of celestial costermongers. Everybody +was on the alert for the advent of Mr. Gladstone. He must surely come +through the Road on his journey from the West Bow-wards. But nobody saw +him or his carriage, except those about the Hall. Probably he went by +tram most of the way. He would have caught cold in an open carriage, or +bobbing his head out of the window of a closed.</p> + +<p>"If he had only been a German prince, or a cannibal king," said Crowl, +bitterly, as he plodded towards the Club, "we should have disguised Mile +End in bunting and blue fire. But perhaps it's a compliment. He knows his +London, and it's no use trying to hide the facts from him. They must have +queer notions of cities, those monarchs. They must fancy everybody lives +in a flutter of flags and walks about under triumphal arches, like as if +I were to stitch shoes in my Sunday clothes." By a defiance of chronology +Crowl had them on to-day, and they seemed to accentuate the simile.</p> + +<p>"And why shouldn't life be fuller of the Beautiful?" said Denzil. The +poet had brushed the reluctant mud off his garments to the extent it was +willing to go, and had washed his face, but his eyes were still bloodshot +from the cultivation of the Beautiful. Denzil was accompanying Crowl to +the door of the Club out of good fellowship. Denzil was himself +accompanied by Grodman, though less obtrusively. Least obtrusively was he +accompanied by his usual Scotland Yard shadows, Wimp's agents. There was +a surging nondescript crowd about the Club, so that the police, and the +doorkeeper, and the stewards could with difficulty keep out the tide of +the ticketless, through which the current of the privileged had equal +difficulty in permeating. The streets all around were thronged with +people longing for a glimpse of Gladstone. Mortlake drove up in a hansom +(his head a self-conscious pendulum of popularity, swaying and bowing to +right and left) and received all the pent-up enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>"Well, good-by, Cantercot," said Crowl.</p> + +<p>"No, I'll see you to the door, Peter."</p> + +<p>They fought their way shoulder to shoulder.</p> + +<p>Now that Grodman had found Denzil he was not going to lose him again. He +had only found him by accident, for he was himself bound to the unveiling +ceremony, to which he had been invited in view of his known devotion to +the task of unveiling the Mystery. He spoke to one of the policemen +about, who said, "Ay, ay, sir," and he was prepared to follow Denzil, if +necessary, and to give up the pleasure of hearing Gladstone for an acuter +thrill. The arrest must be delayed no longer.</p> + +<p>But Denzil seemed as if he were going in on the heels of Crowl. This +would suit Grodman better. He could then have the two pleasures. But +Denzil was stopped halfway through the door.</p> + +<p>"Ticket, sir!"</p> + +<p>Denzil drew himself up to his full height.</p> + +<p>"Press," he said majestically. All the glories and grandeurs of the +Fourth Estate were concentrated in that haughty monosyllable. Heaven +itself is full of journalists who have overawed St. Peter. But the +doorkeeper was a veritable dragon.</p> + +<p>"What paper, sir?"</p> + +<p>"<i>New York Herald</i>" said Denzil, sharply. He did not relish his word +being distrusted.</p> + +<p>"<i>New York Herald</i>" said one of the bystanding stewards, scarce catching +the sounds. "Pass him in."</p> + +<p>And in the twinkling of an eye Denzil had eagerly slipped inside.</p> + +<p>But during the brief altercation Wimp had come up. Even he could not make +his face quite impassive, and there was a suppressed intensity in the +eyes and a quiver about the mouth. He went in on Denzil's heels, blocking +up the doorway with Grodman. The two men were so full of their coming +<i>coups</i> that they struggled for some seconds, side by side, before they +recognised each other. Then they shook hands heartily.</p> + +<p>"That was Cantercot just went in, wasn't it, Grodman?" said Wimp.</p> + +<p>"I didn't notice," said Grodman, in tones of utter indifference.</p> + +<p>At bottom Wimp was terribly excited. He felt that his <i>coup</i> was going +to be executed under very sensational circumstances. Everything would +combine to turn the eyes of the country upon him—nay, of the world, for +had not the Big Bow Mystery been discussed in every language under the +sun? In these electric times the criminal receives a cosmopolitan +reputation. It is a privilege he shares with few other artists. This time +Wimp would be one of them. And he felt deservedly so. If the criminal had +been cunning to the point of genius in planning the murder, he had been +acute to the point of divination in detecting it. Never before had he +pieced together so broken a chain. He could not resist the unique +opportunity of setting a sensational scheme in a sensational framework. +The dramatic instinct was strong in him; he felt like a playwright who +has constructed a strong melodramatic plot, and has the Drury Lane stage +suddenly offered him to present it on. It would be folly to deny himself +the luxury, though the presence of Mr. Gladstone and the nature of the +ceremony should perhaps have given him pause. Yet, on the other hand, +these were the very factors of the temptation. Wimp went in and took a +seat behind Denzil. All the seats were numbered, so that everybody might +have the satisfaction of occupying somebody else's. Denzil was in the +special reserved places in the front row just by the central gangway; +Crowl was squeezed into a corner behind a pillar near the back of the +hall. Grodman had been honoured with a seat on the platform, which was +accessible by steps on the right and left, but he kept his eye on Denzil. +The picture of the poor idealist hung on the wall behind Grodman's head, +covered by its curtain of brown holland. There was a subdued buzz of +excitement about the hall, which swelled into cheers every now and again +as some gentleman known to fame or Bow took his place upon the platform. +It was occupied by several local M.P.'s of varying politics, a number of +other Parliamentary satellites of the great man, three or four labour +leaders, a peer or two of philanthropic pretensions, a sprinkling of +Toynbee and Oxford Hall men, the president and other honorary officials, +some of the family and friends of the deceased, together with the +inevitable percentage of persons who had no claim to be there save cheek. +Gladstone was late—later than Mortlake, who was cheered to the echo when +he arrived, some one starting "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow," as if it +were a political meeting. Gladstone came in just in time to acknowledge +the compliment. The noise of the song, trolled out from iron lungs, had +drowned the huzzahs heralding the old man's advent. The convivial chorus +went to Mortlake's head, as if champagne had really preceded it. His eyes +grew moist and dim. He saw himself swimming to the Millennium on waves of +enthusiasm. Ah, how his brother toilers should be rewarded for their +trust in him!</p> + +<p>With his usual courtesy and consideration, Mr. Gladstone had refused to +perform the actual unveiling of Arthur Constant's portrait. "That," he +said in his postcard, "will fall most appropriately to Mr. Mortlake, a +gentleman who has, I am given to understand, enjoyed the personal +friendship of the late Mr. Constant, and has cooperated with him in +various schemes for the organisation of skilled and unskilled classes +of labour, as well as for the diffusion of better ideals—ideals of +self-culture and self-restraint—among the working men of Bow, who have +been fortunate, so far as I can perceive, in the possession (if in one +case unhappily only temporary possession) of two such men of undoubted +ability and honesty to direct their divided counsels and to lead them +along a road, which, though I cannot pledge myself to approve of it in +all its turnings and windings, is yet not unfitted to bring them somewhat +nearer to goals to which there are few of us but would extend some +measure of hope that the working classes of this great Empire may in due +course, yet with no unnecessary delay, be enabled to arrive."</p> + +<p>Mr. Gladstone's speech was an expansion of his postcard, punctuated by +cheers. The only new thing in it was the graceful and touching way in +which he revealed what had been a secret up till then—that the portrait +had been painted and presented to the Bow Break o' Day Club, by Lucy +Brent, who in the fulness of time would have been Arthur Constant's wife. +It was a painting for which he had sat to her while alive, and she had +stifled yet pampered her grief by working hard at it since his death. The +fact added the last touch of pathos to the occasion. Crowl's face was +hidden behind his red handkerchief; even the fire of excitement in Wimp's +eye was quenched for a moment by a teardrop, as he thought of Mrs. Wimp +and Wilfred. As for Grodman, there was almost a lump in his throat. +Denzil Cantercot was the only unmoved man in the room. He thought the +episode quite too Beautiful, and was already weaving it into rhyme.</p> + +<p>At the conclusion of his speech Mr. Gladstone called upon Tom Mortlake +to unveil the portrait. Tom rose, pale and excited. He faltered as he +touched the cord. He seemed overcome with emotion. Was it the mention of +Lucy Brent that had moved him to his depths?</p> + +<p>The brown holland fell away—the dead stood revealed as he had been in +life. Every feature, painted by the hand of Love, was instinct with +vitality: the fine, earnest face, the sad kindly eyes, the noble brow, +seeming still a-throb with the thought of Humanity. A thrill ran through +the room—there was a low, undefinable murmur. Oh, the pathos and the +tragedy of it! Every eye was fixed, misty with emotion, upon the dead man +in the picture, and the living man who stood, pale and agitated, and +visibly unable to commence his speech, at the side of the canvas. +Suddenly a hand was laid upon the labour leader's shoulder, and there +rang through the hall in Wimp's clear, decisive tones the words—"Tom +Mortlake, I arrest you for the murder of Arthur Constant!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IX__" id="IX__"></a>IX</h2> + + +<p>For a moment there was an acute, terrible silence. Mortlake's face was +that of a corpse; the face of the dead man at his side was flushed with +the hues of life. To the overstrung nerves of the onlookers, the brooding +eyes of the picture seemed sad and stern with menace, and charged with +the lightnings of doom.</p> + +<p>It was a horrible contrast. For Wimp, alone, the painted face had fuller, +more tragical meanings. The audience seemed turned to stone. They sat or +stood—in every variety of attitude—frozen, rigid. Arthur Constant's +picture dominated the scene, the only living thing in a hall of the dead.</p> + +<p>But only for a moment. Mortlake shook off the detective's hand.</p> + +<p>"Boys!" he cried, in accents of infinite indignation, "this is a police +conspiracy."</p> + +<p>His words relaxed the tension. The stony figures were agitated. A dull +excited hubbub answered him. The little cobbler darted from behind his +pillar, and leapt upon a bench. The cords of his brow were swollen with +excitement. He seemed a giant overshadowing the hall.</p> + +<p>"Boys!" he roared, in his best Victoria Park voice, "listen to me. This +charge is a foul and damnable lie."</p> + +<p>"Bravo!" "Hear, hear!" "Hooray!" "It is!" was roared back at him from all +parts of the room. Everybody rose and stood in tentative attitudes, +excited to the last degree.</p> + +<p>"Boys!" Peter roared on, "you all know me. I'm a plain man, and I want to +know if it's likely a man would murder his best friend."</p> + +<p>"No!" in a mighty volume of sound.</p> + +<p>Wimp had scarcely calculated upon Mortlake's popularity. He stood on the +platform, pale and anxious as his prisoner.</p> + +<p>"And if he did, why didn't they prove it the first time?"</p> + +<p>"Hear, Hear!"</p> + +<p>"And if they want to arrest him, why couldn't they leave it till the +ceremony was over? Tom Mortlake's not the man to run away."</p> + +<p>"Tom Mortlake! Tom Mortlake! Three cheers for Tom Mortlake!" "Hip, hip, +hip, hooray!"</p> + +<p>"Three groans for the police!" "Hoo! Oo! Oo!"</p> + +<p>Wimp's melodrama was not going well. He felt like the author to whose +ears is borne the ominous sibilance of the pit. He almost wished he +had not followed the curtain-raiser with his own stronger drama. +Unconsciously the police, scattered about the hall, drew together. The +people on the platform knew not what to do. They had all risen and stood +in a densely packed mass. Even Mr. Gladstone's speech failed him in +circumstances so novel. The groans died away; the cheers for Mortlake +rose and swelled and fell and rose again. Sticks and umbrellas were +banged and rattled, handkerchiefs were waved, the thunder deepened. The +motley crowd still surging about the hall took up the cheers, and for +hundreds of yards around people were going black in the face out of mere +irresponsible enthusiasm. At last Tom waved his hand—the thunder +dwindled, died. The prisoner was master of the situation.</p> + +<p>Grodman stood on the platform, grasping the back of his chair, a curious +mocking Mephistophelian glitter about his eyes, his lips wreathed into a +half smile. There was no hurry for him to get Denzil Cantercot arrested +now. Wimp had made an egregious, a colossal blunder. In Grodman's heart +there was a great, glad calm as of a man who has strained his sinews to +win in a famous match, and has heard the judge's word. He felt almost +kindly to Denzil now.</p> + +<p>Tom Mortlake spoke. His face was set and stony. His tall figure was drawn +up haughtily to its full height. He pushed the black mane back from his +forehead with a characteristic gesture. The fevered audience hung upon +his lips—the men at the back leaned eagerly forward—the reporters were +breathless with fear lest they should miss a word. What would the great +labour leader have to say at this supreme moment?</p> + +<p>"Mr. Chairman and gentlemen. It is to me a melancholy pleasure to have +been honoured with the task of unveiling to-night this portrait of a +great benefactor to Bow and a true friend to the labouring classes. +Except that he honoured me with his friendship while living, and that the +aspirations of my life have, in my small and restricted way, been +identical with his, there is little reason why this honourable duty +should have fallen upon me. Gentlemen, I trust that we shall all find an +inspiring influence in the daily vision of the dead, who yet liveth in +our hearts and in this noble work of art—wrought, as Mr. Gladstone has +told us, by the hand of one who loved him." The speaker paused a moment, +his low vibrant tones faltering into silence. "If we humble working men +of Bow can never hope to exert individually a tithe of the beneficial +influence wielded by Arthur Constant, it is yet possible for each of us +to walk in the light he has kindled in our midst—a perpetual lamp of +self-sacrifice and brotherhood."</p> + +<p>That was all. The room rang with cheers. Tom Mortlake resumed his seat. +To Wimp the man's audacity verged on the Sublime; to Denzil on the +Beautiful. Again there was a breathless hush. Mr. Gladstone's mobile face +was working with excitement. No such extraordinary scene had occurred in +the whole of his extraordinary experience. He seemed about to rise. The +cheering subsided to a painful stillness. Wimp cut the situation by +laying his hand again upon Tom's shoulder.</p> + +<p>"Come quietly with me," he said. The words were almost a whisper, but in +the supreme silence they travelled to the ends of the hall.</p> + +<p>"Don't you go, Tom!" The trumpet tones were Peter's. The call thrilled an +answering chord of defiance in every breast, and a low ominous murmur +swept through the hall.</p> + +<p>Tom rose, and there was silence again. "Boys," he said, "let me go. Don't +make any noise about it. I shall be with you again to-morrow."</p> + +<p>But the blood of the Break o' Day boys was at fever heat. A hurtling mass +of men struggled confusedly from their seats. In a moment all was chaos. +Tom did not move. Half-a-dozen men headed by Peter scaled the platform. +Wimp was thrown to one side, and the invaders formed a ring round Tom's +chair. The platform people scampered like mice from the centre. Some +huddled together in the corners, others slipped out at the rear. The +committee congratulated themselves on having had the self-denial to +exclude ladies. Mr. Gladstone's satellites hurried the old man off and +into his carriage, though the fight promised to become Homeric. Grodman +stood at the side of the platform secretly more amused than ever, +concerning himself no more with Denzil Cantercot, who was already +strengthening his nerves at the bar upstairs. The police about the hall +blew their whistles, and policemen came rushing in from outside and the +neighbourhood. An Irish M.P. on the platform was waving his gingham like +a shillelagh in sheer excitement, forgetting his new-found respectability +and dreaming himself back at Donnybrook Fair. Him a conscientious +constable floored with a truncheon. But a shower of fists fell on the +zealot's face, and he tottered back bleeding. Then the storm broke in all +its fury. The upper air was black with staves, sticks, and umbrellas, +mingled with the pallid hailstones of knobby fists. Yells, and groans, +and hoots, and battle-cries blent in grotesque chorus, like one of +Dvorák's weird diabolical movements. Mortlake stood impassive, with arms +folded, making no further effort, and the battle raged round him as the +water swirls round some steadfast rock. A posse of police from the back +fought their way steadily towards him, and charged up the heights of the +platform steps, only to be sent tumbling backwards, as their leader was +hurled at them like a battering-ram. Upon the top of the heap he fell, +surmounting the strata of policemen. But others clambered upon them, +escalading the platform. A moment more and Mortlake would have been +taken. Then the miracle happened.</p> + +<p>As when of old a reputable goddess <i>ex machinâ</i> saw her favourite hero in +dire peril, straightway she drew down a cloud from the celestial stores +of Jupiter and enveloped her fondling in kindly night, so that his +adversary strove with the darkness, so did Crowl, the cunning cobbler, +the much-daring, essay to ensure his friend's safety. He turned off the +gas at the meter.</p> + +<p>An Arctic night—unpreceded by twilight—fell, and there dawned the +sabbath of the witches. The darkness could be felt—and it left blood and +bruises behind it. When the lights were turned on again, Mortlake was +gone. But several of the rioters were arrested, triumphantly.</p> + +<p>And through all, and over all, the face of the dead man, who had sought +to bring peace on earth, brooded.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Crowl sat meekly eating his supper of bread and cheese, with his head +bandaged, while Denzil Cantercot told him the story of how he had rescued +Tom Mortlake. He had been among the first to scale the height, and had +never budged from Tom's side or from the forefront of the battle till he +had seen him safely outside and into a by-street.</p> + +<p>"I am so glad you saw that he got away safely," said Crowl, "I wasn't +quite sure he would."</p> + +<p>"Yes; but I wish some cowardly fool hadn't turned off the gas. I like men +to <i>see</i> that they are beaten."</p> + +<p>"But it seemed—easier," faltered Crowl.</p> + +<p>"Easier!" echoed Denzil, taking a deep draught of bitter. "Really, Peter, +I'm sorry to find you always will take such low views. It may be easier, +but it's shabby. It shocks one's sense of the Beautiful."</p> + +<p>Crowl ate his bread and cheese shamefacedly.</p> + +<p>"But what was the use of breaking your head to save him?" said Mrs. +Crowl, with an unconscious pun. "He must be caught."</p> + +<p>"Ah, I don't see how the Useful <i>does</i> come in, now," said Peter, +thoughtfully. "But I didn't think of that at the time."</p> + +<p>He swallowed his water quickly, and it went the wrong way and added to +his confusion. It also began to dawn upon him that he might be called to +account. Let it be said at once that he wasn't. He had taken too +prominent a part.</p> + +<p>Meantime, Mrs. Wimp was bathing Mr. Wimp's eye, and rubbing him generally +with arnica. Wimp's melodrama had been, indeed, a sight for the gods. +Only virtue was vanquished and vice triumphant. The villain had escaped, +and without striking a blow.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="X__" id="X__"></a>X</h2> + + +<p>There was matter and to spare for the papers the next day. The striking +ceremony—Mr. Gladstone's speech—the sensational arrest—these would of +themselves have made excellent themes for reports and leaders. But the +personality of the man arrested, and the Big Bow Mystery Battle—as it +came to be called—gave additional piquancy to the paragraphs and the +posters. The behaviour of Mortlake put the last touch to the +picturesqueness of the position. He left the hall when the lights went +out, and walked unnoticed and unmolested through pleiads of policemen +to the nearest police station, where the superintendent was almost too +excited to take any notice of his demand to be arrested. But to do him +justice, the official yielded as soon as he understood the situation. +It seems inconceivable that he did not violate some red-tape regulation +in so doing. To some this self-surrender was limpid proof of innocence; +to others it was the damning token of despairing guilt.</p> + +<p>The morning papers were pleasant reading for Grodman, who chuckled as +continuously over his morning egg, as if he had laid it. Jane was alarmed +for the sanity of her saturnine master. As her husband would have said, +Grodman's grins were not Beautiful. But he made no effort to suppress +them. Not only had Wimp perpetrated a grotesque blunder, but the +journalists to a man were down on his great sensation tableau, though +their denunciations did not appear in the dramatic columns. The Liberal +papers said that he had endangered Mr. Gladstone's life; the Conservative +that he had unloosed the raging elements of Bow blackguardism, and set in +motion forces which might have easily swelled to a riot, involving severe +destruction of property. But "Tom Mortlake" was, after all, the thought +swamping every other. It was, in a sense, a triumph for the man.</p> + +<p>But Wimp's turn came when Mortlake, who reserved his defence, was brought +up before a magistrate, and by force of the new evidence, fully committed +for trial on the charge of murdering Arthur Constant. Then men's thoughts +centred again on the Mystery, and the solution of the inexplicable +problem agitated mankind from China to Peru.</p> + +<p>In the middle of February, the great trial befell. It was another of the +opportunities which the Chancellor of the Exchequer neglects. So stirring +a drama might have easily cleared its expenses—despite the length of the +cast, the salaries of the stars, and the rent of the house—in mere +advance booking. For it was a drama which (by the rights of Magna Charta) +could never be repeated; a drama which ladies of fashion would have given +their earrings to witness, even with the central figure not a woman. And +there <i>was</i> a woman in it anyhow, to judge by the little that had +transpired at the magisterial examination, and the fact that the country +was placarded with bills offering a reward for information concerning a +Miss Jessie Dymond. Mortlake was defended by Sir Charles Brown-Harland, +Q.C., retained at the expense of the Mortlake Defence Fund (subscriptions +to which came also from Australia and the Continent), and set on his +mettle by the fact that he was the accepted labour candidate for an +East-end constituency. Their Majesties, Victoria and the Law, were +represented by Mr. Robert Spigot, Q.C.</p> + +<p>Mr. SPIGOT, Q.C, in presenting his case, said: "I propose to show that +the prisoner murdered his friend and fellow-lodger, Mr. Arthur Constant, +in cold blood, and with the most careful premeditation; premeditation +so studied, as to leave the circumstances of the death an impenetrable +mystery for weeks to all the world, though, fortunately, without +altogether baffling the almost superhuman ingenuity of Mr. Edward Wimp, +of the Scotland Yard Detective Department. I propose to show that the +motives of the prisoner were jealousy and revenge; jealousy, not only of +his friend's superior influence over the working men he himself aspired +to lead, but the more commonplace animosity engendered by the disturbing +element of a woman having relations to both. If, before my case is +complete, it will be my painful duty to show that the murdered man was +not the saint the world has agreed to paint him, I shall not shrink from +unveiling the truer picture, in the interests of justice, which cannot +say <i>nil nisi bonum</i> even of the dead. I propose to show that the murder +was committed by the prisoner shortly before half-past six on the morning +of December 4th, and that the prisoner having, with the remarkable +ingenuity which he has shown throughout, attempted to prepare an alibi +by feigning to leave London by the <i>first</i> train to Liverpool, returned +home, got in with his latch-key through the street door, which he had +left on the latch, unlocked his victim's bedroom with a key which he +possessed, cut the sleeping man's throat, pocketed his razor, locked the +door again, and gave it the appearance of being bolted, went downstairs, +unslipped the bolt of the big lock, closed the door behind him, and got +to Euston in time for the <i>second</i> train to Liverpool. The fog helped +his proceedings throughout." Such was in sum the theory of the +prosecution. The pale, defiant figure in the dock winced perceptibly +under parts of it.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump was the first witness called for the prosecution. She was +quite used to legal inquisitiveness by this time, but did not appear in +good spirits.</p> + +<p>"On the night of December 3rd, you gave the prisoner a letter?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, your ludship."</p> + +<p>"How did he behave when he read it?"</p> + +<p>"He turned very pale and excited. He went up to the poor gentleman's +room, and I'm afraid he quarrelled with him. He might have left his last +hours peaceful." (Amusement.)</p> + +<p>"What happened then?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Mortlake went out in a passion, and came in again in about an hour."</p> + +<p>"He told you he was going away to Liverpool very early the next morning?"</p> + +<p>"No, your ludship, he said he was going to Devonport." (Sensation.)</p> + +<p>"What time did you get up the next morning?"</p> + +<p>"Half-past six."</p> + +<p>"That is not your usual time?"</p> + +<p>"No, I always get up at six."</p> + +<p>"How do you account for the extra sleepiness?"</p> + +<p>"Misfortunes will happen."</p> + +<p>"It wasn't the dull, foggy weather?"</p> + +<p>"No, my lud, else I should never get up early." (Laughter.)</p> + +<p>"You drink something before going to bed?"</p> + +<p>"I like my cup o' tea. I take it strong, without sugar. It always +steadies my nerves."</p> + +<p>"Quite so. Where were you when the prisoner told you he was going to +Devonport?"</p> + +<p>"Drinkin' my tea in the kitchen."</p> + +<p>"What should you say if prisoner dropped something in it to make you +sleep late?"</p> + +<p>WITNESS (startled): "He ought to be shot."</p> + +<p>"He might have done it without your noticing it, I suppose?"</p> + +<p>"If he was clever enough to murder the poor gentleman, he was clever +enough to try and poison me."</p> + +<p>The JUDGE: "The witness in her replies must confine herself to the +evidence."</p> + +<p>Mr. SPIGOT, Q.C.: "I must submit to your lordship that it is a very +logical answer, and exactly illustrates the interdependence of the +probabilities. Now, Mrs. Drabdump, let us know what happened when you +awoke at half-past six the next morning." Thereupon Mrs. Drabdump +recapitulated the evidence (with new redundancies, but slight variations) +given by her at the inquest. How she became alarmed—how she found the +street door locked by the big lock—how she roused Grodman, and got him +to burst open the door—how they found the body—all this with which the +public was already familiar <i>ad nauseam</i> was extorted from her afresh.</p> + +<p>"Look at this key (key passed to witness). Do you recognise it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes; how did you get it? It's the key of my first-floor front. I am sure +I left it sticking in the door."</p> + +<p>"Did you know a Miss Dymond?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, Mr. Mortlake's sweetheart. But I knew he would never marry her, +poor thing." (Sensation.)</p> + +<p>"Why not?"</p> + +<p>"He was getting too grand for her." (Amusement.)</p> + +<p>"You don't mean anything more than that?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know; she only came to my place once or twice. The last time I +set eyes on her must have been in October."</p> + +<p>"How did she appear?"</p> + +<p>"She was very miserable, but she wouldn't let you see it." (Laughter.)</p> + +<p>"How has the prisoner behaved since the murder?"</p> + +<p>"He always seemed very glum and sorry for it."</p> + +<p>Cross-examined: "Did not the prisoner once occupy the bedroom of Mr. +Constant, and give it up to him, so that Mr. Constant might have the two +rooms on the same floor?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but he didn't pay as much."</p> + +<p>"And, while occupying this front bedroom, did not the prisoner once lose +his key and have another made?"</p> + +<p>"He did; he was very careless."</p> + +<p>"Do you know what the prisoner and Mr. Constant spoke about on the night +of December 3rd?"</p> + +<p>"No; I couldn't hear."</p> + +<p>"Then how did you know they were quarrelling?"</p> + +<p>"They were talkin' so loud."</p> + +<p>Sir CHARLES BROWN-HARLAND, Q.C. (sharply): "But I'm talking loudly to you +now. Should you say I was quarrelling?"</p> + +<p>"It takes two to make a quarrel." (Laughter.)</p> + +<p>"Was prisoner the sort of man who, in your opinion, would commit a +murder?"</p> + +<p>"No, I never should ha' guessed it was him."</p> + +<p>"He always struck you as a thorough gentleman?"</p> + +<p>"No, my lud. I knew he was only a comp."</p> + +<p>"You say the prisoner has seemed depressed since the murder. Might not +that have been due to the disappearance of his sweetheart?"</p> + +<p>"No, he'd more likely be glad to get rid of her."</p> + +<p>"Then he wouldn't be jealous if Mr. Constant took her off his hands?" +(Sensation.)</p> + +<p>"Men are dog-in-the-mangers."</p> + +<p>"Never mind about men, Mrs. Drabdump. Had the prisoner ceased to care for +Miss Dymond?"</p> + +<p>"He didn't seem to think of her, my lud. When he got a letter in her +handwriting among his heap he used to throw it aside till he'd torn open +the others."</p> + +<p>BROWN-HARLAND, Q.C. (with a triumphant ring in his voice): "Thank you, +Mrs. Drabdump. You may sit down."</p> + +<p>SPIGOT, Q.C.: "One moment, Mrs. Drabdump. You say the prisoner had ceased +to care for Miss Dymond. Might not this have been in consequence of his +suspecting for some time that she had relations with Mr. Constant?"</p> + +<p>The JUDGE: "That is not a fair question."</p> + +<p>SPIGOT, Q.C.: "That will do, thank you, Mrs. Drabdump."</p> + +<p>BROWN-HARLAND, Q.C.: "No; one question more, Mrs. Drabdump. Did you ever +see anything—say, when Miss Dymond came to your house—to make you +suspect anything between Mr. Constant and the prisoner's sweetheart?"</p> + +<p>"She did meet him once when Mr. Mortlake was out." (Sensation.)</p> + +<p>"Where did she meet him?"</p> + +<p>"In the passage. He was going out when she knocked and he opened the +door." (Amusement.)</p> + +<p>"You didn't hear what they said?"</p> + +<p>"I ain't a eavesdropper. They spoke friendly and went away together."</p> + +<p>Mr. GEORGE GRODMAN was called, and repeated his evidence at the inquest. +Cross-examined, he testified to the warm friendship between Mr. Constant +and the prisoner. He knew very little about Miss Dymond, having scarcely +seen her. Prisoner had never spoken to him much about her. He should not +think she was much in prisoner's thoughts. Naturally the prisoner had +been depressed by the death of his friend. Besides, he was overworked. +Witness thought highly of Mortlake's character. It was incredible that +Constant had had improper relations of any kind with his friend's +promised wife. Grodman's evidence made a very favourable impression on +the jury; the prisoner looked his gratitude; and the prosecution felt +sorry it had been necessary to call this witness.</p> + +<p>Inspector HOWLETT and Sergeant RUNNYMEDE had also to repeat their +evidence. Dr. ROBINSON, police surgeon, likewise retendered his evidence +as to the nature of the wound, and the approximate hour of death. But +this time he was much more severely examined. He would not bind himself +down to state the time within an hour or two. He thought life had been +extinct two or three hours when he arrived, so that the deed had been +committed between seven and eight. Under gentle pressure from the +prosecuting counsel, he admitted that it might possibly have been between +six and seven. Cross-examined, he reiterated his impression in favour of +the later hour.</p> + +<p>Supplementary evidence from medical experts proved as dubious and +uncertain as if the court had confined itself to the original witness. It +seemed to be generally agreed that the data for determining the time of +death of any body were too complex and variable to admit of very precise +inference; rigor mortis and other symptoms setting in within very wide +limits and differing largely in different persons. All agreed that death +from such a cut must have been practically instantaneous, and the theory +of suicide was rejected by all. As a whole the medical evidence tended to +fix the time of death, with a high degree of probability, between the +hours of six and half-past eight. The efforts of the prosecution were +bent upon throwing back the time of death to as early as possible after +about half-past five. The defence spent all its strength upon pinning the +experts to the conclusion that death could not have been earlier than +seven. Evidently the prosecution was going to fight hard for the +hypothesis that Mortlake had committed the crime in the interval between +the first and second trains for Liverpool; while the defence was +concentrating itself on an alibi, showing that the prisoner had travelled +by the second train which left Euston Station at a quarter-past seven, so +that there could have been no possible time for the passage between Bow +and Euston. It was an exciting struggle. As yet the contending forces +seemed equally matched. The evidence had gone as much for as against the +prisoner. But everybody knew that worse lay behind.</p> + +<p>"Call Edward Wimp."</p> + +<p>The story EDWARD WIMP had to tell began tamely enough with +thrice-threshed-out facts. But at last the new facts came.</p> + +<p>"In consequence of suspicions that had formed in your mind you took up +your quarters, disguised, in the late Mr. Constant's rooms?"</p> + +<p>"I did; at the commencement of the year. My suspicions had gradually +gathered against the occupants of No. 11 Glover Street, and I resolved to +quash or confirm these suspicions once for all."</p> + +<p>"Will you tell the jury what followed?"</p> + +<p>"Whenever the prisoner was away for the night I searched his room. I +found the key of Mr. Constant's bedroom buried deeply in the side of +prisoner's leather sofa. I found what I imagine to be the letter he +received on December 3rd, in the pages of a 'Bradshaw' lying under the +same sofa. There were two razors about."</p> + +<p>Mr. SPIGOT, Q.C., said: "The key has already been identified by Mrs. +Drabdump. The letter I now propose to read."</p> + +<p>It was undated, and ran as follows:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Dear Tom,—This is to bid you farewell. It is best for us all. I am +going a long way, dearest. Do not seek to find me, for it will be +useless. Think of me as one swallowed up by the waters, and be assured +that it is only to spare you shame and humiliation in the future that I +tear myself from you and all the sweetness of life. Darling, there is +no other way. I feel you could never marry me now. I have felt it for +months. Dear Tom, you will understand what I mean. We must look facts +in the face. I hope you will always be friends with Mr. Constant. +Good-by, dear. God bless you! May you always be happy, and find a +worthier wife than I. Perhaps when you are great, and rich, and famous, +as you deserve, you will sometimes think not unkindly of one who, however +faulty and unworthy of you, will at least love you till the end.—Yours, +till death,</p> + +<p>"JESSIE."</p></div> + +<p>By the time this letter was finished numerous old gentlemen, with wigs +or without, were observed to be polishing their glasses. Mr. Wimp's +examination was resumed.</p> + +<p>"After making these discoveries what did you do?"</p> + +<p>"I made inquiries about Miss Dymond, and found Mr. Constant had visited +her once or twice in the evening. I imagined there would be some traces +of a pecuniary connection. I was allowed by the family to inspect Mr. +Constant's cheque-book, and found a paid cheque made out for £25 in the +name of Miss Dymond. By inquiry at the Bank, I found it had been cashed +on November l2th of last year. I then applied for a warrant against the +prisoner."</p> + +<p>Cross-examined: "Do you suggest that the prisoner opened Mr. Constant's +bedroom with the key you found?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly."</p> + +<p>BROWN-HARLAND, Q.C. (sarcastically): "And locked the door from within +with it on leaving?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly."</p> + +<p>"Will you have the goodness to explain how the trick was done?"</p> + +<p>"It wasn't done. (Laughter.) The prisoner probably locked the door from +the outside. Those who broke it open naturally imagined it had been +locked from the inside when they found the key inside. The key would, on +this theory, be on the floor as the outside locking could not have been +effected if it had been in the lock. The first persons to enter the room +would naturally believe it had been thrown down in the bursting of the +door. Or it might have been left sticking very loosely inside the lock so +as not to interfere with the turning of the outside key, in which case it +would also probably have been thrown to the ground."</p> + +<p>"Indeed. Very ingenious. And can you also explain how the prisoner could +have bolted the door within from the outside?"</p> + +<p>"I can. (Renewed sensation.) There is only one way in which it was +possible—and that was, of course, a mere conjurer's illusion. To cause a +locked door to appear bolted in addition, it would only be necessary for +the person on the inside of the door to wrest the staple containing the +bolt from the woodwork. The bolt in Mr. Constant's bedroom worked +perpendicularly. When the staple was torn off, it would simply remain at +rest on the pin of the bolt instead of supporting it or keeping it fixed. +A person bursting open the door and finding the staple resting on the pin +and torn away from the lintel of the door, would, of course, imagine he +had torn it away, never dreaming the wresting off had been done +beforehand." (Applause in court, which was instantly checked by the +ushers.) The counsel for the defence felt he had been entrapped in +attempting to be sarcastic with the redoubtable detective. Grodman seemed +green with envy. It was the one thing he had not thought of.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Drabdump, Grodman, Inspector Howlett, and Sergeant Runnymede were +recalled and reëxammed by the embarrassed Sir Charles Brown-Harland as +to the exact condition of the lock and the bolt and the position of the +key. It turned out as Wimp had suggested; so prepossessed were the +witnesses with the conviction that the door was locked and bolted from +the inside when it was burst open that they were a little hazy about the +exact details. The damage had been repaired, so that it was all a +question of precise past observation. The inspector and the sergeant +testified that the key was in the lock when they saw it, though both the +mortice and the bolt were broken. They were not prepared to say that +Wimp's theory was impossible; they would even admit it was quite possible +that the staple of the bolt had been torn off beforehand. Mrs. Drabdump +could give no clear account of such petty facts in view of her immediate +engrossing interest in the horrible sight of the corpse. Grodman alone +was positive that the key was in the door when he burst it open. No, he +did not remember picking it up from the floor and putting it in. And +he was certain that the staple of the bolt was <i>not</i> broken, from the +resistance he experienced in trying to shake the upper panels of the +door.</p> + +<p>By the Prosecution: "Don't you think, from the comparative ease with +which the door yielded to your onslaught, that it is highly probable that +the pin of the bolt was not in a firmly fixed staple, but in one already +detached from the woodwork of the lintel?"</p> + +<p>"The door did not yield so easily."</p> + +<p>"But you must be a Hercules."</p> + +<p>"Not quite; the bolt was old, and the woodwork crumbling; the lock was +new and shoddy. But I have always been a strong man."</p> + +<p>"Very well, Mr. Grodman. I hope you will never appear at the +music-halls." (Laughter.)</p> + +<p>Jessie Dymond's landlady was the next witness for the prosecution. She +corroborated Wimp's statements as to Constant's occasional visits, and +narrated how the girl had been enlisted by the dead philanthropist as a +collaborator in some of his enterprises. But the most telling portion of +her evidence was the story of how, late at night, on December 3rd, the +prisoner called upon her and inquired wildly about the whereabouts of his +sweetheart. He said he had just received a mysterious letter from Miss +Dymond saying she was gone. She (the landlady) replied that she could +have told him that weeks ago, as her ungrateful lodger was gone now some +three weeks without leaving a hint behind her. In answer to his most +ungentlemanly raging and raving, she told him it served him right, as he +should have looked after her better, and not kept away for so long. She +reminded him that there were as good fish in the sea as ever came out, +and a girl of Jessie's attractions need not pine away (as she had seemed +to be pining away) for lack of appreciation. He then called her a liar +and left her, and she hoped never to see his face again, though she was +not surprised to see it in the dock.</p> + +<p>Mr. FITZJAMES MONTGOMERY, a bank clerk, remembered cashing the cheque +produced. He particularly remembered it, because he paid the money to a +very pretty girl. She took the entire amount in gold. At this point the +case was adjourned.</p> + +<p>DENZIL CANTERCOT was the first witness called for the prosecution on the +resumption of the trial. Pressed as to whether he had not told Mr. Wimp +that he had overheard the prisoner denouncing Mr. Constant, he could not +say. He had not actually heard the prisoner's denunciations; he might +have given Mr. Wimp a false impression, but then Mr. Wimp was so +prosaically literal. (Laughter.) Mr. Crowl had told him something of the +kind. Cross-examined, he said Jessie Dymond was a rare spirit and she +always reminded him of Joan of Arc.</p> + +<p>Mr. CROWL, being called, was extremely agitated. He refused to take the +oath, and informed the court that the Bible was a Fad. He could not swear +by anything so self-contradictory. He would affirm. He could not +deny—though he looked like wishing to—that the prisoner had at first +been rather mistrustful of Mr. Constant, but he was certain that the +feeling had quickly worn off. Yes, he was a great friend of the prisoner, +but he didn't see why that should invalidate his testimony, especially as +he had not taken an oath. Certainly the prisoner seemed rather depressed +when he saw him on Bank Holiday, but it was overwork on behalf of the +people and for the demolition of the Fads.</p> + +<p>Several other familiars of the prisoner gave more or less reluctant +testimony as to his sometime prejudice against the amateur rival labour +leader. His expressions of dislike had been strong and bitter. The +prosecution also produced a poster announcing that the prisoner would +preside at a great meeting of clerks on December 4th. He had not turned +up at this meeting nor sent any explanation. Finally, there was the +evidence of the detectives who originally arrested him at Liverpool Docks +in view of his suspicious demeanour. This completed the case for the +prosecution.</p> + +<p>Sir CHARLES BROWN-HARLAND, Q.C., rose with a swagger and a rustle of his +silk gown, and proceeded to set forth the theory of the defence. He said +he did not purpose to call many witnesses. The hypothesis of the +prosecution was so inherently childish and inconsequential, and so +dependent upon a bundle of interdependent probabilities that it crumbled +away at the merest touch. The prisoner's character was of unblemished +integrity, his last public appearance had been made on the same platform +with Mr. Gladstone, and his honesty and highmindedness had been vouched +for by statesmen of the highest standing. His movements could be +accounted for from hour to hour—and those with which the prosecution +credited him rested on no tangible evidence whatever. He was also +credited with superhuman ingenuity and diabolical cunning of which he had +shown no previous symptom. Hypothesis was piled on hypothesis, as in the +old Oriental legend, where the world rested on the elephant and the +elephant on the tortoise. It might be worth while, however, to point out +that it was at least quite likely that the death of Mr. Constant had not +taken place before seven, and as the prisoner left Euston Station at 7.15 +A.M. for Liverpool, he could certainly not have got there from Bow in the +time; also that it was hardly possible for the prisoner, who could prove +being at Euston Station at 5.25 A.M., to travel backwards and forwards to +Glover Street and commit the crime all within less than two hours. "The +real facts," said Sir Charles, impressively, "are most simple. The +prisoner, partly from pressure of work, partly (he had no wish to +conceal) from worldly ambition, had begun to neglect Miss Dymond, to whom +he was engaged to be married. The man was but human, and his head was a +little turned by his growing importance. Nevertheless, at heart he was +still deeply attached to Miss Dymond. She, however, appears to have +jumped to the conclusion that he had ceased to love her, that she was +unworthy of him, unfitted by education to take her place side by side +with him in the new spheres to which he was mounting—that, in short, she +was a drag on his career. Being, by all accounts, a girl of remarkable +force of character, she resolved to cut the Gordian knot by leaving +London, and, fearing lest her affianced husband's conscientiousness +should induce him to sacrifice himself to her; dreading also, perhaps, +her own weakness, she made the parting absolute, and the place of her +refuge a mystery. A theory has been suggested which drags an honoured +name in the mire—a theory so superflous that I shall only allude to it. +That Arthur Constant could have seduced, or had any improper relations +with his friend's betrothed is a hypothesis to which the lives of both +give the lie. Before leaving London—or England—Miss Dymond wrote to her +aunt in Devonport—her only living relative in this country—asking her +as a great favour to forward an addressed letter to the prisoner, a +fortnight after receipt. The aunt obeyed implicitly. This was the letter +which fell like a thunderbolt on the prisoner on the night of December +3rd. All his old love returned—he was full of self-reproach and pity for +the poor girl. The letter read ominously. Perhaps she was going to put an +end to herself. His first thought was to rush up to his friend, Constant, +to seek his advice. Perhaps Constant knew something of the affair. The +prisoner knew the two were in not infrequent communication. It is +possible—my lord and gentlemen of the jury, I do not wish to follow the +methods of the prosecution and confuse theory with fact, so I say it is +possible—that Mr. Constant had supplied her with the £25 to leave the +country. He was like a brother to her, perhaps even acted imprudently in +calling upon her, though neither dreamed of evil. It is possible that he +may have encouraged her in her abnegation and in her altruistic +aspirations, perhaps even without knowing their exact drift, for does he +not speak in his very last letter of the fine female characters he was +meeting, and the influence for good he had over individual human souls? +Still, this we can now never know, unless the dead speak or the absent +return. It is also not impossible that Miss Dymond was entrusted with +the £25 for charitable purposes. But to come back to certainties. The +prisoner consulted Mr. Constant about the letter. He then ran to Miss +Dymond's lodgings in Stepney Green, knowing beforehand his trouble would +be futile. The letter bore the postmark of Devonport. He knew the girl +had an aunt there; possibly she might have gone to her. He could not +telegraph, for he was ignorant of the address. He consulted his +'Bradshaw,' and resolved to leave by the 5.30 A.M. from Paddington, +and told his landlady so. He left the letter in the 'Bradshaw,' which +ultimately got thrust among a pile of papers under the sofa, so that he +had to get another. He was careless and disorderly, and the key found by +Mr. Wimp in his sofa, which he was absurdly supposed to have hidden there +after the murder, must have lain there for some years, having been lost +there in the days when he occupied the bedroom afterwards rented by Mr. +Constant. For it was his own sofa, removed from that room, and the +suction of sofas was well known. Afraid to miss his train, he did not +undress on that distressful night. Meantime the thought occurred to him +that Jessie was too clever a girl to leave so easy a trail, and he jumped +to the conclusion that she would be going to her married brother in +America, and had gone to Devonport merely to bid her aunt farewell. He +determined therefore to get to Liverpool, without wasting time at +Devonport, to institute inquiries. Not suspecting the delay in the +transit of the letter, he thought he might yet stop her, even at the +landing-stage or on the tender. Unfortunately his cab went slowly in the +fog, he missed the first train, and wandered about brooding +disconsolately in the mist till the second. At Liverpool his suspicious, +excited demeanour procured his momentary arrest. Since then the thought +of the lost girl has haunted and broken him. That is the whole, the +plain, and the sufficing story."</p> + +<p>The effective witnesses for the defence were, indeed, few. It is so hard +to prove a negative. There was Jessie's aunt, who bore out the statement +of the counsel for the defence. There were the porters who saw him leave +Euston by the 7.15 train for Liverpool, and arrive just too late for the +5.15; there was the cabman (2138), who drove him to Euston just in time, +he (witness) thought, to catch the 5.15 A.M. Under cross-examination, the +cabman got a little confused; he was asked whether, if he really picked +up the prisoner at Bow Railway Station at about 4.30, he ought not to +have caught the first train at Euston. He said the fog made him drive +rather slowly, but admitted the mist was transparent enough to warrant +full speed. He also admitted being a strong trade unionist, SPIGOT, +Q.C., artfully extorting the admission as if it were of the utmost +significance. Finally, there were numerous witnesses—of all sorts and +conditions—to the prisoner's high character, as well as to Arthur +Constant's blameless and moral life.</p> + +<p>In his closing speech on the third day of the trial, Sir CHARLES pointed +out with great exhaustiveness and cogency the flimsiness of the case for +the prosecution, the number of hypotheses it involved, and their mutual +interdependence. Mrs. Drabdump was a witness whose evidence must be +accepted with extreme caution. The jury must remember that she was unable +to dissociate her observations from her inferences, and thought that the +prisoner and Mr. Constant were quarrelling merely because they were +agitated. He dissected her evidence, and showed that it entirely bore out +the story of the defence. He asked the jury to bear in mind that no +positive evidence (whether of cabmen or others) had been given of the +various and complicated movements attributed to the prisoner on the +morning of December 4th, between the hours of 5.25 and 7.15 A.M., and +that the most important witness on the theory of the prosecution—he +meant, of course, Miss Dymond—had not been produced. Even if she were +dead, and her body were found, no countenance would be given to the +theory of the prosecution, for the mere conviction that her lover had +deserted her would be a sufficient explanation of her suicide. Beyond the +ambiguous letter, no tittle of evidence of her dishonour—on which the +bulk of the case against the prisoner rested—had been adduced. As for +the motive of political jealousy that had been a mere passing cloud. The +two men had become fast friends. As to the circumstances of the alleged +crime, the medical evidence was on the whole in favour of the time of +death being late; and the prisoner had left London at a quarter-past +seven. The drugging theory was absurd, and as for the too clever bolt +and lock theories, Mr. Grodman, a trained scientific observer, had +pooh-poohed them. He would solemnly exhort the jury to remember that if +they condemned the prisoner they would not only send an innocent man to +an ignominious death on the flimsiest circumstantial evidence, but they +would deprive the working men of this country of one of their truest +friends and their ablest leader.</p> + +<p>The conclusion of Sir Charles's vigorous speech was greeted with +irrepressible applause.</p> + +<p>Mr. SPIGOT, Q.C., in closing the case for the prosecution, asked the +jury to return a verdict against the prisoner for as malicious and +premeditated a crime as ever disgraced the annals of any civilised +country. His cleverness and education had only been utilised for the +devil's ends, while his reputation had been used as a cloak. Everything +pointed strongly to the prisoner's guilt. On receiving Miss Dymond's +letter announcing her shame, and (probably) her intention to commit +suicide, he had hastened upstairs to denounce Constant. He had then +rushed to the girl's lodgings, and, finding his worst fears confirmed, +planned at once his diabolically ingenious scheme of revenge. He told his +landlady he was going to Devonport, so that if he bungled, the police +would be put temporarily off his track. His real destination was +Liverpool, for he intended to leave the country. Lest, however, his plan +should break down here, too, he arranged an ingenious alibi by being +driven to Euston for the 5.15 train to Liverpool. The cabman would not +know he did not intend to go by it, but meant to return to 11 Glover +Street, there to perpetrate this foul crime, interruption to which he had +possibly barred by drugging his landlady. His presence at Liverpool +(whither he really went by the second train) would corroborate the +cabman's story. That night he had not undressed nor gone to bed; he had +plotted out his devilish scheme till it was perfect; the fog came as an +unexpected ally to cover his movements. Jealousy, outraged affection, the +desire for revenge, the lust for political power—these were human. They +might pity the criminal, they could not find him innocent of the crime.