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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Jan and Her Job
+
+Author: L. Allen Harker
+
+Release Date: September 9, 2009 [EBook #29945]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JAN AND HER JOB ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Robert Cicconetti, S.D., and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it,
+anyway."]
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+BY
+
+L. ALLEN HARKER
+
+AUTHOR OF "A ROMANCE OF THE NURSERY"; "MISS ESPERANCE AND MR. WYCHERLY";
+"MR. WYCHERLY'S WARDS"; "THE FFOLLIOTS OF REDMARLEY," ETC.
+
+ILLUSTRATED
+
+NEW YORK
+
+CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
+
+1917
+
+
+Copyright, 1917, by
+Charles Scribner's Sons
+
+***
+
+Published March, 1917
+
+
+                       TO
+
+                    F. R. P.
+
+  "_Chary of praise and prodigal of counsel--
+    Who but thou?_"
+                                R. L. S.
+
+
+
+
+_CONTENTS_
+
+
+  CHAPTER                                               PAGE
+
+      I. JAN                                               1
+
+     II. JAN'S MAIL                                       13
+
+    III. BOMBAY                                           19
+
+     IV. THE BEGINNING OF THE JOB                         39
+
+      V. THE CHILDREN                                     52
+
+     VI. THE SHADOW BEFORE                                62
+
+    VII. THE HUMAN TOUCH                                  78
+
+   VIII. THE END OF THE DREAM                             91
+
+     IX. MEG                                              97
+
+      X. PLANS                                           124
+
+     XI. THE STATE OF PETER                              139
+
+    XII. "THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES"                         149
+
+   XIII. THE WHEELS OF CHANCE                            162
+
+    XIV. PERPLEXITIES                                    173
+
+     XV. WREN'S END                                      184
+
+    XVI. "THE BLUDGEONINGS OF CHANCE"                    201
+
+   XVII. "THOUGH AN HOST SHOULD ENCAMP AGAINST
+           ME"                                           212
+
+  XVIII. MEG AND CAPTAIN MIDDLETON                       220
+
+    XIX. THE YOUNG IDEA                                  240
+
+     XX. "ONE WAY OF LOVE"                               252
+
+    XXI. ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE                             261
+
+   XXII. THE ENCAMPMENT                                  276
+
+  XXIII. TACTICS                                         287
+
+   XXIV. "THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID"                  303
+
+    XXV. A DEMONSTRATION IN FORCE                        325
+
+   XXVI. IN WHICH SEVERAL PEOPLE SPEAK THEIR MINDS       339
+
+  XXVII. AUGUST, 1914                                    351
+
+
+
+
+_ILLUSTRATIONS_
+
+
+  "But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it,
+      anyway"                                 _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                      FACING
+                                                       PAGE
+
+  "It would make it easier for both of us if you'd face it,
+      my dear"                                            66
+
+  He washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+      pointing out ... that he "went into all the
+      corners"                                           156
+
+  William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ...
+      nice children                                      188
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+JAN
+
+
+She was something of a puzzle to the other passengers. They couldn't
+quite place her. She came on board the P. and O. at Marseilles. Being
+Christmas week the boat was not crowded, and she had a cabin to herself
+on the spar deck, so there was no "stable-companion" to find out
+anything about her.
+
+The sharp-eyed Australian lady, who sat opposite her at the Purser's
+table, decided that she was not married, or even engaged, as she wore no
+rings of any kind. Besides, her name, "Miss Janet Ross," figured in the
+dinner-list and was plainly painted on her deck-chair. At meals she sat
+beside the Purser, and seemed more or less under his wing. People at her
+table decided that she couldn't be going out as a governess or she would
+hardly be travelling first class, and yet she did not look of the sort
+who globe-trot all by themselves.
+
+Rather tall, slender without being thin, she moved well. Her ringless
+hands were smooth and prettily shaped, so were her slim feet, and always
+singularly well-shod.