</p> + +<p>Mr. Justice CROGIE, summing up, began dead against the prisoner. +Reviewing the evidence, he pointed out that plausible hypotheses neatly +dove-tailed did not necessarily weaken one another, the fitting so well +together of the whole rather making for the truth of the parts. Besides, +the case for the prosecution was as far from being all hypothesis as the +case for the defence was from excluding hypotheses. The key, the letter, +the reluctance to produce the letter, the heated interview with Constant, +the misstatement about the prisoner's destination, the flight to +Liverpool, the false tale about searching for a "him," the denunciations +of Constant, all these were facts. On the other hand, there were various +lacunæ and hypotheses in the case for the defence. Even conceding the +somewhat dubious alibi afforded by the prisoner's presence at Euston at +5.25 A.M., there was no attempt to account for his movements between that +and 7.15 A.M. It was as possible that he returned to Bow as that he +lingered about Euston. There was nothing in the medical evidence to make +his guilt impossible. Nor was there anything inherently impossible in +Constant's yielding to the sudden temptation of a beautiful girl, nor in +a working girl deeming herself deserted, temporarily succumbing to the +fascinations of a gentleman and regretting it bitterly afterwards. What +had become of the girl was a mystery. Hers might have been one of those +nameless corpses which the tide swirls up on slimy river banks. The jury +must remember, too, that the relation might not have actually passed into +dishonour, it might have been just grave enough to smite the girl's +conscience, and to induce her to behave as she had done. It was enough +that her letter should have excited the jealousy of the prisoner. There +was one other point which he would like to impress on the jury, and which +the counsel for the prosecution had not sufficiently insisted upon. This +was that the prisoner's guiltiness was the only plausible solution that +had ever been advanced of the Bow Mystery. The medical evidence agreed +that Mr. Constant did not die by his own hand. Some one must therefore +have murdered him. The number of people who could have had any possible +reason or opportunity to murder him was extremely small. The prisoner had +both reason and opportunity. By what logicians called the method of +exclusion, suspicion would attach to him on even slight evidence. The +actual evidence was strong and plausible, and now that Mr. Wimp's +ingenious theory had enabled them to understand how the door could have +been apparently locked and bolted from within, the last difficulty and +the last argument for suicide had been removed. The prisoner's guilt was +as clear as circumstantial evidence could make it. If they let him go +free, the Bow Mystery might henceforward be placed among the archives of +unavenged assassinations. Having thus well-nigh hung the prisoner, the +judge wound up by insisting on the high probability of the story for the +defence, though that, too, was dependent in important details upon the +prisoner's mere private statements to his counsel. The jury, being by +this time sufficiently muddled by his impartiality, were dismissed, with +the exhortation to allow due weight to every fact and probability in +determining their righteous verdict.</p> + +<p>The minutes ran into hours, but the jury did not return. The shadows of +night fell across the reeking, fevered court before they announced their +verdict—</p> + +<p>"Guilty!"</p> + +<p>The judge put on his black cap.</p> + +<p>The great reception arranged outside was a fiasco; the evening banquet +was indefinitely postponed. Wimp had won; Grodman felt like a whipped +cur.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XI__" id="XI__"></a>XI</h2> + + +<p>"So you were right," Denzil could not help saying as he greeted Grodman a +week afterwards. "I shall <i>not</i> live to tell the story of how you +discovered the Bow murderer."</p> + +<p>"Sit down," growled Grodman; "perhaps you will after all." There was a +dangerous gleam in his eyes. Denzil was sorry he had spoken.</p> + +<p>"I sent for you," Grodman said, "to tell you that on the night Wimp +arrested Mortlake I had made preparations for your arrest."</p> + +<p>Denzil gasped, "What for?"</p> + +<p>"My dear Denzil, there is a little law in this country invented for the +confusion of the poetic. The greatest exponent of the Beautiful is only +allowed the same number of wives as the greengrocer. I do not blame +you for not being satisfied with Jane—she is a good servant but a bad +mistress—but it was cruel to Kitty not to inform her that Jane had a +prior right in you, and unjust to Jane not to let her know of the +contract with Kitty."</p> + +<p>"They both know it now well enough, curse 'em," said the poet.</p> + +<p>"Yes; your secrets are like your situations—you can't keep 'em long. My +poor poet, I pity you—betwixt the devil and the deep sea."</p> + +<p>"They're a pair of harpies, each holding over me the Damocles sword of an +arrest for bigamy. Neither loves me."</p> + +<p>"I should think they would come in very useful to you. You plant one in +my house to tell my secrets to Wimp, and you plant one in Wimp's house to +tell Wimp's secrets to me, I suppose. Out with some, then."</p> + +<p>"Upon my honour, you wrong me. Jane brought <i>me</i> here, not I Jane. As for +Kitty, I never had such a shock in my life as at finding her installed in +Wimp's house."</p> + +<p>"She thought it safer to have the law handy for your arrest. Besides, she +probably desired to occupy a parallel position to Jane's. She must do +something for a living; <i>you</i> wouldn't do anything for hers. And so you +couldn't go anywhere without meeting a wife! Ha! ha! ha! Serve you right, +my polygamous poet."</p> + +<p>"But why should <i>you</i> arrest me?"</p> + +<p>"Revenge, Denzil. I have been the best friend you ever had in this cold, +prosaic world. You have eaten my bread, drunk my claret, written my book, +smoked my cigars, and pocketed my money. And yet, when you have an +important piece of information bearing on a mystery about which I am +thinking day and night, you calmly go and sell it to Wimp."</p> + +<p>"I did-didn't," stammered Denzil.</p> + +<p>"Liar! Do you think Kitty has any secrets from me? As soon as I +discovered your two marriages I determined to have you arrested for—your +treachery. But when I found you had, as I thought, put Wimp on the wrong +scent, when I felt sure that by arresting Mortlake he was going to make a +greater ass of himself than even nature had been able to do, then I +forgave you. I let you walk about the earth—and drink—freely. Now it is +Wimp who crows—everybody pats him on the back—they call him the mystery +man of the Scotland Yard tribe. Poor Tom Mortlake will be hanged, and all +through your telling Wimp about Jessie Dymond!"</p> + +<p>"It was you yourself," said Denzil, sullenly. "Everybody was giving it +up. But you said 'Let us find out all that Arthur Constant did in the +last few months of his life.' Wimp couldn't miss stumbling on Jessie +sooner or later. I'd have throttled Constant, if I had known he'd touched +her," he wound up with irrelevant indignation.</p> + +<p>Grodman winced at the idea that he himself had worked <i>ad majorem +gloriam</i> of Wimp. And yet, had not Mrs. Wimp let out as much at the +Christmas dinner?</p> + +<p>"What's past is past," he said gruffly. "But if Tom Mortlake hangs, you +go to Portland."</p> + +<p>"How can I help Tom hanging?"</p> + +<p>"Help the agitation as much as you can. Write letters under all sorts of +names to all the papers. Get everybody you know to sign the great +petition. Find out where Jessie Dymond is—the girl who holds the proof +of Mortlake's innocence."</p> + +<p>"You really believe him innocent?"</p> + +<p>"Don't be satirical, Denzil. Haven't I taken the chair at all the +meetings? Am I not the most copious correspondent of the Press?"</p> + +<p>"I thought it was only to spite Wimp."</p> + +<p>"Rubbish. It's to save poor Tom. He no more murdered Arthur Constant +than—you did!" He laughed an unpleasant laugh.</p> + +<p>Denzil bade him farewell, frigid with fear.</p> + +<p>Grodman was up to his ears in letters and telegrams. Somehow he had +become the leader of the rescue party—suggestions, subscriptions +came from all sides. The suggestions were burnt, the subscriptions +acknowledged in the papers and used for hunting up the missing girl. Lucy +Brent headed the list with a hundred pounds. It was a fine testimony +to her faith in her dead lover's honour.</p> + +<p>The release of the Jury had unloosed "The Greater Jury," which always +now sits upon the smaller. Every means was taken to nullify the value +of the "palladium of British liberty." The foreman and the jurors were +interviewed, the judge was judged, and by those who were no judges. The +Home Secretary (who had done nothing beyond accepting office under the +Crown) was vituperated, and sundry provincial persons wrote +confidentially to the Queen. Arthur Constant's backsliding cheered +many by convincing them that others were as bad as themselves; and +well-to-do tradesmen saw in Mortlake's wickedness the pernicious effects +of Socialism. A dozen new theories were afloat. Constant had committed +suicide by Esoteric Buddhism, as witness his devotion to Mme. Blavatsky, +or he had been murdered by his Mahatma or victimised by Hypnotism, +Mesmerism, Somnambulism, and other weird abstractions. Grodman's great +point was—Jessie Dymond must be produced, dead or alive. The electric +current scoured the civilised world in search of her. What wonder if the +shrewder sort divined that the indomitable detective had fixed his last +hope on the girl's guilt? If Jessie had wrongs why should she not have +avenged them herself? Did she not always remind the poet of Joan of Arc?</p> + +<p>Another week passed; the shadow of the gallows crept over the days; on, +on, remorselessly drawing nearer, as the last ray of hope sank below the +horizon. The Home Secretary remained inflexible; the great petitions +discharged their signatures at him in vain. He was a Conservative, +sternly conscientious; and the mere insinuation that his obstinacy was +due to the politics of the condemned only hardened him against the +temptation of a cheap reputation for magnanimity. He would not even grant +a respite, to increase the chances of the discovery of Jessie Dymond. In +the last of the three weeks there was a final monster meeting of protest. +Grodman again took the chair, and several distinguished faddists were +present, as well as numerous respectable members of society. The Home +Secretary acknowledged the receipt of their resolutions. The Trade Unions +were divided in their allegiance; some whispered of faith and hope, +others of financial defalcations. The former essayed to organise a +procession and an indignation meeting on the Sunday preceding the Tuesday +fixed for the execution, but it fell through on a rumour of confession. +The Monday papers contained a last masterly letter from Grodman exposing +the weakness of the evidence, but they knew nothing of a confession. The +prisoner was mute and disdainful, professing little regard for a life +empty of love and burdened with self-reproach. He refused to see +clergymen. He was accorded an interview with Miss Brent in the presence +of a gaoler, and solemnly asseverated his respect for her dead lover's +memory. Monday buzzed with rumours; the evening papers chronicled them +hour by hour. A poignant anxiety was abroad. The girl would be found. +Some miracle would happen. A reprieve would arrive. The sentence would be +commuted. But the short day darkened into night even as Mortlake's short +day was darkening. And the shadow of the gallows crept on and on, and +seemed to mingle with the twilight.</p> + +<p>Crowl stood at the door of his shop, unable to work. His big grey eyes +were heavy with unshed tears. The dingy wintry road seemed one vast +cemetery; the street lamps twinkled like corpse-lights. The confused +sounds of the street life reached his ear as from another world. He did +not see the people who flitted to and fro amid the gathering shadows of +the cold, dreary night. One ghastly vision flashed and faded and flashed +upon the background of the duskiness.</p> + +<p>Denzil stood beside him, smoking in silence. A cold fear was at his +heart. That terrible Grodman! As the hangman's cord was tightening round +Mortlake, he felt the convict's chains tightening round himself. And yet +there was one gleam of hope, feeble as the yellow flicker of the gas-lamp +across the way. Grodman had obtained an interview with the condemned late +that afternoon, and the parting had been painful, but the evening paper, +that in its turn had obtained an interview with the ex-detective, +announced on its placard</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"GRODMAN STILL CONFIDENT"</p></div> + +<p>and the thousands who yet pinned their faith on this extraordinary man +refused to extinguish the last sparks of hope. Denzil had bought the +paper and scanned it eagerly, but there was nothing save the vague +assurance that the indefatigable Grodman was still almost pathetically +expectant of the miracle. Denzil did not share the expectation; he +meditated flight.</p> + +<p>"Peter," he said at last, "I'm afraid it's all over."</p> + +<p>Crowl nodded, heart-broken. "All over!" he repeated, "and to think that +he dies—and it is—all over!"</p> + +<p>He looked despairingly at the blank winter sky, where leaden clouds shut +out the stars. "Poor, poor young fellow! To-night alive and thinking. +To-morrow night a clod, with no more sense or motion than a bit of +leather! No compensation nowhere for being cut off innocent in the pride +of youth and strength! A man who has always preached the Useful day and +night, and toiled and suffered for his fellows. Where's the justice of +it, where's the justice of it?" he demanded fiercely. Again his wet eyes +wandered upwards towards heaven, that heaven away from which the soul of +a dead saint at the Antipodes was speeding into infinite space.</p> + +<p>"Well, where was the justice for Arthur Constant if he, too, was +innocent?" said Denzil. "Really, Peter, I don't see why you should take +it for granted that Tom is so dreadfully injured. Your horny-handed +labour leaders are, after all, men of no aesthetic refinement, with no +sense of the Beautiful; you cannot expect them to be exempt from the +coarser forms of crime. Humanity must look to far other leaders—to the +seers and the poets!"</p> + +<p>"Cantercot, if you say Tom's guilty I'll knock you down." The little +cobbler turned upon his tall friend like a roused lion. Then he added, +"I beg your pardon, Cantercot, I don't mean that. After all, I've no +grounds. The judge is an honest man, and with gifts I can't lay claim to. +But I believe in Tom with all my heart. And if Tom is guilty I believe in +the Cause of the People with all my heart all the same. The Fads are +doomed to death, they may be reprieved, but they must die at last."</p> + +<p>He drew a deep sigh, and looked along the dreary Road. It was quite dark +now, but by the light of the lamps and the gas in the shop windows the +dull, monotonous Road lay revealed in all its sordid, familiar outlines; +with its long stretches of chill pavement, its unlovely architecture, and +its endless stream of prosaic pedestrians.</p> + +<p>A sudden consciousness of the futility of his existence pierced the +little cobbler like an icy wind. He saw his own life, and a hundred +million lives like his, swelling and breaking like bubbles on a dark +ocean, unheeded, uncared for.</p> + +<p>A newsboy passed along, clamouring "The Bow murderer, preparaitions for +the hexecution!"</p> + +<p>A terrible shudder shook the cobbler's frame. His eyes ranged sightlessly +after the boy; the merciful tears filled them at last.</p> + +<p>"The Cause of the People," he murmured brokenly, "I believe in the Cause +of the People. There is nothing else."</p> + +<p>"Peter, come in to tea, you'll catch cold," said Mrs. Crowl.</p> + +<p>Denzil went in to tea and Peter followed.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Meantime, round the house of the Home Secretary, who was in town, an +ever-augmenting crowd was gathered, eager to catch the first whisper of a +reprieve.</p> + +<p>The house was guarded by a cordon of police, for there was no +inconsiderable danger of a popular riot. At times a section of the crowd +groaned and hooted. Once a volley of stones was discharged at the +windows. The newsboys were busy vending their special editions, and the +reporters struggled through the crowd, clutching descriptive pencils, and +ready to rush off to telegraph offices should anything "extra special" +occur. Telegraph boys were coming up every now and again with threats, +messages, petitions, and exhortations from all parts of the country to +the unfortunate Home Secretary, who was striving to keep his aching head +cool as he went through the voluminous evidence for the last time and +pondered over the more important letters which "The Greater Jury" had +contributed to the obscuration of the problem. Grodman's letter in that +morning's paper shook him most; under his scientific analysis the +circumstantial chain seemed forged of painted cardboard. Then the poor +man read the judge's summing up, and the chain became tempered steel. The +noise of the crowd outside broke upon his ear in his study like the roar +of a distant ocean. The more the rabble hooted him, the more he essayed +to hold scrupulously the scales of life and death. And the crowd grew +and grew, as men came away from their work. There were many that loved +the man who lay in the jaws of death, and a spirit of mad revolt surged +in their breasts. And the sky was grey, and the bleak night deepened, and +the shadow of the gallows crept on.</p> + +<p>Suddenly a strange inarticulate murmur spread through the crowd, a vague +whisper of no one knew what. Something had happened. Somebody was +coming. A second later and one of the outskirts of the throng was +agitated, and a convulsive cheer went up from it, and was taken up +infectiously all along the street. The crowd parted—a hansom dashed +through the centre. "Grodman! Grodman!" shouted those who recognised the +occupant. "Grodman! Hurrah!" Grodman was outwardly calm and pale, +but his eyes glittered; he waved his hand encouragingly as the hansom +dashed up to the door, cleaving the turbulent crowd as a canoe cleaves +the waters. Grodman sprang out, the constables at the portal made way for +him respectfully. He knocked imperatively, the door was opened +cautiously; a boy rushed up and delivered a telegram; Grodman forced his +way in, gave his name, and insisted on seeing the Home Secretary on a +matter of life and death. Those near the door heard his words and +cheered, and the crowd divined the good omen, and the air throbbed with +cannonades of joyous sound. The cheers rang in Grodman's ears as the door +slammed behind him. The reporters struggled to the front. An excited knot +of working men pressed round the arrested hansom; they took the horse +out. A dozen enthusiasts struggled for the honour of placing themselves +between the shafts. And the crowd awaited Grodman.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XII__" id="XII__"></a>XII</h2> + + +<p>Grodman was ushered into the conscientious Minister's study. The doughty +chief of the agitation was, perhaps, the one man who could not be denied. +As he entered, the Home Secretary's face seemed lit up with relief. At a +sign from his master, the amanuensis who had brought in the last telegram +took it back with him into the outer room where he worked. Needless to +say not a tithe of the Minister's correspondence ever came under his own +eyes.</p> + +<p>"You have a valid reason for troubling me, I suppose, Mr. Grodman?" said +the Home Secretary, almost cheerfully. "Of course it is about Mortlake?"</p> + +<p>"It is; and I have the best of all reasons."</p> + +<p>"Take a seat. Proceed."</p> + +<p>"Pray do not consider me impertinent, but have you ever given any +attention to the science of evidence?"</p> + +<p>"How do you mean?" asked the Home Secretary, rather puzzled, adding, with +a melancholy smile, "I have had to lately. Of course, I've never been a +criminal lawyer, like some of my predecessors. But I should hardly speak +of it as a science; I look upon it as a question of common-sense."</p> + +<p>"Pardon me, sir. It is the most subtle and difficult of all the sciences. +It is, indeed, rather the science of the sciences. What is the whole of +Inductive Logic, as laid down, say, by Bacon and Mill, but an attempt +to appraise the value of evidence, the said evidence being the trails +left by the Creator, so to speak? The Creator has—I say it in all +reverence—drawn a myriad red herrings across the track, but the true +scientist refuses to be baffled by superficial appearances in detecting +the secrets of Nature. The vulgar herd catches at the gross apparent +fact, but the man of insight knows that what lies on the surface does +lie."</p> + +<p>"Very interesting, Mr. Grodman, but really—"</p> + +<p>"Bear with me, sir. The science of evidence being thus so extremely +subtle, and demanding the most acute and trained observation of facts, +the most comprehensive understanding of human psychology, is naturally +given over to professors who have not the remotest idea that 'things are +not what they seem,' and that everything is other than it appears; to +professors, most of whom by their year-long devotion to the shop-counter +or the desk, have acquired an intimate acquaintance with all the infinite +shades and complexities of things and human nature. When twelve of these +professors are put in a box, it is called a jury. When one of these +professors is put in a box by himself, he is called a witness. The +retailing of evidence—the observation of the facts—is given over to +people who go through their lives without eyes; the appreciation of +evidence—the judging of these facts—is surrendered to people who may +possibly be adepts in weighing out pounds of sugar. Apart from their +sheer inability to fulfil either function—to observe, or to judge—their +observation and their judgment alike are vitiated by all sorts of +irrelevant prejudices."</p> + +<p>"You are attacking trial by jury."</p> + +<p>"Not necessarily. I am prepared to accept that scientifically, on the +ground that, as there are, as a rule, only two alternatives, the balance +of probability is slightly in favour of the true decision being come to. +Then, in cases where experts like myself have got up the evidence, the +jury can be made to see through trained eyes."</p> + +<p>The Home Secretary tapped impatiently with his foot.</p> + +<p>"I can't listen to abstract theorising," he said. "Have you any fresh +concrete evidence?"</p> + +<p>"Sir, everything depends on our getting down to the root of the matter. +What percentage of average evidence should you think is thorough, plain, +simple, unvarnished fact, 'the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but +the truth'?"</p> + +<p>"Fifty?" said the Minister, humouring him a little.</p> + +<p>"Not five. I say nothing of lapses of memory, of inborn defects of +observational power—though the suspiciously precise recollection of +dates and events possessed by ordinary witnesses in important trials +taking place years after the occurrences involved, is one of the most +amazing things in the curiosities of modern jurisprudence. I defy you, +sir, to tell me what you had for dinner last Monday, or what exactly you +were saying and doing at five o'clock last Tuesday afternoon. Nobody +whose life does not run in mechanical grooves can do anything of the +sort; unless, of course, the facts have been very impressive. But this by +the way. The great obstacle to veracious observation is the element of +prepossession in all vision. Has it ever struck you, sir, that we never +<i>see</i> any one more than once, if that? The first time we meet a man we +may possibly see him as he is; the second time our vision is coloured and +modified by the memory of the first. Do our friends appear to us as they +appear to strangers? Do our rooms, our furniture, our pipes strike our +eye as they would strike the eye of an outsider, looking on them for the +first time? Can a mother see her babe's ugliness, or a lover his +mistress's shortcomings, though they stare everybody else in the face? +Can we see ourselves as others see us? No; habit, prepossession changes +all. The mind is a large factor of every so-called external fact. The eye +sees, sometimes, what it wishes to see, more often what it expects to +see. You follow me, sir?"</p> + +<p>The Home Secretary nodded his head less impatiently. He was beginning to +be interested. The hubbub from without broke faintly upon their ears.</p> + +<p>"To give you a definite example. Mr. Wimp says that when I burst open the +door of Mr. Constant's room on the morning of December 4th, and saw that +the staple of the bolt had been wrested by the pin from the lintel, I +jumped at once to the conclusion that I had broken the bolt. Now I admit +that this was so, only in things like this you do not seem to <i>conclude</i>, +you jump so fast that you <i>see</i>, or seem to. On the other hand, when you +<i>see</i> a <i>standing</i> ring of fire produced by whirling a burning stick, you +do <i>not</i> believe in its continuous existence. It is the same when +witnessing a legerdemain performance. Seeing is not always believing, +despite the proverb; but believing is often seeing. It is not to the +point that in that little matter of the door Wimp was as hopelessly and +incurably wrong as he has been in everything all along. The door <i>was</i> +securely bolted. Still I confess that I should have seen that I had +broken the bolt in forcing the door, even if it had been broken +beforehand. Never once since December 4th did this possibility occur +to me, till Wimp with perverted ingenuity suggested it. If this is the +case with a trained observer, one moreover fully conscious of this +ineradicable tendency of the human mind, how must it be with an untrained +observer?"</p> + +<p>"Come to the point, come to the point," said the Home Secretary, putting +out his hand as if it itched to touch the bell on the writing-table.</p> + +<p>"Such as," went on Grodman, imperturbably, "such as—Mrs. Drabdump. That +worthy person is unable, by repeated violent knocking, to arouse her +lodger who yet desires to be aroused; she becomes alarmed, she rushes +across to get my assistance; I burst open the door—what do you think the +good lady expected to see?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Constant murdered, I suppose," murmured the Home Secretary, +wonderingly.</p> + +<p>"Exactly. And so she saw it. And what should you think was the condition +of Arthur Constant when the door yielded to my violent exertions and flew +open?"</p> + +<p>"Why, was he not dead?" gasped the Home Secretary, his heart fluttering +violently.</p> + +<p>"Dead? A young, healthy fellow like that! When the door flew open, Arthur +Constant was sleeping the sleep of the just. It was a deep, a very deep +sleep, of course, else the blows at his door would long since have +awakened him. But all the while Mrs. Drabdump's fancy was picturing her +lodger cold and stark, the poor young fellow was lying in bed in a nice +warm sleep."</p> + +<p>"You mean to say you found Arthur Constant alive?"</p> + +<p>"As you were last night."</p> + +<p>The Minister was silent, striving confusedly to take in the situation. +Outside the crowd was cheering again. It was probably to pass the time.</p> + +<p>"Then, when was he murdered?"</p> + +<p>"Immediately afterwards."</p> + +<p>"By whom?"</p> + +<p>"Well, that is, if you will pardon me, not a very intelligent question. +Science and common-sense are in accord for once. Try the method of +exhaustion. It must have been either by Mrs. Drabdump or myself."</p> + +<p>"You mean to say that Mrs. Drabdump—!"</p> + +<p>"Poor dear Mrs. Drabdump, you don't deserve this of your Home Secretary! +The idea of that good lady!"</p> + +<p>"It was <i>you</i>!"</p> + +<p>"Calm yourself, my dear Home Secretary. There is nothing to be alarmed +at. It was a solitary experiment, and I intend it to remain so." The +noise without grew louder. "Three cheers for Grodman! Hip, hip, hip, +hooray," fell faintly on their ears.</p> + +<p>But the Minister, pallid and deeply moved, touched the bell. The Home +Secretary's home secretary appeared. He looked at the great man's +agitated face with suppressed surprise.</p> + +<p>"Thank you for calling in your amanuensis," said Grodman. "I intended to +ask you to lend me his services. I suppose he can write shorthand."</p> + +<p>The Minister nodded, speechless.</p> + +<p>"That is well. I intend this statement to form the basis of an appendix +to the twenty-fifth edition—sort of silver wedding—of my book, +<i>Criminals I have Caught</i>. Mr. Denzil Cantercot, who, by the will I have +made to-day, is appointed my literary executor, will have the task of +working it up with literary and dramatic touches after the model of the +other chapters of my book. I have every confidence he will be able to do +me as much justice, from a literary point of view, as you, sir, no doubt +will from a legal. I feel certain he will succeed in catching the style +of the other chapters to perfection."</p> + +<p>"Templeton," whispered the Home Secretary, "this man may be a lunatic. +The effort to solve the Big Bow Mystery may have addled his brain. +Still," he added aloud, "it will be as well for you to take down his +statement in shorthand."</p> + +<p>"Thank you, sir," said Grodman, heartily. "Ready, Mr. Templeton? Here +goes. My career till I left the Scotland Yard Detective Department is +known to all the world. Is that too fast for you, Mr. Templeton? A +little? Well, I'll go slower; but pull me up if I forget to keep the +brake on. When I retired, I discovered that I was a bachelor. But it was +too late to marry. Time hung heavy on my hands. The preparation of my +book, <i>Criminals I have Caught</i>, kept me occupied for some months. When +it was published, I had nothing more to do but think. I had plenty of +money, and it was safely invested; there was no call for speculation. The +future was meaningless to me; I regretted I had not elected to die in +harness. As idle old men must, I lived in the past. I went over and over +again my ancient exploits; I re-read my book. And as I thought and +thought, away from the excitement of the actual hunt, and seeing the +facts in a truer perspective, so it grew daily clearer to me that +criminals were more fools than rogues. Every crime I had traced, +however cleverly perpetrated, was from the point of view of penetrability +a weak failure. Traces and trails were left on all sides—ragged edges, +rough-hewn corners; in short, the job was botched, artistic completeness +unattained. To the vulgar, my feats might seem marvellous—the average +man is mystified to grasp how you detect the letter 'e' in a simple +cryptogram—to myself they were as commonplace as the crimes they +unveiled. To me now, with my lifelong study of the science of evidence, +it seemed possible to commit not merely one but a thousand crimes that +should be absolutely undiscoverable. And yet criminals would go on +sinning, and giving themselves away, in the same old grooves—no +originality, no dash, no individual insight, no fresh conception! One +would imagine there were an Academy of crime with forty thousand +armchairs. And gradually, as I pondered and brooded over the thought, +there came upon me the desire to commit a crime that should baffle +detection. I could invent hundreds of such crimes, and please myself by +imagining them done; but would they really work out in practice? +Evidently the sole performer of my experiment must be myself; the +subject—whom or what? Accident should determine. I itched to commence +with murder—to tackle the stiffest problems first, and I burned to +startle and baffle the world—especially the world of which I had ceased +to be. Outwardly I was calm, and spoke to the people about me as usual. +Inwardly I was on fire with a consuming scientific passion. I sported +with my pet theories, and fitted them mentally on every one I met. Every +friend or acquaintance I sat and gossiped with, I was plotting how to +murder without leaving a clue. There is not one of my friends or +acquaintances I have not done away with in thought. There is no public +man—have no fear, my dear Home Secretary—I have not planned to +assassinate secretly, mysteriously, unintelligibly, undiscoverably. +Ah, how I could give the stock criminals points—with their second-hand +motives, their conventional conceptions, their commonplace details, their +lack of artistic feeling and restraint."</p> + +<p>The crowd had again started cheering. Impatient as the watchers were, +they felt that no news was good news. The longer the interview accorded +by the Home Secretary to the chairman of the Defence Committee, the +greater the hope his obduracy was melting. The idol of the people would +be saved, and "Grodman" and "Tom Mortlake" were mingled in the exultant +plaudits.</p> + +<p>"The late Arthur Constant," continued the great criminologist, "came to +live nearly opposite me. I cultivated his acquaintance—he was a lovable +young fellow, an excellent subject for experiment. I do not know when I +have ever taken to a man more. From the moment I first set eyes on him, +there was a peculiar sympathy between us. We were drawn to each other. I +felt instinctively he would be the man. I loved to hear him speak +enthusiastically of the Brotherhood of Man—I, who knew the brotherhood +of man was to the ape, the serpent, and the tiger—and he seemed to find +a pleasure in stealing a moment's chat with me from his engrossing +self-appointed duties. It is a pity humanity should have been robbed of +so valuable a life. But it had to be. At a quarter to ten on the night of +December 3rd he came to me. Naturally I said nothing about this visit +at the inquest or the trial. His object was to consult me mysteriously +about some girl. He said he had privately lent her money—which she was +to repay at her convenience. What the money was for he did not know, +except that it was somehow connected with an act of abnegation in which +he had vaguely encouraged her. The girl had since disappeared, and he +was in distress about her. He would not tell me who it was—of course +now, sir, you know as well as I it was Jessie Dymond—but asked for +advice as to how to set about finding her. He mentioned that Mortlake +was leaving for Devonport by the first train on the next day. Of old I +should have connected these two facts and sought the thread; now, as he +spoke, all my thoughts were dyed red. He was suffering perceptibly from +toothache, and in answer to my sympathetic inquiries told me it had been +allowing him very little sleep. Everything combined to invite the trial +of one of my favourite theories. I spoke to him in a fatherly way, and +when I had tendered some vague advice about the girl, I made him promise +to secure a night's rest (before he faced the arduous tram-men's meeting +in the morning) by taking a sleeping draught. I gave him a quantity of +sulfonal in a phial. It is a new drug, which produces protracted sleep +without disturbing digestion, and which I use myself. He promised +faithfully to take the draught; and I also exhorted him earnestly to bolt +and bar and lock himself in so as to stop up every chink or aperture by +which the cold air of the winter's night might creep into the room. I +remonstrated with him on the careless manner he treated his body, and he +laughed in his good-humoured, gentle way, and promised to obey me in all +things. And he did. That Mrs. Drabdump, failing to rouse him, would cry +'Murder!' I took for certain. She is built that way. As even Sir Charles +Brown-Harland remarked, she habitually takes her prepossessions for +facts, her inferences for observations. She forecasts the future in grey. +Most women of Mrs. Drabdump's class would have behaved as she did. She +happened to be a peculiarly favourable specimen for working on by +'suggestion,' but I would have undertaken to produce the same effect on +almost any woman. The key to the Big Bow Mystery is feminine psychology. +The only uncertain link in the chain was, Would Mrs. Drabdump rush across +to get <i>me</i> to break open the door? Women always rush for a man. I was +well-nigh the nearest, and certainly the most authoritative man in the +street, and I took it for granted she would."</p> + +<p>"But suppose she hadn't?" the Home Secretary could not help asking.</p> + +<p>"Then the murder wouldn't have happened, that's all. In due course Arthur +Constant would have awoke, or somebody else breaking open the door would +have found him sleeping; no harm done, nobody any the wiser. I could +hardly sleep myself that night. The thought of the extraordinary crime +I was about to commit—a burning curiosity to know whether Wimp would +detect <i>the modus operandi</i>—the prospect of sharing the feelings of +murderers with whom I had been in contact all my life without being in +touch with the terrible joys of their inner life—the fear lest I should +be too fast asleep to hear Mrs. Drabdump's knock—these things agitated +me and disturbed my rest. I lay tossing on my bed, planning every detail +of poor Constant's end. The hours dragged slowly and wretchedly on +towards the misty dawn. I was racked with suspense. Was I to be +disappointed after all? At last the welcome sound came—the rat-tat-tat +of murder. The echoes of that knock are yet in my ear. 'Come over and +kill him!' I put my night-capped head out of the window and told her to +wait for me. I dressed hurriedly, took my razor, and went across to 11 +Glover Street. As I broke open the door of the bedroom in which Arthur +Constant lay sleeping, his head resting on his hands, I cried, 'My God!' +as if I saw some awful vision. A mist as of blood swam before Mrs. +Drabdump's eyes. She cowered back, for an instant (I divined rather than +saw the action) she shut off the dreaded sight with her hands. In that +instant I had made my cut—precisely, scientifically—made so deep a cut +and drawn out the weapon so sharply that there was scarce a drop of blood +on it; then there came from the throat a jet of blood which Mrs. +Drabdump, conscious only of the horrid gash, saw but vaguely. I covered +up the face quickly with a handkerchief to hide any convulsive +distortion. But as the medical evidence (in this detail accurate) +testified, death was instantaneous. I pocketed the razor and the empty +sulfonal phial. With a woman like Mrs. Drabdump to watch me, I could do +anything I pleased. I got her to draw my attention to the fact that both +the windows were fastened. Some fool, by the by, thought there was a +discrepancy in the evidence because the police found only one window +fastened, forgetting that, in my innocence I took care not to refasten +the window I had opened to call for aid. Naturally I did not call for aid +before a considerable time had elapsed. There was Mrs. Drabdump to quiet, +and the excuse of making notes—as an old hand. My object was to gain +time. I wanted the body to be fairly cold and stiff before being +discovered, though there was not much danger here; for, as you saw by the +medical evidence, there is no telling the time of death to an hour or +two. The frank way in which I said the death was very recent disarmed all +suspicion, and even Dr. Robinson was unconsciously worked upon, in +adjudging the time of death, by the knowledge (query here, Mr. Templeton) +that it had preceded my advent on the scene.</p> + +<p>"Before leaving Mrs. Drabdump, there is just one point I should like to +say a word about. You have listened so patiently, sir, to my lectures on +the science of sciences that you will not refuse to hear the last. A good +deal of importance has been attached to Mrs. Drabdump's oversleeping +herself by half an hour. It happens that this (like the innocent fog +which has also been made responsible for much) is a purely accidental +and irrelevant circumstance. In all works on inductive logic it is +thoroughly recognised that only some of the circumstances of a phenomenon +are of its essence and casually interconnected; there is always a certain +proportion of heterogeneous accompaniments which have no intimate +relation whatever with the phenomenon. Yet, so crude is as yet the +comprehension of the science of evidence, that <i>every</i> feature of the +phenomenon under investigation is made equally important, and sought to +be linked with the chain of evidence. To attempt to explain everything is +always the mark of the tyro. The fog and Mrs. Drabdump's oversleeping +herself were mere accidents. There are always these irrelevant +accompaniments, and the true scientist allows for this element of (so to +speak) chemically unrelated detail. Even I never counted on the +unfortunate series of accidental phenomena which have led to Mortlake's +implication in a network of suspicion. On the other hand, the fact that +my servant, Jane, who usually goes about ten, left a few minutes earlier +on the night of December 3rd, so that she didn't know of Constant's +visit, was a relevant accident. In fact, just as the art of the artist or +the editor consists largely in knowing what to leave out, so does the art +of the scientific detector of crime consist in knowing what details to +ignore. In short, to explain everything is to explain too much. And too +much is worse than too little.</p> + +<p>"To return to my experiment. My success exceeded my wildest dreams. None +had an inkling of the truth. The insolubility of the Big Bow Mystery +teased the acutest minds in Europe and the civilised world. That a man +could have been murdered in a thoroughly inaccessible room savoured of +the ages of magic. The redoubtable Wimp, who had been blazoned as my +successor, fell back on the theory of suicide. The mystery would have +slept till my death, but—I fear—for my own ingenuity. I tried to stand +outside myself, and to look at the crime with the eyes of another, or of +my old self. I found the work of art so perfect as to leave only one +sublimely simple solution. The very terms of the problem were so +inconceivable that, had I not been the murderer, I should have suspected +myself, in conjunction, of course, with Mrs. Drabdump. The first persons +to enter the room would have seemed to me guilty. I wrote at once (in a +disguised hand and over the signature of 'One who looks through his own +spectacles') to the <i>Pell Mell Press</i> to suggest this. By associating +myself thus with Mrs. Drabdump I made it difficult for people to +dissociate the two who entered the room together. To dash a half-truth in +the world's eyes is the surest way of blinding it altogether. This +pseudonymous letter of mine I contradicted (in my own name) the next day, +and in the course of the long letter which I was tempted to write, I +adduced fresh evidence against the theory of suicide. I was disgusted +with the open verdict, and wanted men to be up and doing and trying to +find me out. I enjoyed the hunt more.</p> + +<p>"Unfortunately, Wimp, set on the chase again by my own letter, by dint of +persistent blundering, blundered into a track which—by a devilish tissue +of coincidences I had neither foreseen nor dreamt of—seemed to the world +the true. Mortlake was arrested and condemned. Wimp had apparently +crowned his reputation. This was too much. I had taken all this trouble +merely to put a feather in Wimp's cap, whereas I had expected to shake +his reputation by it. It was bad enough that an innocent man should +suffer; but that Wimp should achieve a reputation he did not deserve, and +over-shadow all his predecessors by dint of a colossal mistake, this +seemed to me intolerable. I have moved heaven and earth to get the +verdict set aside, and to save the prisoner; I have exposed the weakness +of the evidence; I have had the world searched for the missing girl; I +have petitioned and agitated. In vain. I have failed. Now I play my last +card. As the overweening Wimp could not be allowed to go down to +posterity as the solver of this terrible mystery, I decided that the +condemned man might just as well profit by his exposure. That is the +reason I make the exposure to-night, before it is too late to save +Mortlake."</p> + +<p>"So that is the reason?" said the Home Secretary, with a suspicion of +mockery in his tones.</p> + +<p>"The sole reason."</p> + +<p>Even as he spoke, a deeper roar than ever penetrated the study.</p> + +<p>"A Reprieve! Hooray! Hooray!" The whole street seemed to rock with +earthquake and the names of Grodman and Mortlake to be thrown up in a +fiery jet. "A Reprieve! A Reprieve!" And then the very windows rattled +with cheers for the Minister. And even above that roar rose the shrill +voices of the newsboys, "Reprieve of Mortlake! Mortlake Reprieved!" +Grodman looked wonderingly towards the street. "How do they know?" he +murmured.</p> + +<p>"Those evening papers are amazing," said the Minister, drily. "But I +suppose they had everything ready in type for the contingency." He turned +to his secretary.</p> + +<p>"Templeton, have you got down every word of Mr. Grodman's confession?"</p> + +<p>"Every word, sir."</p> + +<p>"Then bring in the cable you received just as Mr. Grodman entered the +house."</p> + +<p>Templeton went back into the outer room and brought back the cablegram +that had been lying on the Minister's writing-table when Grodman came in. +The Home Secretary silently handed it to his visitor. It was from the +Chief of Police of Melbourne, announcing that Jessie Dymond had just +arrived in that city in a sailing vessel, ignorant of all that had +occurred, and had been immediately despatched back to England, having +made a statement entirely corroborating the theory of the defence.</p> + +<p>"Pending further inquiries into this," said the Home Secretary, not +without appreciation of the grim humour of the situation as he glanced at +Grodman's ashen cheeks, "I have reprieved the prisoner. Mr. Templeton was +about to despatch the messenger to the governor of Newgate as you entered +this room. Mr. Wimp's card-castle would have tumbled to pieces without +your assistance. Your still undiscoverable crime would have shaken his +reputation as you intended."</p> + +<p>A sudden explosion shook the room and blent with the cheers of the +populace. Grodman had shot himself—very scientifically—in the heart. He +fell at the Home Secretary's feet, stone dead.</p> + +<p>Some of the working men who had been standing waiting by the shafts of +the hansom helped to bear the stretcher.</p> + + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + + + +<h1><a name="MERELY_MARY_ANN" id="MERELY_MARY_ANN"></a>MERELY MARY ANN</h1> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>Contents</h3> + +<p> +<a href="#I.__">I</a><br /> +<a href="#II.__">II</a><br /> +<a href="#III.__">III</a><br /> + +</p> + + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="I.__" id="I.__"></a>I</h2> + + +<p>Sometimes Lancelot's bell rang up Mrs. Leadbatter herself, but far more +often merely Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>The first time Lancelot saw Mary Ann she was cleaning the steps. He +avoided treading upon her, being kind to animals. For the moment she was +merely a quadruped, whose head was never lifted to the stars. Her faded +print dress showed like the quivering hide of some crouching animal. +There were strange irregular splashes of pink in the hide, standing out +in bright contrast with the neutral background. These were scraps of the +original material neatly patched in.</p> + +<p>The cold, damp steps gave Lancelot a shudder, for the air was raw. He +passed by the prostrate figure as quickly as he could, and hastened to +throw himself into the easy chair before the red fire.</p> + +<p>There was a lamp-post before the door, so he knew the house from its +neighbours. Baker's Terrace as a whole was a defeated aspiration after +gentility. The more auspicious houses were marked by white stones, the +steps being scrubbed and hearth-stoned almost daily; the gloomier +doorsteps were black, except on Sundays. Thus variety was achieved by +houses otherwise as monotonous and prosaic as a batch of fourpenny +loaves. This was not the reason why the little South London side-street +was called Baker's Terrace, though it might well seem so; for Baker +was the name of the builder, a worthy gentleman whose years and virtues +may still be deciphered on a doddering, round-shouldered stone in a +deceased cemetery not far from the scene of his triumphs.</p> + +<p>The second time Lancelot saw Mary Ann he did not remember having seen her +before. This time she was a biped, and wore a white cap. Besides, he +hardly glanced at her. He was in a bad temper, and Beethoven was barking +terribly at the intruder who stood quaking in the doorway, so that the +crockery clattered on the tea-tray she bore. With a smothered oath +Lancelot caught up the fiery little spaniel and rammed him into the +pocket of his dressing-gown, where he quivered into silence like a struck +gong. While the girl was laying his breakfast, Lancelot, who was looking +moodily at the pattern of the carpet as if anxious to improve upon it, +was vaguely conscious of relief in being spared his landlady's +conversation. For Mrs. Leadbatter was a garrulous body, who suffered +from the delusion that small-talk is a form of politeness, and that her +conversation was part of the "all inclusive" her lodgers stipulated for. +The disease was hereditary, her father having been a barber, and +remarkable for the coolness with which, even as a small boy whose +function was lathering and nothing more, he exchanged views about the +weather with his victims.</p> + +<p>The third time Lancelot saw Mary Ann he noticed that she was rather +pretty. She had a slight, well-built figure, not far from tall, small +shapely features, and something of a complexion. This did not displease +him: she was a little aesthetic touch amid the depressing furniture.</p> + +<p>"Don't be afraid, Polly," he said more kindly. "The little devil won't +bite. He's all bark. Call him Beethoven and throw him a bit of sugar."</p> + +<p>The girl threw Beethoven the piece of sugar, but did not venture on the +name. It seemed to her a long name for such a little dog. As she timidly +took the sugar from the basin by the aid of the tongs, Lancelot saw how +coarse and red her hand was. It gave him the same sense of repugnance and +refrigescence as the cold, damp steps. Something he was about to say +froze on his lips. He did not look at Mary Ann for some days; by which +time Beethoven had conquered his distrust of her, though she was still +distrustful of Beethoven, drawing her skirts tightly about her as if he +were a rat. What forced Mary Ann again upon Lancelot's morose +consciousness was a glint of winter sunshine that settled on her light +brown hair. He said, "By the way, Susan, tell your mistress—or is it +your mother?"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann shook her head but did not speak.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you are not Miss Leadbatter?"</p> + +<p>"No; Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>She spoke humbly; her eyes were shy and would not meet his. He winced as +he heard the name, though her voice was not unmusical.</p> + +<p>"Ah, Mary Ann! and I've been calling you Jane all along, Mary Ann what?"</p> + +<p>She seemed confused and flushed a little.</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann!" she murmured.</p> + +<p>"Merely Mary Ann?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>He smiled. "Seems a sort of white Topsy," he was thinking.</p> + +<p>She stood still, holding in her hand the table-cloth she had just folded. +Her eyes were downcast, and the glint of sunshine had leapt upon the long +lashes.</p> + +<p>"Well, Mary Ann, tell your mistress there is a piano coming. It will +stand over there—you'll have to move the sideboard somewhere else."</p> + +<p>"A piano!" Mary Ann opened her eyes, and Lancelot saw that they were +large and pathetic. He could not see the colour for the glint of sunshine +that touched them with false fire.</p> + +<p>"Yes; I suppose it will have to come up through the window, these +staircases are so beastly narrow. Do you never have a stout person in the +house, I wonder?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, sir. We had a lodger here last year as was quite a fat man."</p> + +<p>"And did he come up through the window by a pulley?"</p> + +<p>He smiled at the image, and expected to see Mary Ann smile in response. +He was disappointed when she did not; it was not only that her stolidity +made his humour seem feeble—he half wanted to see how she looked when +she smiled.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, no," said Mary Ann; "he lived on the ground floor!"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" murmured Lancelot, feeling the last sparkle taken from his humour. +He was damped to the skin by Mary Ann's platitudinarian style of +conversation. Despite its prettiness, her face was dulness incarnate.</p> + +<p>"Anyhow, remember to take in the piano if I'm out," he said tartly. "I +suppose you've <i>seen</i> a piano—you'll know it from a kangaroo?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir," breathed Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>"Oh, come, that's something. There is some civilisation in Baker's +Terrace after all. But are you quite sure?" he went on, the teasing +instinct getting the better of him. "Because, you know, you've never seen +a kangaroo."</p> + +<p>Mary Ann's face lit up a little. "Oh, yes, I have, sir; it came to the +village fair when I was a girl."</p> + +<p>"Oh, indeed!" said Lancelot, a little staggered; "what did it come there +for—to buy a new pouch?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir; in a circus."</p> + +<p>"Ah, in a circus. Then, perhaps, you can <i>play</i> the piano, too."</p> + +<p>Mary Ann got very red. "No, sir; missus never showed me how to do that."</p> + +<p>Lancelot surrendered himself to a roar of laughter. "This is a real +original," he said to himself, just a touch of pity blending with his +amusement.</p> + +<p>"I suppose, though, you'd be willing to lend a hand occasionally?" he +could not resist saying.</p> + +<p>"Missus says I must do anything I'm asked," she said, in distress, the +tears welling to her eyes. And a merciless bell mercifully sounding from +an upper room, she hurried out.</p> + +<p>How much Mary Ann did, Lancelot never rightly knew, any more than he knew +the number of lodgers in the house, or who cooked his chops in the +mysterious regions below stairs. Sometimes he trod on the toes of boots +outside doors and vaguely connected them with human beings, peremptory +and exacting as himself. To Mary Ann each of those pairs of boots was a +personality, with individual hours of rising and retiring, breakfasting +and supping, going out and coming in, and special idiosyncrasies of diet +and disposition. The population of 5 Baker's Terrace was nine, mostly +bell-ringers. Life was one ceaseless round of multifarious duties; with +six hours of blessed unconsciousness, if sleep were punctual. All the +week long Mary Ann was toiling up and down the stairs or sweeping them, +making beds or puddings, polishing boots or fire-irons. Holidays were not +in Mary Ann's calendar; and if Sunday ever found her on her knees, it was +only when she was scrubbing out the kitchen. All work and no play makes +Jack a dull boy; it had not, apparently, made Mary Ann a bright girl.</p> + +<p>The piano duly came in through the window like a burglar. It was a good +instrument, but hired. Under Lancelot's fingers it sang like a bird and +growled like a beast. When the piano was done growling Lancelot usually +started. He paced up and down the room, swearing audibly. Then he would +sit down at the table and cover ruled paper with hieroglyphics for hours +together. His movements were erratic to the verge of mystery. He had no +fixed hours for anything; to Mary Ann he was hopeless. At any given +moment he might be playing on the piano, or writing on the curiously +ruled paper, or stamping about the room, or sitting limp with despair in +the one easy chair, or drinking whisky and water, or smoking a black +meerschaum, or reading a book, or lying in bed, or driving away in a +hansom, or walking about Heaven alone knew where or why. Even Mrs. +Leadbatter, whose experience of life was wider than Mary Ann's, +considered his vagaries almost unchristian, though to the highest degree +gentlemanly. Sometimes, too, he sported the swallow-tail and the starched +breast-plate, which was a wonder to Mary Ann, who knew that waiters were +connected only with the most stylish establishments. Baker's Terrace did +not wear evening dress.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann liked him best in black and white. She thought he looked like +the pictures in the young ladies' novelettes, which sometimes caught her +eye as she passed newsvendors' shops on errands. Not that she was read in +this literature—she had no time for reading. But, even when clothed in +rough tweeds, Lancelot had for Mary Ann an aristocratic halo; in his +dressing-gown he savoured of the grand Turk. His hands were masterful: +the fingers tapering, the nails pedantically polished. He had fair hair, +with moustache to match; his brow was high and white, and his grey eyes +could flash fire. When he drew himself up to his full height, he +threatened the gas globes. Never had No. 5 Baker's Terrace boasted of +such a tenant. Altogether, Lancelot loomed large to Mary Ann; she dazzled +him with his own boots in humble response, and went about sad after a +reprimand for putting his papers in order. Her whole theory of life +oscillated in the presence of a being whose views could so run counter to +her strongest instincts. And yet, though the universe seemed tumbling +about her ears when he told her she must not move a scrap of manuscript, +howsoever wildly it lay about the floor or under the bed, she did not for +a moment question his sanity. She obeyed him like a dog; uncomprehending, +but trustful. But, after all, this was only of a piece with the rest of +her life. There was nothing she questioned. Life stood at her bedside +every morning in the cold dawn, bearing a day heaped high with duties; +and she jumped cheerfully out of her warm bed and took them up one by +one, without question or murmur. They were life. Life had no other +meaning any more than it has for the omnibus hack, which cannot conceive +existence outside shafts, and devoid of the intermittent flick of a whip +point. The comparison is somewhat unjust; for Mary Ann did not fare +nearly so well as the omnibus hack, having to make her meals off such +scraps as even the lodgers sent back. Mrs. Leadbatter was extremely +economical, as much so with the provisions in her charge as with those +she bought for herself. She sedulously sent up remainders till they were +expressly countermanded. Less economical by nature, and hungrier by +habit, Mary Ann had much trouble in restraining herself from +surreptitious pickings. Her conscience was rarely worsted; still there +was a taint of dishonesty in her soul, else had the stairs been less of +an ethical battle-ground for her. Lancelot's advent only made her +hungrier; somehow the thought of nibbling at his provisions was too +sacrilegious to be entertained. And yet—so queerly are we and life +compounded—she was probably less unhappy at this period than Lancelot, +who would come home in the vilest of tempers, and tramp the room with +thunder on his white brow. Sometimes he and the piano and Beethoven would +all be growling together, at other times they would all three be mute; +Lancelot crouching in the twilight with his head in his hands, and +Beethoven moping in the corner, and the closed piano looming in the +background like a coffin of dead music.</p> + +<p>One February evening—an evening of sleet and mist—Lancelot, who had +gone out in evening dress, returned unexpectedly, bringing with him for +the first time a visitor. He was so perturbed that he forgot to use his +latch-key, and Mary Ann, who opened the door, heard him say angrily, +"Well, I can't slam the door in your face, but I will tell you in your +face I don't think it at all gentlemanly of you to force yourself upon me +like this."</p> + +<p>"My dear Lancelot, when did I ever set up to be a gentleman? You know +that was always your part of the contract." And a swarthy, thick-set +young man with a big nose lowered the dripping umbrella he had been +holding over Lancelot, and stepped from the gloom of the street into the +fuscous cheerfulness of the ill-lit passage.</p> + +<p>By this time Beethoven, who had been left at home, was in full ebullition +upstairs, and darted at the intruder the moment his calves appeared. +Beethoven barked with short sharp snaps, as became a bilious +liver-coloured Blenheim spaniel.</p> + +<p>"Like master like dog," said the swarthy young man, defending himself at +the point of the umbrella. "Really your animal is more intelligent than +the over-rated common or garden dog, which makes no distinction between +people calling in the small hours and people calling in broad daylight +under the obvious patronage of its own master. This beast of yours is +evidently more in sympathy with its liege lord. Down, Fido, down! I +wonder they allow you to keep such noisy creatures—but stay! I was +forgetting you keep a piano. After that, I suppose, nothing matters."</p> + +<p>Lancelot made no reply, but surprised Beethoven into silence by kicking +him out of the way. He lit the gas with a neatly written sheet of music +which he rammed into the fire Mary Ann had been keeping up, then as +silently he indicated the easy chair.</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said the swarthy young man, taking it. "I would rather see +you in it, but as there's only one I know you wouldn't be feeling a +gentleman; and that would make us both uncomfortable."</p> + +<p>"'Pon my word, Peter," Lancelot burst forth, "you're enough to provoke a +saint."</p> + +<p>"'Pon my word, Lancelot," replied Peter, imperturbably, "you're more than +enough to provoke a sinner. Why, what have you to be ashamed of? You've +got one of the cosiest dens in London and one of the comfortablest +chairs. Why, it's twice as jolly as the garret we shared at Leipsic—up +the ninety stairs."</p> + +<p>"We're not in Germany now. I don't want to receive visitors," answered +Lancelot, sulkily.</p> + +<p>"A visitor! you call me a visitor! Lancelot, it's plain you were not +telling the truth when you said just now you had forgiven me."</p> + +<p>"I had forgiven—and forgotten you."</p> + +<p>"Come, that's unkind. It's scarcely three years since I threw up my +career as a genius, and you know why I left you, old man. When the first +fever of youthful revolt was over, I woke to see things in their true +light. I saw how mean it was of me to help to eat up your wretched +thousand pounds. Neither of us saw the situation nakedly at first—it was +sicklied o'er with Quixotic foolishness. You see, you had the advantage +of me. Your governor was a gentleman. He says: 'Very well, if you won't +go to Cambridge, if you refuse to enter the Church as the younger son of +a blue-blooded but impecunious baronet should, and to step into the +living which is fattening for you, then I must refuse to take any further +responsibility for your future. Here is a thousand pounds; it is the +money I had set aside for your college course. Use it for your musical +tomfoolery if you insist, and then—get what living you can.' Which was +severe but dignified, unpaternal yet patrician. But what does <i>my</i> +governor do? That cantankerous, pig-headed old Philistine—God bless +him!—he's got no sense of the respect a father owes to his offspring. +Not an atom. You're simply a branch to be run on the lines of the old +business or be shut up altogether. And, by the way, Lancelot, he hasn't +altered a jot since those days when—as you remember—the City or +starvation was his pleasant alternative. Of course I preferred +starvation—one usually does at nineteen; especially if one knows there's +a scion of aristocracy waiting outside to elope with him to Leipsic."</p> + +<p>"But you told me you were going back to your dad, because you found you +had mistaken your vocation."</p> + +<p>"Gospel truth also! My Heavens, shall I ever forget the blank horror that +grew upon me when I came to understand that music was a science more +barbarous than the mathematics that floored me at school, that the life +of a musical student, instead of being a delicious whirl of waltz tunes, +was 'one dem'd grind,' that seemed to grind out all the soul of the +divine art and leave nothing but horrid technicalities about consecutive +fifths and suspensions on the dominant? I dare say most people still +think of the musician as a being who lives in an enchanted world of +sound, rather than as a person greatly occupied with tedious feats of +penmanship; just as I myself still think of a <i>prima ballerina</i> not as a +hard-working gymnast but as a fairy, whose existence is all bouquets and +lime-light."</p> + +<p>"But you had a pretty talent for the piano," said Lancelot, in milder +accents. "No one forced you to learn composition. You could have learnt +anything for the paltry fifteen pounds exacted by the Conservatoire—from +the German flute to the grand organ; from singing to scoring band parts."</p> + +<p>"No, thank you. <i>Aut Cæsar aut nihil</i>. You remember what I always used to +say, 'Either Beethoven—' (The spaniel pricked up his ears)—'or bust.' +If I could not be a great musician it was hardly worth while enduring the +privations of one, especially at another man's expense. So I did the +Prodigal Son dodge, as you know, and out of the proceeds sent you my +year's exes in that cheque you with your damnable pride sent me back +again. And now, old fellow, that I have you face to face at last, can you +offer the faintest scintilla of a shadow of a reason for refusing to take +that cheque? No, you can't! Nothing but simple beastly stuckuppishness. +I saw through you at once; all your heroics were a fraud. I was not your +friend, but your protégé—something to practise your chivalry on. You +dropped your cloak, and I saw your feet of clay. Well, I tell you +straight, I made up my mind at once to be bad friends with you for life; +only when I saw your fiery old phiz at Brahmson's I felt a sort of +something tugging inside my greatcoat like a thief after my pocket-book, +and I kinder knew, as the Americans say, that in half an hour I should be +sitting beneath your hospitable roof."</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon—you will have some whisky?" He rang the bell +violently.</p> + +<p>"Don't be a fool—you know I didn't mean that. Well, don't let us +quarrel. I have forgiven you for your youthful bounty, and you have +forgiven me for chucking it up; and now we are going to drink to the +Vaterland," he added, as Mary Ann appeared with suspicious alacrity.</p> + +<p>"Do you know," he went on, when they had taken the first sip of renewed +amity dissolved in whisky, "I think I showed more musical soul than you +in refusing to trammel my inspiration with the dull rules invented by +fools. I suppose you have mastered them all, eh?" He picked up some +sheets of manuscript. "Great Scot! How you must have schooled yourself to +scribble all this—you, with your restless nature—full scores, too! I +hope you don't offer this sort of thing to Brahmson."</p> + +<p>"I certainly went there with that intention," admitted Lancelot. "I +thought I'd catch Brahmson himself in the evening—he's never in when I +call in the morning."</p> + +<p>Peter groaned.</p> + +<p>"Quixotic as ever! You can't have been long in London then?"</p> + +<p>"A year."</p> + +<p>"I suppose you'd jump down my throat if I were to ask you how much is +left of that—" he hesitated, then turned the sentence facetiously—"of +those twenty thousand shillings you were cut off with?"</p> + +<p>"Let this vile den answer."</p> + +<p>"Don't disparage the den; it's not so bad."</p> + +<p>"You are right—I may come to worse. I've been an awful ass. You know how +lucky I was while at the Conservatoire—no, you don't. How should you? +Well, I carried off some distinctions and a lot of conceit, and came over +here thinking Europe would be at my feet in a month. I was only sorry my +father died before I could twit him with my triumph. That's candid, isn't +it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes; you're not such a prig after all," mused Peter. "I saw the old +man's death in the paper—your brother Lionel became the bart."</p> + +<p>"Yes, poor beggar, I don't hate him half so much as I did. He reminds me +of a man invited to dinner which is nothing but flowers and serviettes +and silver plate."</p> + +<p>"I'd pawn the plate, anyhow," said Peter, with a little laugh.</p> + +<p>"He can't touch anything, I tell you; everything's tied up."</p> + +<p>"Ah, well, he'll get tied up, too. He'll marry an American heiress."</p> + +<p>"Confound him! I'd rather see the house extinct first."</p> + +<p>"Hoity, toity! She'll be quite as good as any of you."</p> + +<p>"I can't discuss this with you, Peter," said Lancelot, gently but firmly. +"If there is a word I hate more than the word heiress, it is the word +American."</p> + +<p>"But why? They're both very good words and better things."</p> + +<p>"They both smack of the most vulgar thing in the world—money," said +Lancelot, walking hotly about the room. "In America there's no other +standard. To make your pile, to strike ile—oh, how I shudder to hear +these idioms! And can any one hear the word heiress without immediately +thinking of matrimony? Phaugh! It's a prostitution."</p> + +<p>"What is? You're not very coherent, my friend."</p> + +<p>"Very well, I am incoherent. If a great old family can only bolster up +its greatness by alliances with the daughters of oil-strikers, then let +the family perish with honour."</p> + +<p>"But the daughters of oil-strikers are sometimes very charming creatures. +They are polished with their fathers' oil."</p> + +<p>"You are right. They reek of it. Pah! I pray to Heaven Lionel will either +wed a lady or die a bachelor."</p> + +<p>"Yes; but what do you call a lady?" persisted Peter.</p> + +<p>Lancelot uttered an impatient snarl, and rang the bell violently. Peter +stared in silence. Mary Ann appeared.</p> + +<p>"How often am I to tell you to leave my matches on the mantel-shelf?" +snapped Lancelot. "You seem to delight to hide them away, as if I had +time to play parlour games with you."</p> + +<p>Mary Ann silently went to the mantel-piece, handed him the matches, and +left the room without a word.</p> + +<p>"I say, Lancelot, adversity doesn't seem to have agreed with you," said +Peter, severely. "That poor girl's eyes were quite wet when she went out. +Why didn't you speak? I could have given you heaps of lights, and you +might even have sacrificed another scrap of that precious manuscript."</p> + +<p>"Well, she has got a knack of hiding my matches all the same," said +Lancelot, somewhat shamefacedly. "Besides, I hate her for being called +Mary Ann. It's the last terror of cheap apartments. If she only had +another name like a human being, I'd gladly call her Miss something. I +went so far as to ask her, and she stared at me in a dazed, stupid, silly +way, as if I'd asked her to marry me. I suppose the fact is she's been +called Mary Ann so long and so often that she's forgotten her father's +name—if she ever had any. I must do her the justice, though, to say she +answers to the name of Mary Ann in every sense of the phrase."</p> + +<p>"She didn't seem at all bad-looking, anyway," said Peter.</p> + +<p>"Every man to his taste!" growled Lancelot. "She's as <i>platt</i> and +uninteresting as a wooden sabot."</p> + +<p>"There's many a pretty foot in a sabot," retorted Peter, with an air of +philosophy.</p> + +<p>"You think that's clever, but it's simply silly. How does that fact +affect this particular sabot?"</p> + +<p>"I've put my foot in it," groaned Peter, comically.</p> + +<p>"Besides, she might be a houri from heaven," said Lancelot; "but a houri +in a patched print frock—" He shuddered and struck a match.</p> + +<p>"I don't know exactly what houris from heaven are, but I have a kind of +feeling any sort of frock would be out of harmony—!"</p> + +<p>Lancelot lit his pipe.</p> + +<p>"If you begin to say that sort of thing we must smoke," he said, laughing +between the puffs. "I can offer you lots of tobacco—I'm sorry I've got +no cigars. Wait till you see Mrs. Leadbatter—my landlady—then you'll +talk about houris. Poverty may not be a crime, but it seems to make +people awful bores. Wonder if it'll have that effect on me? <i>Ach Himmel!</i> +how that woman bores me. No, there's no denying it—there's my pouch, old +man—I hate the poor; their virtues are only a shade more vulgar than +their vices. This Leadbatter creature is honest after her lights—she +sends me up the most ridiculous leavings—and I only hate her the more +for it."</p> + +<p>"I suppose she works Mary Ann's fingers to the bone from the same +mistaken sense of duty," said Peter, acutely. "Thanks; think I'll try one +of my cigars. I filled my case, I fancy, before I came out. Yes, here it +is; won't <i>you</i> try one?"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks, I prefer my pipe."</p> + +<p>"It's the same old meerschaum, I see," said Peter.</p> + +<p>"The same old meerschaum," repeated Lancelot, with a little sigh.</p> + +<p>Peter lit a cigar, and they sat and puffed in silence.</p> + +<p>"Dear me!" said Peter, suddenly; "I can almost fancy we're back in our +German garret, up the ninety stairs, can't you?"</p> + +<p>"No," said Lancelot, sadly, looking round as if in search of something; +"I miss the dreams."</p> + +<p>"And I," said Peter, striving to speak cheerfully, "I see a dog too +much."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Lancelot, with a melancholy laugh. "When you funked becoming +a Beethoven, I got a dog and called him after you."</p> + +<p>"What? you called him Peter?"</p> + +<p>"No, Beethoven!"</p> + +<p>"Beethoven! Really?"</p> + +<p>"Really. Here, Beethoven!"</p> + +<p>The spaniel shook himself, and perked his wee nose up wistfully towards +Lancelot's face.</p> + +<p>Peter laughed, with a little catch in his voice. He didn't know whether +he was pleased, or touched, or angry.</p> + +<p>"You started to tell me about those twenty thousand shillings," he said.</p> + +<p>"Didn't I tell you? On the expectations of my triumph, I lived +extravagantly, like a fool, joined a club, and took up my quarters there. +When I began to realise the struggle that lay before me, I took chambers; +then I took rooms; now I'm in lodgings. The more I realised it, the less +rent I paid. I only go to the club for my letters now. I won't have them +come here. I'm living incognito."</p> + +<p>"That's taking fame by the forelock, indeed! Then by what name must I ask +for you next time? For I'm not to be shaken off."</p> + +<p>"Lancelot."</p> + +<p>"Lancelot what?"</p> + +<p>"Only Lancelot! Mr. Lancelot."</p> + +<p>"Why, that's like your Mary Ann!"</p> + +<p>"So it is!" he laughed, more bitterly than cordially; "it never struck me +before. Yes, we are a pair."</p> + +<p>"How did you stumble on this place?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't stumble. Deliberate, intelligent selection. You see, it's the +next best thing to Piccadilly. You just cross Waterloo Bridge, and there +you are at the centre, five minutes from all the clubs. The natives have +not yet risen to the idea."</p> + +<p>"You mean the rent," laughed Peter. "You're as canny and careful as a +Scotch professor. I think it's simply grand the way you've beaten out +those shillings, in defiance of your natural instincts. I should have +melted them years ago. I believe you <i>have</i> got some musical genius after +all."</p> + +<p>"You over-rate my abilities," said Lancelot, with the whimsical +expression that sometimes flashed across his face even in his most +unamiable moments. "You must deduct the thalers I made in exhibitions. +As for living in cheap lodgings, I am not at all certain it's an economy, +for every now and again it occurs to you that you are saving an awful +lot, and you take a hansom on the strength of it."</p> + +<p>"Well, I haven't torn up that cheque yet—"</p> + +<p>"Peter!" said Lancelot, his flash of gaiety dying away, "I tell you these +things as a friend, not as a beggar. If you look upon me as the second, I +cease to be the first."</p> + +<p>"But, man, I owe you the money; and if it will enable you to hold out a +little longer—why, in Heaven's name, shouldn't you—?"</p> + +<p>"You don't owe me the money at all; I made no bargain with you; I am not +a moneylender."</p> + +<p>"<i>Pack dick sum Henker!</i>" growled Peter, with a comical grimace. "<i>Was +für</i> a casuist! What a swindler you'd make! I wonder you have the face +to deny the debt. Well, and how did you leave Frau Sauer-Kraut?" he said, +deeming it prudent to sheer off the subject.</p> + +<p>"Fat as a Christmas turkey."</p> + +<p>"Or a German sausage. The extraordinary things that woman stuffed herself +with!—chunks of fat, stewed apples, Kartoffel salad—all mixed up in one +plate, as in a dustbin."</p> + +<p>"Don't! You make my gorge rise. <i>Ach Himmel!</i> to think that this nation +should be musical! O Music, heavenly maid, how much garlic I have endured +for thy sake!"</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Peter, putting down his whisky that he might throw +himself freely back in the easy chair and roar.</p> + +<p>"O that garlic!" he said, panting. "No wonder they smoked so much in +Leipsic. Even so they couldn't keep the reek out of the staircases. +Still, it's a great country is Germany. Our house does a tremendous +business in German patents."</p> + +<p>"A great country? A land of barbarians rather. How can a people be +civilised that eats jam with its meat?"</p> + +<p>"Bravo, Lancelot! You're in lovely form to-night. You seem to go a +hundred miles out of your way to come the truly British. First it was +oil—now it's jam. There was that aristocratic flash in your eye, too, +that look of supreme disdain which brings on riots in Trafalgar Square. +Behind the patriotic, the national note, 'How can a people be civilised +that eats jam with its meat?' I heard the deeper, the oligarchic accent, +'How can a people be enfranchised that eats meat with its fingers?' Ah, +you are right! How you do hate the poor! What bores they are! You +aristocrats—the products of centuries of culture, comfort, and +cocksureness—will never rid yourselves of your conviction that you are +the backbone of England—no, not though that backbone were picked clean +of every scrap of flesh by the rats of Radicalism."</p> + +<p>"What in the devil are you talking about now?" demanded Lancelot. "You +seem to me to go a hundred miles out of <i>your</i> way to twit me with my +poverty and my breeding. One would almost think you were anxious to +convince me of the poverty of <i>your</i> breeding."</p> + +<p>"Oh, a thousand pardons!" ejaculated Peter, blushing violently. "But good +heavens, old chap! There's your hot temper again. You surely wouldn't +suspect <i>me</i>, of all people in the world, of meaning anything personal? +I'm talking of you as a class. Contempt is in your blood—and quite +right! We're such snobs, we deserve it. Why d'ye think I ever took to you +as a boy at school? Was it because you scribbled inaccurate sonatas and I +had myself a talent for knocking tunes off the piano? Not a bit of it. I +thought it was, perhaps, but that was only one of my many youthful +errors. No, I liked you because your father was an old English baronet, +and mine was a merchant who trafficked mainly in things Teutonic. And +that's why I like you still. 'Pon my soul it is. You gratify my historic +sense—like an old building. You are picturesque. You stand to me for all +the good old ideals—including the pride which we are beginning to see is +deuced unchristian. Mind you, it's a curious kind of pride when one looks +into it. Apparently it's based on the fact that your family has lived on +the nation for generations. And yet you won't take my cheque—which is +your own. Now don't swear—I know one mustn't analyse things, or the +world would come to pieces, so I always vote Tory."</p> + +<p>"Then I shall have to turn Radical," grumbled Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"Certainly you will, when you have had a little more experience of +poverty," retorted Peter. "There, there, old man! forgive me. I only do +it to annoy you. Fact is, your outbursts of temper attract me. They are +pleasant to look back upon when the storm is over. Yes, my dear Lancelot, +you are like the king you look—you can do no wrong. You are picturesque. +Pass the whisky."</p> + +<p>Lancelot smiled, his handsome brow serene once more. He murmured, "Don't +talk rot," but inwardly he was not displeased at Peter's allegiance, half +mocking though he knew it.</p> + +<p>"Therefore, my dear chap," resumed Peter, sipping his whisky and water, +"to return to our lambs, I bow to your patrician prejudices in favour of +forks. But your patriotic prejudices are on a different level. There, I +am on the same ground as you, and I vow I see nothing inherently superior +in the British combination of beef and beetroot, to the German amalgam +of lamb and jam."</p> + +<p>"Damn lamb and jam!" burst forth Lancelot, adding, with his whimsical +look: "There's rhyme, as well as reason. How on earth did we get on this +tack?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Peter, smiling. "We were talking about Frau +Sauer-Kraut, I think. And did you board with her all the time?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and I was always hungry. Till the last, I never learnt to stomach +her mixtures. But it was really too much trouble to go down the ninety +stairs to a restaurant. It was much easier to be hungry."</p> + +<p>"And did you ever get a reform in the hours of washing the floor?"</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha! ha! No, they always waited till I was going to bed. I suppose +they thought I liked damp. They never got over my morning tub, you know. +And that, too, sprang a leak after you left, and helped spontaneously to +wash the floor."</p> + +<p>"Shows the fallacy of cleanliness," said Peter, "and the inferiority of +British ideals. They never bathed in their lives, yet they looked the +pink of health."</p> + +<p>"Yes,—their complexion was high,—like the fish."</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha! Yes, the fish! That was a great luxury, I remember. About once a +month."</p> + +<p>"Of course, the town is so inland," said Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"I see—it took such a long time coming. Ha! ha! ha! And the Herr +Professor—is he still a bachelor?"</p> + +<p>As the Herr Professor was a septuagenarian and a misogamist, even in +Peter's time, his question tickled Lancelot. Altogether the two young men +grew quite jolly, recalling a hundred oddities, and reknitting their +friendship at the expense of the Fatherland.</p> + +<p>"But was there ever a more madcap expedition than ours?" exclaimed Peter. +"Most boys start out to be pirates—"</p> + +<p>"And some do become music-publishers," Lancelot finished grimly, suddenly +reminded of a grievance.</p> + +<p>"Ha! ha! ha! Poor fellow!" laughed Peter. "Then you <i>have</i> found them out +already."</p> + +<p>"Does any one ever find them in?" flashed Lancelot. "I suppose they do +exist and are occasionally seen of mortal eyes. I suppose wives and +friends and mothers gaze on them with no sense of special privilege, +unconscious of their invisibility to the profane eyes of mere musicians."</p> + +<p>"My dear fellow, the mere musicians are as plentiful as niggers on the +sea-shore. A publisher might spend his whole day receiving regiments of +unappreciated geniuses. Bond Street would be impassable. You look at the +publisher too much from your own standpoint."</p> + +<p>"I tell you I don't look at him from any standpoint. That's what I +complain of. He's encircled with a prickly hedge of clerks. 'You will +hear from us.' 'It shall have our best consideration. We have no +knowledge of the Ms. in question.' Yes, Peter, two valuable quartets have +I lost, messing about with these villains."</p> + +<p>"I tell you what. I'll give you an introduction to Brahmson. I know +him—privately."</p> + +<p>"No, thank you, Peter."</p> + +<p>"Why not?"</p> + +<p>"Because you know him."</p> + +<p>"I couldn't give you an introduction if I didn't. This is silly of you, +Lancelot."</p> + +<p>"If Brahmson can't see any merits in my music, I don't want you to open +his eyes. I'll stand on my own bottom. And what's more, Peter, I tell you +once for all"—his voice was low and menacing—"if you try any anonymous +<i>deus ex machinâ</i> tricks on me in some sly, roundabout fashion, don't you +flatter yourself I shan't recognise your hand. I shall, and, by God, it +shall never grasp mine again."</p> + +<p>"I suppose you think that's very noble and sublime," said Peter, coolly. +"You don't suppose if I could do you a turn I'd hesitate for fear of +excommunication? I know you're like Beethoven there—your bark is worse +than your bite."</p> + +<p>"Very well; try. You'll find my teeth nastier than you bargain for."</p> + +<p>"I'm not going to try. If you want to go to the dogs—go. Why should I +put out a hand to stop you?"</p> + +<p>These amenities having reëstablished them in their mutual esteem, they +chatted lazily and spasmodically till past midnight, with more smoke than +fire in the conversation.</p> + +<p>At last Peter began to go, and in course of time actually did take up his +umbrella. Not long after, Lancelot conducted him softly down the dark, +silent stairs, holding his bedroom candle-stick in his hand, for Mrs. +Leadbatter always turned out the hall lamp on her way to bed. The old +phrases came to the young men's lips as their hands met in a last hearty +grip.</p> + +<p>"<i>Lebt wohl!</i>" said Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"<i>Auf Wiedersehen!</i>" replied Peter, threateningly.</p> + +<p>Lancelot stood at the hall door looking for a moment after his +friend—the friend he had tried to cast out of his heart as a recreant. +The mist had cleared—the stars glittered countless in the frosty heaven; +a golden crescent-moon hung low; the lights and shadows lay almost +poetically upon the little street. A rush of tender thoughts whelmed the +musician's soul. He saw again the dear old garret, up the ninety stairs, +in the Hotel Cologne, where he had lived with his dreams; he heard the +pianos and violins going in every room in happy incongruity, publishing +to all the prowess of the players; dirty, picturesque old Leipsic rose +before him; he was walking again in the <i>Hainstrasse</i>, in the shadow of +the quaint, tall houses. Yes, life was sweet after all; he was a coward +to lose heart so soon; fame would yet be his; fame and love—the love of +a noble woman that fame earns; some gracious creature, breathing sweet +refinements, cradled in an ancient home, such as he had left for ever.</p> + +<p>The sentimentality of the Fatherland seemed to have crept into his soul; +a divinely sweet, sad melody was throbbing in his brain. How glad he was +he had met Peter again!</p> + +<p>From a neighbouring steeple came a harsh, resonant clang, "One."</p> + +<p>It roused him from his dream. He shivered a little, closed the door, +bolted it and put up the chain, and turned, half sighing, to take up +his bedroom candle again. Then his heart stood still for a moment. A +figure—a girl's figure—was coming towards him from the kitchen stairs. +As she came into the dim light he saw that it was merely Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>She looked half drowsed. Her cap was off, her hair tangled loosely over +her forehead. In her disarray she looked prettier than he had ever +remembered her. There was something provoking about the large, dreamy +eyes, the red lips that parted at the unexpected sight of him.</p> + +<p>"Good heavens!" he cried. "Not gone to bed yet?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir. I had to stay up to wash up a lot of crockery. The second floor +front had some friends to supper late. Missus says she won't stand it +again."</p> + +<p>"Poor thing!" He patted her soft cheek—it grew hot and rosy under his +fingers, but was not withdrawn. Mary Ann made no sign of resentment. In +his mood of tenderness to all creation his rough words to her recurred to +him.</p> + +<p>"You mustn't mind what I said about the matches," he murmured. "When I am +in a bad temper I say anything. Remember now for the future, will you?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>Her face—its blushes flickered over strangely by the +candle-light—seemed to look up at him invitingly.</p> + +<p>"That's a good girl." And bending down he kissed her on the lips.</p> + +<p>"Good night," he murmured.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann made some startled, gurgling sound in reply.</p> + +<p>Five minutes afterwards Lancelot was in bed, denouncing himself as a +vulgar beast.</p> + +<p>"I must have drunk too much whisky," he said to himself, angrily. "Good +heavens! Fancy sinking to Mary Ann. If Peter had only seen—There was +infinitely more poetry in that red-cheeked <i>Mädchen</i>, and yet I never—It +is true-there is something sordid about the atmosphere that subtly +permeates you, that drags you down to it. Mary Ann! A transpontine +drudge! whose lips are fresh from the coalman's and the butcher's. +Phaugh!"</p> + +<p>The fancy seized hold of his imagination. He could not shake it off, +he could not sleep till he had got out of bed and sponged his lips +vigorously.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile Mary Ann was lying on her bed, dressed, doing her best to keep +her meaningless, half-hysterical sobs from her mistress's keen ear.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="II.__" id="II.__"></a>II</h2> + + +<p>It was a long time before Mary Ann came so prominently into the centre of +Lancelot's consciousness again. She remained somewhere in the outer +periphery of his thought—nowhere near the bull's-eye, so to speak—as a +vague automaton that worked when he pulled a bell-rope. Infinitely more +important things were troubling him; the visit of Peter had somehow put a +keener edge on his blunted self-confidence; he had started a grand opera, +and worked at it furiously in all the intervals left him by his +engrossing pursuit after a publisher. Sometimes he would look up from his +hieroglyphics and see Mary Ann at his side surveying him curiously, and +then he would start, and remember he had rung her up, and try to remember +what for. And Mary Ann would turn red, as if the fault was hers.</p> + +<p>But the publisher was the one thing that was never out of Lancelot's +mind, though he drove Lancelot himself nearly out of it. He was like an +arrow stuck in the aforesaid bull's-eye, and, the target being conscious, +he rankled sorely. Lancelot discovered that the publisher kept a "musical +adviser," whose advice appeared to consist of the famous monosyllable, +"Don't." The publisher generally published all the musical adviser's own +works, his advice having apparently been neglected when it was most worth +taking; at least so Lancelot thought, when he had skimmed through a set +of Lancers by one of these worthies.</p> + +<p>"I shall give up being a musician," he said to himself, grimly. "I shall +become a musical adviser."</p> + +<p>Once, half by accident, he actually saw a publisher. "My dear sir," said +the great man, "what is the use of bringing quartets and full scores to +me? You should have taken them to Brahmson; he's the very man you want. +You know his address, of course—just down the street."</p> + +<p>Lancelot did not like to say that it was Brahmson's clerks that had +recommended him here; so he replied, "But you publish operas, oratorios, +cantatas!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes!—h'm—things that have been played at the big +Festivals—composers of prestige—quite a different thing, sir, quite +a different thing. There's no sale for these things—none at all, +sir—public never heard of you. Now, if you were to write some +songs—nice catchy tunes—high class, you know, with pretty words—"</p> + +<p>Now Lancelot by this time was aware of the publisher's wily ways; he +could almost have constructed an Ollendorffian dialogue, entitled +"Between a Music Publisher and a Composer." So he opened his portfolio +again and said, "I have brought some."</p> + +<p>"Well, send—send them in," stammered the publisher, almost disconcerted. +"They shall have our best consideration."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but you might just as well look over them at once," said Lancelot, +firmly, uncoiling them. "It won't take you five minutes—just let me play +one to you. The tunes are rather more original than the average, I can +promise you; and yet I think they have a lilt that—"</p> + +<p>"I really can't spare the time now. If you leave them, we will do our +best."</p> + +<p>"Listen to this bit!" said Lancelot, desperately. And dashing at a piano +that stood handy, he played a couple of bars. "That's quite a new +modulation."</p> + +<p>"That's all very well," said the publisher; "but how do you suppose I'm +going to sell a thing with an accompaniment like that? Look here, and +here! Why, it's all accidentals."</p> + +<p>"That's the best part of the song," explained Lancelot; "a sort of +undercurrent of emotion that brings out the full pathos of the words. +Note the elegant and novel harmonies." He played another bar or two, +singing the words softly.</p> + +<p>"Yes; but if you think you'll get young ladies to play that, you've got a +good deal to learn," said the publisher, gruffly. "This is the sort of +accompaniment that goes down," and seating himself at the piano for a +moment (somewhat to Lancelot's astonishment, for he had gradually formed +a theory that music publishers did not really know the staff from a +five-barred gate), he rattled off the melody with his right hand, +pounding away monotonously with his left at a few elementary chords.</p> + +<p>Lancelot looked dismayed.</p> + +<p>"That's the kind of thing you'll have to produce, young man," said the +publisher, feeling that he had at last resumed his natural supremacy, "if +you want to get your songs published. Elegant harmonies are all very +well, but who's to play them?"</p> + +<p>"And do you mean to say that a musician in this God-forsaken country must +have no chords but tonics and dominants?" ejaculated Lancelot, hotly.</p> + +<p>"The less he has of any other the better," said the great man, drily. "I +haven't said a word about the melody itself, which is quite out of the +ordinary compass, and makes demands upon the singer's vocalisation which +are not likely to make a demand for the song. What you have to remember, +my dear sir, if you wish to achieve success, is that music, if it is to +sell, must appeal to the average amateur young person. The average +amateur young person is the main prop of music in this country."</p> + +<p>Lancelot snatched up his song and tied the strings of his portfolio very +tightly, as if he were clenching his lips.</p> + +<p>"If I stay here any longer I shall swear," he said. "Good afternoon."</p> + +<p>He went out with a fire at his heart that made him insensitive to the +frost without. He walked a mile out of his way mechanically, then, +perceiving his stupidity, avenged it by jumping into a hansom. He dared +not think how low his funds were running. When he got home he forgot to +have his tea, crouching in dumb misery in his easy chair, while the coals +in the grate faded like the sunset from red to grey, and the dusk of +twilight deepened into the gloom of night, relieved only by a gleam +from the street lamp.</p> + +<p>The noise of the door opening made him look up.</p> + +<p>"Beg pardon, sir. I didn't yer ye come in."</p> + +<p>It was Mary Ann's timid accents. Lancelot's head drooped again on his +breast. He did not answer.</p> + +<p>"You've bin and let your fire go out, sir."</p> + +<p>"Don't bother!" he grumbled. He felt a morbid satisfaction in this +aggravation of discomfort, almost symbolic as it was of his sunk +fortunes.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but it'll freeze 'ard to-night, sir. Let me make it up." Taking his +sullen silence for consent she ran downstairs and reappeared with some +sticks. Soon there were signs of life, which Mary Ann assiduously +encouraged by blowing at the embers with her mouth. Lancelot looked on in +dull apathy, but as the fire rekindled and the little flames leapt up and +made Mary Ann's flushed face the one spot of colour and warmth in the +cold dark room, Lancelot's torpidity vanished suddenly. The sensuous +fascination seized him afresh, and ere he was aware of it he was lifting +the pretty face by the chin.</p> + +<p>"I'm so sorry to be so troublesome, Mary Ann. There, you shall give me a +kiss to show you bear no malice."</p> + +<p>The warm lips obediently met his, and for a moment Lancelot forgot his +worries while he held her soft cheek against his.</p> + +<p>This time the shock of returning recollection was not so violent as +before. He sat up in his chair, but his right arm still twined +negligently round her neck, the fingers patting the warm face. "A fellow +must have something to divert his mind," he thought, "or he'd go mad. And +there's no harm done—the poor thing takes it as a kindness, I'm sure. I +suppose <i>her</i> life's dull enough. We're a pair." He felt her shoulders +heaving a little, as if she were gulping down something. At last she +said: "You ain't troublesome. I ought to ha' yerd ye come in."</p> + +<p>He released her suddenly. Her words broke the spell. The vulgar accent +gave him a shudder.</p> + +<p>"Don't you <i>hear</i> a bell ringing?" he said with dual significance.</p> + +<p>"Nosir," said Mary Ann, ingenuously. "I'd yer it in a moment if there +was. I yer it in my dreams, I'm so used to it. One night I dreamt the +missus was boxin' my yers and askin' me if I was deaf and I said to +'er—"</p> + +<p>"Can't you say 'her'?" cried Lancelot, cutting her short impatiently.</p> + +<p>"Her," said Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>"Then why do you say ''er'?"</p> + +<p>"Missus told me to. She said my own way was all wrong."</p> + +<p>"Oh, indeed!" said Lancelot. "It's missus that has corrupted you, is it? +And pray what used you to say?"</p> + +<p>"She," said Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>Lancelot was taken aback. "She!" he repeated.</p> + +<p>"Yessir," said Mary Ann, with a dawning suspicion that her own vocabulary +was going to be vindicated; "whenever I said 'she' she made me say ''er,' +and whenever I said 'her' she made me say 'she.' When I said 'her and me' +she made me say 'me and she,' and when I said 'I got it from she,' she +made me say 'I got it from ''er.'"</p> + +<p>"Bravo! A very lucid exposition," said Lancelot, laughing. "Did she set +you right in any other particulars?"</p> + +<p>"Eessir—I mean yessir," replied Mary Ann, the forbidden words flying to +her lips like prisoned skylarks suddenly set free. "I used to say, 'Gie I +thek there broom, oo't?' 'Arten thee goin' to?' 'Her did say to I.' 'I be +goin' on to bed.' 'Look at—'"</p> + +<p>"Enough! Enough! What a memory you've got! Now I understand. You're a +country girl."</p> + +<p>"Eessir," said Mary Ann, her face lighting up. "I mean yessir."</p> + +<p>"Well, that redeems you a little," thought Lancelot, with his whimsical +look. "So it's missus, is it, who's taught you Cockneyese? My instinct +was not so unsound, after all. I dare say you'll turn out something +nobler than a Cockney drudge." He finished aloud, "I hope you went +a-milking."</p> + +<p>"Eessir, sometimes; and I drove back the milk-trunk in the cart, and I +rode down on a pony to the second pasture to count the sheep and the +heifers."</p> + +<p>"Then you are a farmer's daughter?"</p> + +<p>"Eessir. But my feyther—I mean my father—had only two little fields +when he was alive, but we had a nice garden, with plum trees, and rose +bushes, and gillyflowers—"</p> + +<p>"Better and better," murmured Lancelot, smiling. And, indeed, the image +of Mary Ann skimming the meads on a pony in the sunshine, was more +pleasant to contemplate than that of Mary Ann whitening the wintry steps. +"What a complexion you must have had to start with!" he cried aloud, +surveying the not unenviable remains of it. "Well, and what else did you +do?"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann opened her lips. It was delightful to see how the dull veil, as +of London fog, had been lifted from her face; her eyes sparkled.</p> + +<p>Then, "Oh, there's the ground-floor bell," she cried, moving +instinctively toward the door.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense; I hear no bell," said Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"I told you I always <i>hear</i> it," said Mary Ann, hesitating and blushing +delicately before the critical word.</p> + +<p>"Oh, well, run along then. Stop a moment—I must give you another kiss +for talking so nicely. There! And—stop a moment—bring me up some +coffee, please, when the ground floor is satisfied."</p> + +<p>"Eessir—I mean yessir. What must I say?" she added, pausing troubled on +the threshold.</p> + +<p>"Say, 'Yes, Lancelot,'" he answered recklessly.</p> + +<p>"Yessir," and Mary Ann disappeared.</p> + +<p>It was ten endless minutes before she reappeared with the coffee. The +whole of the second five minutes Lancelot paced his room feverishly, +cursing the ground floor, and stamping as if to bring down its ceiling. +He was curious to know more of Mary Ann's history.</p> + +<p>But it proved meagre enough. Her mother died when Mary Ann was a child; +her father when she was still a mere girl. His affairs were found in +hopeless confusion, and Mary Ann was considered lucky to be taken into +the house of the well-to-do Mrs. Leadbatter, of London, the elder sister +of a young woman who had nursed the vicar's wife. Mrs. Leadbatter had +promised the vicar to train up the girl in the way a domestic should go.</p> + +<p>"And when I am old enough she is going to pay me wages as well," +concluded Mary Ann, with an air of importance.</p> + +<p>"Indeed—how old were you when you left the village?"</p> + +<p>"Fourteen."</p> + +<p>"And how old are you now?"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann looked confused. "I don't quite know," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"Oh, come," said Lancelot laughingly; "is this your country simplicity? +You're quite young enough to tell how old you are."</p> + +<p>The tears came into Mary Ann's eyes.</p> + +<p>"I can't, Mr. Lancelot," she protested earnestly; "I forgot to +count—I'll ask missus."</p> + +<p>"And whatever she tells you, you'll be," he said, amused at her +unshakable loyalty.</p> + +<p>"Yessir," said Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>"And so you are quite alone in the world?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir—but I've got my canary. They sold everything when my father +died, but the vicar's wife she bought my canary back for me because I +cried so. And I brought it to London and it hangs in my bedroom. And the +vicar, he was so kind to me, he did give me a lot of advice, and Mrs. +Amersham, who kept the chandler's shop, she did give me ninepence, all in +threepenny bits."</p> + +<p>"And you never had any brothers or sisters?"</p> + +<p>"There was our Sally, but she died before mother."</p> + +<p>"Nobody else?"</p> + +<p>"There's my big brother Tom—but I mustn't tell you about him."</p> + +<p>"Mustn't tell me about him? Why not?"</p> + +<p>"He's so wicked."</p> + +<p>The answer was so unexpected that Lancelot could not help laughing, and +Mary Ann flushed to the roots of her hair.</p> + +<p>"Why, what has he done?" said Lancelot, composing his mouth to gravity.</p> + +<p>"I don't know; I was only six. Father told me it was something very +dreadful, and Tom had to run away to America, and I mustn't mention him +any more. And mother was crying, and I cried because Tom used to give me +tickey-backs and go black-berrying with me and our little Sally; and +everybody else in the village they seemed glad, because they had said so +all along, because Tom would never go to church, even when a little boy."</p> + +<p>"I suppose then <i>you</i> went to church regularly?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir. When I was at home, I mean."</p> + +<p>"Every Sunday?"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann hung her head. "Once I went meechin'," she said in low tones. +"Some boys and girls they wanted me to go nutting, and I wanted to go +too, but I didn't know how to get away, and they told me to cough very +loud when the sermon began, so I did, and coughed on and on till at last +the vicar glowed at father, and father had to send me out of church."</p> + +<p>Lancelot laughed heartily. "Then you didn't like the sermon."</p> + +<p>"It wasn't that, sir. The sun was shining that beautiful outside, and I +never minded the sermon, only I did get tired of sitting still. But I +never done it again—our little Sally, she died soon after."</p> + +<p>Lancelot checked his laughter. "Poor little fool!" he thought. Then to +brighten her up again he asked cheerily, "And what else did you do on the +farm?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, please sir, missus will be wanting me now."</p> + +<p>"Bother missus. I want some more milk," he said, emptying the milk-jug +into the slop-basin. "Run down and get some."</p> + +<p>Mary Ann was startled by the splendour of the deed. She took the jug +silently and disappeared.</p> + +<p>When she returned he said: "Well, you haven't told me half yet. I suppose +you kept bees?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, and I fed the pigs."</p> + +<p>"Hang the pigs! Let's hear something more romantic."</p> + +<p>"There was the calves to suckle sometimes, when the mother died or was +sold."</p> + +<p>"Calves! H'm! H'm! Well, but how could you do that?"</p> + +<p>"Dipped my fingers in milk, and let the calves suck 'em. The silly +creatures thought it was their mother's teats. Like this."</p> + +<p>With a happy inspiration she put her fingers into the slop-basin, and +held them up dripping.</p> + +<p>Lancelot groaned. It was not only that his improved Mary Ann was again +sinking to earth, unable to soar in the romantic æther where he would +fain have seen her volant; it was not only that the coarseness of her +nature had power to drag her down, it was the coarseness of her red, +chapped hands that was thrust once again and violently upon his reluctant +consciousness.</p> + +<p>Then, like Mary Ann, he had an inspiration.</p> + +<p>"How would you like a pair of gloves, Mary Ann?"</p> + +<p>He had struck the latent feminine. Her eyes gleamed. "Oh, sir!" was all +she could say. Then a swift shade of disappointment darkened the eager +little face.</p> + +<p>"But I never goes out," she cried.</p> + +<p>"I never <i>go</i> out," he corrected, shuddering.</p> + +<p>"I never <i>go</i> out," said Mary Ann, her lip twitching.</p> + +<p>"That doesn't matter. I want you to wear them indoors."</p> + +<p>"But there's nobody to see 'em indoors!"</p> + +<p>"I shall see them," he reminded her.</p> + +<p>"But they'll get dirty."</p> + +<p>"No they won't. You shall only wear them when you come to me. If I buy +you a nice pair of gloves, will you promise to put them on every time I +ring for you?"</p> + +<p>"But what'll missus say?"</p> + +<p>"Missus won't see them. The moment you come in, you'll put them on, and +just before going out—you'll take them off! See!"</p> + +<p>"Yessir. Then nobody'll see me looking so grand but you."</p> + +<p>"That's it. And wouldn't you rather look grand for me than for anybody +else?"</p> + +<p>"Of course I would, sir," said Mary Ann, earnestly, with a grateful +little sigh.</p> + +<p>So Lancelot measured her wrist, feeling her pulse beat madly. She really +had a very little hand, though to his sensitive vision the roughness of +the skin seemed to swell it to a size demanding a boxing glove. He bought +her six pairs of tan kid, in a beautiful cardboard box. He could ill +afford the gift, and made one of his whimsical grimaces when he got the +bill. The young lady who served him looked infinitely more genteel than +Mary Ann. He wondered what she would think if she knew for whom he was +buying these dainty articles. Perhaps her feelings would be so outraged +she would refuse to participate in the transaction. But the young lady +was happily unconscious; she had her best smile for the handsome, +aristocratic young gentleman, and mentioned his moustache later to her +bosom-friend in the next department.</p> + +<p>And thus Mary Ann and Lancelot became the joint owners of a secret, and +coplayers in a little comedy. When Mary Ann came into the room, she would +put whatever she was carrying on a chair, gravely extract her gloves from +her pocket, and draw them on, Lancelot pretending not to know she was in +the room, though he had just said, "Come in." After allowing her a minute +he would look up. In the course of a week this became mechanical, so that +he lost the semi-ludicrous sense of secrecy which he felt at first, as +well as the little pathetic emotion inspired by her absolute +unconsciousness that the performance was not intended for her own +gratification. Nevertheless, though he could now endure to see Mary Ann +handling the sugar tongs, he remained cold to her for some weeks. He had +kissed her again in the flush of her joy at the sight of the gloves, but +after that there was a reaction. He rarely went to the club now (there +was no one with whom he was in correspondence except music publishers, +and they didn't reply), but he dropped in there once soon after the glove +episode, looked over the papers in the smoking-room, and chatted with a +popular composer and one or two men he knew. It was while the waiter was +holding out the coffee-tray to him that Mary Ann flashed upon his +consciousness. The thought of her seemed so incongruous with the sober +magnificence, the massive respectability that surrounded him, the +cheerful, marble hearth reddened with leaping flame, the luxurious +lounges, the well-groomed old gentlemen smoking eighteenpenny cheroots, +the suave, noiseless satellites, that Lancelot felt a sudden pang of +bewildered shame. Why, the very waiter who stood bent before him would +disdain her. He took his coffee hastily, with a sense of personal +unworthiness. This feeling soon evaporated, but it left less of +resentment against Mary Ann which made him inexplicable to her. +Fortunately, her habit of acceptance saved her some tears, though she +shed others. And there remained always the gloves. When she was putting +them on she always felt she was slipping her hands in his.</p> + +<p>And then there was yet a further consolation.