+
+Perhaps her chief outward characteristic was that she looked
+delightfully fresh and clean. Her fair skin helped to this effect, and
+the trim suitability of her clothes accentuated it. And yet there was
+nothing challenging or particularly noticeable in her personality.
+
+Her face, fresh-coloured and unlined, was rather round. Her eyes
+well-opened and blue-grey, long-sighted and extremely honest. Her hair,
+thick and naturally wavy, had been what hairdressers call "mid-brown,"
+but was now frankly grey, especially round the temples; and the grey
+hair puzzled people, so that opinions differed widely regarding her age.
+
+The five box-wallahs (gentlemen engaged in commercial pursuits are so
+named in the East to distinguish them from the Heaven-Born in the
+various services that govern India), who, with the Australian lady, sat
+opposite to her at table, decided that she was really young and
+prematurely grey. Between the courses they diligently took stock of her.
+The Australian lady disagreed with them. She declared Miss Ross to be
+middle-aged, to look younger than she was. In this the Australian lady
+was quite sincere. She could not conceive of any _young_ woman
+neglecting the many legitimate means that existed of combating this most
+distressing semblance--if semblance it was--of age.
+
+The Australian lady set her down as a well-preserved forty at least.
+
+Mr. Frewellen, the oldest and crossest and greediest of the five
+box-wallahs, declared that he would lay fifteen rupees to five annas
+that she was under thirty; that her eyes were sad, and it was probably
+trouble that had turned her hair. At his time of life, he could tell a
+young woman when he saw one. No painted old harridan could deceive
+_him_. After all, if Miss Ross _had_ grey hair, she had plenty of it,
+and it was her own. But Mr. Frewellen, who sat directly opposite her,
+was prejudiced in her favour, for she always let him take her roll if it
+was browner than his own. He also took her knife if it happened to be
+sharper than the one he had, and he insisted on her listening to his
+incessant grumbling as to the food, the service, the temperature, and
+the general imbecility and baseness of his fellow-creatures.
+
+Like the Ancient Mariner, he held her with his glittering spectacles.
+Miss Ross trembled before his diatribes. He spoke in a loud and rumbling
+voice, and made derogatory remarks about the other passengers as they
+passed to their respective tables. She would thankfully have changed
+hers, but that it might have seemed ungrateful to the Purser, into whose
+charge she had been given by friends; and the Purser had been most kind
+and attentive.
+
+The Australian lady was sure that the Purser knew more about Miss Ross
+than he would acknowledge--which he did. But when tackled by one
+passenger about another, he was discreet or otherwise in direct ratio to
+what he considered was the discretion of the questioner. And he was a
+pretty shrewd judge of character. He had infinite opportunities of so
+judging. A sea-voyage lays bare many secrets and shows up human nature
+at its starkest.
+
+Janet Ross did not seek to make friends, but kindly people who spoke to
+her found her pleasant and not in the least disposed to be mysterious
+when questioned, though she never volunteered any information about
+herself. She was a good listener, and about the middle of any voyage
+that is a quality supplying a felt want. Mankind in general finds his
+own doings very interesting, and takes great pleasure in recounting the
+same. Even the most energetic young passenger cannot play deck-quoits
+all day, and mixed cricket matches are too heating to last long once
+Aden is left behind. A great many people found it pleasant to drop into
+a chair beside the quiet lady, who was always politely interested in
+their remarks. She looked so cool and restful in her white frock and
+shady hat. She did _not_ buy a solar topee at Port Said, for though this
+was her first voyage she had not, it seemed, started quite unwarned.
+
+In the middle of the Indian Ocean she suddenly found favour in the eyes
+of Sir Langham Sykes, and when that was the case Sir Langham proclaimed
+his preference to the whole ship. No one who attracted his notice could
+remain in obscurity. When he was not eating he was talking, generally
+about himself, though he was also fond of asking questions.
+
+A short, stout man with a red face, little fierce blue eyes, a booming
+voice, noisy laugh and a truculent, domineering manner, Sir Langham
+made his presence felt wherever he was.