</p> + +<p>For the gloves had also a subtle effect on Lancelot. They gave him a +sense of responsibility. Vaguely resentful as he felt against Mary Ann +(in the intervals of his more definite resentment against publishers), +he also felt that he could not stop at the gloves. He had started +refining her, and he must go on till she was, so to speak, all gloves. He +must cover up her coarse speech, as he had covered up her coarse hands. +He owed that to the gloves; it was the least he could do for them. So, +whenever Mary Ann made a mistake, Lancelot corrected her. He found these +grammatical dialogues not uninteresting, and a vent for his ill-humour +against publishers to boot. Very often his verbal corrections sounded +astonishingly like reprimands. Here, again, Mary Ann was forearmed by her +feeling that she deserved them. She would have been proud had she known +how much Mr. Lancelot was satisfied with her aspirates, which came quite +natural. She had only dropped her "h's" temporarily, as one drops country +friends in coming to London. Curiously enough, Mary Ann did not regard +the new locutions and pronunciations as superseding the old. They were a +new language; she knew two others, her mother-tongue and her missus's +tongue. She would as little have thought of using her new linguistic +acquirements in the kitchen as of wearing her gloves there. They were for +Lancelot's ears only, as her gloves were for his eyes.</p> + +<p>All this time Lancelot was displaying prodigious musical activity, so +much so that the cost of ruled paper became a consideration. There was no +form of composition he did not essay, none by which he made a shilling. +Once he felt himself the prey of a splendid inspiration, and sat up all +night writing at fever pitch, surrounded with celestial harmonies, +audible to him alone; the little room resounded with the thunder of a +mighty orchestra, in which every instrument sang to him individually—the +piccolo, the flute, the oboes, the clarionets, filling the air with a +silver spray of notes; the drums throbbing, the trumpets shrilling, the +four horns pealing with long stately notes, the trombones and bassoons +vibrating, the violins and violas sobbing in linked sweetness, the 'cello +and the contra-bass moaning their under-chant. And then, in the morning, +when the first rough sketch was written, the glory faded. He threw down +his pen, and called himself an ass for wasting his time on what nobody +would ever look at. Then he laid his head on the table, overwrought, full +of an infinite pity for himself. A sudden longing seized him for some one +to love him, to caress his hair, to smooth his hot forehead. This mood +passed too; he smoothed the slumbering Beethoven instead. After a while +he went into his bedroom, and sluiced his face and hands in ice-cold +water, and rang the bell for breakfast.</p> + +<p>There was a knock at the door in response.</p> + +<p>"Come in!" he said gently—his emotions had left him tired to the point +of tenderness. And then he waited a minute while Mary Ann was drawing on +her gloves.</p> + +<p>"Did you ring, sir?" said a wheezy voice, at last. Mrs. Leadbatter had +got tired of waiting.</p> + +<p>Lancelot started violently—Mrs. Leadbatter had latterly left him +entirely to Mary Ann. "It's my hastmer," she had explained to him +apologetically, meeting him casually in the passage. "I can't trollop up +and down stairs as I used to when I fust took this house five-an'-twenty +year ago, and pore Mr. Leadbatter—" and here followed reminiscences +long since in their hundredth edition.</p> + +<p>"Yes; let me have some coffee—very hot—please," said Lancelot, less +gently. The woman's voice jarred upon him; and her features were not +redeeming.</p> + +<p>"Lawd, sir, I 'ope that gas 'asn't been burnin' all night, sir," she +said, as she was going out.</p> + +<p>"It has," he said shortly.</p> + +<p>"You'll hexcoose me, sir, but I didn't bargen for that. I'm only a +pore, honest, 'ard-workin' widder, and I noticed the last gas bill was +'eavier then hever since that black winter that took pore Mr. Leadbatter +to 'is grave. Fair is fair, and I shall 'ave to reckon it a hextry, with +the rate gone up sevenpence a thousand and my Rosie leavin' a fine +nurse-maid's place in Bayswater at the end of the month to come 'ome and +'elp 'er mother, 'cos my hastmer—"</p> + +<p>"Will you please shut the door after you?" interrupted Lancelot, biting +his lip with irritation. And Mrs. Leadbatter, who was standing in the +aperture with no immediate intention of departing, could find no repartee +beyond slamming the door as hard as she could.</p> + +<p>This little passage of arms strangely softened Lancelot to Mary Ann. It +made him realise faintly what her life must be.</p> + +<p>"I should go mad and smash all the crockery!" he cried aloud. He felt +quite tender again towards the uncomplaining girl.</p> + +<p>Presently there was another knock. Lancelot growled, half prepared to +renew the battle, and to give Mrs. Leadbatter a piece of his mind on the +subject. But it was merely Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>Shaken in his routine, he looked on steadily while Mary Ann drew on her +gloves; and this in turn confused Mary Ann. Her hand trembled.</p> + +<p>"Let me help you," he said.</p> + +<p>And there was Lancelot buttoning Mary Ann's glove just as if her name +were Guinevere! And neither saw the absurdity of wasting time upon an +operation which would have to be undone in two minutes. Then Mary Ann, +her eyes full of soft light, went to the sideboard and took out the +prosaic elements of breakfast.</p> + +<p>When she returned, to put them back, Lancelot was astonished to see her +carrying a cage—a plain square cage, made of white tin wire.</p> + +<p>"What's that?" he gasped.</p> + +<p>"Please, Mr. Lancelot, I want to ask you to do me a favour." She dropped +her eyelashes timidly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Mary Ann," he said briskly. "But what have you got there?"</p> + +<p>"It's only my canary, sir. Would you—please, sir, would you mind?"—then +desperately, "I want to hang it up here, sir!"</p> + +<p>"Here?" he repeated in frank astonishment. "Why?"</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, I—I—it's sunnier here, sir, and I—I think it must be +pining away. It hardly ever sings in my bedroom."</p> + +<p>"Well, but," he began—then seeing the tears gathering on her eyelids, he +finished with laughing good-nature—"as long as Mrs. Leadbatter doesn't +reckon it an extra."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, sir," said Mary Ann, seriously. "I'll tell her. Besides, she +will be glad, because she don't like the canary—she says its singing +disturbs her. Her room is next to mine, you know, Mr. Lancelot."</p> + +<p>"But you said it doesn't sing much."</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, I—I mean in summer," explained Mary Ann, in rosy +confusion; "and—and—it'll soon be summer, sir."</p> + +<p>"Sw—e-e-t!" burst forth the canary, suddenly, as if encouraged by Mary +Ann's opinion.</p> + +<p>It was a pretty little bird—one golden yellow from beak to tail, as +though it had been dipped in sunshine.</p> + +<p>"You see, sir," she cried eagerly, "it's beginning already."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Lancelot, grimly; "but so is Beethoven."</p> + +<p>"I'll hang it high up—in the window," said Mary Ann, "where the dog +can't get at it."</p> + +<p>"Well, I won't take any responsibilities," murmured Lancelot, resignedly.</p> + +<p>"No, sir, I'll attend to that," said Mary Ann, vaguely.</p> + +<p>After the installation of the canary Lancelot found himself slipping more +and more into a continuous matter-of-course flirtation; more and more +forgetting the slavey in the candid young creature who had, at moments, +strange dancing lights in her awakened eyes, strange flashes of witchery +in her ingenuous expression. And yet he made a desultory struggle against +what a secret voice was always whispering was a degradation. He knew she +had no real place in his life; he scarce thought of her save when she +came bodily before his eyes with her pretty face and her trustful glance.</p> + +<p>He felt no temptation to write sonatas on her eyebrow—to borrow Peter's +variation, for the use of musicians, of Shakespeare's "write sonnets on +his mistress's eyebrow"—and, indeed, he knew she could be no fit +mistress for him—this starveling drudge, with passive passions, meek, +accepting, with well-nigh every spark of spontaneity choked out of her. +The women of his dreams were quite other—beautiful, voluptuous, full of +the joy of life, tremulous with poetry and lofty thought, with dark +amorous orbs that flashed responsive to his magic melodies. They hovered +about him as he wrote and played—Venuses rising from the seas of his +music. And then—with his eyes full of the divine tears of youth, with +his brain a hive of winged dreams—he would turn and kiss merely Mary +Ann! Such is the pitiful breed of mortals.</p> + +<p>And after every such fall, he thought more contemptuously of Mary +Ann. Idealise her as he might, see all that was best in her as he +tried to, she remained common and commonplace enough. Her ingenuousness, +while from one point of view it was charming, from another was but a +pleasant synonym for silliness. And it might not be ingenuousness—or +silliness—after all! For, was Mary Ann as innocent as she looked? The +guilelessness of the dove might very well cover the wisdom of the +serpent. The instinct—the repugnance that made him sponge off her first +kiss from his lips—was probably a true instinct. How was it possible a +girl of that class should escape the sordid attentions of street swains? +Even when she was in the country she was well-nigh of wooable age, the +likely cynosure of neighbouring ploughboys' eyes. And what of the other +lodgers!</p> + +<p>A finer instinct—that of a gentleman—kept him from putting any +questions to Mary Ann. Indeed, his own delicacy repudiated the images +that strove to find entry in his brain, even as his fastidiousness shrank +from realising the unlovely details of Mary Ann's daily duties—these +things disgusted him more with himself than with her. And yet he found +himself acquiring a new and illogical interest in the boots he met +outside doors. Early one morning he went halfway up the second flight of +stairs—a strange region where his own boots had never before trod—but +came down ashamed and with fluttering heart as if he had gone up to steal +boots instead of to survey them. He might have asked Mary Ann or her +"missus" who the other tenants were, but he shrank from the topic. Their +hours were not his, and he only once chanced on a fellow-man in the +passage, and then he was not sure it was not the tax-collector. Besides, +he was not really interested—it was only a flicker of idle curiosity as +to the actual psychology of Mary Ann. That he did not really care he +proved to himself by kissing her next time. He accepted her as she +was—because she was there. She brightened his troubled life a little, +and he was quite sure he brightened hers. So he drifted on, not worrying +himself to mean any definite harm to her. He had quite enough worry with +those music publishers.</p> + +<p>The financial outlook was, indeed, becoming terrifying. He was glad there +was nobody to question him, for he did not care to face the facts. +Peter's threat of becoming a regular visitor had been nullified by his +father despatching him to Germany to buy up some more Teutonic patents. +"Wonderful are the ways of Providence!" he had written to Lancelot. "If I +had not flown in the old man's face and picked up a little German here +years ago, I should not be half so useful to him now.... I shall pay a +flying visit to Leipsic—not on business."</p> + +<p>But at last Peter returned, Mrs. Leadbatter panting to the door to let +him in one afternoon without troubling to ask Lancelot if he was "at +home." He burst upon the musician, and found him in the most +undisguisable dumps.</p> + +<p>"Why didn't you answer my letter, you impolite old bear?" Peter asked, +warding off Beethoven with his umbrella.</p> + +<p>"I was busy," Lancelot replied pettishly.</p> + +<p>"Busy writing rubbish. Haven't you got 'Ops.' enough? I bet you haven't +had anything published yet."</p> + +<p>"I am working at a grand opera," he said in dry, mechanical tones. "I +have hopes of getting it put on. Gasco, the <i>impresario</i>, is a member of +my club, and he thinks of running a season in the autumn. I had a talk +with him yesterday."</p> + +<p>"I hope I shall live to see it," said Peter, sceptically.</p> + +<p>"I hope you will," said Lancelot, sharply.</p> + +<p>"None of my family ever lived beyond ninety," said Peter, shaking his +head dolefully; "and then, my heart is not so good as it might be."</p> + +<p>"It certainly isn't!" cried poor Lancelot. "But everybody hits a chap +when he's down."</p> + +<p>He turned his head away, striving to swallow the lump that would rise to +his throat. He had a sense of infinite wretchedness and loneliness.</p> + +<p>"Oh, poor old chap; is it so bad as all that?" Peter's somewhat strident +voice had grown tender as a woman's. He laid his hand affectionately on +Lancelot's tumbled hair. "You know I believe in you with all my soul. I +never doubted your genius for a moment. Don't I know too well that's what +keeps you back? Come, come, old fellow. Can't I persuade you to write +rot? One must keep the pot boiling, you know. You turn out a dozen +popular ballads, and the coin'll follow your music as the rats did the +pied piper's. Then, if you have any ambition left, you kick away the +ladder by which you mounted, and stand on the heights of art."</p> + +<p>"Never!" cried Lancelot. "It would degrade me in my own eyes. I'd rather +starve; and you can't shake them off—the first impression is everything; +they would always be remembered against me," he added after a pause.</p> + +<p>"Motives mixed," reflected Peter. "That's a good sign." Aloud he said, +"Well, you think it over. This is a practical world, old man; it wasn't +made for dreamers. And one of the first dreams that you've got to wake +from is the dream that anybody connected with the stage can be relied on +from one day to the next. They gas for the sake of gassing, or they tell +you pleasant lies out of mere goodwill, just as they call for your +drinks. Their promises are beautiful bubbles, on a basis of soft soap, +and made to 'bust.'"</p> + +<p>"You grow quite eloquent," said Lancelot, with a wan smile.</p> + +<p>"Eloquent! There's more in me than you've yet found out. Now then! Give +us your hand that you'll chuck art, and we'll drink to your popular +ballad—hundredth thousand edition, no drawing-room should be without +it."</p> + +<p>Lancelot flushed. "I was just going to have some tea. I think it's five +o'clock," he murmured.</p> + +<p>"The very thing I'm dying for," cried Peter, energetically; "I'm as +parched as a pea." Inwardly he was shocked to find the stream of whisky +run dry.</p> + +<p>So Lancelot rang the bell, and Mary Ann came up with the tea-tray in the +twilight.</p> + +<p>"We'll have a light," cried Peter, and struck one of his own with a +shadowy underthought of saving Mary Ann from a possible scolding, in case +Lancelot's matches should be again unapparent. Then he uttered a comic +exclamation of astonishment. Mary Ann was putting on a pair of gloves! In +his surprise he dropped the match.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann was equally startled by the unexpected sight of a stranger, but +when he struck his second match her hands were bare and red.</p> + +<p>"What in Heaven's name were you putting on gloves for, my girl?" said +Peter, amused.</p> + +<p>Lancelot stared fixedly at the fire, trying to keep the blood from +flooding his cheeks. He wondered that the ridiculousness of the whole +thing had never struck him in its full force before. Was it possible +he could have made such an ass of himself?</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, I've got to go out, and I'm in a hurry," said Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>Lancelot felt intense relief. An instant after his brow wrinkled itself. +"Oho!" he thought. "So this is Miss Simpleton, is it?"</p> + +<p>"Then why did you take them off again?" retorted Peter.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann's repartee was to burst into tears and leave the room.</p> + +<p>"Now I've offended her," said Peter. "Did you see how she tossed her +pretty head?"</p> + +<p>"Ingenious minx," thought Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"She's left the tray on a chair by the, door," went on Peter. "What an +odd girl! Does she always carry on like this?"</p> + +<p>"She's got such a lot to do. I suppose she sometimes gets a bit queer in +her head," said Lancelot, conceiving he was somehow safeguarding Mary +Ann's honour by the explanation.</p> + +<p>"I don't think that," answered Peter. "She did seem dull and stupid when +I was here last. But I had a good stare at her just now, and she seems +rather bright. Why, her accent is quite refined—she must have picked it +up from you."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, nonsense," exclaimed Lancelot, testily.</p> + +<p>The little danger—or rather the great danger of being made to appear +ridiculous—which he had just passed through, contributed to rouse him +from his torpor. He exerted himself to turn the conversation, and was +quite lively over tea.</p> + +<p>"Sw—eet! Sw—w—w—w—eet!" suddenly broke into the conversation.</p> + +<p>"More mysteries!" cried Peter. "What's that?"</p> + +<p>"Only a canary."</p> + +<p>"What, another musical instrument! Isn't Beethoven jealous? I wonder he +doesn't consume his rival in his wrath. But I never knew you liked +birds."</p> + +<p>"I don't particularly. It isn't mine."</p> + +<p>"Whose is it?"</p> + +<p>Lancelot answered briskly: "Mary Ann's. She asked to be allowed to keep +it here. It seems it won't sing in her attic; it pines away."</p> + +<p>"And do you believe that?"</p> + +<p>"Why not? It doesn't sing much even here."</p> + +<p>"Let me look at it—ah, it's a plain Norwich yellow. If you wanted a +singing canary you should have come to me; I'd have given you one 'made +in Germany'—one of our patents—they train them to sing tunes and that +puts up the price."</p> + +<p>"Thank you, but this one disturbs me sufficiently."</p> + +<p>"Then why do you put up with it?"</p> + +<p>"Why do I put up with that Christmas number supplement over the +mantel-piece? It's part of the furniture. I was asked to let it be here +and I couldn't be rude."</p> + +<p>"No, it's not in your nature. What a bore it must be to feed it! Let me +see, I suppose you give it canary seed biscuits—I hope you don't give +it butter."</p> + +<p>"Don't be an ass!" roared Lancelot. "You don't imagine I bother my head +whether it eats butter or—or marmalade."</p> + +<p>"Who feeds it then?"</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann, of course."</p> + +<p>"She comes in and feeds it?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly."</p> + +<p>"Several times a day?"</p> + +<p>"I suppose so."</p> + +<p>"Lancelot," said Peter, solemnly. "Mary Ann's mashed on you."</p> + +<p>Lancelot shrank before Peter's remark as a burglar from a policeman's +bull's-eye. The bull's-eye seemed to cast a new light on Mary Ann, too, +but he felt too unpleasantly dazzled to consider that for the moment; his +whole thought was to get out of the line of light.</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" he answered; "why, I'm hardly ever in when she feeds it, and +I believe it eats all day long—gets supplied in the morning like a +coal-scuttle. Besides, she comes in to dust and all that when she +pleases. And I do wish you wouldn't use that word 'mashed.' I loathe it."</p> + +<p>Indeed, he writhed under the thought of being coupled with Mary Ann. The +thing sounded so ugly—so squalid. In the actual, it was not so +unpleasant, but looked at from the outside—unsympathetically—it +was hopelessly vulgar, incurably plebeian. He shuddered.</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Peter. "It's a very expressive word, is 'mashed.' +But I will make allowance for your poetical feelings and give up the +word—except in its literal sense, of course. I'm sure you wouldn't +object to mashing a music publisher!"</p> + +<p>Lancelot laughed with false heartiness. "Oh, but if I'm to write those +popular ballads, you say he'll become my best friend."</p> + +<p>"Of course he will," cried Peter, eagerly sniffing at the red herring +Lancelot had thrown across the track. "You stand out for a royalty on +every copy, so that if you strike ile—oh, I beg your pardon, that's +another of the phrases you object to, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Don't be a fool," said Lancelot, laughing on. "You know I only object to +that in connection with English peers marrying the daughters of men who +have done it."</p> + +<p>"Oh, is that it? I wish you'd publish an expurgated dictionary with most +of the words left out, and exact definitions of the conditions under +which one may use the remainder. But I've got on a siding. What was I +talking about?"</p> + +<p>"Royalty," muttered Lancelot, languidly.</p> + +<p>"Royalty? No. You mentioned the aristocracy, I think." Then he burst into +a hearty laugh. "Oh, yes—on that ballad. Now, look here! I've brought +a ballad with me, just to show you—a thing that is going like wildfire."</p> + +<p>"Not <i>Good-night and Good-by</i>, I hope," laughed Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"Yes—the very one!" cried Peter, astonished.</p> + +<p>"<i>Himmel!</i>" groaned Lancelot, in comic despair.</p> + +<p>"You know it already?" inquired Peter, eagerly.</p> + +<p>"No; only I can't open a paper without seeing the advertisement and the +sickly sentimental refrain."</p> + +<p>"You see how famous it is, anyway," said Peter. "And if you want to +strike—er—to make a hit you'll just take that song and do a deliberate +imitation of it."</p> + +<p>"Wha-a-a-t!" gasped Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"My dear chap, they all do it. When the public cotton to a thing, they +can't have enough of it."</p> + +<p>"But I can write my own rot, surely."</p> + +<p>"In the face of all this litter of 'Ops.' I daren't dispute that for a +moment. But it isn't enough to write rot—the public want a particular +kind of rot. Now just play that over—oblige me." He laid both hands on +Lancelot's shoulders in amicable appeal.</p> + +<p>Lancelot shrugged them, but seated himself at the piano, played the +introductory chords, and commenced singing the words in his pleasant +baritone.</p> + +<p>Suddenly Beethoven ran towards the door, howling.</p> + +<p>Lancelot ceased playing and looked approvingly at the animal.</p> + +<p>"By Jove! he wants to go out. What an ear for music that animal's got."</p> + +<p>Peter smiled grimly. "It's long enough. I suppose that's why you call him +Beethoven."</p> + +<p>"Not at all. Beethoven had no ear—at least not in his latest period—he +was deaf. Lucky devil! That is, if this sort of thing was brought round +on barrel-organs."</p> + +<p>"Never mind, old man! Finish the thing."</p> + +<p>"But consider Beethoven's feelings!"</p> + +<p>"Hang Beethoven!"</p> + +<p>"Poor Beethoven. Come here, my poor maligned musical critic! Would they +give you a bad name and hang you? Now you must be very quiet. Put your +paws into those lovely long ears of yours, if it gets too horrible. You +have been used to high-class music, I know, but this is the sort of thing +that England expects every man to do, so the sooner you get used to it, +the better." He ran his fingers along the keys. "There, Peter, he's +growling already. I'm sure he'll start again, the moment I strike the +theme."</p> + +<p>"Let him! We'll take it as a spaniel obligato."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but his accompaniments are too staccato. He has no sense of time."</p> + +<p>"Why don't you teach him, then, to wag his tail like the pendulum of a +metronome? He'd be more use to you that way than setting up to be a +musician, which Nature never meant him for—his hair's not long enough. +But go ahead, old man, Beethoven's behaving himself now."</p> + +<p>Indeed, as if he were satisfied with his protest, the little beast +remained quiet, while his lord and master went through the piece. He did +not even interrupt at the refrain:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Kiss me, good-night, dear love,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Dream of the old delight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My spirit is summoned above,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Kiss me, dear love, good-night."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"I must say it's not so awful as I expected," said Lancelot, candidly; +"it's not at all bad—for a waltz."</p> + +<p>"There, you see!" cried Peter, eagerly; "the public are not such fools +after all."</p> + +<p>"Still, the words are the most maudlin twaddle!" said Lancelot, as if he +found some consolation in the fact.</p> + +<p>"Yes, but I didn't write <i>them</i>!" replied Peter, quickly. Then he grew +red and laughed an embarrassed laugh. "I didn't mean to tell you, old +man. But there—the cat's out. That's what took me to Brahmson's that +afternoon we met! And I harmonised it myself, mind you, every crotchet. I +picked up enough at the Conservatoire for that. You know lots of fellows +only do the tune—they give out all the other work."</p> + +<p>"So you are the great Keeley Lesterre, eh?" said Lancelot, in amused +astonishment.</p> + +<p>"Yes; I have to do it under another name. I don't want to grieve the old +man. You see, I promised him to reform, when he took me back to his +heart and business."</p> + +<p>"Is that strictly honourable, Peter?" said Lancelot, shaking his head.</p> + +<p>"Oh, well! I couldn't give it up altogether, but I do practically stick +to the contract—it's all overtime, you know. It doesn't interfere a bit +with business. Besides, as you'd say, it isn't music," he said slyly. +"And just because I don't want it I make a heap of coin out of it—that's +why I'm so vexed at your keeping me still in your debt."</p> + +<p>Lancelot frowned. "Then you had no difficulty in getting published?" he +asked.</p> + +<p>"I don't say that. It was bribery and corruption so far as my first song +was concerned. I tipped a professional to go down and tell Brahmson he +was going to take it up. You know, of course, well-known singers get +half-a-guinea from the publisher every time they sing a song."</p> + +<p>"No; do they?" said Lancelot. "How mean of them!"</p> + +<p>"Business, my boy. It pays the publisher to give it them. Look at the +advertisement!"</p> + +<p>"But suppose a really fine song was published, and the publisher refused +to pay this blood-money?"</p> + +<p>"Then I suppose they'd sing some other song, and let that moulder on the +foolish publisher's shelves."</p> + +<p>"Great Heavens!" said Lancelot, jumping up from the piano in wild +excitement. "Then a musician's reputation is really at the mercy of a +mercenary crew of singers, who respect neither art nor themselves. Oh, +yes, we are indeed a musical people!"</p> + +<p>"Easy there! Several of 'em are pals of mine, and I'll get them to take +up those ballads of yours as soon as you write 'em."</p> + +<p>"Let them go to the devil with their ballads!" roared Lancelot, and with +a sweep of his arm whirled <i>Good-night</i> and <i>Good-by</i> into the air. Peter +picked it up and wrote something on it with a stylographic pen which he +produced from his waistcoat pocket.</p> + +<p>"There!" he said, "that'll make you remember it's your own property—and +mine—that you are treating so disrespectfully."</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon, old chap," said Lancelot, rebuked and remorseful.</p> + +<p>"Don't mention it," replied Peter. "And whenever you decide to become +rich and famous—there's your model."</p> + +<p>"Never! Never! Never!" cried Lancelot, when Peter went at ten. "My poor +Beethoven! What you must have suffered! Never mind, I'll play you your +moonlight sonata."</p> + +<p>He touched the keys gently and his sorrows and his temptations faded from +him. He glided into Bach, and then into Chopin and Mendelssohn, and at +last drifted into dreamy improvisation, his fingers moving almost of +themselves, his eyes half closed, seeing only inward visions.</p> + +<p>And then, all at once, he awoke with a start, for Beethoven was barking +towards the door, with pricked-up ears and rigid tail.</p> + +<p>"Sh! You little beggar," he murmured, becoming conscious that the hour +was late, and that he himself had been noisy at unbeseeming hours. +"What's the matter with you?" And, with a sudden thought, he threw open +the door.</p> + +<p>It was merely Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>Her face—flashed so unexpectedly upon him—had the piquancy of a vision, +but its expression was one of confusion and guilt; there were tears on +her cheeks; in her hand was a bedroom candle-stick.</p> + +<p>She turned quickly, and began to mount the stairs. Lancelot put his hand +on her shoulder, and turned her face towards him and said in an imperious +whisper:—</p> + +<p>"Now then, what's up? What are you crying about?"</p> + +<p>"I ain't—I mean I'm <i>not</i> crying," said Mary Ann, with a sob in her +breath.</p> + +<p>"Come, come, don't fib. What's the matter?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not crying, it's only the music," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"The music," he echoed, bewildered.</p> + +<p>"Yessir. The music always makes me cry—but you can't call it crying—it +feels so nice."</p> + +<p>"Oh, then you've been listening!"</p> + +<p>"Yessir." Her eyes drooped in humiliation.</p> + +<p>"But you ought to have been in bed," he said. "You get little enough +sleep as it is."</p> + +<p>"It's better than sleep," she answered.</p> + +<p>The simple phrase vibrated through him, like a beautiful minor chord. He +smoothed her hair tenderly.</p> + +<p>"Poor child!" he said.</p> + +<p>There was an instant's silence. It was past midnight, and the house was +painfully still. They stood upon the dusky landing, across which a bar of +light streamed from his half-open door, and only Beethoven's eyes were +upon them. But Lancelot felt no impulse to fondle her, only just to lay +his hand on her hair, as in benediction and pity.</p> + +<p>"So you liked what I was playing," he said, not without a pang of +personal pleasure.</p> + +<p>"Yessir; I never heard you play that before."</p> + +<p>"So you often listen!"</p> + +<p>"I can hear you, even in the kitchen. Oh, it's just lovely! I don't care +what I have to do then, if it's grates or plates or steps. The music goes +and goes, and I feel back in the country again, and standing, as I used +to love to stand of an evening, by the stile, under the big elm, and +watch how the sunset did redden the white birches, and fade in the water. +Oh, it was so nice in the springtime, with the hawthorn that grew on the +other bank, and the bluebells—"</p> + +<p>The pretty face was full of dreamy tenderness, the eyes lit up +witchingly. She pulled herself up suddenly, and stole a shy glance at +her auditor.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, go on," he said; "tell me all you feel about the music."</p> + +<p>"And there's one song you sometimes play that makes me feel floating on +and on like a great white swan."</p> + +<p>She hummed a few bars of the <i>Gondel-Lied</i>—flawlessly.</p> + +<p>"Dear me! you have an ear!" he said, pinching it. "And how did you like +what I was playing just now?" he went on, growing curious to know how his +own improvisations struck her.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I liked it so much," she whispered back, enthusiastically; +"because it reminded me of my favourite one—every moment I did think—I +thought—you were going to come into that."</p> + +<p>The whimsical sparkle leapt into his eyes. "And I thought I was so +original," he murmured.</p> + +<p>"But what I liked best," she began, then checked herself, as if suddenly +remembering she had never made a spontaneous remark before, and lacking +courage to establish a precedent.</p> + +<p>"Yes—what you liked best?" he said encouragingly.</p> + +<p>"That song you sang this afternoon," she said shyly.</p> + +<p>"What song? I sang no song," he said, puzzled for a moment.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes! That one about—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'Kiss me, dear love, good-night.'<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"I was going upstairs but it made me stop just here—and cry."</p> + +<p>He made his comic grimace.</p> + +<p>"So it was you Beethoven was barking at! And I thought he had an ear! And +I thought you had an ear! But no! You're both Philistines after all. +Heigho!"</p> + +<p>She looked sad. "Oughtn't I to ha' liked it?" she asked anxiously.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," he said reassuringly; "it's very popular. No drawing-room is +without it."</p> + +<p>She detected the ironic ring in his voice. "It wasn't so much the music," +she began apologetically.</p> + +<p>"Now—now you're going to spoil yourself," he said. "Be natural."</p> + +<p>"But it wasn't," she protested. "It was the words—"</p> + +<p>"That's worse," he murmured below his breath.</p> + +<p>"They reminded me of my mother as she laid dying."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Lancelot.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir, mother was a long time dying—it was when I was a little girl +and I used to nurse her—I fancy it was our little Sally's death that +killed her, she took to her bed after the funeral and never left it till +she went to her own," said Mary Ann, with unconscious flippancy. "She +used to look up to the ceiling and say that she was going to little +Sallie, and I remember I was such a silly then, I brought mother flowers +and apples and bits of cake to take to Sally with my love. I put them on +her pillow, but the flowers faded and the cake got mouldy—mother was +such a long time dying—and at last I ate the apples myself, I was so +tired of waiting. Wasn't I silly?" And Mary Ann laughed a little laugh +with tears in it. Then growing grave again, she added: "And at last, when +mother was really on the point of death, she forgot all about little +Sally and said she was going to meet Tom. And I remember thinking she was +going to America—I didn't know people talk nonsense before they die."</p> + +<p>"They do—a great deal of it, unfortunately," said Lancelot, lightly, +trying to disguise from himself that his eyes were moist. He seemed to +realise now what she was—a child; a child who, simpler than most +children to start with, had grown only in body, whose soul had been +stunted by uncounted years of dull and monotonous drudgery. The blood +burnt in his veins as he thought of the cruelty of circumstance and the +heartless honesty of her mistress. He made up his mind for the second +time to give Mrs. Leadbatter a piece of his mind in the morning.</p> + +<p>"Well, go to bed now, my poor child," he said, "or you'll get no rest at +all."</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>She went obediently up a couple of stairs, then turned her head +appealingly towards him. The tears still glimmered on her eyelashes. For +an instant he thought she was expecting her kiss, but she only wanted to +explain anxiously once again, "That was why I liked that song, 'Kiss me, +good-night, dear love.' It was what my mother—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, I understand," he broke in, half amused, though somehow the +words did not seem so full of maudlin pathos to him now. "And there—" he +drew her head towards him—"Kiss <i>me</i>, good-night—"</p> + +<p>He did not complete the quotation; indeed, her lips were already drawn +too close to his. But, ere he released her, the long-repressed thought +had found expression.</p> + +<p>"You don't kiss anybody but me?" he said half playfully.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, sir," said Mary Ann, earnestly.</p> + +<p>"What!" more lightly still. "Haven't you got half a dozen young men?"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann shook her head, more regretfully than resentfully. "I told you I +never go out—except for little errands."</p> + +<p>She had told him, but his attention had been so concentrated on the +ungrammatical form in which she had conveyed the information, that the +fact itself had made no impression. Now his anger against Mrs. Leadbatter +dwindled. After all, she was wise in not giving Mary Ann the run of the +London streets.</p> + +<p>"But"—he hesitated. "How about the—the milkman—and the—the other +gentlemen?"</p> + +<p>"Please, sir," said Mary Ann, "I don't like them."</p> + +<p>After that no man could help expressing his sense of her good taste.</p> + +<p>"Then you won't kiss anybody but me," he said, as he let her go for the +last time. He had a Quixotic sub-consciousness that he was saving her +from his kind by making her promise formally.</p> + +<p>"How could I, Mr. Lancelot?" And the brimming eyes shone with soft light. +"I never shall—never."</p> + +<p>It sounded like a troth.</p> + +<p>He went back to the room and shut the door, but could not shut out her +image. The picture she had unwittingly supplied of herself took +possession of his imagination: he saw her almost as a dream-figure—the +virginal figure he knew—standing by the stream in the sunset, amid the +elms and silver birches, with daisies in her hands and bluebells at her +feet, inhaling the delicate scent that wafted from the white hawthorn +bushes, and watching the water glide along till it seemed gradually to +wash away the fading colours of the sunset that glorified it. And as he +dwelt on the vision he felt harmonies and phrases stirring and singing in +his brain, like a choir of awakened birds. Quickly he seized paper and +wrote down the theme that flowed out at the point of his pen—a reverie +full of the haunting magic of quiet waters and woodland sunsets and the +gracious innocence of maidenhood. When it was done he felt he must give +it a distinctive name. He cast about for one, pondering and rejecting +titles innumerable. Countless lines of poetry ran through his head, from +which he sought to pick a word or two as one plucks a violet from a posy. +At last a half-tender, half-whimsical look came into his face, and +picking his pen out of his hair, he wrote merely—"Marianne."</p> + +<p>It was only natural that Mary Ann should be unable to maintain +herself—or be maintained—at this idyllic level. But her fall was +aggravated by two circumstances, neither of which had any particular +business to occur. The first was an intimation from the misogamist German +Professor that he had persuaded another of his old pupils to include a +prize-symphony by Lancelot in the programme of a Crystal Palace Concert. +This was of itself sufficient to turn Lancelot's head away from all but +thoughts of Fame, even if Mary Ann had not been luckless enough to be +again discovered cleaning the steps—and without gloves. Against such a +spectacle the veriest idealist is powerless. If Mary Ann did not +immediately revert to the category of quadrupeds in which she had +started, it was only because of Lancelot's supplementary knowledge of the +creature. But as he passed her by, solicitous as before not to tread upon +her, he felt as if all the cold water in her pail were pouring down the +back of his neck.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, the effect of both of these turns of fortune was transient. +The symphony was duly performed, and dismissed in the papers as +promising, if over-ambitious; the only tangible result was a suggestion +from the popular composer, who was a member of his club, that Lancelot +should collaborate with him in a comic opera, for the production of which +he had facilities. The composer confessed he had a fluent gift of tune, +but had no liking for the drudgery of orchestration, and, as Lancelot was +well up in these tedious technicalities, the two might strike a +partnership to mutual advantage.</p> + +<p>Lancelot felt insulted, but retained enough mastery of himself to reply +that he would think it over. As he gave no signs of life or thought, the +popular composer then wrote to him at length on the subject, offering him +fifty pounds for the job, half of it on account. Lancelot was in sore +straits when he got the letter, for his stock of money was dwindling to +vanishing point, and he dallied with the temptation sufficiently to take +the letter home with him. But his spirit was not yet broken, and the +letter, crumpled like a rag, was picked up by Mary Ann and straightened +out, and carefully placed upon the mantel-shelf.</p> + +<p>Time did something of a similar service for Mary Ann herself, picking +her up from the crumpled attitude in which Lancelot had detected her on +the doorstep, straightening her out again, and replacing her upon her +semi-poetic pedestal. But, as with the cream-laid note-paper, the +wrinklings could not be effaced entirely; which was more serious for Mary +Ann.</p> + +<p>Not that Mary Ann was conscious of these diverse humours in Lancelot. +Unconscious of changes in herself she could not conceive herself related +to his variations of mood; still less did she realise the inward +struggle, of which she was the cause. She was vaguely aware that he had +external worries, for all his grandeur, and if he was by turns brusque, +affectionate, indifferent, playful, brutal, charming, callous, +demonstrative, she no more connected herself with these vicissitudes than +with the caprices of the weather. If her sun smiled once a day it was +enough. How should she know that his indifference was often a victory +over himself, as his amativeness was a defeat?</p> + +<p>If any excuse could be found for Lancelot, it would be that which he +administered to his conscience morning and evening like a soothing syrup. +His position was grown so desperate that Mary Ann almost stood between +him and suicide. Continued disappointment made his soul sick; his proud +heart fed on itself. He would bite his lips till the blood came, vowing +never to give in. And not only would he not move an inch from his ideal, +he would rather die than gratify Peter by falling back on him; he would +never even accept that cheque which was virtually his own.</p> + +<p>It was wonderful how, in his stoniest moments, the sight of Mary Ann's +candid face, eloquent with dumb devotion, softened and melted him. He +would take her gloved hand and press it silently. And Mary Ann never knew +one iota of his inmost thought! He could not bring himself to that; +indeed, she never for a moment appeared to him in the light of an +intelligent being; at her best she was a sweet, simple, loving child. And +he scarce spoke to her at all now—theirs was a silent communion—he had +no heart to converse with her as he had done. The piano too was almost +silent; the canary sang less and less, though spring was coming, and +glints of sunshine stole between the wires of its cage; even Beethoven +sometimes failed to bark when there was a knock at the street door.</p> + +<p>And at last there came a day when—for the first time in his +life—Lancelot inspected his wardrobe, and hunted together his odds and +ends of jewelry. From this significant task he was aroused by hearing +Mrs. Leadbatter coughing in his sitting-room.</p> + +<p>He went in with an interrogative look.</p> + +<p>"Oh, my chest!" said Mrs. Leadbatter, patting it. "It's no use my denyin' +of it, sir, I'm done up. It's as much as I can do to crawl up to the top +to bed. I'm thinkin' I shall have to make up a bed in the kitchen. It +only shows 'ow right I was to send for my Rosie, though quite the lady, +and where will you find a nattier nursemaid in all Bayswater?"</p> + +<p>"Nowhere," assented Lancelot, automatically.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I didn't know you'd noticed her running in to see 'er pore old +mother of a Sunday arternoon," said Mrs. Leadbatter, highly gratified. +"Well, sir, I won't say anything about the hextry gas, though a poor +widder and sevenpence hextry on the thousand, but I'm thinkin' if you +would give my Rosie a lesson once a week on that there pianner, it would +be a kind of set-off, for you know, sir, the policeman tells me your +winder is a landmark to 'im on the foggiest nights."</p> + +<p>Lancelot flushed, then wrinkled his brows. This was a new idea +altogether. Mrs. Leadbatter stood waiting for his reply, with a +deferential smile tempered by asthmatic contortions.</p> + +<p>"But have you got a piano of your own?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, sir," cried Mrs. Leadbatter, almost reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"Well; but how is your Rosie to practise? One lesson a week is of very +little use anyway, but unless she practises a good deal it'll only be a +waste of time."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you don't know my Rosie," said Mrs. Leadbatter, shaking her head +with sceptical pride. "You mustn't judge by other gels—the way that gel +picks up things is—well, I'll just tell you what 'er school-teacher, +Miss Whiteman said. She says—"</p> + +<p>"My good lady," interrupted Lancelot, "I practised six hours a day +myself."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but it don't come so natural to a man," said Mrs. Leadbatter, +unshaken. "And it don't look natural neither to see a man playin' the +pianner—it's like seein' him knittin'."</p> + +<p>But Lancelot was knitting his brows in a way that was exceedingly +natural. "I may as well tell you at once that what you propose is +impossible. First of all, because I am doubtful whether I shall remain +in these rooms; and secondly, because I am giving up the piano +immediately. I only have it on hire, and I—I—" He felt himself +blushing.</p> + +<p>"Oh, what a pity!" interrupted Mrs. Leadbatter. "You might as well let me +go on payin' the hinstalments, instead of lettin' all you've paid go for +nothing. Rosie ain't got much time, but I could allow 'er a 'our a day if +it was my own pianner."</p> + +<p>Lancelot explained "hire" did not mean the "hire system." But the idea of +acquiring the piano, having once fired Mrs. Leadbatter's brain, could not +be extinguished. The unexpected conclusion arrived at was that she was to +purchase the piano on the hire system, allowing it to stand in Lancelot's +room, and that five shillings a week should be taken off his rent in +return for six lessons of an hour each, one of the hours counterbalancing +the gas grievance. Reviewing the bargain, when Mrs. Leadbatter was gone, +Lancelot did not think it at all bad for him.</p> + +<p>"Use of the piano. Gas," he murmured, with a pathetic smile, recalling +the advertisements he had read before lighting on Mrs. Leadbatter's. "And +five shillings a week—it's a considerable relief! There's no loss of +dignity either—for nobody will know. But I wonder what the governor +would have said!"</p> + +<p>The thought shook him with silent laughter; a spectator might have +fancied he was sobbing.</p> + +<p>But, after the lessons began, it might almost be said it was only when a +spectator was present that he was not sobbing. For Rosie, who was an +awkward, ungraceful young person, proved to be the dullest and most +butter-fingered pupil ever invented for the torture of teachers; at +least, so Lancelot thought, but then he had never had any other pupils, +and was not patient. It must be admitted, though, that Rosie giggled +perpetually, apparently finding endless humour in her own mistakes. But +the climax of the horror was the attendance of Mrs. Leadbatter at the +lessons, for, to Lancelot's consternation, she took it for granted that +her presence was part of the contract. She marched into the room in her +best cap, and sat, smiling, in the easy chair, wheezing complacently and +beating time with her foot. Occasionally she would supplement Lancelot's +critical observations.</p> + +<p>"It ain't as I fears to trust 'er with you, sir," she also remarked about +three times a week, "for I knows, sir, you're a gentleman. But it's the +neighbours; they never can mind their own business. I told 'em you was +going to give my Rosie lessons, and you know, sir, that they <i>will</i> talk +of what don't concern 'em. And, after all, sir, it's an hour, and an +hour is sixty minutes, ain't it, sir?"</p> + +<p>And Lancelot, groaning inwardly, and unable to deny this chronometry, +felt that an ironic Providence was punishing him for his attentions to +Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>And yet he only felt more tenderly towards Mary Ann. Contrasted with +these two vulgar females, whom he came to conceive as her oppressors, +sitting in gauds and finery, and taking lessons which had better befitted +their Cinderella—the figure of Mary Ann definitely reassumed some of its +antediluvian poetry, if we may apply the adjective to that catastrophic +washing of the steps. And Mary Ann herself had grown gloomier—once or +twice he thought she had been crying, though he was too numbed and +apathetic to ask, and was incapable of suspecting that Rosie had anything +to do with her tears. He hardly noticed that Rosie had taken to feeding +the canary; the question of how he should feed himself was becoming every +day more and more menacing. He saw starvation slowly closing in upon him +like the walls of a torture-chamber. He had grown quite familiar with the +pawn-shop now, though he still slipped in as though his goods were +stolen.</p> + +<p>And at last there came a moment when Lancelot felt he could bear it no +longer. And then he suddenly saw daylight. Why should he teach only +Rosie? Nay, why should he teach Rosie at all? If he <i>was</i> reduced to +giving lessons—and after all it was no degradation to do so, no +abandonment of his artistic ideal, rather a solution of the difficulty so +simple that he wondered it had not occurred to him before—why should he +give them at so wretched a price? He would get another pupil, other +pupils, who would enable him to dispense with the few shillings he made +by Rosie. He would not ask anybody to recommend him pupils—there was no +need for his acquaintances to know, and if he asked Peter, Peter would +probably play him some philanthropic trick. No, he would advertise.</p> + +<p>After he had spent his last gold breast-pin in advertisements, he +realised that to get pianoforte pupils in London was as easy as to get +songs published. By the time he quite realised it, it was May, and then +he sat down to realise his future.</p> + +<p>The future was sublimely simple—as simple as his wardrobe had grown. +All his clothes were on his back. In a week or two he would be on the +streets; for a poor widow could not be expected to lodge, partially board +(with use of the piano, gas), an absolutely penniless young gentleman, +though he combined the blood of twenty county families with the genius of +a pleiad of tone poets.</p> + +<p>There was only one bright spot in the prospect. Rosie's lessons would +come to an end.</p> + +<p>What he would do when he got on the streets was not so clear as the +rest of this prophetic vision. He might take to a barrel-organ—but that +would be a cruel waste of his artistic touch. Perhaps he would die on a +doorstep, like the professor of many languages, whose starvation was +recorded in that very morning's paper.</p> + +<p>Thus, driven by the saturnine necessity that sneers at our puny +resolutions, Lancelot began to meditate surrender. For surrender of some +sort must be—either of life or ideal. After so steadfast and protracted +a struggle—oh, it was cruel, it was terrible; how noble, how high-minded +he had been; and this was how the fates dealt with him—but at that +moment—</p> + +<p>"Sw—eet," went the canary, and filled the room with its rapturous +demi-semi-quavers, its throat swelling, its little body throbbing with +joy of the sunshine. And then Lancelot remembered—not the joy of the +sunshine, not the joy of life—no, merely Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>Noble! high-minded! No, let Peter think that, let posterity think that. +But he could not cozen himself thus! He had fallen—horribly, vulgarly. +How absurd of him to set himself up as a saint, a martyr, an idealist! He +could not divide himself into two compartments like that and pretend that +only one counted in his character. Who was he to talk of dying for art? +No, he was but an everyday man. He wanted Mary Ann—yes, he might as well +admit that to himself now. It was no use humbugging himself any longer. +Why should he give her up? She was his discovery, his treasure-trove, +his property.</p> + +<p>And if he could stoop to her, why should he not stoop to popular work, to +devilling, to anything that would rid him of these sordid cares? Bah! +away with all pretences!</p> + +<p>Was not this shamefaced pawning as vulgar, as wounding to the artist's +soul as the turning out of tawdry melodies?</p> + +<p>Yes, he would escape from Mrs. Leadbatter and her Rosie; he would write +to that popular composer—he had noticed his letter lying on the +mantel-piece the other day—and accept the fifty pounds, and whatever he +did he could do anonymously, so that Peter wouldn't know, after all; he +would escape from this wretched den and take a flat far away, somewhere +where nobody knew him, and there he would sit and work, with Mary Ann for +his housekeeper. Poor Mary Ann! How glad she would be when he told her! +The tears came into his eyes as he thought of her naïve delight. He would +rescue her from this horrid, monotonous slavery, and—happy thought—he +would have her to give lessons to instead of Rosie.</p> + +<p>Yes, he would refine her; prune away all that reminded him of her wild +growth, so that it might no longer humiliate him to think to what a +companion he had sunk. How happy they would be! Of course the world would +censure him if it knew, but the world was stupid and prosaic, and +measured all things by its coarse rule of thumb. It was the best thing +that could happen to Mary Ann—the best thing in the world. And then the +world <i>wouldn't</i> know.</p> + +<p>"Sw—eet," went the canary. "Sw—eet."</p> + +<p>This time the joy of the bird penetrated to his own soul—the joy of +life, the joy of the sunshine. He rang the bell violently, as though he +were sounding a clarion of defiance, the trumpet of youth.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann knocked at the door, came in, and began to draw on her gloves.</p> + +<p>He was in a mad mood—the incongruity struck him so that he burst into a +roar of laughter.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann paused, flushed, and bit her lip. The touch of resentment he had +never noted before gave her a novel charm, spicing her simplicity.</p> + +<p>He came over to her and took her half-bare hands. No, they were not so +terrible, after all. Perhaps she had awakened to her iniquities, and had +been trying to wash them white. His last hesitation as to her worthiness +to live with him vanished.</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann," he said, "I'm going to leave these rooms."</p> + +<p>The flush deepened, but the anger faded. She was a child again—her big +eyes full of tears. He felt her hands tremble in his.</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann," he went on, "how would you like me to take you with me?"</p> + +<p>"Do you mean it, sir?" she asked eagerly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, dear." It was the first time he had used the word. The blood +throbbed madly in her ears. "If you will come with me—and be my +little housekeeper—we will go away to some nice spot, and be quite +alone together—in the country if you like, amid the foxglove and +the meadowsweet, or by the green waters, where you shall stand in the +sunset and dream; and I will teach you music and the piano"—her eyes +dilated—"and you shall not do any of this wretched nasty work any more. +What do you say?"</p> + +<p>"Sw—eet, sw—eet," said the canary, in thrilling jubilation.</p> + +<p>Her happiness was choking her—she could not speak.</p> + +<p>"And we will take the canary, too—unless I say good-by to you as well."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, you mustn't leave us here!"</p> + +<p>"And then," he said slowly, "it will not be good-by—nor good-night. Do +you understand?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," she breathed, and her face shone.</p> + +<p>"But think, think, Mary Ann," he said, a sudden pang of compunction +shooting through his breast. He released her hands. "<i>Do</i> you +understand?"</p> + +<p>"I understand—I shall be with you, always."</p> + +<p>He replied uneasily, "I shall look after you—always."</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes," she breathed. Her bosom heaved. "Always."</p> + +<p>Then his very first impression of her as "a sort of white Topsy" recurred +to him suddenly and flashed into speech.</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann, I don't believe you know how you came into the world. I dare +say you 'specs you growed."</p> + +<p>"No, sir," said Mary Ann, gravely; "God made me."</p> + +<p>That shook him strangely for a moment. But the canary sang on:—</p> + +<p>"Sw-eet. Sw-w-w-w-w-eet."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="III.__" id="III.__"></a>III</h2> + + +<p>And so it was settled. He wrote the long-delayed answer to the popular +composer, found him still willing to give out his orchestration, and they +met by appointment at the club.</p> + +<p>"I've got hold of a splendid book," said the popular composer. "Awfully +clever; jolly original. Bound to go—from the French, you know. Haven't +had time to set to work on it—old engagement to run over to Monte Carlo +for a few days—but I'll leave you the book; you might care to look over +it. And—I say—if any catchy tunes suggest themselves as you go along, +you might just jot them down, you know. Not worth while losing an idea; +eh, my boy! Ha! ha! ha! Well, good-by. See you again when I come back; +don't suppose I shall be away more than a month. Good-by!" And, having +shaken his hand with tremendous cordiality, the popular composer rushed +downstairs and into a hansom.</p> + +<p>Lancelot walked home with the libretto and the five five-pound notes. He +asked for Mrs. Leadbatter, and gave her a week's notice. He wanted to +drop Rosie immediately, on the plea of pressure of work, but her mother +received the suggestion with ill grace, and said that Rosie should come +up and practise on her own piano all the same, so he yielded to the +complexities of the situation, and found hope a wonderful sweetener of +suffering. Despite Rosie and her giggling, and Mrs. Leadbatter and her +best cap and her asthma, the week went by almost cheerfully. He worked +regularly at the comic opera, nearly as happy as the canary which sang +all day long, and, though scarcely a word more passed between him and +Mary Ann, their eyes met ever and anon in the consciousness of a sweet +secret.</p> + +<p>It was already Friday afternoon. He gathered together his few personal +belongings—his books, his manuscripts, <i>opera</i> innumerable. There was +room in his portmanteau for everything—now he had no clothes. On the +Monday the long nightmare would be over. He would go down to some obscure +seaside nook and live very quietly for a few weeks, and gain strength and +calm in the soft spring airs, and watch hand-in-hand with Mary Ann the +rippling scarlet trail of the setting sun fade across the green waters. +Life, no doubt, would be hard enough still. Struggles and trials enough +were yet before him, but he would not think of that now—enough that for +a month or two there would be bread and cheese and kisses. And then, in +the midst of a tender reverie, with his hand on the lid of his +portmanteau, he was awakened by ominous sounds of objurgation from the +kitchen.</p> + +<p>His heart stood still. He went down a few stairs and listened.</p> + +<p>"Not another stroke of work do you do in my house, Mary Ann!" Then there +was silence, save for the thumping of his own heart. What had happened?</p> + +<p>He heard Mrs. Leadbatter mounting the kitchen stairs, wheezing and +grumbling, "Well, of all the sly little things!"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann had been discovered. His blood ran cold at the thought. The +silly creature had been unable to keep the secret.</p> + +<p>"Not a word about 'im all this time. Oh, the sly little thing! Who would +hever a-believed it?"</p> + +<p>And then, in the intervals of Mrs. Leadbatter's groanings, there came to +him the unmistakable sound of Mary Ann sobbing—violently, hysterically. +He turned from cold to hot in a fever of shame and humiliation. How had +it all come about? Oh, yes, he could guess. The gloves! What a fool he +had been! Mrs. Leadbatter had unearthed the box. Why did he give her more +than the pair that could always be kept hidden in her pocket? Yes, it was +the gloves. And then there was the canary. Mrs. Leadbatter had suspected +he was leaving her for a reason. She had put two and two together, she +had questioned Mary Ann, and the ingenuous little idiot had naively told +her he was going to take her with him. It didn't really matter, of +course; he didn't suppose Mrs. Leadbatter could exercise any control over +Mary Ann, but it was horrible to be discussed by her and Rosie; and then +there was that meddlesome vicar, who might step in and make things nasty.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Leadbatter's steps and wheezes and grumblings had arrived in the +passage, and Lancelot hastily stole back into his room, his heart +continuing to flutter painfully.</p> + +<p>He heard the complex noises reach his landing, pass by, and move up +higher. She wasn't coming in to him then; he could endure the suspense no +longer. He threw open his door and said, "Is there anything the matter?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Leadbatter paused and turned her head.</p> + +<p>"His there anything the matter!" she echoed, looking down upon him. "A +nice thing when a woman's troubled with hastmer and brought 'ome 'er +daughter to take 'er place, that she should 'ave to start 'untin' +afresh!"</p> + +<p>"Why, is Rosie going away?" he said, immeasurably relieved.</p> + +<p>"My Rosie! She's the best girl breathing. It's that there Mary Ann!"</p> + +<p>"Wh-a-t!" he stammered. "Mary Ann leaving you?"</p> + +<p>"Well, you don't suppose," replied Mrs. Leadbatter, angrily, "as +I can keep a gel in my kitchen as is a-goin' to 'ave 'er own +nors-end-kerridge!"</p> + +<p>"Her own horse and carriage!" repeated Lancelot, utterly dazed. "Whatever +are you talking about?"</p> + +<p>"Well—there's the letter!" exclaimed Mrs. Leadbatter, indignantly. +"See for yourself if you don't believe me. I don't know how much +two and a 'arf million dollars is—but it sounds unkimmonly like a +nors-end-kerridge—and never said a word about 'im the whole time, the +sly little thing!"</p> + +<p>The universe seemed oscillating so that he grasped at the letter like a +drunken man. It was from the vicar. He wrote:—</p> + +<p>"I have much pleasure in informing you that our dear Mary Ann is the +fortunate inheritress of two and a half million dollars by the death of +her brother Tom, who, as I learn from the lawyers who have applied to me +for news of the family, has just died in America, leaving his money to +his surviving relatives. He was rather a wild young man, but it seems he +became the lucky possessor of some petroleum wells which made him wealthy +in a few months. I pray God Mary Ann may make a better use of the money +than he would have done. I want you to break the news to her, please, and +to prepare her for my visit. As I have to preach on Sunday, I cannot come +to town before, but on Monday (D.V.) I shall run up and shall probably +take her back with me, as I desire to help her through the difficulties +that will attend her entry into the new life. How pleased you will be to +think of the care you took of the dear child during these last five +years. I hope she is well and happy; I think you omitted to write to me +last Christmas on the subject. Please give her my kindest regards and +best wishes and say I shall be with her (D.V.) on Monday."</p> + +<p>The words swam uncertainly before Lancelot's eyes, but he got through +them all at last. He felt chilled and numbed. He averted his face as he +handed the letter back to Mary Ann's "missus."</p> + +<p>"What a fortunate girl!" he said in a low, stony voice.</p> + +<p>"Fortunate ain't the word for it! The mean, sly little cat! Fancy never +telling <i>me</i> a word about 'er brother all these years—me as 'as fed her, +and clothed her, and lodged her, and kepper out of all mischief, as if +she'd bin my own daughter; never let her go out Bankhollidayin' in loose +company—as you can bear witness yourself, sir—and eddicated 'er out of +'er country talk and rough ways, and made 'er the smart young woman she +is, fit to wait on the most troublesome of gentlemen. And now she'll go +away and say I used 'er 'arsh, and overworked 'er, and Lord knows what, +don't tell me! Oh, my poor chest!"</p> + +<p>"I think you may make your mind quite easy," said Lancelot, grimly. "I'm +sure Mary Ann is perfectly satisfied with your treatment."</p> + +<p>"But she ain't—there, listen! don't you hear her going on?" Poor Mary +Ann's sobs were still audible, though exhaustion was making them momently +weaker. "She's been going on like that ever since I broke the news to 'er +and gave her a piece of my mind—the sly little cat! She wanted to go on +scrubbing the kitchen, and I had to take the brush away by main force. A +nice thing, indeed! A gel as can keep a nors-end-kerridge down on the +cold kitchen stones! 'Twasn't likely I could allow that. 'No, Mary Ann,' +says I, firmly, 'you're a lady, and if you don't know what's proper for a +lady, you'd best listen to them as does. You go and buy yourself a dress +and a jacket to be ready for that vicar who's been a real good kind +friend to you; he's coming to take you away on Monday, he is, and how +will you look in that dirty print? Here's a suvrin,' says I, 'out of my +'ard-earned savin's—and get a pair o' boots, too: you can git a sweet +pair for 2s. 11d. at Rackstraw's afore the sale closes,' and with that I +shoves the suvrin into 'er hand instead o' the scrubbin' brush, and what +does she do? Why, busts out a-cryin' and sits on the damp stones, and +sobs, and sulks, and stares at the suvrin in her hand as if I'd told her +of a funeral instead of a fortune!" concluded Mrs. Leadbatter, +alliteratively.</p> + +<p>"But you did—her brother's death," said Lancelot. "That's what she's +crying about."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Leadbatter was taken aback by this obverse view of the situation; +but recovering herself, she shook her head. "<i>I</i> wouldn't cry for no +brother that lef me to starve when he was rollin' in two and a 'arf +million dollars," she said sceptically. "And I'm sure my Rosie wouldn't. +But she never 'ad nobody to leave her money, poor dear child, except me, +please Gaud. It's only the fools as 'as the luck in <i>this</i> world." And +having thus relieved her bosom, she resumed her panting progress upwards.</p> + +<p>The last words rang on in Lancelot's ears long after he had returned to +his room. In the utter breakdown and confusion of his plans and his +ideas, it was the one definite thought he clung to, as a swimmer in a +whirlpool clings to a rock. His brain refused to concentrate itself on +any other aspect of the situation—he could not, would not, dared not, +think of anything else. He knew vaguely he ought to rejoice with her over +her wonderful stroke of luck, that savoured of the fairy-story, but +everything was swamped by that one almost resentful reflection. Oh, the +irony of fate! Blind fate showering torrents of gold upon this foolish, +babyish household drudge; who was all emotion and animal devotion, +without the intellectual outlook of a Hottentot, and leaving men of +genius to starve, or sell their souls for a handful of it! How was the +wisdom of the ages justified! Verily did fortune favour fools. And +Tom—the wicked—he had flourished as the wicked always do, like the +green bay tree, as the Psalmist discovered ever so many centuries ago.</p> + +<p>But gradually the wave of bitterness waned. He found himself listening +placidly and attentively to the joyous trills and roulades of the canary, +till the light faded and the grey dusk crept into the room and stilled +the tiny winged lover of the sunshine. Then Beethoven came and rubbed +himself against his master's leg, and Lancelot got up, as one wakes from +a dream, and stretched his cramped limbs dazedly, and rang the bell +mechanically for tea. He was groping on the mantel-piece for the matches +when the knock at the door came, and he did not turn round till he had +found them. He struck a light, expecting to see Mrs. Leadbatter or Rosie. +He started to find it was merely Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>But she was no longer merely Mary Ann, he remembered with another shock. +She loomed large to him in the match-light—he seemed to see her through +a golden haze. Tumultuous images of her glorified gilded future rose and +mingled dizzily in his brain.</p> + +<p>And yet, was he dreaming? Surely it was the same Mary Ann, with the same +winsome face and the same large pathetic eyes, ringed though they were +with the shadow of tears. Mary Ann, in her neat white cap—yes—and in +her tan kid gloves. He rubbed his eyes. Was he really awake? Or—a +thought still more dizzying—<i>had</i> he been dreaming? He had fallen asleep +and reinless fancy had played him the fantastic trick, from which, +cramped and dazed, he had just awakened to the old sweet reality.</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann!" he cried wildly. The lighted match fell from his fingers and +burnt itself out unheeded on the carpet.</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>"Is it true"—his emotion choked him—"is it true you've come into two +and a half million dollars?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir, and I've brought you some tea."</p> + +<p>The room was dark, but darkness seemed to fall on it as she spoke.</p> + +<p>"But why are you waiting on me, then?" he said slowly. "Don't you know +that you—that you—"</p> + +<p>"Please, Mr. Lancelot, I wanted to come in and see you."</p> + +<p>He felt himself trembling.</p> + +<p>"But Mrs. Leadbatter told me she wouldn't let you do any more work."</p> + +<p>"I told missus that I must; I told her she couldn't get another girl +before Monday, if then, and if she didn't let me I wouldn't buy a new +dress and a pair of boots with her sovereign—it isn't suvrin, is it, +sir?"</p> + +<p>"No," murmured Lancelot, smiling in spite of himself.</p> + +<p>"With her sovereign. And I said I would be all dirty on Monday."</p> + +<p>"But what can you get for a sovereign?" he asked irrelevantly. He felt +his mind wandering away from him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, ever such a pretty dress!"</p> + +<p>The picture of Mary Ann in a pretty dress painted itself upon the +darkness. How lovely the child would look in some creamy white evening +dress with a rose in her hair. He wondered that in all his thoughts of +their future he had never dressed her up thus in fancy, to feast his eyes +on the vision.</p> + +<p>"And so the vicar will find you in a pretty dress," he said at last.</p> + +<p>"No, sir."</p> + +<p>"But you promised Mrs. Leadbatter to—"</p> + +<p>"I promised to buy a dress with her sovereign. But I shan't be here when +the vicar comes. He can't come till the afternoon."</p> + +<p>"Why, where will you be?" he said, his heart beginning to beat fast.</p> + +<p>"With you," she replied, with a faint accent of surprise.</p> + +<p>He steadied himself against the mantel-piece.</p> + +<p>"But—" he began, and ended, "is that honest?"</p> + +<p>He dimly descried her lips pouting. "We can always send her another when +we have one," she said.</p> + +<p>He stood there, dumb, glad of the darkness.</p> + +<p>"I must go down now," she said. "I mustn't stay long."</p> + +<p>"Why?" he articulated.</p> + +<p>"Rosie," she replied briefly.</p> + +<p>"What about Rosie?"</p> + +<p>"She watches me—ever since she came. Don't you understand?"</p> + +<p>This time he was the dullard. He felt an extra quiver of repugnance for +Rosie, but said nothing, while Mary Ann briskly lit the gas, and threw +some coals on the decaying fire. He was pleased she was going down; he +was suffocating; he did not know what to say to her. And yet, as she was +disappearing through the doorway, he had a sudden feeling things couldn't +be allowed to remain an instant in this impossible position.</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann!" he cried.</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>She turned back—her face wore merely the expectant expression of a +summoned servant. The childishness of her behaviour confused him, +irritated him.</p> + +<p>"Are you foolish?" he cried suddenly; half regretting the phrase the +instant he had uttered it.</p> + +<p>Her lip twitched.</p> + +<p>"No, Mr. Lancelot!" she faltered.</p> + +<p>"But you talk as if you were," he said less roughly. "You mustn't run +away from the vicar just when he is going to take you to the lawyer's to +certify who you are, and see that you get your money."</p> + +<p>"But I don't want to go with the vicar—I want to go with you. You said +you would take me with you." She was almost in tears now.</p> + +<p>"Yes—but don't you—don't you understand that—that," he stammered; +then, temporising, "but I can wait."</p> + +<p>"Can't the vicar wait?" said Mary Ann. He had never known her show such +initiative.</p> + +<p>He saw that it was hopeless—that the money had made no more dint upon +her consciousness than some vague dream, that her whole being was set +towards the new life with him, and shrank in horror from the menace of +the vicar's withdrawal of her in the opposite direction. If joy and +redemption had not already lain in the one quarter, the advantages of +the other might have been more palpably alluring. As it was, her +consciousness was "full up" in the matter, so to speak. He saw that he +must tell her plain and plump, startle her out of her simple confidence.</p> + +<p>"Listen to me, Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>"You are a young woman—not a baby. Strive to grasp what I am going to +tell you."</p> + +<p>"Yessir," in a half sob, that vibrated with the obstinate resentment +of a child that knows it is to be argued out of its instincts by adult +sophistry. What had become of her passive personality?</p> + +<p>"You are now the owner of two and a half million dollars—that is about +five hundred thousand pounds. Five—hundred thousand—pounds. Think of +ten sovereigns—ten golden sovereigns like that Mrs. Leadbatter gave you. +Then ten times as much as that, and ten times as much as all that"—he +spread his arms wider and wider—"and ten times as much as all that, and +then"—here his arms were prematurely horizontal, so he concluded hastily +but impressively,—"and then FIFTY times as much as all that. Do you +understand how rich you are?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir." She was fumbling nervously at her gloves, half drawing them +off.</p> + +<p>"Now all this money will last forever. For you invest it—if only at +three per cent.—never mind what that is—and then you get fifteen +thousand a year—fifteen thousand golden sovereigns to spend every—"</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, I must go now. Rosie!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, but you can't go yet. I have lots more to tell you."</p> + +<p>"Yessir; but can't you ring for me again?"</p> + +<p>In the gravity of the crisis, the remark tickled him; he laughed with a +strange ring in his laughter.</p> + +<p>"All right; run away, you sly little puss."</p> + +<p>He smiled on as he poured out his tea; finding a relief in prolonging his +sense of the humour of the suggestion, but his heart was heavy, and his +brain a-whirl. He did not ring again till he had finished tea.</p> + +<p>She came in, and took her gloves out of her pocket.</p> + +<p>"No! no!" he cried, strangely exasperated. "An end to this farce! Put +them away. You don't need gloves any more."</p> + +<p>She squeezed them into her pocket nervously, and began to clear away the +things, with abrupt movements, looking askance every now and then at the +overcast handsome face.</p> + +<p>At last he nerved himself to the task and said: "Well, as I was saying, +Mary Ann, the first thing for you to think of is to make sure of all +this money—this fifteen thousand pounds a year. You see you will be +able to live in a fine manor house—such as the squire lived in in your +village—surrounded by a lovely park with a lake in it for swans and +boats—"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann had paused in her work, slop-basin in hand. The concrete details +were beginning to take hold of her imagination.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but I should like a farm better," she said. "A large farm with great +pastures and ever so many cows and pigs and outhouses, and a—oh, just +like Atkinson's farm. And meat every day, with pudding on Sundays! Oh, if +father was alive, wouldn't he be glad!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, you can have a farm—anything you like."</p> + +<p>"Oh, how lovely! A piano?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—six pianos."</p> + +<p>"And you will learn me?"</p> + +<p>He shuddered and hesitated.</p> + +<p>"Well—I can't say, Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>"Why not? Why won't you? You said you would! You learn Rosie."</p> + +<p>"I may not be there, you see," he said, trying to put a spice of +playfulness into his tones.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but you will," she said feverishly. "You will take me there. We will +go there instead of where you said—instead of the green waters." Her +eyes were wild and witching.</p> + +<p>He groaned inwardly.</p> + +<p>"I cannot promise you now," he said slowly. "Don't you see that +everything is altered?"</p> + +<p>"What's altered? You are here and here am I." Her apprehension made her +almost epigrammatic.</p> + +<p>"Ah, but you are quite different now, Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>"I'm not—I want to be with you just the same."</p> + +<p>He shook his head. "I can't take you with me," he said decisively.</p> + +<p>"Why not?" She caught hold of his arm entreatingly.</p> + +<p>"You are not the same Mary Ann—to other people. You are a somebody. +Before, you were a nobody. Nobody cared or bothered about you—you +were no more than a dead leaf whirling in the street."</p> + +<p>"Yes, you cared and bothered about me," she cried, clinging to him.</p> + +<p>Her gratitude cut him like a knife. "The eyes of the world are on you +now," he said. "People will talk about you if you go away with me now."</p> + +<p>"Why will they talk about me? What harm shall I do them?"</p> + +<p>Her phrases puzzled him.</p> + +<p>"I don't know that you will harm them," he said slowly, "but you will +harm yourself."</p> + +<p>"How will I harm myself?" she persisted.</p> + +<p>"Well, one day, you will want a—a husband. With all that money it is +only right and proper you should marry—"</p> + +<p>"No, Mr. Lancelot, I don't want a husband. I don't want to marry. I +should never want to go away from you."</p> + +<p>There was another painful silence. He sought refuge in a brusque +playfulness.</p> + +<p>"I see you understand <i>I'm</i> not going to marry you."</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>He felt a slight relief.</p> + +<p>"Well, then," he said, more playfully still. "Suppose I wanted to go away +from <i>you</i>, Mary Ann?"</p> + +<p>"But you love me," she said, unaffrighted.</p> + +<p>He started back perceptibly.</p> + +<p>After a moment, he replied, still playfully, "I never said so."</p> + +<p>"No, sir; but—but—" she lowered her eyes; a coquette could not have +done it more artlessly—"but I—know it."</p> + +<p>The accusation of loving her set all his suppressed repugnances and +prejudices bristling in contradiction. He cursed the weakness that had +got him into this soul-racking situation. The silence clamoured for +him to speak—to do something.</p> + +<p>"What—what were you crying about before?" he said abruptly.</p> + +<p>"I—I don't know, sir," she faltered.</p> + +<p>"Was it Tom's death?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir, not much. I did think of him black-berrying with me and our +little Sally—but then he was so wicked! It must have been what missus +said; and I was frightened because the vicar was coming to take me +away—away from you; and then—oh, I don't know—I felt—I couldn't tell +you—I felt I must cry and cry, like that night when—" she paused +suddenly and looked away.</p> + +<p>"When," he said encouragingly.</p> + +<p>"I must go—Rosie," she murmured, and took up the tea-tray.</p> + +<p>"That night when—" he repeated tenaciously.</p> + +<p>"When you first kissed me," she said.</p> + +<p>He blushed. "That—that made you cry!" he stammered. "Why?"</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, I don't know."</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann," he said gravely, "don't you see that when I did that I +was—like your brother Tom?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir. Tom didn't kiss me like that."</p> + +<p>"I don't mean that, Mary Ann; I mean I was wicked."</p> + +<p>Mary Ann stared at him.</p> + +<p>"Don't you think so, Mary Ann?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, sir. You were very good."</p> + +<p>"No, no, Mary Ann. Don't say good."</p> + +<p>"Ever since then I have been so happy," she persisted.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that was because you were wicked too," he explained grimly. "We have +both been very wicked, Mary Ann; and so we had better part now, before +we get more wicked."</p> + +<p>She stared at him plaintively, suspecting a lurking irony, but not sure.</p> + +<p>"But you didn't mind being wicked before!" she protested.</p> + +<p>"I'm not so sure I mind now. It's for your sake, Mary Ann, believe me, my +dear." He took her bare hand kindly and felt it burning. "You're a very +simple, foolish little thing, yes, you are. Don't cry. There's no harm in +being simple. Why, you told me yourself how silly you were once when you +brought your dying mother cakes and flowers to take to your dead little +sister. Well, you're just as foolish and childish now, Mary Ann, though +you don't know it any more than you did then. After all you're only +nineteen—I found it out from the vicar's letter. But a time will +come—yes, I'll warrant in only a few months' time you'll see how wise I +am and how sensible you have been to be guided by me. I never wished you +any harm, Mary Ann, believe me, my dear, I never did. And I hope, I do +hope so much that this money will make you happy. So you see you mustn't +go away with me now—you don't want everybody to talk of you as they did +of your brother Tom, do you, dear? Think what the vicar would say."</p> + +<p>But Mary Ann had broken down under the touch of his hand and the +gentleness of his tones.</p> + +<p>"I was a dead leaf so long, I don't care!" she sobbed passionately. +"Nobody never bothered to call me wicked then. Why should I bother now?"</p> + +<p>Beneath the mingled emotions her words caused him was a sense of surprise +at her recollection of his metaphor.</p> + +<p>"Hush! You're a silly little child," he repeated sternly. "Hush! or Mrs. +Leadbatter will hear you." He went to the door and closed it tightly. +"Listen, Mary Ann! Let me tell you once for all that even if you were +fool enough to be willing to go with me, I wouldn't take you with me. It +would be doing you a terrible wrong."</p> + +<p>She interrupted him quietly.</p> + +<p>"Why more now than before?"</p> + +<p>He dropped her hand as if stung, and turned away. He knew he could not +answer that to his own satisfaction, much less to hers.</p> + +<p>"You're a silly little baby," he repeated resentfully. "I think you had +better go down now. Missus will be wondering."</p> + +<p>Mary Ann's sobs grew more spasmodic. "You are going away without me," she +cried hysterically.</p> + +<p>He went to the door again, as if apprehensive of an eavesdropper. The +scene was becoming terrible. The passive personality had developed with a +vengeance.</p> + +<p>"Hush, hush!" he cried imperatively.</p> + +<p>"You are going away without me. I shall never see you again."</p> + +<p>"Be sensible, Mary Ann. You will be—"</p> + +<p>"You won't take me with you."</p> + +<p>"How can I take you with me?" he cried brutally, losing every vestige of +tenderness for this distressful vixen. "Don't you understand that it's +impossible—unless I marry you," he concluded contemptuously.</p> + +<p>Mary Ann's sobs ceased for a moment.</p> + +<p>"Can't you marry me, then?" she said plaintively.</p> + +<p>"You know it is impossible," he replied curtly.</p> + +<p>"Why is it impossible?" she breathed.</p> + +<p>"Because—" He saw her sobs were on the point of breaking out, and had +not the courage to hear them afresh. He dared not wound her further by +telling her straight out that, with all her money, she was ridiculously +unfit to bear his name—that it was already a condescension for him to +have offered her his companionship on any terms.</p> + +<p>He resolved to temporise again.</p> + +<p>"Go downstairs now, there's a good girl; and I'll tell you in the +morning. I'll think it over. Go to bed early and have a long, nice +sleep—missus will let you—now. It isn't Monday yet; we have plenty +of time to talk it over."</p> + +<p>She looked up at him with large appealing eyes, uncertain, but calming +down.</p> + +<p>"Do, now, there's a dear." He stroked her wet cheek soothingly.</p> + +<p>"Yessir," and almost instinctively she put up her lips for a good-night +kiss. He brushed them hastily with his. She went out softly, drying her +eyes. His own grew moist—he was touched by the pathos of her implicit +trust. The soft warmth of her lips still thrilled him. How sweet and +loving she was! The little dialogue rang in his brain.</p> + +<p>"Can't you marry me, then?"</p> + +<p>"You know it is impossible."</p> + +<p>"Why is it impossible?"</p> + +<p>"Because—"</p> + +<p>"Because what?" an audacious voice whispered. Why should he not? He +stilled the voice but it refused to be silent—was obdurate, insistent, +like Mary Ann herself. "Because—oh, because of a hundred things," he +told it. "Because she is no fit mate for me—because she would degrade +me, make me ridiculous—an unfortunate fortune-hunter, the butt of the +witlings. How could I take her about as my wife? How could she receive +my friends? For a housekeeper—a good, loving housekeeper—she is +perfection, but for a wife—<i>my</i> wife—the companion of my +soul—impossible!"</p> + +<p>"Why is it impossible?" repeated the voice, catching up the cue. And +then, from that point, the dialogue began afresh.</p> + +<p>"Because this, and because that, and because the other—in short, because +I am Lancelot and she is merely Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>"But she is not merely Mary Ann any longer," urged the voice.</p> + +<p>"Yes, for all her money, she is merely Mary Ann. And am I to sell myself +for her money—I who have stood out so nobly, so high-mindedly, through +all these years of privation and struggle? And her money is all in +dollars. Pah! I smell the oil. Struck ile! Of all things in the world, +her brother should just go and strike ile!" A great shudder traversed his +form. "Everything seems to have been arranged out of pure cussedness, +just to spite me. She would have been happier without the money, poor +child—without the money, but with me. What will she do with all her +riches? She will only be wretched—like me."</p> + +<p>"Then why not be happy together?"</p> + +<p>"Impossible."</p> + +<p>"Why is it impossible?"</p> + +<p>"Because her dollars would stick in my throat—the oil would make me +sick. And what would Peter say, and my brother (not that I care what <i>he</i> +says), and my acquaintances?"</p> + +<p>"What does that matter to you? While you were a dead leaf nobody bothered +to talk about you; they let you starve—you, with your genius—now you +can let them talk—you, with your heiress. Five hundred thousand pounds. +More than you will make with all your operas if you live a century. +Fifteen thousand a year. Why, you could have all your works performed at +your own expense, and for your own sole pleasure if you chose, as the +King of Bavaria listened to Wagner's operas. You could devote your life +to the highest art—nay, is it not a duty you owe to the world? Would it +not be a crime against the future to draggle your wings with sordid +cares, to sink to lower aims by refusing this Heaven-sent boon?"</p> + +<p>The thought clung to him. He rose and laid out heaps of muddled +manuscript—<i>opera disjecta</i>—and turned their pages.</p> + +<p>"Yes—yes—give us life!" they seemed to cry to him. "We are dead drops +of ink, wake us to life and beauty. How much longer are we to lie here, +dusty in death? We have waited so patiently—have pity on us, raise us up +from our silent tomb, and we will fly abroad through the whole earth, +chanting your glory; yea, the world shall be filled to eternity with the +echoes of our music and the splendour of your name."</p> + +<p>But he shook his head and sighed, and put them back in their niches, and +placed the comic opera he had begun in the centre of the table.</p> + +<p>"There lie the only dollars that will ever come my way," he said aloud. +And, humming the opening bars of a lively polka from the manuscript, he +took up his pen and added a few notes. Then he paused; the polka would +not come—the other voice was louder.</p> + +<p>"It would be a degradation," he repeated, to silence it. "It would be +merely for her money. I don't love her."</p> + +<p>"Are you so sure of that?"</p> + +<p>"If I really loved her I shouldn't refuse to marry her."</p> + +<p>"Are you so sure of that?"</p> + +<p>"What's the use of all this wire-drawing?—the whole thing is +impossible."</p> + +<p>"Why is it impossible?"</p> + +<p>He shrugged his shoulders impatiently, refusing to be drawn back into the +eddy, and completed the bar of the polka.</p> + +<p>Then he threw down his pen, rose and paced the room in desperation.</p> + +<p>"Was ever any man in such a dilemma?" he cried aloud.</p> + +<p>"Did ever any man get such a chance?" retorted his silent tormentor.</p> + +<p>"Yes, but I mustn't seize the chance—it would be mean."</p> + +<p>"It would be meaner not to. You're not thinking of that poor girl—only +of yourself. To leave her now would be more cowardly than to have left +her when she was merely Mary Ann. She needs you even more now that she +will be surrounded by sharks and adventurers. Poor, poor Mary Ann! It is +you who have the right to protect her now; you were kind to her when the +world forgot her. You owe it to yourself to continue to be good to her."</p> + +<p>"No, no, I won't humbug myself. If I married her it would only be for her +money."</p> + +<p>"No, no, don't humbug yourself. You like her. You care for her very much. +You are thrilling at this very moment with the remembrance of her lips +to-night. Think of what life will be with her—life full of all that is +sweet and fair—love and riches, and leisure for the highest art, and +fame and the promise of immortality. You are irritable, sensitive, +delicately organised; these sordid, carking cares, these wretched +struggles, these perpetual abasements of your highest self—a few more +years of them—they will wreck and ruin you, body and soul. How many men +of genius have married their housekeepers even—good, clumsy, homely +bodies, who have kept their husband's brain calm and his pillow smooth. +And again, a man of genius is the one man who can marry anybody. The +world expects him to be eccentric. And Mary Ann is no coarse city weed, +but a sweet country bud. How splendid will be her blossoming under the +sun! Do not fear that she will ever shame you; she will look beautiful, +and men will not ask her to talk. Nor will you want her to talk. She will +sit silent in the cosy room where you are working, and every now and +again you will glance up from your work at her and draw inspiration from +her sweet presence. So pull yourself together, man; your troubles are +over, and life henceforth one long blissful dream. Come, burn me that +tinkling, inglorious comic opera, and let the whole sordid past mingle +with its ashes."</p> + +<p>So strong was the impulse—so alluring the picture—that he took up the +comic opera and walked towards the fire, his finger itching to throw it +in. But he sat down again after a moment and went on with his work. It +was imperative he should make progress with it; he could not afford to +waste his time—which was money—because another person—Mary Ann to +wit—had come into a superfluity of both. In spite of which the comic +opera refused to advance; somehow he did not feel in the mood for gaiety; +he threw down his pen in despair and disgust. But the idea of not being +able to work rankled in him. Every hour seemed suddenly precious—now +that he had resolved to make money in earnest—now that for a year or +two he could have no other aim or interest in life. Perhaps it was that +he wished to overpower the din of contending thoughts. Then a happy +thought came to him. He rummaged out Peter's ballad. He would write a +song on the model of that, as Peter had recommended—something tawdry and +sentimental, with a cheap accompaniment. He placed the ballad on the rest +and started going through it to get himself in the vein. But to-night the +air seemed to breathe an ineffable melancholy, the words—no longer +mawkish—had grown infinitely pathetic:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Kiss me, good-night, dear love,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Dream of the old delight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My spirit is summoned above,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Kiss me, dear love, good-night!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The hot tears ran down his cheeks, as he touched the keys softly and +lingeringly. He could go no farther than the refrain; he leant his elbows +on the keyboard, and dropped his head upon his arms. The clashing notes +jarred like a hoarse cry, then vibrated slowly away into a silence that +was broken only by his sobs.</p> + +<p>He rose late the next day, after a sleep that was one prolonged +nightmare, full of agonised, abortive striving after something that +always eluded him, he knew not what. And when he woke—after a momentary +breath of relief at the thought of the unreality of these vague +horrors—he woke to the heavier nightmare of reality. Oh, those terrible +dollars!</p> + +<p>He drew the blind, and saw with a dull acquiescence that the brightness +of May had fled. The wind was high—he heard it fly past, moaning. In the +watery sky, the round sun loomed silver-pale and blurred. To his fevered +eye it looked like a worn dollar.</p> + +<p>He turned away, shivering, and began to dress. He opened the door a +little, and pulled in his lace-up boots, which were polished in the +highest style of art. But when he tried to put one on, his toes stuck +fast in the opening, and refused to advance. Annoyed, he put his hand in, +and drew out a pair of tan gloves, perfectly new. Astonished, he inserted +his hand again and drew out another pair, then another. Reddening +uncomfortably, for he divined something of the meaning, he examined the +left boot, and drew out three more pairs of gloves, two new and one +slightly soiled.</p> + +<p>He sank down, half dressed, on the bed with his head on his breast, +leaving his boots and Mary Ann's gloves scattered about the floor. He was +angry, humiliated; he felt like laughing, and he felt like sobbing.</p> + +<p>At last he roused himself, finished dressing, and rang for breakfast. +Rosie brought it up.</p> + +<p>"Hullo! Where's Mary Ann?" he said lightly.</p> + +<p>"She's above work now," said Rosie, with an unamiable laugh. "You know +about her fortune."</p> + +<p>"Yes; but your mother told me she insisted on going about her work till +Monday."</p> + +<p>"So she said yesterday—silly little thing! But to-day she says she'll +only help mother in the kitchen—and do all the boots of a morning. She +won't do any more waiting."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Lancelot, crumbling his toast.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe she knows what she wants," concluded Rosie, turning to +go.</p> + +<p>"Then I suppose she's in the kitchen now?" he said, pouring out his +coffee down the side of his cup.</p> + +<p>"No, she's gone out now, sir."</p> + +<p>"Gone out!" He put down the coffee-pot—his saucer was full. "Gone out +where?"</p> + +<p>"Only to buy things. You know her vicar is coming to take her away the +day after to-morrow, and mother wanted her to look tidy enough to travel +with the vicar; so she gave her a sovereign."</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes; your mother said something about it."</p> + +<p>"And yet she won't answer the bells," said Rosie, "and mother's asthma is +worse, so I don't know whether I shall be able to take my lesson to-day, +Mr. Lancelot. I'm so sorry, because it's the last."</p> + +<p>Rosie probably did not intend the ambiguity of the phrase. There was real +regret in her voice.</p> + +<p>"Do you like learning, then?" said Lancelot, softened, for the first +time, towards his pupil. His nerves seemed strangely flaccid to-day. He +did not at all feel the relief he should have felt at forgoing his daily +infliction.</p> + +<p>"Ever so much, sir. I know I laugh too much, sometimes; but I don't mean +it, sir. I suppose I couldn't go on with the lessons after you leave +here?" She looked at him wistfully.</p> + +<p>"Well"—he had crumbled the toast all to little pieces now—"I don't +quite know. Perhaps I shan't go away after all."</p> + +<p>Rosie's face lit up. "Oh, I'll tell mother," she exclaimed joyously.</p> + +<p>"No, don't tell her yet; I haven't quite settled. But if I stay—of +course the lessons can go on as before."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I <i>do</i> hope you'll stay," said Rosie, and went out of the room with +airy steps, evidently bent on disregarding his prohibition, if, indeed, +it had penetrated to her consciousness.</p> + +<p>Lancelot made no pretence of eating breakfast; he had it removed, and +then fished out his comic opera. But nothing would flow from his pen; he +went over to the window, and stood thoughtfully drumming on the panes +with it, and gazing at the little drab-coloured street, with its high +roof of mist; along which the faded dollar continued to spin +imperceptibly. Suddenly he saw Mary Ann turn the corner, and come along +towards the house, carrying a big parcel and a paper bag in her ungloved +hands. How buoyantly she walked! He had never before seen her move in +free space, nor realised how much of the grace of a sylvan childhood +remained with her still. What a pretty colour there was on her cheeks, +too!</p> + +<p>He ran down to the street door and opened it before she could knock. The +colour on her cheeks deepened at the sight of him, but now that she was +near he saw her eyes were swollen with crying.</p> + +<p>"Why do you go out without gloves, Mary Ann?" he inquired sternly. +"Remember you're a lady now."</p> + +<p>She started and looked down at his boots, then up at his face.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I found them, Mary Ann. A nice graceful way of returning me my +presents, Mary Ann. You might at least have waited till Christmas. Then +I should have thought Santa Claus sent them."</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, I thought it was the surest way for me to send them back."</p> + +<p>"But what made you send them back at all?"</p> + +<p>Mary Ann's lip quivered, her eyes were cast down. "Oh—Mr. Lancelot—you +know," she faltered.</p> + +<p>"But I don't know," he said sharply.</p> + +<p>"Please let me go downstairs, Mr. Lancelot. Missus must have heard me +come in."</p> + +<p>"You shan't go downstairs till you've told me what's come over you. Come +upstairs to my room."</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>She followed him obediently. He turned round brusquely, "Here, give me +your parcels." And almost snatching them from her, he carried them +upstairs and deposited them on his table on top of the comic opera.</p> + +<p>"Now, then, sit down. You can take off your hat and jacket."</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>He helped her to do so.</p> + +<p>"Now, Mary Ann, why did you return me those gloves?"</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, I remember in our village when—when"—she felt a +diffidence in putting the situation into words and wound up quickly, +"something told me I ought to."</p> + +<p>"I don't understand you," he grumbled, comprehending only too well. "But +why couldn't you come in and give them to me instead of behaving in that +ridiculous way?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't want to see you again," she faltered.</p> + +<p>He saw her eyes were welling over with tears.</p> + +<p>"You were crying again last night," he said sharply.</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>"But what did you have to cry about now? Aren't you the luckiest girl in +the world?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>As she spoke a flood of sunlight poured suddenly into the room; the sun +had broken through the clouds, the worn dollar had become a dazzling +gold-piece. The canary stirred in its cage.</p> + +<p>"Then what were you crying about?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't want to be lucky."</p> + +<p>"You silly girl—I have no patience with you. And why didn't you want to +see me again?"</p> + +<p>"Please, Mr. Lancelot, I knew you wouldn't like it."</p> + +<p>"Whatever put that into your head?"</p> + +<p>"I knew it, sir," said Mary Ann, firmly. "It came to me when I was +crying. I was thinking of all sorts of things—of my mother and our +Sally, and the old pig that used to get so savage, and about the way the +organ used to play in church, and then all at once somehow I knew it +would be best for me to do what you told me—to buy my dress and go back +with the vicar, and be a good girl, and not bother you, because you were +so good to me, and it was wrong for me to worry you and make you +miserable."</p> + +<p>"Tw-oo! Tw-oo!" It was the canary starting on a preliminary carol.</p> + +<p>"So I thought it best," she concluded tremulously, "not to see you again. +It would only be two days, and after that it would be easier. I could +always be thinking of you just the same, Mr. Lancelot, always. That +wouldn't annoy you, sir, would it? Because you know, sir, you wouldn't +know it."</p> + +<p>Lancelot was struggling to find a voice. "But didn't you forget something +you had to do, Mary Ann?" he said in hoarse accents.</p> + +<p>She raised her eyes swiftly a moment, then lowered them again.</p> + +<p>"I don't know; I didn't mean to," she said apologetically.</p> + +<p>"Didn't you forget that I told you to come to me and get my answer to +your question?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir, I didn't forget. That was what I was thinking of all night."</p> + +<p>"About your asking me to marry you?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>"And my saying it was impossible?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir, and I said, 'Why is it impossible?' and you said, 'Because—' +and then you left off; but please, Mr. Lancelot, I didn't want to know +the answer this morning."</p> + +<p>"But I want to tell you. Why don't you want to know?"</p> + +<p>"Because I found out for myself, Mr. Lancelot. That's what I found out +when I was crying—but there was nothing to find out, sir. I knew it all +along. It was silly of me to ask you—but you know I am silly sometimes, +sir, like I was when my mother was dying. And that was why I made up my +mind not to bother you any more, Mr. Lancelot, I knew you wouldn't like +to tell me straight out."</p> + +<p>"And what was the answer you found out? Ah, you won't speak. It looks as +if <i>you</i> don't like to tell me straight out. Come, come, Mary Ann, tell +me why—why—it is impossible."</p> + +<p>She looked up at last and said slowly and simply, "Because I am not good +enough for you, Mr. Lancelot."</p> + +<p>He put his hands suddenly to his eyes. He did not see the flood of +sunlight—he did not hear the mad jubilance of the canary.</p> + +<p>"No, Mary Ann," his voice was low and trembling. "I will tell you +why it is impossible, I didn't know last night, but I know now. It is +impossible, because—you are right, I don't like to tell you straight +out."</p> + +<p>She opened her eyes wide, and stared at him in puzzled expectation.</p> + +<p>"Mary Ann," he bent his head, "it is impossible—because I am not good +enough for you."</p> + +<p>Mary Ann grew scarlet. Then she broke into a little nervous laugh. "Oh, +Mr. Lancelot, don't make fun of me."</p> + +<p>"Believe me, my dear," he said tenderly, raising his head; "I wouldn't +make fun of you for two million million dollars. It is the truth—the +bare, miserable, wretched truth. I am not worthy of you, Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>"I don't understand you, sir," she faltered.</p> + +<p>"Thank Heaven for that!" he said with the old whimsical look. "If you did +you would think meanly of me ever after. Yes, that is why, Mary Ann. I +am a selfish brute—selfish to the last beat of my heart, to the inmost +essence of my every thought. Beethoven is worth two of me, aren't you, +Beethoven?" The spaniel, thinking himself called, trotted over. "He never +calculates—he just comes and licks my hand—don't look at me as if I +were mad, Mary Ann. You don't understand me—thank Heaven again. Come +now! Does it never strike you that if I were to marry you now, it would +be only for your two and a half million dollars?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir," faltered Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>"I thought not," he said triumphantly. "No, you will always remain a +fool, I am afraid, Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>She met his contempt with an audacious glance.</p> + +<p>"But I know it wouldn't be for that, Mr. Lancelot."</p> + +<p>"No, no, of course it wouldn't be, not now. But it ought to strike you +just the same. It doesn't make you less a fool, Mary Ann. There! There! +I don't mean to be unkind, and, as I think I told you once before, it's +not so very dreadful to be a fool. A rogue is a worse thing, Mary Ann. +All I want to do is to open your eyes. Two and a half million dollars are +an awful lot of money—a terrible lot of money. Do you know how long it +will be before I make two million dollars, Mary Ann?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir." She looked at him wonderingly.</p> + +<p>"Two million years. Yes, my child, I can tell you now. You thought I was +rich and grand, I know, but all the while I was nearly a beggar. Perhaps +you thought I was playing the piano—yes, and teaching Rosie—for my +amusement; perhaps you thought I sat up writing half the night out +of—sleeplessness," he smiled at the phrase, "or a wanton desire to burn +Mrs. Leadbatter's gas. No, Mary Ann, I have to get my own living by hard +work—by good work if I can, by bad work if I must—but always by hard +work. While you will have fifteen thousand pounds a year, I shall be +glad, overjoyed, to get fifteen hundred. And while I shall be grinding +away body and soul for my fifteen hundred, your fifteen thousand will +drop into your pockets, even if you keep your hands there all day. Don't +look so sad, Mary Ann. I'm not blaming you. It's not your fault in the +least. It's only one of the many jokes of existence. The only reason I +want to drive this into your head is to put you on your guard. Though I +don't think myself good enough to marry you, there are lots of men who +will think they are ... though they don't know you. It is you, not me, +who are grand and rich, Mary Ann ... beware of men like me—poor and +selfish. And when you do marry—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Lancelot!" cried Mary Ann, bursting into tears at last, "why do +you talk like that? You know I shall never marry anybody else."</p> + +<p>"Hush, hush! Mary Ann! I thought you were going to be a good girl and +never cry again. Dry your eyes now, will you?"</p> + +<p>"Yessir."</p> + +<p>"Here, take my handkerchief."</p> + +<p>"Yessir ... but I won't marry anybody else."</p> + +<p>"You make me smile, Mary Ann. When you brought your mother that cake for +Sally you didn't know a time would come when—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, please, sir, I know that. But you said yesterday I was a young woman +now. And this is all different to that."</p> + +<p>"No, it isn't, Mary Ann. When they've put you to school, and made you a +Ward in Chancery, or something, and taught you airs, and graces, and +dressed you up"—a pang traversed his heart, as the picture of her in the +future flashed for a moment upon his inner eye—"why, by that time, +you'll be a different Mary Ann, outside and inside. Don't shake your +head; I know better than you. We grow and become different. Life is full +of chances, and human beings are full of changes, and nothing remains +fixed."</p> + +<p>"Then, perhaps"—she flushed up, her eyes sparkled—"perhaps"—she grew +dumb and sad again.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps what?"</p> + +<p>He waited for her thought. The rapturous trills of the canary alone +possessed the silence.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps you'll change, too." She flashed a quick deprecatory glance at +him—her eyes were full of soft light.</p> + +<p>This time he was dumb.</p> + +<p>"Sw—eet!" trilled the canary, "sw—eet!" though Lancelot felt the +throbbings of his heart must be drowning its song.</p> + +<p>"Acutely answered," he said at last. "You're not such a fool after all, +Mary Ann. But I'm afraid it will never be, dear. Perhaps if I also made +two million dollars, and if I felt I had grown worthy of you, I might +come to you and say—two and two are four—let us go into partnership. +But then, you see," he went on briskly, "the odds are I may never even +have two thousand. Perhaps I'm as much a duffer in music as in other +things. Perhaps you'll be the only person in the world who has ever +heard my music, for no one will print it, Mary Ann. Perhaps I shall be +that very common thing—a complete failure—and be worse off than even +you ever were, Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Lancelot, I'm so sorry." And her eyes filled again with tears.</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't be sorry for me. I'm a man. I dare say I shall pull through. +Just put me out of your mind, dear. Let all that happened at Baker's +Terrace be only a bad dream—a very bad dream, I am afraid I must call +it. Forget me, Mary Ann. Everything will help you to forget me, thank +Heaven, it'll be the best thing for you. Promise me now."</p> + +<p>"Yessir ... if you will promise me."</p> + +<p>"Promise you what?"</p> + +<p>"To do me a favour."</p> + +<p>"Certainly, dear, if I can."</p> + +<p>"You have the money, Mr. Lancelot, instead of me—I don't want it, and +then you could—"</p> + +<p>"Now, now, Mary Ann," he interrupted, laughing nervously, "you're getting +foolish again, after talking so sensibly."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but why not?" she said plaintively.</p> + +<p>"It is impossible," he said curtly.</p> + +<p>"Why is it impossible?" she persisted.</p> + +<p>"Because—," he began, and then he realised with a start that they had +come back again to that same old mechanical series of questions—if only +in form.</p> + +<p>"Because there is only one thing I could ever bring myself to ask you for +in this world," he said slowly.