+
+It was "her shape," as he called it, that first attracted his attention
+to Miss Ross, as he watched her walking briskly round and round the
+hurricane-deck for her morning constitutional.
+
+"That woman moves well," he remarked to his neighbour; "wonder if she's
+goin' out to be married. Nice-looking woman and pleasant, no frills
+about her--sort that would be kind in illness."
+
+And Sir Langham sighed. He couldn't take any exercise just then, for his
+last attack of gout had been very severe, and his left foot was still
+swathed and slippered.
+
+There was a dance that night on the hurricane-deck, and Sir Langham,
+while watching the dancers, talked at the top of his voice with the more
+important lady passengers. On such occasions he claimed close intimacy
+with the Reigning House, and at all times of day one heard such
+sentences as, "And _I_ said to the Princess Henrietta," with a full
+account of what he did say. And the things he declared he said, and the
+stories he told, certainly suggested a doubt as to whether the ladies of
+our Royal Family are quite as strait-laced as the ordinary public is led
+to believe. But then one had only Sir Langham's word for it. There was
+no possibility of questioning the Princess.
+
+Presently Sir Langham got tired of trying to drown the band--it was such
+a noisy band--and he hobbled down the companion on to the almost
+deserted deck. Right up in the stern he spied Miss Ross, quite alone,
+sitting under an electric light absorbed in a book. Beside her was an
+empty chair with a comfortable leg-rest. Sir Langham never made any
+bones about interrupting people. It would not, to him, have seemed
+possible that a woman could prefer any form of literature to the charm
+of his conversation. So with a series of grunts he lowered himself into
+it, arranged his foot upon the rest, and, without asking permission, lit
+a cigar.
+
+"Don't you care for dancin'?" he asked.
+
+She closed her book. "Oh, yes," she said, "but I don't know many men on
+board, and there are such a lot of young people who do know one another.
+It's pretty to watch them; but the night is pretty, too, don't you
+think? The stars all seem so near compared to what they do at home."
+
+"I've seen too many Eastern nights to take much stock in 'em now," he
+said in a disparaging voice. "I take it this is all new to you--first
+voyage, eh?"
+
+"Yes, I've never been a long voyage before."
+
+"Goin' to India, I suppose. You'd have started sooner if you'd been
+goin' for the winter to Australia. Now what are you goin' to India
+_for_?"
+
+"To stay with my sister."
+
+"Married sister?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Older than you, then, of course."
+
+"No, younger."
+
+"Much younger?"
+
+"Three years."
+
+"Is she like you?"
+
+"Not in the least. She is a beautiful person."
+
+"Been married long?"
+
+"Between five and six years. I'm to take her home at the end of the cold
+weather."
+
+"Any kids?"
+
+"Two."
+
+"And you haven't been out before?"
+
+"No; this is my first visit."
+
+"She's been home, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes, once."
+
+"Is her husband in the Army?"
+
+"No."
+
+Had Sir Langham been an observant person he would have noted that her
+very brief replies did not exactly encourage further questions. But his
+idea of conversation was either a monologue or a means of obtaining
+information, so he instantly demanded, "What does her husband do?"
+
+The impulse of the moment urged her to reply, "What possible business is
+it of yours _what_ he does?" But well-bred people do not yield to these
+impulses, so she answered quietly, "He's in the P.W.D."
+
+"Not a bad service, not a bad service, though not equal to the I.C.S.
+They've had rather a scandal in it lately. Didn't you see about it in
+the papers just before we left?"
+
+At that moment Sir Langham was very carefully flicking the ash from the
+end of his cigar, otherwise he might have observed that as he spoke his
+companion flushed. A wave of warm colour surged over her face and bare
+neck and receded again, leaving her very pale. Her hands closed over the
+book lying in her lap, as if glad to hold on to something, and their
+knuckles were white against the tan.
+
+"Didn't you see it?" he repeated. "Some chap been found to have taken
+bribes over contracts in a native state. Regular rumpus there's been.