</p> + +<p>"Yes; what is that?" she said flutteringly.</p> + +<p>He laid his hand tenderly on her hair.</p> + +<p>"Merely Mary Ann."</p> + +<p>She leapt up: "Oh, Mr. Lancelot, take me, take me! You do love me! You do +love me!"</p> + +<p>He bit his lip. "I am a fool," he said roughly. "Forget me. I ought not +to have said anything. I spoke only of what might be—in the dim +future—if the—chances and changes of life bring us together again—as +they never do. No! You were right, Mary Ann. It is best we should not +meet again. Remember your resolution last night."</p> + +<p>"Yessir." Her submissive formula had a smack of sullenness, but she +regained her calm, swallowing the lump in her throat that made her +breathing difficult.</p> + +<p>"Good-by, then, Mary Ann," he said, taking her hard red hands in his.</p> + +<p>"Good-by, Mr. Lancelot." The tears she would not shed were in her voice. +"Please, sir—could you—couldn't you do me a favour?—Nothing about +money, sir."</p> + +<p>"Well, if I can," he said kindly.</p> + +<p>"Couldn't you just play Good-night and Good-by, for the last time? You +needn't sing it—only play it."</p> + +<p>"Why, what an odd girl you are!" he said with a strange, spasmodic laugh. +"Why, certainly! I'll do both, if it will give you any pleasure."</p> + +<p>And, releasing her hands, he sat down to the piano, and played the +introduction softly. He felt a nervous thrill going down his spine as he +plunged into the mawkish words. And when he came to the refrain, he had +an uneasy sense that Mary Ann was crying—he dared not look at her. He +sang on bravely:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Kiss me, good-night, dear love,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Dream of the old delight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My spirit is summoned above,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Kiss me, dear love, good-night."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>He couldn't go through another verse—he felt himself all a-quiver, every +nerve shattered. He jumped up. Yes, his conjecture had been right. Mary +Ann was crying. He laughed spasmodically again. The thought had occurred +to him how vain Peter would be if he could know the effect of his +commonplace ballad.</p> + +<p>"There, I'll kiss you too, dear!" he said huskily, still smiling. +"That'll be for the last time."</p> + +<p>Their lips met, and then Mary Ann seemed to fade out of the room in a +blur of mist.</p> + +<p>An instant after there was a knock at the door.</p> + +<p>"Forgot her parcels after a last good-by," thought Lancelot, and +continued to smile at the comicality of the new episode.</p> + +<p>He cleared his throat.</p> + +<p>"Come in," he cried, and then he saw that the parcels were gone, too, and +it must be Rosie.</p> + +<p>But it was merely Mary Ann.</p> + +<p>"I forgot to tell you, Mr. Lancelot," she said—her accents were almost +cheerful—"that I'm going to church to-morrow morning."</p> + +<p>"To church!" he echoed.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I haven't been since I left the village, but missus says I ought to +go in case the vicar asks me what church I've been going to."</p> + +<p>"I see," he said, smiling on.</p> + +<p>She was closing the door when it opened again, just revealing Mary Ann's +face.</p> + +<p>"Well?" he said, amused.</p> + +<p>"But I'll do your boots all the same, Mr. Lancelot." And the door closed +with a bang.</p> + +<p>They did not meet again. On the Monday afternoon the vicar duly came and +took Mary Ann away. All Baker's Terrace was on the watch, for her story +had now had time to spread. The weather remained bright. It was cold but +the sky was blue. Mary Ann had borne up wonderfully, but she burst into +tears as she got into the cab.</p> + +<p>"Sweet, sensitive little thing!" said Baker's Terrace.</p> + +<p>"What a good woman you must be, Mrs. Leadbatter," said the vicar, wiping +his spectacles.</p> + +<p>As part of Baker's Terrace, Lancelot witnessed the departure from his +window, for he had not left after all.</p> + +<p>Beethoven was barking his short snappy bark the whole time at the +unwonted noises and the unfamiliar footsteps; he almost extinguished the +canary, though that was clamorous enough.</p> + +<p>"Shut up, you noisy little devils!" growled Lancelot. And taking the +comic opera he threw it on the dull fire. The thick sheets grew slowly +blacker and blacker, as if with rage; while Lancelot thrust the five +five-pound notes into an envelope addressed to the popular composer, and +scribbled a tiny note:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Dear Peter,—If you have not torn up that cheque I shall be glad of it +by return. Yours,</p> + +<p>"LANCELOT.</p> + +<p>"P.S.—I send by this post a Reverie, called <i>Marianne</i>, which is the +best thing I have done, and should be glad if you could induce Brahmson +to look at it."</p></div> + +<p>A big, sudden blaze, like a jubilant bonfire, shot up in the grate and +startled Beethoven into silence.</p> + +<p>But the canary took it for an extra flood of sunshine, and trilled and +demi-semi-quavered like mad.</p> + +<p>"Sw—eet! Sweet!"</p> + +<p>"By Jove!" said Lancelot, starting up, "Mary Ann's left her canary +behind!"</p> + +<p>Then the old whimsical look came over his face.</p> + +<p>"I must keep it for her," he murmured. "What a responsibility! I suppose +I oughtn't to let Rosie look after it any more. Let me see, what did +Peter say? Canary seed, biscuits ... yes, I must be careful not to give +it butter.... Curious I didn't think of her canary when I sent back all +those gloves ... but I doubt if I could have squeezed it in—my boots are +only sevens after all—to say nothing of the cage."</p> + + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + + + +<h1><a name="THE_SERIO-COMIC_GOVERNESS" id="THE_SERIO-COMIC_GOVERNESS"></a>THE SERIO-COMIC GOVERNESS</h1> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>Contents</h3> + +<p> +<a href="#IA">I</a><br /> +<a href="#IIA">II</a><br /> +<a href="#IIIA">III</a><br /> +<a href="#IVA">IV</a><br /> +<a href="#VA">V</a><br /> +<a href="#VIA">VI</a><br /> +<a href="#VIIA">VII</a><br /> +<a href="#VIIIA">VIII</a><br /> +<a href="#IXA">IX</a><br /> +<a href="#XA">X</a><br /> +<a href="#XIA">XI</a><br /> +<a href="#XIIA">XII</a><br /> +<a href="#XIIIA">XIII</a><br /> +<a href="#XIVA">XIV</a><br /> +<a href="#XVA">XV</a><br /> +<a href="#XVIA">XVI</a><br /> +<a href="#XVIIA">XVII</a><br /> +<a href="#XVIIIA">XVIII</a><br /> +<a href="#XIXA">XIX</a><br /> +<a href="#XXA">XX</a><br /> +<a href="#XXIA">XXI</a><br /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IA" id="IA"></a>I</h2> + + +<p>Nelly O'Neill had her day in those earlier and quieter reaches of the +Victorian era when the privilege of microscopic biography was reserved +for the great and the criminal classes, and when the Bohemian celebrity +(who is perhaps a cross between the two) was permitted to pass—like a +magic-lantern slide—from obscurity to oblivion through an illuminated +moment.</p> + +<p>Thus even her real name has not hitherto leaked out, and to this day the +O'Keeffes are unaware of their relative's reputation and believe their +one connection with the stage to be a dubious and undesirable +consanguinity with O'Keeffe, the actor and fertile farce-writer whose +<i>Wild Oats</i> made a sensation at Covent Garden at the end of the +eighteenth century. To her many brothers and sisters, Eileen was just the +baby, and always remained so, even in the eyes of the eminent civil +engineer who was only her senior by a year. Among the peasantry—subtly +prescient of her freakish destinies—she was dubbed "a fairy child": +which was by no means a compliment. A bad uncanny creature for all the +colleen's winsome looks. The later London whispers of a royal origin had +a travestied germ of truth in her father's legendary descent from Brian +Boru. He himself seemed scarcely less legendary, this highly coloured +squire of the old Irish school, surviving into the Victorian era, like a +Georgian caricature; still inhabiting a turreted castle romantically out +of repair, infested with ragged parasites: still believing in high living +and deep drinking: still receiving the reverence if not the rent of a +feudal tenantry, and the affection of a horsey and bibulous countryside. +When in liquor there was nothing the O'Keeffe might not do except pay off +his mortgages. "He looked like an elephant when he put his trousers on +wrong—you know elephants have their knees the wrong way," Eileen once +told the public in a patter-song. She did not tell the public it was her +father, but like a true artist she learned in suffering what she taught +in song. One of her childish memories was to be stood in a row of +brothers and sisters against a background of antlers, fishing-rods, and +racing prints, and solemnly sworn at for innumerability by a ruddy-faced +giant in a slovenly surtout. "Bad luck to ye, ye gomerals, make up your +minds whether ye're nine or eleven," he would say. "A man ought to know +the size of his family: Mother in heaven, I never thought mine was half +so large!" These attempts to take a census of his children generally +occurred after a peasant had brought him up the drive—"hat in one hand, +and Squire in the other," as the patter-song had it. At the moment of +assisted entry his paternal dignity was always at its stateliest, and it +was not till he had gravely hung his cocked hat upon an imaginary +door-peg in the middle of the hall and seen it flop floorward that he +lost his calm. "Blood and 'ouns, ye've the door taken away again."</p> + +<p>Sometimes—though this was scarcely a relief—another befuddled gentleman +would be left at the uninhabited lodge in his stead. That was chiefly +after hunt dinners or card and claret parties, when a new coachman would +take a quartet of gentry home, all clouded as to their identities. "Arrah +now! they've got thimselves mixed! let thim sort thimselves." And the +coachman would grab at the nearest limb, extricate it and its belongings +from the tangle, and prop the total mass against the first gate he +passed. And so with the rest.</p> + +<p>Eileen's mother, who was as remarkable for her microscopic piety as for +the beauty untarnished by a copious maternity, figured in the child's +memories as a stout saint who moved with a rustle of silken skirts and +heaved an opulent black silk bosom relieved by a silver cross.</p> + +<p>"Who are you?" her spouse would inquire with an oath.</p> + +<p>"It's your wife I am, Bagenal dear," she would reply cheerfully. For she +had grown up in the four-bottle tradition, and intoxication appeared as +natural for the superior sex as sleep. Both were temporary phases, and +did not prevent men from being the best of husbands and creatures when +clear. And when the marketwomen or the beggarwomen respectfully inquired +of her, "How is your good provider?" she made her reply with no sense of +irony, though she had been long paying the piper herself. And the piper +figured literally in the household accounts, as well as the fiddler, for +the O'Keeffe was what the mud cabins called a "ginthleman to the +backbone."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IIA" id="IIA"></a>II</h2> + + +<p>Family tradition necessitated that Eileen should at least complete her +education at a convent in the outskirts of Paris, and her first communion +was delayed till she should "make" it in that more pious atmosphere. The +O'Keeffe convoyed her across the two Channels, and took the opportunity +of visiting a "variety" theatre in Montmartre, where he was delighted +to find John Bull and his inelegant womenkind so faithfully delineated. +So exhilarated was he by this excellent take-off and a few <i>bocks</i> on the +Boulevard, that he refused to get down from the omnibus at its terminus.</p> + +<p>"<i>Jamais je ne descendrai, jamais</i>," he vociferated. Eileen was, however, +spared the sight of this miniature French revolution. She was lying +sleepless in the strange new dormitory, watching the nun walking up and +down in the dim weird room reading her breviary, now lost in deep shadow +with the remoter beds, now lucidly outlined in purple dress with creamy +cross as she came under the central night-light. Eileen wondered how she +could see to read, and if she were not just posing picturesquely, but +from the fervency with which she occasionally kissed the crucifix +hanging to the rosary at her side Eileen concluded she must know the +office by heart. Her own Irish home seemed on another planet, and her +turret-bedroom was already far more shadowy than this: presently both +were swallowed up into nothingness.</p> + +<p>She commenced her convent career characteristically enough by making a +sensation. For on rising in the morning she felt ineffably feeble and +forlorn; she seemed to have scarcely closed her eyes, when she must be up +and doing. The tiny hand-basin scarcely held enough water to cool her +brow, still giddy from the sea-passage; to do her hair she had to borrow +a minute hand-glass from her neighbour, and when after early mass in the +chapel she found other prayers postponing breakfast, she fainted most +alarmingly and dramatically. She was restored and refreshed with +balm-mint water, but it took some days to reconcile her to the rigid +life. To some aspects of it, indeed, she was never reconciled. The +atmosphere of suspicious supervision was asphyxiating, after the +disorderliness and warm humanity of her Irish home, after the run of the +stables and the kennels, and the freedom of the village, after the chats +with the pedlars and the beggars, and the borrowing and blowing of the +postman's bugle, after the queenship of a host of barefooted gossoons, +her loyal messenger-boys. Now her mere direct glance under reproof +was considered "<i>hardi</i>." "Droop your eyes, you bold child," said the +shocked Madame Agathe. A fancy she took to a French girl was checked. +"<i>On defend les amities particulières</i>," she was told to her +astonishment. But on this one point Eileen was recalcitrant. She would +even walk with her arm in Marcelle's, and somehow her will prevailed. +Perhaps Eileen was trusted as a foreigner: perhaps Marcelle, being a +day-boarder, weighed less upon the convent's conscience. There came a +time when even their desks adjoined and were not put asunder. For by this +time <i>Madame La Supèrieure</i> herself, at the monthly reading of the marks, +had often beamed upon Eileen. The <i>maîtresse de classe</i> had permitted +her to kiss her crucifix, and the music-mistress was enchanted with her +skill upon the piano and her rich contralto voice, such a godsend for the +choir. In her very first term she was allowed to run up to the dormitory +for something, unescorted by an <i>Enfant de Marie</i>. "Ascend, my child," +said Madame Agathe, smiling sweetly, for Eileen had outstripped all her +classmates that morning in geography, and Eileen, with a prim "<i>Oui, ma +mere</i>," rose and sailed with drooping eyelashes to the other end of the +schoolroom, and courtesied herself out of the door, knowing herself the +focus of envy and humorously conscious of her goodness. She had learned +to love this soothing sensation of goodness, as she sat in her blue +pelerine on a hard tabouret before her desk, her hands folded in front of +her, her little feet demurely crossed. The sweeping courtesy of entrance +and exit dramatised this pleasant sense of virtue. Later her aspirant's +ribbon painted it in purple.</p> + +<p>She worked hard for her examinations. "<i>Elle est si sage, cet enfant</i>," +she heard Madame Ursule say to Madame Hortense, and she had a delicious +sense of overwork. But she was not always <i>sage</i>. Once when her school +desk was ransacked in her absence—one of the many forms of +espionage—she refused to rearrange its tumbled contents, and when she +was given a bad mark for disorder, she cried defiantly, "It is Madame +Rosaline who deserves that bad mark." And the pleasure of seeing herself +as rebel and phrasemaker was no less keen than the pleasure of goodness.</p> + +<p>One other institution found her regularly rebellious, and that was the +pious reading which came punctually at half-past eight every morning. She +was bored by all the holy heroines who seemed to have taken vows of +celibacy at the age of four. "Devil take them all," she thought +whimsically one morning. "But I dare say these good little people have no +more reality than our 'little good people' who dance reels with the dead +on November Eve. I wish Dan O'Leary had taught them all to shake their +feet," and at the picture of jiggling little saints Eileen nearly gave +herself away by a peal of laughter. For she had learned to conceal her +unshared contempt for the holy heroines, and found a compensating +pleasure in the sense of amused superiority, and the secret duality which +it gave to her consciousness. She even went so far as to ransack the +library for these beatific biographies, and when she found herself +rewarded for "diligent reading" her amusement was at its apogee. And +thus, when the first awe and interest of the strange life receded, Eileen +was left standing apart as on a little rock, criticising, satirising, and +even circulating verses among the few cronies who were not sneaks. The +dowerless "sisters" who scrubbed the floors, the portioned <i>Mesdames</i>, +with their more dignified humility, the Refectory readers, the Father +Confessors, the little <i>Enfants de Jésus</i>, the big <i>Enfants de Marie</i>, +who sometimes owed their blue ribbon to their birth or their money rather +than to their exemplary behaviour, all had their humours, and all figured +in Eileen's French couplets. The difficulty of passing these from hand to +hand only made the reading—and the writing—the spicier. Literature did +not interfere with lessons, for Eileen composed not during "preparation," +but while she sat embroidering handkerchiefs, as demure as a sleeping +kitten.</p> + +<p>When the kitten was not thus occupied, she was playing with skeins of +logic and getting herself terribly tangled.</p> + +<p>She put her difficulties to her favourite nun as they walked in the +quaint arcades of the lovely old garden, and their talk was punctuated +by the flippant click of croquet-balls in the courtyard beyond.</p> + +<p>"Madame Agathe is pleased with me to-day," said Eileen. "To-morrow she +will be displeased. But how can I help the colour of my soul any more +than the colour of my hair?"</p> + +<p>"Hush, my child; if you talk like that you will lose your faith. Nobody +is pleased or vexed with anybody for the colour of their hair."</p> + +<p>"Yes, where I come from a peasant girl suffers a little for having red +hair. Also a man with a hump, he cannot marry unless he owns many pigs."</p> + +<p>"Eileen! Who has put such dreadful thoughts into your head?"</p> + +<p>"That is what I ask myself, <i>ma mère</i>. Many things are done to me and I +sit in the centre looking on, like the weathercock on our castle at home, +who sees himself turning this way and that way and can only creak."</p> + +<p>"A weathercock is dead—you are alive."</p> + +<p>"Not at night, <i>ma mère</i>. At home in my bedroom I used to put out my +candle every night by clapping the extinguisher upon it. Who is it puts +the extinguisher upon me?"</p> + +<p>The good sister almost wished it could be she.</p> + +<p>But she replied gently, "It is God who gives us sleep—we can't be always +awake."</p> + +<p>"Then I am not responsible for my dreams anyhow?"</p> + +<p>"I hope you don't have bad dreams," said the nun, affrighted.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I dream—what do I not dream? Sometimes I fly—oh, so high, and all +the people look up at me, they marvel. But I laugh and kiss my hand to +them down there."</p> + +<p>"Well, there's no harm in flying," said the nun. "The angels fly."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but I am not always an angel in my dreams. Is it God who sends these +bad dreams, too?"</p> + +<p>"No—that is the devil."</p> + +<p>"Then it is sometimes he who puts the extinguisher on?"</p> + +<p>"That is when you have not said your prayers properly."</p> + +<p>Eileen opened wide eyes of protest. "Oh, but, dear mother, I always say +my prayers properly."</p> + +<p>"You think so? That is already a sin in you—the sin of spiritual pride."</p> + +<p>"But, <i>ma mere</i>, devil-dreams or angel-dreams—it is always the same in +the morning. Every morning one finds oneself ready on the pillow, like a +clock that has been wound up. One did not make the works."</p> + +<p>"But one can keep them clean."</p> + +<p>Eileen burst into a peal of laughter.</p> + +<p>"<i>Qu'avez-vous donc?</i>" said the good creature in vexation.</p> + +<p>"I thought of a clock washing its face with its hands."</p> + +<p>"You are a naughty child—one cannot talk seriously to you."</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear mother, I am just as serious when I am laughing as when I am +crying."</p> + +<p>"My child, we must never cultivate the mocking spirit. Leave me. I am +vexed with you."</p> + +<p>As her first communion approached, however, all these simmerings of +scepticism and revolt died down into the recommended <i>recueillement</i>. Her +days of retreat, passed in holy exercises, were an ecstasy of absorption +into the divine, and the pious readings began to assume a truer +complexion as the experiences of sister-souls, deep crying unto deep. Oh, +how she yearned to take the vows, to leave the trivial distracting life +of the outer world for the peace of self-sacrificial love!</p> + +<p>As she sat in the chapel, all white muslin and white veil, her hair +braided under a little cap, the new rosary of amethyst—a gift from +home—at her side, her hands clasped, exalted by incense and flowers and +the sweet voices of the choir, chanting Gounod's Canticle, "<i>Le Ciel a +visité la terre</i>," she felt that never more would she let this celestial +visitant go. When after the communion she pulled the last piece of +veiling over her face, she felt that it was for ever between her and the +crude world of sense; the "Hymn of Thanksgiving" was the apt expression +of her emotions.</p> + +<p>But next time she came under these aesthetic, devotional influences—even +as her own voice was soaring heavenward in the choir—she thought to +herself, "How delicious to have an emotion which you feel will last for +ever and which you know won't!" And a gleam of amusement flitted over her +rapt features.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IIIA" id="IIIA"></a>III</h2> + + +<p>When Eileen returned to the Convent after her first summer vacation in +Ireland she was richer by a surreptitious correspondent. He wrote to her, +care of Marcelle, who had a careless mother. He was a young officer from +the neighbouring barracks who, invited to make merry with the hospitable +O'Keeffe, had fallen a victim to Eileen's girlish charms and mature +appearance, for Eileen carried herself as if her years were three more +and her inches six higher. Her face had the winsome Irish sweetness; it, +too, looked lovelier than a scientific survey would have determined. Her +nose was straightish, her mouth small, her lashes were long and dark and +conspired with her dark hair to trick a casual observer into thinking her +eyes dark, but they were grey with little flecks of golden light if you +looked closelier than you should. Her hands were large but finely shaped, +with long fingers somewhat turned back at the tips, and pretty pink +nails—the hands were especially noticeable, because even when Eileen was +not playing the pianoforte, she was prone to extend her thumb as though +stretching an octave and to flick it as though striking a note.</p> + +<p>It was not love-letters, though, that Lieutenant Doherty sent Eileen, +for the schoolgirl had always taken him in a motherly way, and indeed +signed herself "Your Mother-Confessor." But the mystery and difficulty +of smuggling the letters to and fro lent colour to the drab Convent +days, far vivider colour than the whilom passing of verses. So long +as Marcelle's desk remained next to Eileen's it was comparatively +easy—though still risky—while one's head was studiously buried in +"Greek roots," for one's automatic hand to pass or receive the letter +beneath the desks through the dangerous space of daylight between the +two. "Let not your right hand know what your left hand doeth," Eileen +once quoted when Marcelle's conscience pricked. For Marcelle imagined +an amour of the darkest dye, and could not understand Eileen's calmness +any more than Eileen could understand Marcelle's romantic palpitations +alternating with suggestive sniggerings.</p> + +<p>But when Marcelle was at length separated from Eileen by a suspicious +management, a much more breathless plan was necessary. For Marcelle would +deposit the Doherty letter in Eileen's compartment in the curtained row +of little niches—where one kept one's work-bag, atlas, and other +educational reserves—or Eileen would slip the reply into Marcelle's, and +there it would lie, exposed to inspectorial ransacking, till such times +as Eileen or Marcelle could transfer it to her bosom. Poor Marcelle lived +with her heart in her mouth, trembling, at every rustle of the curtain, +for her purple ribbon. However, luck favoured the bold, while the only +bad moment in which Eileen was on the verge of detection she surmounted +by a stroke of genius.</p> + +<p>"What are you hiding there?" said the music-mistress, more sharply than +she was wont to address her pet pupil. Eileen put her hand to her bosom. +'Twas as if she were protecting the young lieutenant from pursuing foes, +and he became romantically dear to her in that perilous moment, pregnant +with swift invention.</p> + +<p>She looked round with dramatic mysteriousness. "Hush, <i>ma mère</i>," she +breathed; "the Mother Superior might hear."</p> + +<p>"Ah, it concerns the Reverend Mother's fête," cried the music-mistress, +falling into the trap and even saving Eileen from the lie direct. "Good, +my child," and she smiled tenderly upon her. For the birthday of the Lady +Superior which was imminent was heralded by infinite mysteriousness. The +Reverend Mother was taken by surprise, regularly and punctually. The +girls all subscribed, their parents were invited to send plants and +flowers. The air vibrated with sublime secrecy, amid which the Reverend +Mother walked guilelessly. And when the great day came and the fête was +duly sprung upon her, and the pupils all dressed in white overwhelmed her +with bouquets and courtesies, how exquisite was her pleased astonishment! +That night talking was allowed in the Refectory, and how the girls +jabbered! It was like the rolling of ceaseless thunder—one would have +thought they had never talked before and never would talk again, and that +they were anxious to unload themselves once for all.</p> + +<p>"How the ordinary becomes the extraordinary by being forbidden," +philosophised Eileen. "At the Castle I can do a hundred things, which +here become enormous privileges, even if I am allowed to do them at all. +Is it so with everything they say is wrong? Is all sin artificial, and do +people sin so zestfully only because they are cramped? Or is there a +residue of real wickedness?" Thus she thought, struggling against the +obsession of an inquisitorial system which merely clouded her perceptions +of real right and wrong. And alone she ate silently, a saintly figure +amid the laughing, chattering crew.</p> + +<p>She wrote her maternal admonitions to young Doherty during the +preparation-time, and far keener than her sense of the lively, +good-looking young officer was her sense of the double life she led +through him in this otherwise monotonous Convent. When she achieved the +blue ribbon of the <i>Enfants de Marie</i>, for which she had worked with true +devotion, it added poignancy to her pious pleasure to think that one +false step in her secret life would have marred her overt life.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IVA" id="IVA"></a>IV</h2> + + +<p>As the end of her conventual period drew nigh Eileen resolved never to +go back to the spotted world, but to ask her father to pay her dowry as +Bride to the Church, and she had just placed in Marcelle's niche the +letter informing Lieutenant Doherty of her call to the higher life (and +pointing out how apter than ever his confessions would now be) when +Marcelle's signal warned her to look in her own niche. There she found a +letter which she could not read till bread-and-chocolate time, but which +then took the flavour out of these refreshments. Her lover—he leaped to +that verbal position in her thought in this moment of crisis—was ordered +off in haste to Afghanistan. The geographical proficiency which had won +her so many marks served her only too well, but she hastened to extract +her atlas from the fatal niche, and to pore over her geographical misery. +She felt she ought to withdraw her own letter for revision, but she could +not get at Marcelle or even make her understand. In her perturbation she +gave Cabul and Candahar as Kings of Navarre, and Marcelle, implacable as +a pillar-box, went away in the evening like a mail-cart.</p> + +<p>But the very same night the Superior handed Eileen an opened cablegram +which banished Lieutenant Doherty much farther than Afghanistan. Her +father was very ill, and called her to his bedside. Things had a way of +happening simultaneously to Eileen, these coincidences dogged her life, +so that she came to think of them as the rival threads of her life +getting tangled at certain points and then going off separately again. +After all, if you have several strings to your life, she told herself, +it would be more improbable that they should always remain separate than +that they should sometimes intertwine.</p> + +<p>Eileen reached the Castle through a tossing avenue of villagers, weeping +and blessing, and divined from their torment of sympathy that "his +honour" was already in his grave. Poor feckless father, how she had loved +him spite all his rollicking ways, or perhaps because of them. Through +her tears she saw him counting—on his entry into Paradise—the children +who had preceded him, and more than ever fuzzled by the flapping of their +wings. Oh, poor dearest, how unhomely it would all be to him, this other +world where his jovial laugh would shock the nun-like spirits, where +there was no more claret, cold, mulled, or buttered, and no sound of horn +or tally-ho.</p> + +<p>Perhaps it was as well that so many of his brood had gone before him, for +with his departure the Castle fell metaphorically about the ears of the +survivors. Creditors gave quarter no longer, and Mrs. O'Keeffe found +herself reduced to a modest red-gabled farmhouse, with nothing saved from +the crash save that part of her dowry which was invested in trustees for +the education of her boys. There was no question of Eileen returning to +the Convent as a pupil: her desire to take the veil failed at the thought +that now she could only be a dowerless working-sister, not a teacher. And +for teaching, especially music-teaching, she felt she had a real gift. By +a natural transition arose the idea of becoming a music-teacher or a +governess outside a Convent, and since her stay at home only helped to +diminish her mother's resources, she resolved to augment them by leaving +her. Family pride forbade the neighbourhood witnessing a deeper decline. +The O'Keeffes were still "the Quality"; it would be better to seek her +fortunes outside Ireland and retain her prestige at home. The dual +existence would give relish and variety.</p> + +<p>Eileen's mind worked so quickly that she communicated these ideas to her +mother, ere that patient lady had quite realised that never more would +she say, "It's your wife I am, Bagenal dear."</p> + +<p>"No, no, you are not to be going away," cried Mrs. O'Keeffe, in alarm.</p> + +<p>"Why wouldn't I?" asked Eileen.</p> + +<p>Mrs. O'Keeffe could not tell, but looked mysterious meanings. This +excited Eileen, so that the poor woman had no rest till she answered +plainly, "Because, mavourneen, it's married you are going to be, +please the saints."</p> + +<p>"Married! Me!"</p> + +<p>"It was your father's dying wish, God keep his soul."</p> + +<p>"But to whom?"</p> + +<p>"You should be asking the priest how good he is. Didn't you notice that +the chapel is being white-washed afresh and how clear the Angelus bell +rings? Not that it matters much to him, for he has lashings of money as +well as a heart of gold."</p> + +<p>"Hasn't he a name, too?"</p> + +<p>"Don't jump down my throat, Eileen darling. I shouldn't be thinking of +O'Flanagan if your father—"</p> + +<p>"O'Flanagan! Do you mean the man that bought our Castle at the auction?"</p> + +<p>"And isn't it beautifully repaired he's having it for you? He saw you +when you were home for the holidays, and he asked us for your hand, all +so humble, but your father told him he must wait till you came home for +good."</p> + +<p>"O'Flanagan!" Eileen flicked him away with her thumb. "A half-mounted +gentleman like that."</p> + +<p>"Eileen aroon, beggars can't be choosers."</p> + +<p>Eileen flushed all over her body. "No more can beggars on horseback."</p> + +<p>"Your father will be sorry you take it like that, mavourneen." And the +stout saint burst into tears.</p> + +<p>Eileen winced. She could almost have flung her arms round her mother and +promised to think of it. Suddenly she remembered Lieutenant Doherty. How +dared they tear her away from the man she loved! They had not even +consulted her. She flicked her thumb agitatedly on the back of her +mother's chair. Let her weep! Did they want to sell her, to exchange her +for a castle, as if she were a chess-piece? The thought made her smile +again.</p> + +<p>Her mother said no more, but she could not have employed a more +convincing eloquence. The reticence wrought upon Eileen's nerves. After a +couple of months of maternal meekness and family poverty, the suggested +sacrifice began to appeal to her. A letter from Doherty on his steamer +(forwarded to her from Paris by Marcelle), passionately protesting +against her intention to take the vows, came to remind her that sacrifice +was what she yearned for. The coming of the letter was providential, she +told herself: if Marcelle had not posted hers against her will, she might +not have had this monition. To return to the Castle as a bride, martyred +for the family redemption, was really only a way of returning to the +Convent. It meant a life of penance for the good of others. To think +of her mother sunning herself again upon the battlemented terrace, or +sleeping—if only as guest—in the great panelled bedroom, brought a lump +to her throat; her poor tenantry, too, should bless her name; she would +glide among them like a spirit, very sad, yet with such healing in her +smile and in her touch. "Sure the misthress is the swatest angel God iver +sint, so she is." At home she would sit and spin in the old tapestried +room, her own life as faded, and sometimes she would dream in the hall, +among the antlers and beast-skins, and watch the great burning logs, so +much more poetic than this peat smoke which hurt one's eyes. Ah, but then +there was O'Flanagan. Well, he would not be much in the way. He liked +riding over his new estate in his buckskin breeches, cracking his great +loaded whip. She had met him herself once or twice, and the great shy +creature had blushed furiously and ridden off down the first bridle-path. +"I turn his horse's head as well as his," she had thought with a smile. +Yes, she must sacrifice herself. How strange that the nuns should +imagine you only renounced by giving up earthly life. Why, earthly life +might be the most celestial renunciation of all. But Lieutenant Doherty, +what of him? Had she the right to sacrifice him, too? But then she had +never given him any claim upon her—she had been merely his little +mother-confessor. If he had dared to love her—as his passionate protest +against the veil seemed to suggest—it was at his own risk. Poor Doherty, +how grieved he would be in far Afghanistan. He would probably rush upon +the assegais and die, murmuring her name. Her eyes filled with delicious +tears. She sat down and scribbled him a letter hastily, announcing her +impending marriage, and posted it at once, so as to put herself beyond +temptation to draw back. Then she dashed to her mother's room and sobbed +out, "Dear heart, I consent to be martyred."</p> + +<p>"What?" said Mrs. O'Keeffe, opening her eyes.</p> + +<p>"I consent to be married," Eileen corrected hastily.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to Mr. O'Flanagan?" Mrs. O'Keeffe's face became red as the +sun in mist. The cross heaved convulsively on her black silk bosom.</p> + +<p>"To whom else? You haven't forgotten he wanted to marry me."</p> + +<p>"No, but <i>he</i> has, I am fearing."</p> + +<p>"What?" It was now Eileen's turn to open her eyes, and the tears dried on +her lashes as she listened. Mrs. O'Keeffe explained, amid the ebb and +flow of burning blood, that she had waited in vain for Mr. O'Flanagan to +renew his proposal. At first she thought he was waiting for a decent +interval to elapse, or for the Castle to be ready for his bride, but +gradually she had become convinced by his silence and by the way he +avoided her eye when they met and turned his horse down the nearest +boreen, that Eileen had been right in calling him half-mounted. He had +proposed when he imagined the Squire's fortunes were as of yore, but now +he feared he would have to support the ruined family. Well, he needn't +fear. The family wouldn't touch him with a forty-foot pole.</p> + +<p>"If only your poor father had been alive," wound up Mrs. O'Keeffe, "the +dirty upstart would never have dared to put such an insult on his +orphaned daughter, that he wouldn't, and if Dan O'Leary should hear of +it—which the saints forbid—it's not the jig that his foot would be +teaching Mr. O' Flanagan."</p> + +<p>The bathos of this anti-climax to martyrdom was too grotesque. Eileen +burst into a peal of laughter, which was taken by her mother as a tribute +to her lively vituperation. Decidedly, life was deliciously odd. Suddenly +she remembered her posted letter to Doherty, and she laughed louder.</p> + +<p>Should she send another on its heels? No, it would be rather difficult to +explain. Besides, it would be so interesting to see how he replied.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VA" id="VA"></a>V</h2> + + +<p>Holly Hall—Eileen's first place—was in the English midlands, towards +the North: a sombre stone house looking down on a small manufacturing +town, whose very grass seemed dingied with coal-dust. "A dromedary town," +Eileen dubbed it; for it consisted of a long level with two humps, +standing in a bleak desert. On one of the humps she found herself +perched. Below—between the humps—lay the town proper, with its savour +of grime and gain. The Black Hole was Eileen's name for this quarter; +and indeed you might leave your hump, bathed in sunlight, dusty but still +sunlight, and as you came down the old wagon-road you would plunge deeper +and deeper into the yellowish fog which the poor townspeople mistook for +daylight. The streets of the Black Hole bristled with public-houses, +banks, factories, and dissenting chapels. The population was given over +to dogs and football, and medical men abounded. Arches, blank walls, and +hoardings were flamboyant with ugly stage-beauties, melodramatic +tableaux, and the advertisements of tailors. After the Irish glens and +the Convent garden the Black Hole was not exhilarating.</p> + +<p>Mr. Maper, the proprietor of Holly Hall, was a mill-owner, a big-boned, +kindly man, who derived his Catholicism from an Irish mother, and had +therefore been pleased to find an Irish girl among the candidates for the +post of companion to his wife.</p> + +<p>As he drove her from the station up the steep old wagon-road he explained +the situation, in more than one sense. Eileen's girlish intuition helped +his lame sentences over the stiles. Briefly, she was to polish the +quondam mill-hand, whom he had married when he, too, was a factory +operative, but who had not been able to rise with him. He was an alderman +and a J.P. That made things difficult enough. But how if he became Mayor? +An alderman has no necessary feminine, not even alderwoman, but Mayor +makes Mayoress. And a Mayoress is not safe from the visits of royalty +itself. Of course the Mayoress was not to suspect she was being refined; +"made a Lady Mayoress," as Eileen put it to herself.</p> + +<p>She entered with a light heart upon a task she soon found heavy. For +the mistress of Holly Hall had no sense of imperfections. She was a +tall and still good-looking person, and this added to her fatal +complacency. Eileen saw that she imagined God made the woman and money +the lady, and that between a female in a Paris bonnet and a female in a +head-shawl there was a natural gap as between a crested cockatoo and a +hedge-sparrow. Mrs. Maper indeed suffered badly from swelled self, for it +had subconsciously expanded with its surroundings. The wide rooms of the +Hall were her spacious skirts, bedecked with the long glitter of the +glass-houses; her head reached the roof and wore the weathercock as a +feather in her bonnet. All those whirring engines in the misty valley +below were her demon-slaves, and the chimneys puffed up incense at her. +When she drove out, her life-blood coursed pleasurably through the +ramping, glossy horses.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Maper, in short, saw herself an empress. It was simply impossible +for her to realise that there were eyes which could still see the +head-shawl, not the crown. Her one touch of dignity was grotesque—it +consisted of extending her arm like a stiff sceptre, in moments of +emphasis, and literally pointing her remarks with her forefinger. +Sometimes she pointed to the ceiling, sometimes to the carpet, sometimes +to the walls. This digital punctuation appeared to be not only +superfluous but irrelevant, for Heaven might be invoked from the floor.</p> + +<p>With this bejewelled lady Eileen passed her days either on the Hump, or +in the Black Hole, or in the environs, and but for her sense of humour +and her power of leading a second life above or below her first, her +tenure of the post would have been short. The most delicate repetitions +of mispronounced words, the subtlest substitution of society phrases for +factory idioms, fell blunted against an impenetrable ignorance and +self-sufficiency. Short of dropping the pose of companion and boldly +rapping a pupil on the knuckles, there seemed to her no way of modifying +her mistress. "Who can refine what Fortune has gilded?" she asked herself +in humorous despair. The appearance of Mr. Maper at dinner brought little +relief. It was a strange meal in the lordly dining room—three covers +laid at one end of the long mahogany table, under the painted stare of +somebody else's ancestors. Eileen's girlish enjoyment of the prodigal +fare was spoiled by her furtive watch on the hostess's fork. Nor did the +alderman contribute ease, for he was on pins lest the governess should +reveal her true mission, and on needles lest his wife should reveal her +true depths. Likewise he worried Eileen to drink his choicest wines. +Vintages that she felt her father would have poised on his tongue in +mystic clucking ecstasy stood untasted in a regiment of little glasses +at her elbow.</p> + +<p>She repaid them, however, by adroit educational remarks.</p> + +<p>"How stupid of me again!" she said once. "I held out my hock glass for +the champagne! Do tell me again which is which, dear Mrs. Maper."</p> + +<p>"I suppose you never had a drink of champagne in your life afore you come +here," said Mrs. Maper, beamingly. And she indicated the port glass.</p> + +<p>"No, no, Lucy, don't play pranks on a stranger," her husband put in +tactfully. "It's this glass, Miss O'Keeffe."</p> + +<p>"Oh, thank you!" Eileen gushed. "And this is what? Sherry?"</p> + +<p>"No, port," replied Mr. Maper, scarcely able to repress a wink.</p> + +<p>"You'll have to tell me again to-morrow night," said Eileen, enjoying her +own comedy powers. "My poor father tried to teach me the difference +between bird's-eye and shag, but I could never remember."</p> + +<p>"Ah, Bob's the boy for teaching you that," guffawed the mill owner. "I +stick to half-crown cigars myself." His wife shot him a dignified rebuke, +as though he were forgetting his station in undue familiarity.</p> + +<p>Afterwards Eileen wondered who Bob was, but at the moment she could think +of nothing but the farcical complications arising from the idea of Mrs. +Maper's providing Mr. Maper with a male companion secretly to improve +<i>his</i> manners. Of course the <i>two</i> companions would fall in love with +each other.</p> + +<p>After dinner things usually woke up a little, for Eileen was made to play +and even sing from the scores of "Madame Angot" and other recent comic +operas—a form of music that had not hitherto come her way, though it was +the only form the music-racks held to feed the grand piano with. Not till +the worthy couple had retired, could she permit herself her old Irish +airs, or the sonatas and sacred pieces of the Convent.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VIA" id="VIA"></a>VI</h2> + + +<p>Accident—the key to all great inventions—supplied Eileen with a new way +of educating her mistress. The cook had been impertinent, Mrs. Maper +complained. "Why don't you hunt her?" Eileen replied. Mrs. Maper +corrected the Irishism by saying, "Do you mean dismiss?" Eileen hastened +to accuse herself of Irish imperfections, and henceforward begged to +learn the correct phrases or pronunciations. Sometimes she ventured +apologetically to wonder if the Irish way was not more approved of the +dictionary. Then they would wander into the library in the apparently +unoccupied wing, and consult dictionary after dictionary till Eileen +hoped Mrs. Maper's brain had received an indelible impression.</p> + +<p>One Sunday afternoon a friendly orthoepical difference of this nature +arose even as Mrs. Maper sat in her palatial drawing room waiting for +callers, and they repaired to the library, Mrs. Maper arguing the point +with loud good humour. A glass door giving by corkscrew iron steps on the +garden, banged hurriedly as they made their chattering entry. The rows of +books—that had gone with the Hall like the family portraits—stretched +silently away, but amid the smell of leather and learning, Eileen's +lively nostrils detected the whiff of the weed, and sure enough on the +top of a stepladder reposed a plain briar pipe beside an unclosed Greek +folio.</p> + +<p>"The scent is hot," she thought, touching the still warm bowl. "Bob seems +as scared as a rabbit and as learned as an owl." Suddenly she had +difficulty in repressing a laugh. What if Bob <i>were</i> the corresponding +male companion!</p> + +<p>"I see Mr. Robert has forgotten his pipe," she said audaciously.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Maper was taken aback. "The—the boy is shy," she stammered.</p> + +<p>What! Was there a son lying <i>perdu</i> in the house all this while? What +fun! A son who did not even go to church or to his mother's receptions. +But how had he managed to escape her? And why did nobody speak of him? +Ah, of course, he was a cripple, or facially disfigured, morbidly +dreading society, living among his books. She had read of such things. +Poor young man!</p> + +<p>After dinner she found herself examining the family album inquisitively, +but beyond a big-browed and quite undistorted baby nursing a kitten, +there did not seem anything remotely potential, and she smiled at herself +as she thought of the difficulty of evolving bibs into briar pipes and +developing Greek folios out of kittens.</p> + +<p>From Mrs. Maper's keenness about the University Boat Race as it drew +near, and from her wearing on the day itself a dark blue gown trimmed +profusely with ribbons of the same hue, Eileen divined that Bob was an +Oxford man. This gave the invisible deformed a new touch of interest, but +long ere this Eileen had found a much larger interest—the theatre.</p> + +<p>She had never been to the play, and the Theatre Royal of the Black Hole +was the scene of her induction into this enchantment. In those days the +touring company system had not developed to its present complexity, and +the theatre had been closed during the first month or so of Eileen's +residence in Dromedary Town. But at length, to Mrs. Maper's delight, a +company arrived with a melodrama, and as part of her duties, Eileen, no +less excited over the new experience (which her Confessor had permitted +her), drove with her mistress behind a pair of spanking steeds to the +Wednesday <i>matinee</i>. Mrs. Maper alleged her inability to leave her +homekeeping husband as the cause of her daylight playgoing, but Eileen +maliciously ascribed it to the pomp of the open carriage.</p> + +<p>They occupied a box and Eileen was glad they did. For instead of +undergoing the illusion of the drama, she found it killingly comic as +soon as she understood that it was serious. It was all she could do to +hide her amusement from her entranced companion, and somehow this box at +the theatre reminded her of the Convent room in which she used to sit +listening to the pious readings anent infant prodigies. One afternoon it +came upon her that here Mrs. Maper had learned her strange pump handle +gestures. Here it was that ladies worked arms up and down and pointed +denunciatory forefingers, albeit the direction had more reference to the +sentiment.</p> + +<p>It was not till a comic opera came along that Eileen was able to take the +theatre seriously. Then she found some of the melodies of the drawing +room scores wedded to life and diverting action, sometimes even to poetic +dancing; the first gleam of poetry the stage gave her. When these airs +were lively, Mrs. Maper's feet beat time and Eileen lived in the fear +that she would arise and prance in her box. It was an effervescence of +joyous life—the factory girl recrudescent—and Eileen's hand would lie +lightly on Mrs. Maper's shoulder, feeling like a lid over a kettle about +to boil.</p> + +<p>When they came home Eileen would gratify her mistress by imitations of +comedians. Presently she ventured on the tragedians, without being seen +through. She even raised her arm towards the ceiling or shot it towards +the centre of the carpet pattern, and Mrs. Maper followed it spellbound.</p> + +<p>But from all these monkey tricks she found relief in her real music. When +she crooned the old Irish songs, the Black Hole was washed away as by the +soft Irish rain, and the bogs stretched golden with furze-blossom and +silver with fluffy fairy cotton, and at the doors of the straggling +cabins overhung by the cloud-shadowed mountains, blue-cloaked women +sat spinning, and her eyes filled with tears as though the peat smoke +had got into them.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VIIA" id="VIIA"></a>VII</h2> + + +<p>In such a mood she was playing one Saturday evening in the interval +before dinner, when she became aware that somebody was listening, and +turning her head, she saw through the Irish mist a man's figure standing +in the conservatory. The figure was vanishing when she cried out a whit +huskily, "Oh, pray, don't let me drive you away."</p> + +<p>He stood still. "If I am not interrupting your music," he murmured.</p> + +<p>"Not at all," she said, breaking it off altogether.</p> + +<p>As the mist cleared she had a vivid impression of a tall, fair young +man against a background of palms. "Eyes burning under a white marble +mantel-piece," she summed up his face. Could this uncrippled, rather +good-looking person be Bob?</p> + +<p>"Won't you come in, Mr. Robert?" she said riskily.</p> + +<p>"I only wished to thank you," he said, sliding a step or two into the +room.</p> + +<p>"There is nothing to thank me for," she said, whirling her stool to face +him. "It's my way of amusing myself." She was glad she was in her evening +frock.</p> + +<p>"Amusing yourself!" He looked aghast.</p> + +<p>"What else? I am alone—I have nothing better in the world to do."</p> + +<p>"Does it amuse you?" He was flushed now, even the marble mantel-piece +ruddied by the flame. "I wish it amused me."</p> + +<p>Now it was Eileen's turn to gasp. "Then why do you listen?"</p> + +<p>"I don't listen—I bury myself as far away as I can."</p> + +<p>"So I have understood. Then what are you thanking me for?"</p> + +<p>"For what you are doing for—." his hesitation was barely +perceptible—"my mother."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" Eileen looked blank. "I thought you meant for my music."</p> + +<p>His face showed vast relief. "Oh, you were talking of your music! Of +course, of course, how stupid of me! That is what has drawn me from my +hole, like a rat to the Pied Piper, and I do thank you most sincerely. +But being drawn, what I most wished to thank the Piper for was—"</p> + +<p>"Your mother pays the Piper for that," she broke in.</p> + +<p>He smiled but tossed his head. "Money! what is that?"</p> + +<p>"It is more than I deserve for mere companionship—pleasant drives and +theatres."</p> + +<p>He did not accept her delicate reticence.</p> + +<p>"But you have altered her wonderfully!" he cried.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I have not," she cried, doubly startled. "It's just nothing that I +have done—nothing." Then she felt her modesty had put her foot in a +bog-hole. Unseeingly he helped her out.</p> + +<p>"It is most kind of you to put it like that. But I see it in every +movement, every word. She imitates you unconsciously—I became curious to +see so excellent a model, though I had resolved not to meet you. No, no, +please, don't misunderstand."</p> + +<p>"I don't," she said mischievously. "You have now given me three reasons +for seeing me. You need give me none for not seeing me."</p> + +<p>"But you must understand," he said, colouring again, "how painful all +this has been for me—"</p> + +<p>"Not seeing me?" she interpolated innocently.</p> + +<p>"The—the whole thing," he stammered.</p> + +<p>"Yes, parents are tiresome," she said sympathetically.</p> + +<p>He came nearer the music-stool.</p> + +<p>"Are they not? They came down every year for the Eights."</p> + +<p>"Is that at Oxford?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>She was silent; her thumb flicked at a note on the keyboard behind her.</p> + +<p>"But that's not what I mind in them most—"</p> + +<p>She wondered at the rapidity with which his shyness was passing into +effusiveness. But then was she not the "Mother-Confessor"? Had not even +her favourite nuns told her things about their early lives, even when +there was no moral to be pointed? "They're very good-hearted," she +murmured apologetically. "I'm often companion—in charity expeditions."</p> + +<p>"It's easy to be good-hearted when you don't know what to do with your +money. This place is full of such people. But I look in vain for the +diviner impulse."</p> + +<p>Eileen wondered if he were a Dissenter. But then "the place was full of +such people."</p> + +<p>"You don't think there's enough religion?" she murmured.</p> + +<p>"There's certainly plenty of churches and chapels. But I find myself +isolated here. You see, I'm a Socialist."</p> + +<p>Eileen crossed herself instinctively.</p> + +<p>"You don't believe in God!" she cried in horror. For the good nuns had +taught her that "<i>les socialistes</i>" were synonymous with "<i>les athées</i>."</p> + +<p>He laughed. "Not, if by God you mean Mammon. I don't believe in +Property—we up here in the sun and the others down there in the soot."</p> + +<p>"But you <i>are</i> up here," said Eileen, naively.</p> + +<p>"I can't help it. My mother would raise Cain." He smiled wistfully. "She +couldn't bear to see a stranger helping father in the factory +management."</p> + +<p>"Then you <i>are</i> down there."</p> + +<p>"Quite so. I work as hard as any one even if my labour isn't manual. I +dress like an ordinary hand, too, though my mother doesn't know that, for +I change at the office."</p> + +<p>"But what good does that do?"</p> + +<p>"It satisfies my conscience."</p> + +<p>"And I suppose the men like it?"</p> + +<p>"No, that's the strange part. They don't. And father only laughs. But one +must persist. At Oxford I worked under Ruskin."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you're an artist!"</p> + +<p>"No, I didn't mean that part of Ruskin's work. His gospel of labour—we +had a patch for digging."</p> + +<p>"What—real spades!"</p> + +<p>"Did you imagine we called a spoon a spade?" he said, a whit resentfully.</p> + +<p>Eileen smiled. "No, but I can't imagine you using a common or garden +spade."</p> + +<p>"You are thinking of my hands." He looked at them, not without +complacency, Eileen thought, as she herself wondered where he had got his +long white fingers from. "But it is a couple of years ago," he explained. +"It was hard work, I assure you."</p> + +<p>"Did your mother know?" Eileen asked with a little whimsical look.</p> + +<p>"Of course not. She would have been horrified."</p> + +<p>"Well, but most people would be surprised."</p> + +<p>"Yes. Put your muscle into an oar or a cricket bat and you are a hero; +put your muscle into a spade and you are a madman."</p> + +<p>"You think it's <i>vice versa</i>?" queried Eileen, ingenuously.</p> + +<p>"Much more. At least," he stammered and coloured again, "I don't pose as +a hero but simply—"</p> + +<p>"As what?" Eileen still looked innocent.</p> + +<p>"I simply think work is the noblest function of man," he burst forth. +"Don't you?"</p> + +<p>"I do not," answered Eileen. "Work is a curse. If the serpent had not +tempted Eve to break God's commandment, we should still be basking in +Paradise."</p> + +<p>He looked at her curiously. "You believe that?"</p> + +<p>"Isn't it in the Bible?" she answered, seriously astonished.</p> + +<p>"Whatever the primitive Semitic allegorist may have thought, work is a +blessing, not a curse."</p> + +<p>"Then you <i>are</i> an atheist!" Eileen recoiled from this strange young man.</p> + +<p>"Ah, you shrink back!" he said in tones of bitter pleasure. "I told you I +lived in isolation."</p> + +<p>Eileen's humour shot forth candidly. "You'll not be isolated when you +die."</p> + +<p>His bitterness passed into genial superiority. "You mean I'll go to hell. +How can you believe anything so horrible?"</p> + +<p>"Why is that horrible for me to believe? For you—" And she filled up the +sentence with a smile.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe you do believe it."</p> + +<p>"There's nothing you seem to believe. I do honestly think that you can't +be saved if you don't believe."</p> + +<p>"I accept that. The question, however, is what kind of belief and what +kind of saving. Do you suppose Plato is in hell?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. He invented Platonic love, didn't he? So that might save +him." She looked at him with her great grey eyes—he couldn't tell +whether she was quizzing him or not.</p> + +<p>"Is that all you know of Plato?"</p> + +<p>"I know he was a Greek philosopher. But I only learned Greek roots at the +Convent. So Plato is Greek to me."</p> + +<p>"He has been beautifully Englished by the Master of my College. I wish +you'd read him."</p> + +<p>"Is the translation in the library?"</p> + +<p>"Of course—with lots of other interesting books, and such queer folios +and quartos and first editions. The collector was a man of taste. Why do +you never come and let me show them you?"</p> + +<p>"You'd run away."</p> + +<p>"No, I wouldn't," he smiled encouragingly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, you would. And leave your pipe on Plato!"</p> + +<p>He laughed. "Was I rude? But I didn't know you then. Come to-morrow +afternoon and show you've forgiven me."</p> + +<p>The new interest was sufficiently tempting. But her maidenliness held +back. "I'll come with your mother."</p> + +<p>Disgust lent him wit. "You're her companion—not she yours."</p> + +<p>"True. Nor I yours."</p> + +<p>"Then I'll come here."</p> + +<p>"Bringing the Plato and the folios—?"</p> + +<p>"Why not? You can't forbid me my own drawing-room."</p> + +<p>"I can run away and leave my crochet-hook behind."</p> + +<p>"You'll find me hooked on whenever you return."</p> + +<p>"Well, if you're determined—by hook or by crook! But you're not going to +convert me to Socialism?"</p> + +<p>"I won't promise."</p> + +<p>"You must. I don't mind reading Plato."</p> + +<p>"He's worse. He isn't a Christian at all."</p> + +<p>"I don't mind that. He's B.C. He couldn't help it. But you Socialists +came after Christ."</p> + +<p>"How do you know Socialism isn't a return to Him?"</p> + +<p>"Is it?"</p> + +<p>"Aha! You are getting interested.... But I hear my mother coming down to +dinner. To be continued in our next. <i>À demain</i>, is it not?"</p> + +<p>He held out his shapely white hand, and hastened through the conservatory +into the garden.</p> + +<p>"Going to dig?" Eileen called after him maliciously.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VIIIA" id="VIIIA"></a>VIII</h2> + + +<p>Eileen became interested in Robert Maper, for the old books he opened +up to her were quite new and enlarging. She had imagined the Church +replacing Paganism as light replaced darkness. Now she felt that it was +only as gas replaced candle-light. The darkness was less Egyptian than +the nuns insinuated. Plato in particular was a veritable chandelier. It +occurred to her suddenly that he might be on the black list. But she was +afraid to ask her Confessor for fear of hearing her doubt confirmed. To +tell the good father of the semi-secret meetings in the library would +have been superfluous, since there was nothing to conceal even from Mrs. +Maper, though that lady did not happen to know of them. Eileen did not +even use the garden door. Besides, there was never a formal appointment, +not infrequently, indeed, a disappointment, when the library held nothing +but books. Robert Maper merely provided that possibility of an innocent +double life, without which existence would have been too savourless for +Eileen. Even a single line of railway always appeared dismal to her; she +liked the great junctions with their bewildering intertanglements, their +possibilities of collision. And now that Lieutenant Doherty had faded +away into Afghanistan and silence—he did not even acknowledge the letter +announcing her approaching marriage—Robert Maper proved a useful +substitute.</p> + +<p>One day Mr. Maper senior invited her to drive down with him and go over +the factory, and as Mrs. Maper was not averse from impressing her +employée by the sight of the other employes, she was permitted to go. +Nothing, however, would induce Mrs. Maper to adventure herself in these +scenes of her early life, touching which she professed a sovereign +ignorance. "Machines are so clattery," she said. "My head wouldn't stand +them. I once went to that exhibition in London and I said to myself, +never no more for this gal."</p> + +<p>"And you never did go <i>any</i> more since you were a <i>girl</i>?" asked the +companion, with professional pointedness.</p> + +<p>"No, never no more," replied Mrs. Maper, serenely, "once is too often, as +the gal said when the black man kissed her."</p> + +<p>Eileen laughed dutifully at this quotation from the latest comic opera, +and went off, delighted to companion the husband by way of change. He +proved quite a new man, too, in his own element, bringing the most +complicated machinery to the level of her understanding. Room after room +they passed through, department after department full of tireless +machinery, and tired men and women, who seemed slaves to the whims of +fantastic iron monsters, all legs and arms and wheels. It took a morning +to see everything, down to the pasting and drying and packing rooms, and +as a last treat Mr. Maper took her to the engine-room, whence he said +came the power that turned those myriad wheels, moved those myriad +levers, in whatever department they might be and whatever their function. +Eileen gazed long at the mighty engine, rapt in reverie. She could +scarcely tear herself away, and when at last Mr. Maper brought her into +the counting-house, she had forgotten that she must meet his son there. +The white-browed clerk in corduroys did not, however, raise his eyes from +his ledger, and Eileen was grateful to him for preserving the piquancy of +their relation.</p> + +<p>She did not find it so piquant, though, in the library next Sunday +afternoon when he was clutching at her hand and asking her to be his +wife. She awoke as from a dream to the perception of a solemn and +grotesque fact.</p> + +<p>"Oh, please!" and she tried to tear her hand away.</p> + +<p>He clung on desperately. "Eileen—don't say you don't care at all."</p> + +<p>"I'm not Eileen, and I particularly dislike you at this moment. Let me +have my hand, please."</p> + +<p>He dropped it like a stinging nettle. "I was hoping you'd let me keep +it," he murmured.</p> + +<p>"Why?" She was simple and pitiless. "Because we read Plato together? That +was platonic enough, wasn't it?"</p> + +<p>"You can jest about what breaks my heart?"</p> + +<p>"I am very sorry. I like you."</p> + +<p>His breathing changed, "like a fish thrown back into the water," Eileen +thought. She hastened to add, "But it's not what a wife should feel."</p> + +<p>"How do you know what a wife should feel?"</p> + +<p>Eileen screwed up her forehead. "If I felt it, I should know, I suppose."</p> + +<p>"No, you mightn't. You've liked to come here and talk to me."</p> + +<p>"Because I like books. And you talk like a book."</p> + +<p>"That was before I fell in love. I didn't talk like a book just now."</p> + +<p>"When you took my hand! More like a book than ever. I've read it +all—lots of times."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Eil—Miss O'Keeffe—you are very cruel."</p> + +<p>Eileen smiled. "I am not—I'm very kind—I threw you back into the +water."</p> + +<p>He gasped, as though out of it again. "Do you mean I am not grown +enough?"</p> + +<p>She flushed and improvised on his theme. "Not quite that. You hooked +yourself, as you threatened to do. But suppose I had landed you. You know +the next step—hot water. What a lot you would have got into, too!"</p> + +<p>"You are thinking of my mother?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, raising Cain, I think you said once. Oh, dear, swim about and be +thankful." And a vision of Mrs. Maper's amazement twitched the corners of +her lips and made them more enchanting.</p> + +<p>"I'm not so cold-blooded as all that. But if you do throw me back, let it +be with the promise to take me again, when I <i>am</i> grown. I don't say it +to tempt you, but you know I shall be very rich."</p> + +<p>"Indigestible, do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, please let us drop that metaphor! Metaphors can never go on all +fours."</p> + +<p>"Certainly not when they have fins."</p> + +<p>"Don't jest, Eil—Miss O'Keeffe! Let me redeem you from your sordid +life."</p> + +<p>"Why is it sordid? You said work was divine."</p> + +<p>"You can work in a higher sphere."</p> + +<p>"And this is the Socialist! I really thought you'd want me to turn +factory lass."</p> + +<p>"You are laughing at me."</p> + +<p>"I am perfectly serious. I won't drag you down from Socialism, and a +head-shawl wouldn't become me."</p> + +<p>"Why, you'd look sweet in it. Dear, dear, Miss O'Keeffe—"</p> + +<p>"Good-by."</p> + +<p>"No, you shan't go." He barred her way. Her airiness had given him new +hope.</p> + +<p>"If you don't behave sensibly, I'll go altogether—give notice."</p> + +<p>"Then I'll follow you to your next place."</p> + +<p>"No followers allowed. Seriously, I'll leave if you are foolish."</p> + +<p>"Very well," he said abruptly. "Let's go on reading Plato," and he turned +to the book.</p> + +<p>"No, no more Dialogues, in or out of Plato."</p> + +<p>She was smiling but stern. He opened the library door and bowed as she +passed out.</p> + +<p>"Remember," he said. "I will remain foolish for ever."</p> + +<p>"You have too long an opinion of yourself," was Eileen's parting flash.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IXA" id="IXA"></a>IX</h2> + + +<p>The next evening she sat in the drawing-room before dinner, softly +playing an accompaniment to her thoughts. Why didn't she feel anything +about Robert Maper except a mild irritation at the destruction of so +truly platonic a converse? In a book, of which his proposal savoured, she +would have found him quite a romantic person. In the actuality she felt +as frigid as if his marble forehead was chilling her, and what she +remembered most acutely was his fishlike gasping. Then, too, the +contradictoriness of his social attitude, his desire to make her a rich +drone, his shame at his mother, his reclusive shyness—all the weaknesses +of the man—came to obscure her sense of his literary idealism, if not, +indeed, to reveal it as a mere coquetry with fine ideas and coarse +clothes. And then for a moment the humour of being Mrs. Maper's +daughter-in-law appealed to her, and she laughed to herself in soft +duet with the music.</p> + +<p>And in the middle of the duet Mrs. Maper herself burst in, with her +bodice half hooked and her hair half done.</p> + +<p>"What's this I hear, Miss Hirish Himpudence, of your goings-on with my +son?"</p> + +<p>Eileen swung round on her stool. "I beg your pardon," she said.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you can't get out of it by beggin' my pardon, creepin' into the +library like a mouse—and it's a nice sly mouse you are, too, but there's +never a mouse without its cat—"</p> + +<p>"She'd have done better to do your hair and mind her business," said +Eileen, calmly.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Maper's forefinger shot heavenwards. "It was you as ought to have +minded your business. I didn't pay you like a lady and feed you like a +duchess to set your cap at your betters. But I told Mr. Maper what 'ud +come of it if we let you heat with us, though I didn't dream what a sly +little mouse—"</p> + +<p>The torrent went on and on. Eileen as in a daze watched the theatric +forefinger—now pointed at the floor as if to the mouse-hole, now leaping +ceilingwards like the cat,—and her main feeling was professional. She +was watching her pupil, storing up in her memory the mispronunciations +and vulgarisms for later insinuative improvement. Only a tithe of her was +aware of the impertinence. But suddenly she heard herself interrupting +quietly.</p> + +<p>"I shall not sleep under your roof another night." Mrs. Maper paused so +abruptly that her forefinger fell limp. She was not sure she meant to +give her companion notice, and have the trouble of training another, and +she certainly did not wish to be dismissed instead of dismissing.</p> + +<p>"Silly chit!" she said in more conciliatory tones. "And where will you +sleep?"</p> + +<p>But Eileen now felt she must obey her own voice—the voice of her +outraged pride, perhaps even of Brian Boru himself. "Good-by. I'll take +some things in a handbag and send for my box in the morning."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Maper's hand pointed to the ceiling. "And is that the way you treat +a lady—you're no lady, I tell you that. I demand a month's notice or I +shall summons you."</p> + +<p>At this juncture it occurred to Eileen that this might have been her +mother-in-law, and a smile danced into her eyes.</p> + +<p>"Himpudent Hirish hussy! Oh, but I'll have the lore of you. Don't forget +I'm the wife of a Justice of the Peace."</p> + +<p>"Very well; you get Justice, I want Peace." And Eileen fled to her room.</p> + +<p>She had hardly begun packing her handbag when she heard the door locked +from the outside with a savage snap and a cry of, "I'll learn you who's +mistress here, my lady."</p> + +<p>Eileen smiled. She was only on the second floor, and captivity revived +all her girlish prankishness. She now began to enjoy the whole episode. +That she was out of place, out of character, out of lodging even, was +nothing beside the humour of this incursion into real life of the +melodrama she had mocked at. Was she not the innocent heroine entrapped +by the villain? Fortunately, she would not need the hero to rescue her. +She went on packing. When her handbag was ready she looked about for +means to escape. She opened her windows and studied the drop and the odd +bits of helpful rainpipe. Descent was not so easy as she had imagined. +Short of tearing the sheets into strips (and that might really bring her +within the J.P.'s purview) or of picking the lock (which seemed even more +burglarious, not to mention more difficult) she might really remain +trapped. However, there would be time to think properly when she had +packed her big box. Half an hour passed cheerfully in the folding of +dresses to an underplay of planned escapes, and she had just locked the +box, when Mrs. Maper's voice pierced the door panel.</p> + +<p>"Well, are you ready to come to supper?"</p> + +<p>The governess's instinct corrected "dinner." Mrs. Maper when excited was +always tripping into this betrayal of auld lang syne, but she preserved a +disdainful silence.</p> + +<p>"Eileen, why don't you hanser?"</p> + +<p>Still silence. The key grated in the lock.</p> + +<p>Eileen looked round desperately. The thought of meeting Mrs. Maper again +was intolerable. The mirrored door of the rifled wardrobe stood ajar, +revealing an enticing emptiness. Snatching up her handbag and her hat, +she crept inside and closed the door noiselessly upon herself. "The +wardrobe mouse," she thought, smiling.</p> + +<p>"Well, my lady!" Mrs. Maper dashed through the door, in her dinner-gown +and diamonds, her forefinger hovering, balanced, between earth and +heaven. She saw nothing but an answering figure ribboned and jewelled, +that dashed at her and pointed its forefinger menacingly.</p> + +<p>The appearance of this figure as from behind the glass shut out from +her mind the idea of another figure behind it. The packed box, neat and +new-labelled, the absence of the handbag and of any sign of occupancy, +the open windows, the silence, all told their lying tale.</p> + +<p>"The Hirish witch!" she screamed.</p> + +<p>She ran from one window to the other seeking for a sign of the escaped or +the escapade. She was relieved to find no batter of brains and blood +spoiling the green lawn. How had the trick been done? It did not even +occur to her to look under the bed, so hypnotised was she by the sense of +a flown bird. Eileen almost betrayed herself by giggling, as at the real +stage melodrama.</p> + +<p>When Mrs. Maper ran downstairs to interrogate the servants—eruption into +the kitchen was one of her incurable habits—Eileen slipped through the +wide-flung door, down the staircase, and then, seeing the butler ahead, +turned sharp off to the little-used part of the corridor and so into the +library. She made straight for the iron staircase to the grounds, and +came face to face with Robert Maper.</p> + +<p>Twilight was not his hour for the library—she saw even through her +perturbation that he was pacing it in fond memory. His face lighted up +with amazement, as though the dead had come up through a tombstone.</p> + +<p>"Good-by!" she said, shifting her handbag to her left hand and holding +out her right. Her self-possession pleased her.</p> + +<p>"What!" he cried. And again he had the gasp of a fish out of water.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I came to say good-by."</p> + +<p>"You are leaving us?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Oh, and it is I that have driven you away!"</p> + +<p>"No, no, don't reproach yourself, please don't. Good-by."</p> + +<p>He gasped in silence. She gave a little laugh. "Now that I offer you my +hand, it is you who won't take it."</p> + +<p>He seized it. "Oh, Eil—Miss O'Keeffe—let me keep it."</p> + +<p>"Please! we settled that."</p> + +<p>"It will never be settled till you are my wife."</p> + +<p>"Listen!" said Eileen, dramatically. "In a few minutes your mother and +father will be seated at dinner. Your mother will have told your father +I've left the house in disgrace. Don't interrupt. Would you be prepared +to walk in upon them with me on your arm and to say, 'Mother, father, +Miss O'Keeffe has done me the honour of consenting to be my wife'?"</p> + +<p>With her warm hand still in his, how could he hesitate? "Oh, Eileen, if +you'd only let me!"</p> + +<p>The imagination of the tableau was only less tempting to Eileen. It was +procurable—she had only to move her little finger, or rather not to move +it. But the very facility of production lessened the tableau's +temptingness. The triumph was complete without the vulgar actuality.</p> + +<p>"I can't," she said, withdrawing her hand. "But you are a good fellow. +Good-by." She moved towards the garden steps. He was incredulous of the +utter end. "I shall write to you," he said.</p> + +<p>"This is a short cut," she murmured, descending. As her feet touched the +grass she smiled. How they had both tried to stop her, mother and son! +She hurried through the shrubbery, and by a side gate was out on the old +wagon road. More slowly, but still at a good pace, she descended towards +the Black Hole, now beginning to twinkle and glimmer with lights, and far +less grimy and prosaic than in the crude day.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XA" id="XA"></a>X</h2> + + +<p>While packing her big box, she had decided to try to lodge that night +with a programme-girl she had got to know at the Theatre Royal, and the +motive that set her pace was the desire to find her before she had +started for the theatre.</p> + +<p>The girl usually hovered about Mrs. Maper's box. Once Eileen had asked +her why she wasn't in evidence the week before. "Lord, miss," she said, +"didn't you recognise me on the stage?"</p> + +<p>Eileen thus discovered that the girl sometimes figured as a super, when +travelling companies came with sensational pieces, relying upon local +talent, hastily drilled, for the crowds. Mary became a Greek slave, or a +Billingsgate fishwife, with amusing unexpectedness.</p> + +<p>Eileen's next discovery about the girl was that she supported a paralysed +mother, though the bed-ridden creature on inspection proved to be more +cheerful than the visitors she depressed. Mr. Maper had sent her grapes +from his hothouse only a few days before, and in taking them to the +little house Eileen had noticed a "Bedroom to Let."</p> + +<p>To her relief, when she reached the bleak street, she could see that +though the blind was down, the bill was still in the window. Her spirits +bubbled up again. Ere she could knock at the door, the programme-girl +bounced through it, hatted and cloaked for the theatre.</p> + +<p>"Miss O'Keeffe!" She almost staggered backward. Eileen's face worked +tragically in the gloom.</p> + +<p>"There are villains after me!" Eileen gasped. "Take this bag, it contains +the family jewels. That bedroom of yours, it is still to let?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, miss."</p> + +<p>"I take it for to-night, perhaps for ever. The avenger is on my +footsteps. The law may follow me, but I shall defy its myrmidons in my +trackless eyrie."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Miss O'Keeffe! You frighten me. I shouldn't like to have all these +jewels in my house, and with my mother tied to her bed."</p> + +<p>Eileen burst into a laugh. "Oh, miss!" she said, mimicking the +programme-girl. "Didn't you recognise me on the stage?"</p> + +<p>"Mary Murchison!" gasped the programme-girl. "Oh, Miss O'Keeffe, how +wonderful! You nearly made my heart stop—"</p> + +<p>"I am sorry, but I do want to take your bedroom. I've left Mrs. Maper, +and you are not to ask any questions."</p> + +<p>"I haven't time, I'm late already. Fortunately, I only come on in the +second act."</p> + +<p>"That's nice; put my bag in and I'll come to the theatre with you." The +thought was impromptu, an evening with a bed-ridden woman was not +exhilarating at such a crisis.</p> + +<p>"You ought to be an actress yourself," the programme-girl remarked +admiringly on the way.</p> + +<p>Eileen shuddered. "No, thank you. Scream the same thing night after +night—like a parrot with not even one's own words—I should die of +monotony."</p> + +<p>"Oh, it isn't at all monotonous. It's a different audience every night, +and even the laughs come in different places. My parts have mostly been +thinking parts—to-night I'm a prince without a word—but still it's +fun."</p> + +<p>"But how can you bear strange men staring at you?"</p> + +<p>"One gets used to it. The first time they put me in tights I blushed all +through the piece, but they had painted me so thick it wasn't visible."</p> + +<p>"In short, you blushed unseen."</p> + +<p>Eileen wished to go to the pit, but her new friend would not hear of her +not occupying her habitual box, since she knew that the management would +be glad to have it occupied if it were empty. This proved to be the case, +and put the seal upon Eileen's enjoyment of the situation. To spend her +evening in Mrs. Maper's box was indeed a climax.</p> + +<p>She borrowed theatre-paper and scribbled a note to her ex-employer, +giving the address for her trunk. An orange and some biscuits sufficed +for her dinner.</p> + +<p>Not till she was in her little bedroom, surrounded by pious texts, did +she break down in tears.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIA" id="XIA"></a>XI</h2> + + +<p>The next morning, as she sat answering advertisements, the programme-girl +knocked at the door of the bedroom and announced that Mr. Maper had +called.</p> + +<p>Eileen turned red. It was too disconcerting. Would he never take "no" for +an answer? "I won't see him. I can't see him," she cried.</p> + +<p>The girl departed and returned. "Oh, Miss O'Keeffe, he begs so for only +one word."</p> + +<p>"The word is 'no.'"</p> + +<p>"After he's been so kind as to bring your box down!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, has he? Then the word is 'thanks.'"</p> + +<p>"Please, miss, would you mind giving it to him yourself?"</p> + +<p>"Who's Irish, you or I? I won't speak to him at all, I tell you."</p> + +<p>"But I don't like to send him away like that, when he's been so kind +to mother."</p> + +<p>"When has he been kind to your mother?"</p> + +<p>"Those grapes you brought—"</p> + +<p>"That was old Mr. Maper."</p> + +<p>"So is this."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" Eileen was quite taken aback, for once. "All right, I'll go into +the parlour."</p> + +<p>He was infinitely courteous and apologetic. He had been very anxious +about her. Why had she been so unkind as to leave, and without ever +a good-by to him?</p> + +<p>"Oh, hasn't your wife told you, then?"</p> + +<p>"She has told me you were rude, and that you left without notice, and +she wants me to prosecute you. I suppose you lost your temper. You +found her rather difficult."</p> + +<p>"I found her impossible," said Eileen, frigidly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, I understand." He was flushed and unhappy. "You found her +impossible to live with?"</p> + +<p>Eileen nodded; she would have added "or to make a lady of," but he +looked so purple and agitated that she charitably forbore. She was +wondering whether Mrs. Maper could really have been so mean as to omit +her share in the quarrel, but he went on eagerly:—</p> + +<p>"Quite so, quite so. And what do you think it has been for me?"</p> + +<p>She murmured inarticulate sympathy.</p> + +<p>"Ah, if you only knew! Oh, my dear Miss O'Keeffe, while you've been in +the house, it's been like heaven."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad I've given satisfaction," she said drily.</p> + +<p>"Then what do you give by going? I assure you the day you came to the +works it was like heaven there too."</p> + +<p>"You forget the temperature," Eileen smiled. "However, it was a very +nice day, and I thank you. But I can't come back after—"</p> + +<p>"Who asks you to come back?" he broke in. "No, I should be sorry to see +you again in a menial position, you with your divine gifts of beauty and +song. The idea of your getting a new place," he added with a fall into +prose, "makes me feel sick."</p> + +<p>"I value your sympathy, but it is misplaced," she replied freezingly.</p> + +<p>"Sympathy! It isn't sympathy! It's jealousy. Oh, my dear Miss O'Keeffe!" +He seized her limp hand. "Eileen! Let me help you—"</p> + +<p>As the true significance of his visit, and of the purple agitation, +dawned upon her, the grim humour of the position overbore every other +feeling. Her hand still in his, she began to laugh, and no biting of her +lips could do more than change the laugh into an undignified snigger. +Instead of profiting by his grip of her, he dropped her hand suddenly as +if a hose had been turned on his passion, and this surrender of her hand +reduced Eileen to a passable gravity.</p> + +<p>"I'm very sorry, Mr. Maper. But really, life is too horribly amusing."</p> + +<p>"I'm very sorry it's me that affords you amusement," he said stiffly.</p> + +<p>"No, it isn't you at all, it's just the whole thing. You've been most +kind all along. And I dare say you mean to be kind now. But I don't +really need any help. Your wife's threats of prosecution are ridiculous, +she made my longer stay impossible. I could more justly claim a month's +notice from her."</p> + +<p>"That's what I thought. I've brought you a month's salary." He fumbled in +his pocket-book.</p> + +<p>"Don't trouble. I shall not accept it."</p> + +<p>"You shall," he said sternly. "Or I'll prosecute you."</p> + +<p>Eileen's laugh rang out clear. This time he laughed too.</p> + +<p>"Now, don't you call life amusing?" she said. "Here am I to take a cheque +under penalty of having to pay it."</p> + +<p>"Well, which shall it be?"</p> + +<p>"Such a cheque is charming." And she held out her hand. He put the cheque +in it and shook both warmly. They parted, the best of friends.</p> + +<p>"Come to me for a character, of course," he said.</p> + +<p>"Don't you come to me," replied Eileen, with a roguish smile.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIIA" id="XIIA"></a>XII</h2> + + +<p>Eileen's next place was—as if by contrast—with a much more genteel +family, and a much poorer, though it flew higher socially. It lived in a +house, half in a fashionable London terrace, half in a shabby side +street, and its abode was typical of its ambitions and its means. Mrs. +Lee Carter drew the line clearly between herself and her governess, which +was a blessing, for it meant Eileen's total exclusion from her social +life, and Eileen's consequent enjoyment of her own evenings at home or +abroad, as she wished. This unusual freedom compensated for the hard +work of teaching children in various stages of growth and ignorance how +to talk French and play the piano. Her salary was small, for Mrs. Lee +Carter's ambition to live beyond her neighbours' means was only achieved +by pinching whomever she could. She was not bad-hearted; she simply could +not afford anything but luxuries. Eileen wondered at not being asked +sometimes to perform at her parties, till she found that only celebrities +ever did anything in that house.</p> + +<p>This was a period of much mental activity in Eileen's life. The tossing +ocean of London life, the theatres that played Shakespeare, the world of +new books and new thought, her recent perusal of Plato and of man, all +produced fermentation. But every night she knelt by her bedside and said +her "Ave Maria" with a voluptuous sense of spiritual peace, and every +morning she woke with a certain joy in existence and a certain surprise +to find herself again existing. Her old convent-thought recurred. "We +are worked from without—marionettes who can watch their own performance. +And it is very amusing." Once she read of a British action in Afghanistan +against border-tribes, and she wondered if Lieutenant Doherty was in the +fighting. Since she had ceased to be his mother-confessor he had become +very shadowy; his image now rose substantial from the newspaper lines, +and she was surprised to find in herself a little palpitation at his +probable perils. "One's heartstrings, too, are pulled," she thought. +"I don't like it. Marionettes should move, not feel." These reflections, +however, came to her more often anent her family, and the struggles of +her kin for a livelihood touched her more deeply than any love. "We are +like bits of the same shattered body," she thought. "In these cold +English families everybody is another body." She sent most of her salary +to Ireland, and her pocket-money came from singing in the choir on +Sunday.</p> + +<p>The bass chorister was a very amusing man. His voice was sepulchral but +his conversation skittish. Eileen's repartees smote him to almost the +only serious respect of his life, and one day he said: "Why, there's +a future in you. Why don't you go on the stage?"</p> + +<p>"What nonsense!" But the blood was secretly stirred in her veins. She saw +herself walking along the Black Hole with the programme-girl, but her +point of view had been modified since she had received a similar +suggestion with a shudder. If she could play Rosalind to a great London +audience, the staring men-folk would matter little.</p> + +<p>"Why not?" went on the bass tempter. "A humour like yours with such a +voice and such a face!"</p> + +<p>"The stage is full of better voices and better faces."</p> + +<p>"No, indeed. Why, there isn't a girl at the Half-and-Half—" He stopped +and almost blushed.</p> + +<p>She smiled. "Oh, I don't mind your going to such places. What is the +Half-and-Half, a place where they drink beer?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's just our slang name for a little music-hall that's just between +the East End and the West End, with a corresponding programme."</p> + +<p>"Our slang name?"</p> + +<p>"Well—" he paused. "If you'll keep it very dark—but of course you +will—I appear there myself."</p> + +<p>"You! What do you do?"</p> + +<p>"I sing patriotic songs and drinking-songs—"</p> + +<p>"Aren't they the same thing in England?"</p> + +<p>"Don't say that on the stage or they'll throw pewter pots. They're very +patriotic."</p> + +<p>"That's just what I said. What's your name—I suppose you change it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—as I hope you will yours—some day."</p> + +<p>"I shan't take yours."</p> + +<p>"Nobody arxed you, miss," he said. "And, besides, mine is +copyright—Jolly Jack Jenkins. I make a fiver a week by it."</p> + +<p>"A fiver!" The bass chorister suddenly took on an air of Arabian nights. +At this rate she could buy back the family castle. Her struggling +brothers—how they would bless their magician sister—Mick should have +a London practice, Miles a partnership in an engineering firm.</p> + +<p>"You come with me and see Fossy," continued Jolly Jack Jenkins.</p> + +<p>Eileen declined with thanks. It took a week of Sundays to argue away her +objections—religious, moral, and social. To play Rosalind to fashionable +London was one thing: to appear at a variety theatre or low-class +music-hall, which nobody in her world or Mrs. Lee Carter's had ever heard +of, was another pair of shoes. Yet strange to say, it was the last +consideration that decided her to try. Even if admitted to the boards, +she could make her failure in secure obscurity. It would simply be +another girlish escapade, and she was ripe for mischief after her +long sobriety.</p> + +<p>"But even your Mr. Fossy mustn't know my real name or address," she +stipulated.</p> + +<p>"Who shall I say you are?"</p> + +<p>"Nelly O'Neill."</p> + +<p>"Ripping. Flows from the tongue like music."</p> + +<p>"Then it's rippling you mean."</p> + +<p>"What a tongue! Wait till Fossy sees you."</p> + +<p>"Will he ask me to stick it out?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Lord, I wish I had your repartee. But I'm thinking—Nelly +O'Neill—doesn't it give you away a bit?"</p> + +<p>"Keeps me a bit, too. I shouldn't like to lose myself altogether—gain +reputation for another woman."</p> + +<p>Fossy proved to be a gentleman named Josephs, who in a tiny triangular +room near the stage of the Half-and-Half listened critically to her comic +singing, shook his head and said he would let her know. Eileen left the +room with leaden heart and feet.</p> + +<p>"Wait for me a moment, please," Jolly Jack Jenkins called after her, +and she hung about timidly, jostled by dirty attendants and painted +performers. She was reading a warning to artistes that any improper +songs or lines would lead to their instant dismissal, and regretting more +than ever her incompetence for this innocent profession, when she heard +the bass chorister's big breathing behind her.</p> + +<p>"Bravo! You knocked him all of a heap."</p> + +<p>"Rubbish! Don't try to cheer me."</p> + +<p>"You!" Jolly Jack Jenkins opened his eyes. "You taken in by Fossy! He'll +suggest your doing a trial turn next Saturday night when the public are +least critical, you'll make a furore, and he'll offer you two guineas a +week."</p> + +<p>"A pleasing picture, but quite visionary. Why, he didn't even ask for an +address to write to!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I dare say he thought care of me would find you. No, don't glower at +me—I don't mean anything wrong."</p> + +<p>"I hope you didn't let him misunderstand—"</p> + +<p>"You asked me not to let him know too much. Fossy has to do so much with +queer folk—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I saw he had to warn them against improper songs."</p> + +<p>Jolly Jack Jenkins exploded in a guffaw.</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry I came," said Eileen, in vague distress.</p> + +<p>"Fossy isn't," he retorted. "He was clean bowled over. In that Irish +fox-hunting song all the gallery will be shouting 'Tally-ho!' Where did +you pick it up?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't <i>pick</i> it up, I <i>made</i> it up for the occasion."</p> + +<p>"By Jove! I have to pay a guinea to a bloodsucking composer when <i>I</i> want +a song. Oh, Fossy's spotted a winner this time."</p> + +<p>"Why is he called Fossy?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Nobody knows. I found the name, I pass it on."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it's a corruption of Foxy."</p> + +<p>"There! I never thought of that! You <i>are</i> a—!"</p> + +<p>The jolly chorister's mouth remained open. But the prophecy that had +already issued from it came true in every detail.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIIIA" id="XIIIA"></a>XIII</h2> + + +<p>Despite her private stage-fright, Nelly O'Neill, the new serio-comic, +made a big hit. Her innocent roguery was captivating; her virginal +freshness floated over the footlights, like a spring breeze through the +smoky Hall.</p> + +<p>"Well, you <i>are</i> an all-round success," cried Jolly Jack Jenkins, pumping +her hand off at the wings, amid a thunder of applause, encores, and +whistles.</p> + +<p>"You mean a Half-and-Half!" laughed Nelly through Eileen's tears. She had +given herself to the audience, but how it had given itself in return, +flashing back to her in electric waves its monstrous vitality, its +apparently single life.</p> + +<p>The Half-and-Half was one of those early Victorian halls of the people, +with fixed stars and only a few meteors. The popular favourites changed +their songs and their clothes at periodic intervals, but they would +have lost favour if they had not remained the same throughout everything. +A chairman with a hammer announced the turns, and condescendingly +took champagne with anybody who paid for it. Eileen soon became an +indispensable part of this smoky world. She signed an agreement at three +guineas a week for three years, to perform only at the Half-and-Half. +Fossy saw far. Eileen did not. She jumped for joy when she got beyond +eyeshot. She felt herself jumping out of the governess-life. Second +thoughts and soberer footsteps brought doubt. She had intended telling +Mrs. Lee Carter as soon as the trial-performance was over, but now she +hesitated and was lost. Half the charm lay in the secret adventure, the +dare-devilry. Besides, as a governess she had a comfortable home and a +respectable status, and she had already seen and divined enough of the +world behind the footlights to shrink from being absorbed into it. What +fun in the double life! She had never found a single life worth living. +She would belong to two worlds—be literally Half-and-Half. Nelly O'Neill +must only be born at twilight. But she felt she could not be out +uniformly every evening without some explanation.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Lee Carter," she said, "I have to tell you of a peculiar chance of +augmenting my income that has come to me."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lee Carter, wearing plumes and train for a court reception, paled. +"You are not going to leave me!"</p> + +<p>The naïve exclamation strengthened Eileen's hand.</p> + +<p>"I don't quite see how to do otherwise," she said boldly.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, I wish I could afford more. I know you're worth it."</p> + +<p>Eileen thought, "If you'd only give your guests good claret instead of +bad champagne!" But she said, "You are very kind—you have always been +most considerate."</p> + +<p>The plumes wagged.</p> + +<p>"I try to please all parties."</p> + +<p>Nelly O'Neill thought, "And to give too many." Eileen said, "Yes, you've +given me my evenings to myself as it is, and considering the new work is +only in the evenings, I did think of running the two, but I'm afraid—"</p> + +<p>"If we lightened your work a little—" interrupted Mrs. Lee Carter, +eagerly.</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't so much ask that as to have perfect freedom like a young +man—a latch-key even." Never had Eileen looked more demure and Puritan.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I hope you won't be working too late—"</p> + +<p>"The people who go there are engaged in the daytime. I'd better be frank +with you; it's an extremely unfashionable place towards the East End, and +I quite understand you may not like me to take it. At the same time I +shall never meet anybody who knows me. In fact, it's a dancing and +singing place."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Mrs. Lee Carter, blankly. "I didn't know you could teach +dancing, too."</p> + +<p>"You never asked me.... Of course, if you prefer it, I could come here as +a day governess and leave after tea.... You see it's a longish journey +home: I'm bound to be late...."</p> + +<p>"What's the difference? Come and go as you please.... Of course, you +won't mind using the back door when there's a party ... the +servants...."</p> + +<p>For the deception Eileen at first salved her conscience Irish-wise by +sending every farthing to her mother under the deceiving pretext of rich +private pupils. She would not even deduct for cabs. Sometimes she could +not get an omnibus, but she almost preferred to walk till she was +footsore, for both riding and walking were forms of penance. The stuffy +omnibus interior after the smoky Hall was nauseating, and in those days +no lady thought of climbing the steep ladder to the slanting roof. But it +sometimes happened that a crawling cabman coming westward would invite +her to a free ride, and Eileen would accept gratefully, and, moreover, +gain from conversations with her drivers new material for her songs.</p> + +<p>This period of her life was almost as amusing as she had anticipated; her +only depressions came from the children of the footlights, and the +necessity of adjusting herself superficially to her environment, under +pain of unpopularity. Her isolation and the privacy of her home-life +already made sufficiently for that. And to be disliked even by those she +disliked Eileen disliked. Her nature needed to wallow in warm admiration. +She got plenty.</p> + +<p>When, fifteen months later, she agreed to pay Fossy a hundred pounds +for modifying her contract so as to enable her to appear at other Halls, +she said with a smile, "You deserve it. You are the only man at the +Half-and-Half who hasn't made love to me."</p> + +<p>Fossy grinned. "If I had known that, I should have demanded a larger +compensation."</p> + +<p>Even the bass chorister had not been able to resist proposing, though his +grief at being refused was short-lived, for he died soon after by a fall +from one of those giant wheels that were the saurians of the modern +cycle. Eileen shed many a tear over Jolly Jack Jenkins.</p> + +<p>With the growth of her popularity before and behind the footlights came +heavier calls upon her geniality, and, like a hostess who tries to pay +off her debts in one social lump sum, Eileen got "a Sunday out," and +Nelly gave a lunch at a riverside hotel to a motley company of popular +favourites. It was expensive; for the profession, even in those days, +expected champagne. It was appallingly protracted; for the party, having +no work to do that evening, showed no disposition to break up, and +brandies-and-sodas succeeded one another in an aroma of masculine cigars +and feminine cigarettes. It was noisy and hilarious, and gradually it +became rowdy. The Singing Sisters sang, but not in duet. The Lion +Comique, whose loyal melodies were on every barrel-organ, argued +Republicanism and flourished that day's copy of Reynolds's Newspaper, The +Beauteous Bessie Bilhook—"the Queen of Serio-Comics" was scandalously +autobiographic, and the old plantation songster—looking unreal with his +washed face—was with difficulty dissuaded from displaying his ability to +dance on the table without smashing anything. The climax was reserved for +the demure one-legged gymnast, who suddenly produced a pistol and +discharged it in the air. When the panic subsided, he explained to the +landlord and the company that he was "paying his shot."</p> + +<p>"That's a hint for me to discharge the bill," said Nelly, adroitly, and, +thanking everybody effusively for the happiness afforded her, she hurried +home to Oxbridge Terrace, to wash it all away in nursery tea. The young +Lee Carters made a restful spectacle with their shining innocent faces, +and she almost wished they would never grow up.</p> + +<p>As her success grew, offers from the pantomimes and even the legitimate +stage began to reach her. But now she would not make the step. At the +Halls she was her own mistress, able to arrange at her own convenience +with orchestras. Even Rosalind would have meant long rehearsals and a +complex interference with her governess-life.</p> + +<p>At the theatres, too, to judge by all she heard, a sordid side of the +profession was accentuated. The players played for their own hands, and +even the greatest did not disdain to "queer" the effects of their +subordinates, whenever such effects did not heighten their own. Hamlet +had been known to be jealous of the ghost, and the success of his +sepulchral bass. It was in fact a world of jostling jealousies, as hidden +from the public as the prompter. In the Halls she was her own company and +her own playwright and her own composer. She had her elbows free.</p> + +<p>And even here Bessie Bilhook, whose vanity was a byword in Lower Bohemia, +and who had arrogantly assumed the sovereignty of the Serio-Comics, +refused to appear on the same programmes unless her name was printed +twice as large as Nelly O'Neill's, and was further displayed on a board +outside, alone in its nine-inch glory. Again, actresses were recognised +by the newspapers; the Halls had as yet no status. Their performers were +not so photographed; indeed, Eileen refused to sit. She desired this +obscurer form of celebrity. If her fame should ever reach Mrs. Lee +Carter, the game would be nearly up. Her poor mother might even suffer +the shock of it; perhaps the professional future of her brothers would be +injured. Her sedate life had grown as dear as her noisy life, she loved +the transition to the innocent home circle.</p> + +<p>Yet in this very domesticity lay a danger. It provoked her to an +ever broader humour on the stage. She let herself go, like a swimmer +emboldened by a boat behind. Eileen O'Keeffe she felt would rescue Nelly +O'Neill if licence carried her too near the falls. It was so irresistibly +seductive, this swift response of the audience to the wink of suggestion. +Like a vast lyre, the Hall vibrated to the faintest breath of +roguishness. Almost in contemptuous mockery one was tempted to +experiment....</p> + +<p>One day, in a sudden horror of herself, she pleaded illness and hurried +back to her mother for a holiday.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIVA" id="XIVA"></a>XIV</h2> + + +<p>The straggling village looked much the same, the same pigs and turkeys +rooted and strutted, the same stinging turf-smoke came from the doors and +windows (save from one or two cabins unroofed by the Castle tyrant), the +same weeds grew in the potato-patches, the same old men in patched +brogues pulled their caubeens from their heads and their dudeens from +their mouths, as she went past, half-consciously studying the humours for +stage reproduction. It was hard for her to remember she wasn't "the +Quality" in London, or that the Half-and-Half existed simultaneously with +these beloved woods and waters. In only one particular was the village +changed. Golf links had been discovered near it, a club-house had sprung +up and the peasants found themselves enriched by the employment of their +gossoons as caddies. The O'Keeffes were prospering equally—thanks to her +subsidies—although she hadn't yet bought them back their castle. "All's +for the best in the greenest of isles," she told herself, as she sat +basking in family affection.</p> + +<p>And yet the wave of melancholia refused to ebb. Indeed, it swelled and +grew blacker. The remedy seemed to intensify the disease; a holiday but +gave her time to possess her soul, and brood upon its stains, her +childhood's scene but enabled her to measure the realities of her +achievement against the visions of girlhood. Life seemed too hopeless, +too absurd. To amuse the gross adult, to instruct the innocent +child—what did it all mean to her own life? She was tired of doing, +she wanted to <i>be</i> something; something for herself. She was always +observing, imitating, caricaturing, but what was <i>she</i>? A nothing, a +phantasm, an emptiness.</p> + +<p>"Eileen avourneen," said her mother, suddenly. "I wish you were married."</p> + +<p>Eileen opened her eyes. "Dear heart, is this another offer from the +castle?" And she laughed gently.</p> + +<p>Mrs. O'Keeffe's fingers played uneasily with her bosom's cross. "No, but +I should feel happier about you. It—it settles people."</p> + +<p>"It certainly does," Eileen laughed, and her celebrated ditty, "The +Marriage Settlement," flashed upon her. "Oh, dear," and her laugh changed +to a sigh. "The marriages I see around me!"</p> + +<p>"What! Isn't Mrs. Lee Carter happy?"</p> + +<p>Eileen flushed. "I shouldn't like to be in her shoes," she said +evasively.</p> + +<p>"Officers seem to make the best husbands," said Mrs. O'Keeffe.</p> + +<p>"Because they are so much away?" queried Eileen, with a vague memory of +her Lieutenant Doherty.</p> + +<p>That night the melancholia was heavy as a nightmare, without the partial +unconsciousness of sleep. This blackness must be "the horrors" she had +heard women of her stage-world speak of. She wanted to spring out of bed, +to run to her mother's room. But that would have meant hysteric +confession, so she bit her lips and stuck her nails into the sheet. +Perhaps suicide would be simplest. She was nothing; it would not even be +blowing out a light. No, she <i>was</i> something, she was a retailer of gross +humours, a vile sinner; it might be kindling more than a light, an +eternal flame. "Child of Mary," indeed! She deserved to be strangled with +her white ribbon. And she exaggerated everything with that morbid +mendacity of the confessional.</p> + +<p>Two days later she went for a walk along the springy turf of the valley. +The sun shone overhead, but from her spirit the mist had not quite +lifted. Suddenly a small white ball came scudding towards her feet. She +looked round and saw herself amid little flags sticking in the ground. +Distant voices came to her ear.</p> + +<p>"This must be the new game that's creeping in from Scotland," she +thought. "Perhaps I ought to have a song ready if ever it catches on. Ah, +here comes one of the young fools—I'll watch him—"</p> + +<p>He came, clothed as in a grey skin that showed the beautiful modelling +of his limbs. His face glowed.</p> + +<p>"Ouidà's Apollo," she thought, but in the very mockery she trembled, +struck as by a lightning shaft. The blackness was sucked up into fire +and light. "Am I in the way?" she said with her most bewitching smile.</p> + +<p>He raised his hat. "I was afraid you might have been struck."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps I was," she could not help saying.</p> + +<p>"Oh, gracious, are you hurt?" His voice was instantly caressing.</p> + +<p>"Do I look an object for ambulances?"</p> + +<p>He smiled dazzlingly. "You look awfully jolly." Later Eileen +remembered how she had taken this reply for a line of poetry.</p> + +<p>A week later the Hon. Reginald Winsor, younger brother of an English +Earl, was teaching Eileen golf.</p> + +<p>It had been a week of ecstasy.</p> + +<p>She thought of Reginald the last thing at night and the first thing in +the morning and dreamed of him all night.</p> + +<p>Now she knew what her life had lacked—to be caught up into another's +personality, to lose one's petty individuality in—in what? Surely not +in a larger; she couldn't be so blind as that. In what then? Ah, yes, in +Nature. He was gloriously elemental. He wasn't himself. He was the +masculine. Yes, that was the correlative element her being needed. The +mere manliness of his pipe made its aroma in his clothes adorable. Or was +it his big simplicity, in which she could bury all her torturing +complexity? Oh, to nestle in it and be at rest. Yet she held him at arm's +length. When they shook hands her nerves thrilled, but she was the colder +outwardly for very fear of herself.</p> + +<p>On the ninth day he proposed.</p> + +<p>Eileen knew it would be that day. Lying in bed that morning, she found +herself caught by her old impersonal whimsy. "I'm a fever, and on the +ninth day of me the man comes out in a rash proposal." Ah, but this +time she was in a tertian, too. What a difference from those other +proposals—proper or improper. Her mind ran over half a dozen, with a +touch of pity she had not felt at the time. Poor Bob Maper, poor Jolly +Jack Jenkins, if it was like this they felt! But was it her fault? No man +could say she had led him on—except, perhaps, the Hon. Reginald, and +towards him her intentions were honourable, she told herself smiling. But +the jest carried itself farther and more stingingly. Could he make an +"honourable" she told herself her? Ah, God, was she worthy of him, of his +simple manhood? And would he continue proposing, if she told him she was +Nelly O'Neill? And what of his noble relatives? No, no, she must not run +risks. She was only Eileen O'Keeffe, she had never left Ireland save for +the Convent. The rest was a nightmare. How glad she was that nobody knew!</p> + +<p>The proposal duly took place in a bunker, while Eileen was whimsically +vituperating her ball. The fascination of her virginal <i>diablerie</i> was +like a force compelling the victim to seize her in his arms after the +fashion of the primitive bridegroom. However the poor Honourable +refrained, said boldly, "Try it with this," and under pretence of +changing her golfsticks possessed himself of her hand. For the first time +his touch left her apathetic.