+Quite right, too; we sahibs must have clean hands. No dealing with brown
+people if you haven't clean hands--can't have rupees sticking to 'em in
+any Government transactions. Expect you'll hear all about it when you
+get out there--makes a great sensation in any service does that sort of
+thing. I don't remember the name of the chap--perhaps they didn't give
+it--do you?"
+
+"I didn't see anything about it," she said quietly. "I was very busy
+just before I left, and hardly looked at a paper."
+
+"Where is your sister?"
+
+"In Bombay."
+
+"Oh, got a billet there, has he? Expect you'll like Bombay; cheery
+place, in the cold weather, but not a patch on Calcutta, to my mind. I
+hear the Governor and his wife do the thing in style--hospitable, you
+know; got private means, as people in that position always ought to
+have."
+
+"I don't suppose I shall go out at all," she said. "My sister is ill,
+and I've got to look after her. Directly she is strong enough to travel
+I shall bring her home."
+
+"Oh, you _must_ see something of the social life of the place while
+you're there. D'you know what I thought? I thought you were goin' out to
+get married, and"--he continued gallantly--"I thought he was a deuced
+lucky chap."
+
+She smiled and shook her head. She was not looking at Sir Langham, but
+at the long, white, moonlit pathway of foam left in the wake of the
+ship.
+
+"I say," he went on confidentially, "what's your Christian name? I'm
+certain they don't call you Janet. Is it Nettie, now? I bet it's
+Nettie!"
+
+"My _family_," said Miss Ross somewhat coldly, "call me Jan."
+
+"Nice little name," he exclaimed, "but more like a boy's. Now, I never
+got a pet name. I started Langham, and Langham I've stopped, and I
+flatter myself I've made the name known and respected."
+
+He wanted her to look at him, and leaned towards her: "Look here, Miss
+Ross, I'm goin' to ask you a funny question, and it's not one you can
+ask most women--but you're a puzzle. You've got a face like a child, and
+yet you're as grey as a badger. What _is_ your age?"
+
+"I shall be twenty-eight in March."
+
+She looked at him then, and her grey eyes were so full of amusement
+that, incredulous as he usually was as to other people's statements, he
+knew that she was speaking the truth.
+
+"Then why the devil don't you _do_ something _to_ it?" he demanded.
+
+She laughed. "I couldn't be bothered. And it might turn green, or
+something. I don't mind it. It began when I was twenty-three."
+
+"_I_ don't mind it either," Sir Langham declared magnanimously; "but
+it's misleading."
+
+"I'm sorry," she said demurely. "I wouldn't mislead anyone for the
+world."
+
+"Now, what age should you think _I_ am? But I suppose you know--that's
+the worst of being a public character; when one gets nearly a column in
+_Who's Who_, everybody knows all about one. That's the penalty of
+celebrity."
+
+"Do you mind people knowing your age?"
+
+"Not I! Nor anything else about me. _I've_ never done anything to be
+ashamed of. Quite the other way, I can assure you."
+
+"How pleasant that must be," she said quietly.
+
+Sir Langham turned and looked suspiciously at her; but her face was
+guileless and calm, with no trace of raillery, her eyes still fixed on
+the long bright track of foam.
+
+"I suppose you, now," he muttered hoarsely, "always sleep well, go off
+directly you turn in--eh?"
+
+Her quiet eyes met his; little and fierce and truculent, but behind
+their rather bloodshot boldness there lurked something else, and with a
+sudden pang of pity she knew that it was fear, and that Sir Langham
+dreaded the night.
+
+"As a rule I do," she said gently; "but of course I've known what it is
+to be sleepless, and it's horrid."
+
+"It's hell," said Sir Langham, "and I'm in it every night this voyage,
+for I've knocked off morphia and opiates--they were playing the deuce
+with my constitution, and I've strength of mind for anything when I
+fairly take hold. But it's awful. When d'you suppose natural sleep will
+come back?"