</p> + +<p>"Now it is coming," she thought, and suddenly froze to a spectator of +the marionette show. As the Hon. Reginald went through his performance, +she felt with a shudder of horror over what brink she had nearly stepped. +The man was merely a magnificent animal! She, with her heart, her soul, +her brain, mated to that! Like a convict chained to a log. Not worthy of +him forsooth! "There's a gulf between us," she thought, "and I nearly +fell down it." And the Half-and-Half rose before her, clamouring, +pungent, deliciously seductive.</p> + +<p>"Dear Mr. Winsor," she listened with no less interest to her own part +in the marionette performance, "it's really too bad of you. Just as I +was getting on so nicely, too!"</p> + +<p>"Is that all you feel about—about our friendship?"</p> + +<p>"All? Didn't you undertake to teach me golf? I haven't the faintest +desire not to go on ... as soon as we have escaped from this wretched +bunker. Come! Did you say the niblick?"</p> + +<p>Reginald's manners were too good to permit him to swear, even at golf.</p> + +<p>"One's body is like an Irish mud-cabin," Eileen reflected. "It shelters +both a soul and a pig."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVA" id="XVA"></a>XV</h2> + + +<p>Nelly O'Neill threw herself into her work with greater ardour than +ever. But her triumphs were shadowed by worries. She was nervous lest +the Hon. Reginald should turn up at one of her Halls—she had three now; +she was afraid her voice was spoiling in the smoky atmosphere; sometimes +the image of the Hon. Reginald came back reproachfully, sometimes +tantalisingly. Oh, why was he so stupid? Or was it she who had been +stupid?</p> + +<p>Then there was the apprehension of the end of her career at the Lee +Carters'. The young generation was nearly grown up. The eldest boy she +even suspected of music-halls. He might stumble upon her.</p> + +<p>Her popularity, too, was beginning to frighten her. Adventurous young +gentlemen followed her in cabs—cabs were now a necessity of her triple +appearance—and she never dared drive quite to her door or even the +street. Bracelets she always returned, if the address was given; flowers +she sent to hospitals, anonymous gifts to her family. Nobody ever saw her +wearing his badge.</p> + +<p>A sketch of her even found its way to one of Mrs. Lee Carter's journals.</p> + +<p>"Why, she looks something like me!" Eileen said boldly.</p> + +<p>"You flatter yourself," said Mrs. Lee Carter. "You're both Irish, that's +all. But I don't see why these music-hall minxes should be pictured in +respectable household papers."</p> + +<p>"Some people say that the only real talent is now to be found in the +Halls," said Eileen.</p> + +<p>"Well, I hope it'll stay there," rejoined her mistress, tartly. Eileen +recalled this conversation a few nights later, when she met Master +Harold Lee Carter outside the door at midnight with a rival latch-key.</p> + +<p>"Been to a theatre, Miss O'Keeffe?" asked her whilom pupil.</p> + +<p>"No; have you?"</p> + +<p>"Well, not exactly a theatre!"</p> + +<p>"Why, what do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Sort of half-and-half place, you know."</p> + +<p>By the icy chill at her heart at his innocent phrase, she knew how she +dreaded discovery and clung to her social status.</p> + +<p>"What is a half-and-half place?" she asked smiling.</p> + +<p>"Oh, comic songs and tumblers and you can smoke."</p> + +<p>"No? You're not really allowed to smoke in a theatre?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, we are. They call it a music-hall—it's great fun. But don't tell +the mater."</p> + +<p>"You naughty boy!"</p> + +<p>"I don't see it. All the chaps go."</p> + +<p>She shook her head. "Not the nicest."</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's tommyrot," he said disrespectfully. "Their women folk don't +know—that's all."</p> + +<p>Eileen now began to feel like a criminal round whom the toils thicken. +In the most fashionable of her three Halls, she sang a little French +song. And she had taught Master Harold his French.</p> + +<p>Of course, even if Nelly were seen by Eileen's friends or acquaintances, +detection was not sure. Eileen was always in such sedate gowns, never +low-cut, her manners were so suppressed, her hair done so differently, +and what a difference hair made! In fact, it was in her private life that +she felt herself more truly the actress. On the boards her real secret +self seemed to flash forth, full of verve, dash, roguery, devilry. Should +she take to a wig, or to character songs in appropriate costumes? No, she +would run the risk. It gave more spice to life. Every evening now was an +adventure, nay three adventures, and when she snuggled herself up at +midnight in her demure white bed, overlooked by the crucifix, she felt +like the hunted were-wolf, safely back in human shape. And she became +more audacious, letting herself go, so as to widen the chasm between +Nelly and Eileen, and make anybody who should suspect her be sure he was +wrong. And occasionally she paid for all this fever and gaiety by fits of +the blackest melancholy.</p> + +<p>She had gradually dropped her habit of prayer, but in one of her dark +moods she found herself slipping to her knees and crying: "Oh, Holy +Mother, look down on Thy distressed daughter, and deliver her from the +body of this death. So many wooers and no spark of love in herself; a +woman who sings love-songs with lips no man has touched, a lone-of-soul +who can live neither with the respectable nor with the Bohemians, who +loves you, <i>sanctissima Maria</i>, without being sure you exist. Oh, Holy +Mother of God, advocate of sinners, pray for me. If I had only something +solid to cling to—a babe to suckle with its red grotesque little face. +You will say cling to the cross, but is not my whole life also a +crucifixion? I am rent in twain that a thousand fools may laugh nightly. +Oh, Holy Mother, make me at one with myself; it is the atonement I +need. Send me the child's heart, and I will light a hundred candles to +you.... Or do you now prefer electricity? Oh, Maria mavourneen, I cannot +pray to you, for there is a mocking devil within me, and you will not +cast her out." And she burst into hysteric tears.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVIA" id="XVIA"></a>XVI</h2> + + +<p>As she was about to start one evening for her round, Mrs. Lee Carter's +maid brought up a bombshell. Superficially it looked like a letter with +foreign stamps, marked "Private" and readdressed with an English stamp +from Ireland. But that one line of unerased writing, her name, threw her +into heats and colds, for she remembered the long-forgotten hand of +Lieutenant Doherty. She had to sit down on her bed and finish trembling +before she broke the seal and set free this voice from the past.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"DEAR MOTHER-CONFESSOR,—You will be wondering why I have been silent all +these years and why I write now. Well, I will tell you the truth. It +wasn't that I believed you had really gone into the Convent you wrote me +you were joining, it was the new and exciting life and duties that opened +up before me when I got to Afghanistan, far from post-offices. Afterwards +I was drafted to India and had a lot of skirmishing and tiger-shooting, +and your image—forgive me!—became faint, and I excused myself for not +writing by making myself believe you were buried in the Convent. ["So, +after all, he never got the letter telling him I was going to marry back +the Castle!" Eileen mused joyfully through her agitation.] But now that I +am at last coming home in a few months, no longer a minor, but nearer a +major (that's like one of your old jokes)—somehow your face seems to be +the only thing I am coming back for. It's no use trying to explain it +all, or even apologising. It's just like that. I've <i>confessed</i>, you +see, though it is hopeless to get straight with my arrears, so I won't +attempt it. And when I found out how I felt, of course came the horrible +thought that you might be in the Convent after all, or, worse still, +married and done for, so what do you think I did? I just sent this cable +to your mother: 'Is Eileen free? Reply paid. Colonel Doherty.' Wasn't it +clever and economical of me to think of the word 'free,' meaning such a +lot—not married, not a nun, not even engaged to another fellow? Imagine +my joy when I got back the monosyllable, meaning all that lot. I +instantly cabled back 'Thanks, don't tell her of this.' ["So that's what +mother was hinting at," thought Eileen, with a smile.] It was all I could +do not to cable to you: 'Will you marry me? Reply paid.' ["What a good +idea for a song!" murmured Nelly.] Put me out of my agony as soon as you +can, won't you, dearest Eileen? Your face is floating before me as I +write, with its black Irish eyes and its roguish dimples...."</p></div> + +<p>She could read no more. She sat long on her bed, dazed by the rush +of bitter-sweet memories. The Convent, her father, her early years, +this dear boy ... all was washed together in tears. There was something +so bizarre, unexpected and ingenuous about it all; it touched the +elemental in her. If he had excused himself even, she would have +tossed him off impatiently. But his frank exposure of his own +self-contradictoriness appealed subtly to her. Was this the want in her +life, was it for him she had been yearning, below the surface of her +consciousness, even as she had remained below the surface of his? Here, +indeed, was salvation—providential salvation. A hand was stretched to +save her—snatch her from spiritual destruction. The dear brown manly +hand that had potted tigers while she had been gesticulating on +platforms—a performing lioness. Distance, imagination, early memories, +united to weave a glamour round him. It was many minutes before she +could read the postscript: "I think it right to say that my complexion is +not yellow nor my liver destroyed. I know this is how we are represented +on your stage. I have sat for a photograph, especially to send you."</p> + +<p>The stage! Why should he just stumble upon the word, to chill her with +the awful question whether she would have to tell him. She was late at +her engagements, her performance was perfunctory—she was no longer with +"the boys," but seated in a howdah on an elephant's back, side by side +with a mighty hunter, or walking with a tall flaxen-haired lieutenant +between the honeysuckled hedges of an Irish boreen. It struck her as +almost miraculous—though it was probably only because her attention +was now drawn to the name—that she read of Colonel Doherty in the +evening paper the gasman tendered her that very evening, as she waited at +the wing. It was a little biography full of deeds of derringdo. "My +Bayard!" she murmured, and her eyes filled with tears.</p> + +<p>She wrote and tore up many replies. The first commenced: "What a strange +way of proposing! You begin by giving me two black eyes to prove you've +forgotten me. I am so different in other people's eyes as well as in my +own it would be unfair to accept you. You are in love with a shadow." +The word-play about her eyes seemed to savour of the "Half-and-Half." +She struck it out. But "you are in love with a shadow," remained the +<i>Leit-motif</i> of all the letters. And if he was grasping at a shadow it +would be unfair for her to grasp at the substance.</p> + +<p>The correspondence continued by every Indian mail after his receipt of +her guarded refusal; he Quixotic, devoted, no matter how she had changed. +He loved the mere scent of her letter paper. Was she only a governess? +Had she been a charwoman, he would have kissed her cheeks white. The +boyish extravagance of his passion worked upon her, troubling her to her +sincerest core. She would hide nothing from him. She wrote a full account +of her stage career, morbidly exaggerating the vulgarity of her +performance and the degradation of her character. She was blacker than +any charwoman, she said with grim humour. The moment she dropped the +letter into the box, a trembling seized on all her limbs. She spent three +days of torture; her fear of losing him seeming to have heightened her +love for him.</p> + +<p>Then Mrs. Lee Carter handed her a cable.</p> + +<p>"Sailing unexpectedly S.S. <i>Colombo</i> to-morrow—Doherty." She nearly fell +fainting in dual joy. He was coming home, and he would cross her letter. +Before it could return they would be safely married. It should be +destroyed unread.</p> + +<p>"Is anything wrong?" said her mistress.</p> + +<p>"No, quite the contrary."</p> + +<p>"I am glad, because I had rather unpleasant news to tell you. But you +must have seen that when Kenneth goes to Winchester, there will +practically be nothing for you to do."</p> + +<p>"How lucky! For I am going to be married."</p> + +<p>"Oh, my dear, I am so glad," gushed Mrs. Lee Carter.</p> + +<p>Afterwards Eileen marvelled at the obvious finger of Providence +unravelling her problems. She had never relished the idea of finding +another place, not easily would she find one so dovetailing into her +second life; she might have been tempted to burn her boats.</p> + +<p>She prepared now to burn her ships instead. Her contracts with the Halls +were now only monthly; Nelly O'Neill could easily slip out of existence. +She would not say she was going to be married—that would concentrate +attention on herself. Illness seemed the best excuse. For the one week +after the <i>Colombo's</i> arrival she could send conscience money. The +Saturday it was due found her still starred; she did not believe his ship +would get in till late, and managers would particularly dislike being +done out of her Saturday night turn. Perhaps she ought to have left the +previous week, she thought. It was foolish to rush things so close. But +it was not so easy to give up the habits of years, and activity allayed +the fever of waiting. She had sent an ardent letter to meet the ship at +Southampton, saying he was to call at the Lee Carters' in Oxbridge +Terrace on Sunday afternoon, which she had to herself. Being only a poor +governess, she would be unable to meet him at the station or receive him +at the house on Saturday night, even if he got in so early. He must be +resigned to her situation, she added jestingly. On the Saturday afternoon +she received a wire full of their own hieroglyphic love-words, grumbling +but obeying. How could he live till Sunday afternoon? Why hadn't she +resigned her situation?</p> + +<p>As she was starting for the Halls for the last time, in the dusk of a +Spring day, a special messenger put into her hand a letter he had +scribbled in the train. He was in London then. Her heart thumped with +a medley of emotions as she tore open the letter:</p> + +<p>"Oh, my darling, I shall see you at last face to face—" But she had no +time to spend under the hall-light reading it. In her cab she struck a +match and read another scrap. "But, oh, cruel one, not to let me come +to-night!" She winced. That gave her a pause. If she had let him come—to +the Half-and-Half! He would turn from her, shuddering. And was it not +precisely to the Half-and-Half that honour should have invited him? The +Half-and-Half arrived at the cab window ere she had finished pondering. +She thrust the letter into her pocket.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVIIA" id="XVIIA"></a>XVII</h2> + + +<p>Would she ever get through her three Halls? It did not seem as if she had +strength for the Half-and-Half itself. She nerved herself to the task, +and knew, not merely from the shrieks of delight, that she had surpassed +herself. Happy and flushed she flung herself into her waiting cab.</p> + +<p>She had the 9.45 turn at her second and most fashionable Hall—a Hall +where the chairman had been replaced by programme numbers—and then would +come her third and last appearance at 10.35. It was strange to think that +in another hour Nelly O'Neill's career would be over. It seemed like +murdering her. Yes, Eileen O'Keeffe would be her murderess. Well, why not +murder what lay between one and happiness? As she waited at the wings, +just before going on, while the orchestra played her opening bars, she +glanced diagonally at the packed stalls, and her heart stood still. +There in the second row sat Colonel Doherty, smoking a big cheroot. +Instinctively she made the sign of the cross; then swayed back and was +caught by the man who changed the programme-numbers.</p> + +<p>"Is No. 9 come?" she gasped.</p> + +<p>"I think so; aren't you well, Miss O'Neill?"</p> + +<p>"For God's sake, give me breathing space," she said, with a last wild +peep at the Colonel. Yes, there was no mistaking him after the three new +portraits he had sent her. He was in cheerful conversation with a stout, +sallow gentleman of the Anglo-Indian stage-type. Both were in immaculate +evening-dress and wore white orchids. How fortunate she had refused to +send any photograph in return, pleading ugliness but really afraid of +theatrical sketches that might find their way to the officers' mess!</p> + +<p>The band stopped, changed its tune, No. 9 appeared on the board; there +was a murmur of confusion.</p> + +<p>"No, by Heaven, I'll face the music," she said with grim humour. She +almost hustled the hastening juggler out of the way. She was in a +whirlwind of excitement. So he was there—well, so much the better. He +had saved her from lying. He had given her an easy way of confessing. +Words were so inadequate, he should see the reality: the stage to-night +would be her confessional. She would extenuate nothing. She would throw +herself furiously into the fun and racket; go to her broadest limits, +else the confession would be inadequate. Then ... if he survived the +shock ... why then, perhaps, she'd insist on going on with this double +life...! He had risen in his seat. No, no, he must not go away, she could +not risk the juggler boring him.</p> + +<p>"I'm better; I mustn't be late at my next shop," she murmured +apologetically as the number and the music were changed back.</p> + +<p>"Ah, she's come—she was late," came the murmurs of the audience as it +stirred in excited expectation.</p> + +<p>She flung on roguish, feverish, diabolical, seductive in low-cut bodice +pranked with flowers. It was a frenzy of impromptu extravagance, dazzling +even the orchestra; each line accentuated by new gesture, the verses +supplemented by new monologue; a miracle of chic and improvisation, and +the house rose at it. Out of the mist before her eyes thunder seemed to +come in great roars and crashes. She almost groped her way to the wing.</p> + +<p>She was recalled. The mist cleared. She bowed direct at him, smiling +defiance from her sparkling eyes. He was applauding with his hands, his +stick, his lungs! Was it possible?—yes, he had not recognised her!</p> + +<p>Now came a new revulsion. Again she felt herself saved. She sang her +other songs straight at him, and exaggerated them equally, half to tempt +Providence, half as a bold way of keeping Eileen still concealed. She +heard his companion chuckling, "By Jove, Willie, she's mashed on you," +as she threw a farewell kiss towards him. Then she hurried to her +dressing-room and took out his letter. She had transferred it to the +pocket of her theatrical gown, but had not as yet found time to finish +it. Even before she re-perused it, another emotion had begun to possess +her, a rush of resentment. So this was how he amused himself while +waiting to clasp her in his arms! How would he ever live through the +hours till Sunday afternoon, forsooth! She was jealous of the applause he +lavished on Nelly O'Neill, incensed at his levity, at his immaculate +evening-dress, at his white orchid. How dare he be so gay and debonair? +Her anger rose as she read his protestations, his romantic professions. +"O my darling, I shall sit up all night, thinking of you, re-reading all +your dear letters, recalling our past, picturing our future. In short, as +old Landor puts it:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'A night of memories and of sighs<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I consecrate to thee.'"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>She crumpled the paper in her hand. There was a knock at the door; Fossy +poked his head in. He had risen in the world of Halls, even as Nelly +O'Neill.</p> + +<p>"Might I present two friends of mine? They want so much to know you."</p> + +<p>"You know I never see anybody, and that I have to hurry off."</p> + +<p>"Then, I was to give you this bouquet."</p> + +<p>He handed in a costly floral mass. Amid it lay a card, "Colonel Doherty." +She crumpled his letter more viciously.</p> + +<p>"Tell them I can give them ten minutes only. Oh, Fossy, it's an amusing +Show, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"It was a rattling good show," said Fossy, half puzzled. "Come in, boys."</p> + +<p>Entered the Anglo-Indian twain with shining faces and shirt-fronts, +cheroots politely lowered.</p> + +<p>"Oh, smoke away, gentlemen," cried Nelly O'Neill, facing them in all +the dazzle of her flesh and the crudity of her stage-paint, and her +over-lustrous eyes, "don't mind me. Which of you is the Colonel?"</p> + +<p>The stout, sallow gentleman jocosely pushed his tall flaxen-haired +companion forward. "Oh, I knew the Major was out of it," he grinned.</p> + +<p>"Not at all, Major," said Nelly. "I only wanted to know which I had to +thank for these lovely flowers."</p> + +<p>"You have yourself to thank," said the Colonel, smartly. "By Jove! You +gave us a treat. London was worth coming back to."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you've been away from London?"</p> + +<p>"Just back this very day from India—"</p> + +<p>"And of course the first thing after a good dinner is the good old +Friv—" put in the Major.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Major," said Fossy. "That's handsome of you. And now I'll +leave you to Miss O'Neill."</p> + +<p>"That's handsomer still," said the Colonel. And the three men guffawed. +Eileen felt sick.</p> + +<p>The Major began to talk of the music-halls of India; the Colonel chimed +in. They treated her as a comrade, told her anecdotes of the <i>coulisses</i> +of Calcutta. The Colonel retailed a jest of the bazaars.</p> + +<p>"I permit smoke, not smoking-room stories," she said severely. At which +the twain poked each other shriekingly in the ribs. After that Eileen let +the Colonel have rope enough to hang himself with, though she felt it +cutting cruelly into her own flesh. It was an orgie of the eternal +masculine, spiced with the aroma of costly cigars.</p> + +<p>"I'm so sorry," she said, when she had let them have a quarter of an +hour's run. "I really must fly." And she seized the bouquet, and +carefully adjusted his card in the glowing mass. "Won't you come +and have tea with me to-morrow? About four."</p> + +<p>The Colonel winced. "I fear I have another appointment."</p> + +<p>"Oh, rot! I'll bring him," said the Major. "Where do you hang out?"</p> + +<p>"22 Oxbridge,"—her hesitation was barely perceptible—"Crescent."</p> + +<p>The Colonel started. "Do you know it, Colonel?" She looked at him +ingenuously.</p> + +<p>"No, but how odd! My other appointment is at 22 Oxbridge Terrace."</p> + +<p>"How funny!" laughed Eileen. "Just round the corner. Then you'll be +able to kill two ladies with one cab." And she fled from the Major's +cachinnation.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVIIIA" id="XVIIIA"></a>XVIII</h2> + + +<p>She had missed her turn at the third Hall, but she did not care. She went +on and gave a spiritless performance. It fell dead, but she cared less. +Her head throbbed with a dozen possibilities. She was still undiscovered. +As she sat resting on her couch ere resuming her work-a-day gown, her +nerves stretched to snapping point, and old Irish songs crooning +themselves irrelevantly in her brain, a telegram was handed her.</p> + +<p>"He has found out," she thought, going hot and cold. She tore open the +pink envelope... and burst into a shriek of laughter. The dresser rushed +in, wondering. Nelly O'Neill merely held her sides, jollity embodied. +"Oh, the Show, the Show!" she gasped, the tears streaking her painted +cheeks.</p> + +<p>The telegram that hung between her fingers in two sheets ran: "Reply +prepaid. I don't know the ways of the stage so I send you this as a sure +way of reaching you to ask when and where I may have the pleasure of +calling upon your friend, Miss O'Keeffe, and renewing the study of +Plato.—Robert Maper, Hotel Belgravia."</p> + +<p>"Any answer, miss?" said the imperturbable doorkeeper.</p> + +<p>The answer flashed irresistibly into her mind as he spoke. Oh, she would +play up to Bob Maper. Doubtless he imagined her fallen to the level of +her <i>métier</i>, though he wasn't insulting. She scribbled hastily: "Robert +Maper, Hotel Belgravia. I am waiting at the Hall for you. Come and take +me to supper.—EILEEN O'NEILL." She gave instructions he was to be +admitted. Then she relapsed into her hysteric amusement. "Oh, the merry +master of marionettes, the night my love comes from beyond the seas, you +send me to supper with Robert Maper." She waited with impatience. Now +that the long-dreaded discovery had come, she was consumed with curiosity +as to its effect upon the discoverer. At last she remembered to wash off +the rouge and the messes necessary for stage-perspective. Her winsome +face came back to her in the mirror, angelic by contrast, and while she +was looking wonderingly at this mystic flashing mask of hers, there was a +knock, and in another instant she was looking into the eyes burning +unchanged under the white marble mantel-piece.</p> + +<p>"Ah, there you are!" she said gaily, and shook his hand as though they +had met the evening before. "Where shall we go?"</p> + +<p>He accepted the situation. "I don't know—I thought you would know."</p> + +<p>"I don't—I never supped with a man in my life."</p> + +<p>He flushed with complex pleasure and surprise. "Really! Oh, Eileen!"</p> + +<p>"Hush! Call me Nelly, if you must be Christian. I suppose you think you +may, now."</p> + +<p>"I—I beg your pardon," he stammered, disconcerted.</p> + +<p>"Don't look so gaspy—poor little thing! It shall be thrown back into the +water. Will you carry my bouquet?"</p> + +<p>"With pleasure." He grasped it eagerly, and carried it towards the stage +door and a hansom.</p> + +<p>"It wanted only that," she said. "Oh, the Show, the Show!"</p> + +<p>"I don't understand you."</p> + +<p>"Do I understand myself?" They got into the hansom. "Where shall we go?" +she repeated.</p> + +<p>"Places all close at twelve on Saturday night."</p> + +<p>"Ah, do they? Your hotel also?"</p> + +<p>"No, of course one may eat at one's own hotel. If you don't mind going +there—"</p> + +<p>"If <i>you</i> don't mind, rather."</p> + +<p>"I? Who is my censor?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, the word admits I'm discreditable. Never mind, Bob. See how +Christian I am."</p> + +<p>"No, no, I've felt it was all my doing. Indirectly I drove you to +it—oh, how you have weighed on me!"</p> + +<p>"Really, I'd quite forgotten you."</p> + +<p>He winced and gasped. "Hotel Belgravia," he called up through the +trap-door.</p> + +<p>"Very strange you should find me," she said, as they glided through the +flashing London night.</p> + +<p>"Not in the least. I knew you blindfold, so to speak. You forget how I +used to stand outside the drawing-room, listening to your singing."</p> + +<p>"Eavesdropper!" she murmured. But he struck a tender chord—all the +tender chords of her twilight playing that now rose up softly and floated +around her.</p> + +<p>"Eavesdropper if you like, who heard nothing that was not beautiful. And +so I hadn't to <i>look</i> for you. As a matter of fact, I wasn't looking but +consulting my programme to know who number eleven was, when you began to +sing."</p> + +<p>"If you <i>had</i> looked you wouldn't have recognised me," she said, smiling.</p> + +<p>"Probably not. The stage get-up would have blurred my memories."</p> + +<p>She began to like him again: the oddness of it all was appealing. +"Nevertheless," she said, "it is strange you should just find me +to-night, for I—"</p> + +<p>"No, it isn't," he interrupted eagerly. "I've been every night this +week."</p> + +<p>"Ah, eavesdropping again," she said, touched.</p> + +<p>"I wanted to be absolutely sure—and then I couldn't pluck up courage to +write to you."</p> + +<p>"But you did to-night?"</p> + +<p>"You looked so tired—I felt I wanted to protect you."</p> + +<p>A sob came into her throat, but she managed to say coldly, "Was I very +bad?"</p> + +<p>"To one who had seen you the other nights," he said with complimentary +candour.</p> + +<p>She laughed. "How is your mother?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, she's very well, thank you. She lives in London now."</p> + +<p>"Then your father has retired from—"</p> + +<p>"He is dead,—didn't you hear?"</p> + +<p>"No." Eileen sat in shocked silence. "I am sorry," she murmured at +length. But underneath this mild shock she was conscious—as they rolled +on without speaking—of a new ease that had come into her life: some +immense relaxation of tension. "A hunted criminal must breathe more +calmly when he is caught," she thought.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIXA" id="XIXA"></a>XIX</h2> + + +<p>"Lucky I'm in evening dress," she said, loosening her cloak as they went +through a corridor, shimmering with dresses and diamonds, to a crowded +supper-room.</p> + +<p>"But you're always in evening dress, surely."</p> + +<p>"I might have been in tights." And she had a malicious self-wounding +pleasure in watching him gasp. She hurried into a revelation of her exact +position, as soon as they had secured a just-vacated little table in a +window niche. She omitted only Colonel Doherty.</p> + +<p>He listened breathlessly. "And nobody knows you are Eileen O'Keeffe, I +mean Nelly O'Neill?"</p> + +<p>She laughed. "You see <i>you</i> don't know which I am."</p> + +<p>"It's incredible."</p> + +<p>"So much the worse for your theories of credibility. The longer I live, +the less the Show surprises me."</p> + +<p>"What show?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's too long to explain. Say Vanity Fair." Her thumb fell into its +old habit of flicking the table. There was a silence.</p> + +<p>"I am sorry you told me," he said slowly.</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>A waiter loomed over them.</p> + +<p>"Supper, Sir Robert?"</p> + +<p>She glanced quickly at her companion.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said. "<i>Ma buonissima!</i> I leave it to you. And champagne."</p> + +<p>"<i>Prestissimo</i>, Sir Robert." He smirked himself off.</p> + +<p>"Why does he call you that?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"Oh, didn't you know my poor father was made a Baronet, after we +entertained Royalty?"</p> + +<p>"No; how strange your lives should have been going on all the time!" The +pop of a cork at her elbow startled her. Then she lifted her frothing +glass. "Sir—to you!"</p> + +<p>He clinked his against it. "To the lady of my dreams."</p> + +<p>"Still?" She sipped the wine: her eyes sparkled.</p> + +<p>"Yes; I've still a long opinion of myself."</p> + +<p>She put out her hand quickly and pressed his an instant.</p> + +<p>"Thank you!" he said huskily. "That was why I said I was sorry to know +that to the world you were still a governess. Of course I was glad, +too."</p> + +<p>"I don't understand. I always said you were more Irish than I."</p> + +<p>"I was glad you had kept yourself unspotted from the stage-world."</p> + +<p>"Good God! You call that unspotted! What are men made of?"</p> + +<p>"You were in a bad atmosphere. Your lips caught phrases."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense. I'm a crow, not a parrot; a thoroughly sooty bird."</p> + +<p>"It was your whiteness that attracted—your morning freshness. You don't +know what vulgarity is."</p> + +<p>"You don't know what <i>I</i> am."</p> + +<p>"I know you to your delicious finger-tips. And that's why I am sorry you +told me so much. I wanted to ask Nelly O'Neill to marry me. Now she'll +think I'm only asking Eileen O'Keeffe, the daughter of the Irish +gentleman."</p> + +<p>Her eyes filled with tears. "No, they both believe you capable of any +folly. Besides, somebody would find out Nelly all the same." And a smile +made a rainbow across her tears.</p> + +<p>The arrival of the soup relaxed the tension of emotion. In mid-plate she +suddenly put down her spoon and laughed softly.</p> + +<p>"What is it?" he said, not without alarm at her transitions.</p> + +<p>"Why, it would be one of those stock theatrical marriages, into which we +entrap titles! Fascinated by a Serio-Comic, poor silly young man. She +played her cards well, that Nelly. Ha! ha! ha! Who would dream of Plato's +dialogues? And you talk of incredible!"</p> + +<p>"I am content to be called silly." He tried to take her hand.</p> + +<p>"Well, don't be it in public. You will rank with Lord Tippleton who +married Bessie Bilhook, and made a Lady of her—the only ladyhood she's +ever known."</p> + +<p>"No, I can't rank with him," he smiled back. "I'm only a Baronet."</p> + +<p>"It sounds the same. Lady Maper!" she murmured. "But, oh, how funny! +There'd be two Lady Mapers."</p> + +<p>"My mother would be the Dowager Lady—"</p> + +<p>"That's funnier still."</p> + +<p>He ate in silence. Eileen mused on the picture of the Dowager, her +forefinger to heaven.</p> + +<p>"The Royalty—how did that go off?" she said, as he carved the chicken.</p> + +<p>"With fireworks. For the reception father built a new house and furnished +it with old furniture. Royalty stopped an hour and a quarter. Oh, she was +wonderful. I mean my mother. Copied your phrases—see what an impression +you made."</p> + +<p>"And what have you been doing since you came into the title?"</p> + +<p>"Looking for you."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" She dropped her fork. "But you knew I had people in Ireland."</p> + +<p>"I never knew exactly where."</p> + +<p>"But what put you on the track of the music-halls?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. I never dreamed of looking for you there. I just went." Master +Harold Lee Carter's phrase flashed back to her memory, "All the chaps +go."</p> + +<p>"But what about the Black Hole—I mean the works?"</p> + +<p>"They go on," he said. "I just get the profits."</p> + +<p>"And how about your Socialism?"</p> + +<p>"You taught me the fallacy of it."</p> + +<p>"I? Well, that's the cream of the joke."</p> + +<p>"Yes. Don't laugh at me, please. When you came into my life, or rather +when you went out of it—yes, I am Irish—I saw that money and station +are the mere veneer of life: the central reality is—Love."</p> + +<p>Again her eyes filled with tears, but she remained silent.</p> + +<p>"And I saw that I, the master, was really poorer than the majority of my +serfs, with their wives and bairns."</p> + +<p>"You are a good fellow," she murmured. "I—I meant to say," she corrected +herself, "what have you done with your clothes?"</p> + +<p>"My clothes!" he echoed vaguely, looking down at his spotless +shirt-front.</p> + +<p>"Your factory clothes! Wouldn't it be fun to wear them at supper here? Do +you think they could turn you out? I don't see how, legally. Do test the +question. Yes, do. Please do." And she laid her hand on his black sleeve. +"I won't marry you if you don't."</p> + +<p>"I did think you were serious to-night, Eileen," he said, disappointed.</p> + +<p>"How could you think that, if you read the programme, as you say? 'Nelly +O'Neill, Serio-Comic.' <i>Allons, ne faites cette tête mine de hibou</i>. +Admit the world is entirely ridiculous and give me some more champagne." +Her eyes glittered strangely.</p> + +<p>A clock struck twelve.</p> + +<p>"What, midnight!" she cried, starting up. "I must go."</p> + +<p>"No, no;" he took her hand.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes; don't you know, at the stroke of midnight I change back to a +governess."</p> + +<p>"Well, the magic didn't work, for that clock's very slow. Sit down, +please."</p> + +<p>"You have spoken the omen. I remain Nelly O'Neill and drop Eileen for +ever. <i>Vogue la galère.</i>"</p> + +<p>"Absit omen!" He shuddered.</p> + +<p>"Why not? What do you offer me? The love of one man. But my public loves +me as one man—with a much more voluminous love—I love it in return. Why +should I change?"</p> + +<p>"Shall we say merely because the public changes? I am constant."</p> + +<p>"Yes, you are very wonderful.... And if it's to-morrow already, my fate +will be settled to-day. Drink to my destiny."</p> + +<p>"I drink to our destiny," he said, raising his glass.</p> + +<p>"No. Only to mine. It will be decided this afternoon."</p> + +<p>"You will give me your answer this afternoon?" he cried joyfully.</p> + +<p>"I don't say that. It's my answer I shall know this afternoon. Yours you +shall have to-morrow afternoon. You don't mind giving me one day's option +of your hand?"</p> + +<p>"One day's! When you have had—"</p> + +<p>She interrupted impatiently. "Let bygones be bygones. You shall have a +letter by Monday afternoon. But, oh, Heavens! how could we marry? You +believe in nothing!"</p> + +<p>"There's the Registrar."</p> + +<p>She pouted: "Dry legality. No flowers, no organ, no feeling sweet and +virginal in a long veil. Oh, dear! Besides, there's mother—"</p> + +<p>"I don't object to the church ceremony."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad. The law may end marriage. Marriage shouldn't begin with law. +It ought to look beautiful at the start, at least, though one may know +it's a shaky scraw."</p> + +<p>"A shaky what?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's an Irish term for a bit of black bog that looks like lovely +green meadow. You step out so gaily on the glittering grass, and then +squish! squash! down you go to choke in the ooze."</p> + +<p>"Don't be so pessimistic. It would be much more sensible to think of +marriage as solid meadow-land after your present scramble over a shaky +what-d'ye-call it."</p> + +<p>"True for you! I give you the stage as the shakiest of all scraws. But +where <i>is</i> solid footing to be found? The world itself is only a vast bog +that sucks in the generations."</p> + +<p>"I am sorry I asked you to be serious," he said glumly. "You're such a +quick-change artiste."</p> + +<p>"I must quickly assume the governess or I'll lose my character," she +said, rising resolutely.</p> + +<p>He put her cloak tenderly round her.</p> + +<p>"You know I'll take you without a character," he said lightly.</p> + +<p>"If I had no character I might be tempted to take you," she retorted +dispiritingly. "Thank you so much for my first supper."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXA" id="XXA"></a>XX</h2> + + +<p>Eileen slept little. The dramatic possibilities of the interview with +Colonel Doherty were too agitating and too numerous. This time the +marionette-play needed writing. Who should receive him when he called? +Eileen O'Keeffe or Nelly O'Neill?</p> + +<p>Either possibility offered exquisite comedy.</p> + +<p>Eileen—as plain as possible—with a high, black dress, drooped lids, +stiffly brushed hair, even eyeglasses perhaps, with a deportment redolent +of bread-and-butter and five-finger exercises, could perhaps disenchant +him sufficiently to make him moderate his matrimonial ardour, even to +hurry off apologetically to his serio-comic Circe round the corner. What +a triumph of acting if she could drive him to her rival! Then as he went +through the door—to loosen her hair, throw off her glasses and whistle +him back to Nelly O'Neill!</p> + +<p>The part was tempting; it bristled with opportunities. But it was also +too trying. He might begin by taking lover's liberties, and the strain of +repulsing him would be too great. Besides, she wasn't clear how to play +the opening of the scene. But then there was another star part open to +her.</p> + +<p>Nelly O'Neill's <i>rôle</i> was much easier: it played itself. She had only +to go on with the episode. And the way the episode went on would also +serve to determine finally her attitude when the moment came to throw off +the mask and turn to governess. The only difficult moment would be the +first—to obfuscate him immediately with the notion that he had mixed up +the two addresses. Even if she failed and he realised his ghastlier +blunder, it would only precipitate the dramatic duel which she must face +sooner or later. All these high-strung possibilities deadened the +horrible pain she knew her soul held for her, as soldiers carry wounds to +be felt when the charge is over. She fell asleep near morning, her battle +planned, and slept late, a sleep full of strange dreams, in one of which +her drunken father counted her, and couldn't decide how many she was. +"It's two I am, father asthore, only two, Eileen and Nelly," she kept +crying. But he counted on.</p> + +<p>Towards four in the afternoon she posted herself at the window. It was +absolutely necessary to the comedy that she should open the door to him +herself. At last a cab containing him halted at the door. She +flew down, just supplanting the butler.</p> + +<p>"How good of you, Colonel!" she cried. "But where is the Major?"</p> + +<p>It was exquisitely calculated. She had pulled the string and the +marionette moved with precision. A daze, a flash, a stammer—all the +embarrassment of a man who believes that in a day-dream he has given +a second address first.</p> + +<p>"Miss—Miss O'Neill," he stuttered, mechanically removing his hat.</p> + +<p>"Nelly to my friends," she smiled fascinatingly. "Come in!" Christopher +Sly was not more bewildered when he opened his eyes on the glories of his +Court.</p> + +<p>"What—what is this address?" he blurted, as she prisoned him by closing +the door.</p> + +<p>"Why?... Oh, I know. Ha! ha! ha! You've come to the Crescent instead of +the Terrace."</p> + +<p>"That confounded cabman! I'm sure I told him the Terrace."</p> + +<p>"Don't swear. He's more accustomed to the Crescent. So many pros coming +home late, and all that!"</p> + +<p>He hesitated at the foot of the stairs. "I really think I ought to call +there first...."</p> + +<p>Now all the coquette in Nelly O'Neill rose to detain him, subtly tangled +with the actress. She pouted adorably. "Oh, now you're here, can't you +put her second for once?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't say it was a <i>her</i>."</p> + +<p>"A she," corrected the governess, instinctively. Nelly hastened to add, +"No man leaves a woman for a man."</p> + +<p>"This is such an old appointment," he pleaded in distress.</p> + +<p>"I see. You want to be off with the old love before you are on with the +new."</p> + +<p>"Nothing of the kind, I assure you."</p> + +<p>"What! Not even the new?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, that part!" He smiled and followed her up. "You won't mind my going +soon?"</p> + +<p>"The sooner the better if you talk like that!" She threw open the door of +her little sitting-room. How well the Show was going!</p> + +<p>"A soda and whisky, Colonel? I suppose that's your idea of tea." She +had the scene ready. She had got it all up like a little play, writing +down the articles on a sheet of paper headed "Property List": "Cigars, +cigarettes, syphons, spirits, sporting-papers," all borrowed from Master +Harold Lee Carter to entertain a visitor.</p> + +<p>But at the height of the play's prosperity, while the Colonel clinked +tumblers with Nelly, came a <i>contretemps</i>, and all the farce darkened +swiftly to drama as the gay landscape is overgloomed by a thundercloud.</p> + +<p>It all came from Mrs. Lee Carter's benevolent fussiness, her interest in +the man who had come to marry her governess. A servant knocked at the +door, stuck her head in, and said, "Mrs. Lee Carter's compliments, and +would you like some tea?"</p> + +<p>"No, thank you," said Eileen, hurriedly.</p> + +<p>But as the door closed, the Colonel's glass fell to the ground, and he +rose to his feet. His bronzed face was working wildly.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Lee Carter!" he gasped. "You—you are Eileen!"</p> + +<p>"Here's a mess," she said coolly, stooping to wipe up the carpet.</p> + +<p>"Eileen! Explain!" he said piteously.</p> + +<p>"It's you that ought to be explaining. I've all I can do to pick up the +nasty little bits of glass."</p> + +<p>"My brain reels. Who <i>are</i> you? What <i>are</i> you? For God's sake."</p> + +<p>"Hush! Who are <i>you</i>? What are <i>you</i>?"</p> + +<p>"I know what I was—your lover."</p> + +<p>"Whose? Mine or Nelly's?"</p> + +<p>"Good God, Eileen! You saw how anxious I was to get to you. That I was +subtly drawn to Nelly is only a proof of how you were in my blood. But +you're not really Nelly O'Neill. This is some stupid practical joke. +Don't torture me longer."</p> + +<p>"It tortures you that I should be Nelly O' Neill!" All the confessed +sweetness of her position came up into clear consciousness: the lights, +the laughter, the very smell of the smoke endeared by a thousand +triumphs. How dared he speak of Nelly O'Neill as though she couldn't be +touched with a pitchfork! Yes, and Bob Maper, too—her anger ricocheted +to him—with his priggish notions of saving her from black bogs! And +who was it that now stood over her like a fuddled accusing angel? She +pulled out his letter and read viciously:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'A night of memories and of sighs<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I consecrate to thee.'"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"I was dying to rush to you—you wouldn't see me. And the Major dragged +me—"</p> + +<p>"Through all that mud? All those Indian escapades?"</p> + +<p>He groaned, "And you listened—!"</p> + +<p>"Am I not your mother-confessor?"</p> + +<p>He seized her by the wrists. "Don't madden me! You're not really on +the Halls? You <i>are</i> living here as governess. It is some prank, some +masquerade! Say it is!" He shook her. She tried to wrest her hands away.</p> + +<p>"Not till you tell me the truth! You haven't been lying to me all these +months?"</p> + +<p>A sudden remembrance came to give her strength and scorn. "I <i>have</i> told +you the truth, only my letter crossed you on the ocean. When it returns +to England, you will see."</p> + +<p>His grip relaxed, he staggered back. "Come," she said, pursuing her +unforeseen advantage. "We will talk this thing over quietly. I always +said you were in love with a shadow. But I find it was I who imagined a +Bayard."</p> + +<p>"And what have I done and said worse than other men?" Again Master Harold +Lee Carter's complacent sentiment came to her. Men were all alike, only +their women folk didn't know.</p> + +<p>"Worse than other men!" She laughed bitterly. "I wanted you better—all +the seven heavens better—saint as well as hero, with no thought but for +me, and no one before me or after me. Oh, yes, it sounds a large order, +but that's what we women want. Don't speak! I know what you're going to +say. Skip me. Talk of yourself."</p> + +<p>"You get what you want. The other's only make-believe. It passes like +water from a duck's back. You women don't understand. The white fire of +your purity cleanses us, and that is why we will have nothing less—"</p> + +<p>"Ah, now you have skipped <i>to</i> me. I'm not pretending there isn't an evil +spirit in me to match yours. It split away from me and became Nelly +O'Neill. You asked which I was? I am both. Here, I am a respectable +governess. Let me ring for Mrs. Lee Carter. She'll give you my character. +The white fire and all that." She pressed the bell.</p> + +<p>"Don't be so absurd. Give me time to collect my senses."</p> + +<p>"All right, pick up the pieces, while I collect these." She stooped over +the bits of glass.</p> + +<p>"But for Heaven's sake don't bring that woman into it—"</p> + +<p>The door opened. "Yes, miss?"</p> + +<p>"Another glass, please." The servant disappeared.</p> + +<p>"I do hope you won't break this one. In what country is it that the +bridegroom breaks a glass in the marriage ceremonial? Oh, yes, I +remember. Fossy told me. Among the Jews. There's a lot in the profession. +Not that it's such a marrying profession. And to think I might have been +a regular bride! But I've lost you, my dear boy, hero of a hundred +hill-fights, I <i>know</i> it—and the moment you've picked your little +bits of senses together, you'll know it, too. Alas, we shall never go +tiger-hunting together.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"'A night of memories and of sighs<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I consecrate to thee.'"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>"I don't say I won't keep my promise," he said sulkily.</p> + +<p>"Your promise! Hoity toity! Upon my word! I'm no breach-of-promise +lady—Chops and tomato sauce indeed! I recognise that we could never +marry. There would always be that between us!"</p> + +<p>Her fascination gripped him in proportion as she let him go.</p> + +<p>"I don't know that I should mind if nobody really knows," he began.</p> + +<p>"You! It's I that would mind. And I really know. Could I marry a man who +had told me smoking-room stories? No, Eileen is done with you. Good-by!"</p> + +<p>"Good-by? No, I can't go. I can't face the emptiness. You've filled me +and fooled me with love all these weeks. Good God! Do you owe me +nothing?"</p> + +<p>"I leave you something—Nelly O'Neill! Go and see her. Now you're off +with the old love. You mark what a prophetess I was. Nelly'll receive you +very differently. No cant of superiority. You'll be just a pair of jolly +good fellows. You'll sit up drinking whisky together and yarning +anecdotes. No uncomfortable pretences; no black bog posing as white +fire; no driven snow business, London snow nicely trodden, in. And +the tales of the world you tell me—how useful they'll come in for +stage-patter! Oh, we shall be happy enough! We can still pick up the +pieces!"</p> + +<p>"Eileen! Eileen! you will drive me mad. What do you mean? You know I +could never have a wife on the Halls. It would ruin me in the clubs, it +would—"</p> + +<p>"In the clubs! Ha! ha! ha! Every member of which would be delighted to +have tea with me! But who's proposing to you a wife on the Halls? You +said I owed you myself, and it's true, but you don't suppose I could +<i>marry</i> a man I didn't respect? I told you we're not a marrying +profession. Come, let's kiss and be friends."</p> + +<p>He drew back as in horror. "No, no, Eileen, I respect you too much for +that."</p> + +<p>She looked at him long and curiously. "Yes, the sexes don't understand +each other. Well, good-by. I almost could marry you, after all. But I'm +too wise. Please go. I have a headache and it is quite possible I shall +scream. Good-by, dear. I was never more than a phantom to you—a boyish +memory, and a bad one at that. Don't you know you gave me a pair of black +eyes? Good-by: you'll marry a dear, sweet girl in white muslin who'll +never know. God bless you."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXIA" id="XXIA"></a>XXI</h2> + + +<p>Sir Robert Maper simply could not get up on the Monday morning. The agony +of suspense was too keen, and he lay with closed eyes, trying to drowse +his consciousness, and exchanging it in his fitful snatches of sleep for +oppressive dreams, in one of which Eileen figured as a Lorelei, combing +her locks on a rock as she sang her siren song.</p> + +<p>But she did not prolong his agony beyond mid-day.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"MY DEAR SIR ROBERT,—Both of us are dead and gone, so, alas! neither can +marry you. Don't be alarmed, we are only dead to the world, and gone +to the Continent. 'Get thee to a nunnery.' Hamlet knew best. If I could +have married any man it would have been you. You are the only gentleman +I have ever known. But I don't love you. It's a miserable pity. I wish I +did. I wonder why 'love' is an active verb in all languages. It ought to +have a passive form, like 'loquor' (though that passive should be +reserved for parrots). Forgive the governess! I seem to have undergone +'love' for two men, but one was a fool and the other not quite a rogue, +and I dare say I never really loved anybody but myself (and there the +verb is very active)! I love to coquet, but the moment a man comes too +close, I feel hunted. I dare say I was secretly pleased to find my hero +tripping, so as to send him packing. Was ever hero in such a comic +plight? Poor, unlucky hero! But this will be Greek to you—the kind you +can't read. Oh, the men I could have married! It is curious, when you +think of it, the men one little woman might marry and be dutifully +absorbed in. I could have been a bass chorister's wife or a Baronet's +wife, the wife of an Honourable dolt, and the wife of a dishonourable +dramatist. <i>J'en passe et des meilleurs.</i> I could have lived in Calcutta +or in Clerkenwell, been received in Belgravia or in Boulogne. Good Lord! +the parts one woman is supposed to be fit for, while the man remains his +stolid, stupid self. Talk of the variety stage! Or is it that they all +want the same thing of her?</p> + +<p>"Talking of the variety stage, there would have been the danger, too, of +my thirsting for it, even with a Dowager Lady for a stepmother. The +nostalgia of the boards is a disease your love might not have warded off. +You are well rid of both of us.</p> + +<p>"You said—at my first and last supper—that money and station are the +mere veneer of life, the central reality is love. That is true, if by +love you read the love of God, of Christ. Do you remember my going one +day over the works with your poor father? Well, after I had been through +rooms and rooms of whirring machinery infinitely ingenious and +diversified—that made my head ache—they took me to a shed where stood +in a sort of giant peace the great engine that moved it all. 'God!' was +my instant thought, and somehow my headache fled. And ever since then, +when I have been oppressed by the complex clatter of life, my thought has +gone back to that power-room, to the great simple force behind it all. I +rested in the thought as a swimmer on a placid ocean. But the ocean is +cold and infinite, and of late I have longed for a more human God that +loved and forgave, and so I come back to the Christ. You see Plato never +satisfied me. Your explanation of the B.C. glories was sown on barren +soil. I grant you a nobility in your Plato as of Greek pillars, soaring +in the sunlight, but somehow I want the Gothic—I long for 'dim religious +light' and windows stained with saints. Oh, to find my soul again! If I +could tell you how the Convent rises before me as a vision of +blessedness—after life's 'shaky scraw'—the cool cloisters, the rows of +innocent beds, the delicious old garden. There are tears at my heart, as +I think of it. What flowers I will bring to my favourite nun.... God +grant she is still alive! What altar-cloths I will weave with my silver +and gold! Yes, the wages of sin shall not be death, I will pay them to +the life eternal; my dowry as the bride of Christ. I, too, shall be laid +on the altar, my complex corrupt soul shall be simplified and purified, +and the Holy Mother will lead me by the hand like a little child. But all +this will be caviare to you. Adieu. I will pray for you.</p> + +<p>"Eileen.</p> + +<p>"P.S.—It is a convent that trains the young, so I shall still be a +Governess."</p></div> + +<p>"And perhaps still a Serio-Comic," thought the Baronet, bitterly.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREY WIG: STORIES AND NOVELETTES***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 16408-h.txt or 16408-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/4/0/16408">https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/4/0/16408</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>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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