+
+She knew that he did not lack physical courage, that he had fearlessly
+faced great dangers in many outposts of the world; but the demon of
+insomnia had got a hold of Sir Langham, and he dreaded the night
+unspeakably. At that moment there was something pathetic about the
+little, boastful, filibustering man.
+
+"I think you will sleep to-night," she said confidently, "especially if
+you go to bed early."
+
+She half rose as she spoke, but he put his hand on her arm and pressed
+her down in her chair again.
+
+"Don't go yet," he cried. "Keep on tellin' me I'll sleep, and then
+perhaps I shall. You look as if you could will people to do things.
+You're that quiet sort. Will me, there's a good girl. Tell me again I'll
+sleep to-night."
+
+It was getting late; the music had stopped and the dancers had
+disappeared. Miss Ross did not feel over comfortable alone with Sir
+Langham so far away from everybody else. Especially as she saw he was
+excited and nervous. Had he been drinking? she wondered. But she
+remembered that he had proclaimed far and wide that, because of his
+gout, he'd made a vow to touch no form of "alcoholic liquor" on the
+voyage, except on Christmas and New Year's Day. It was six days since
+Christmas, and already Aden was left behind. No, it was just sheer
+nervous excitement, and if she could do him any good....
+
+"I feel sure you will sleep to-night," she said soothingly, "if you will
+do as I tell you."
+
+"I'll do any mortal thing. I've got a deck-cabin to myself. Will you
+keep willin' me when you turn in?"
+
+"Go to bed now," she said firmly. "Undress quickly, and then think about
+nothing ... and I'll do the rest."
+
+"You will, you promise?"
+
+"Yes, but you must keep your mind a perfect blank, or I can't do
+anything."
+
+She stood up tall and straight. The moonlight caught her grey hair and
+burnished it to an aureole of silver.
+
+With many grunts Sir Langham pulled himself out of his chair. "No
+smokin'-room, eh?"
+
+"Good night," Miss Ross said firmly, and left him.
+
+"Don't forget to ask your sister's husband about that chap in the
+P.W.D.," he called after her. "He's sure to know all about it. What's
+his name?--your brother-in-law, I mean."
+
+But Miss Ross had disappeared.
+
+"Now how the devil," he muttered, "am I to make my mind, _my_ mind, a
+perfect blank?"
+
+Two hours later Sir Langham's snores grievously disturbed the occupants
+of adjacent cabins.
+
+In hers, Miss Ross sat by the open porthole reading and re-reading the
+mail that had reached her at Aden.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+JAN'S MAIL
+
+
+                                   _Bombay, December 13th._
+
+      My Dear Jan,
+
+      It was a great relief to get your cable saying definitely
+      that you were sailing by the _Carnduff_. Misfortunes seem
+      to have come upon us in such numbers of late that I dreaded
+      lest your departure might be unavoidably delayed or
+      prevented. I will not now enter into the painful question
+      of my shameful treatment by Government, but you can well
+      understand that I shall leave no stone unturned to reverse
+      their most unfair and unjust decision, and to bring my
+      traducers to book. Important business having reference to
+      these matters calls me away at once, as I feel it is most
+      essential not to lose a moment, my reputation and my whole
+      future being at stake. I shall therefore, to my great
+      regret, be unable to meet you on your arrival in Bombay,
+      and, as my movements for the next few months will be rather
+      uncertain, I may find it difficult to let you have regular
+      news of me. I would therefore advise you to take Fay and
+      the children home as soon as all is safely over and she is
+      able to travel, and I will join you in England if and when
+      I find I can get away. I know, dear Jan, that you will not
+      mind financing Fay to this extent at present; as, owing to
+      these wholly unexpected departmental complications, I am
+      uncommonly hard up. I will, of course, repay you at the
+      earliest possible opportunity.
+
+      Poor Fay is not at all well; all these worries have been
+      very bad for her, and I have been distracted by anxiety on
+      her behalf, as well as about my own most distressing
+      position, and a severe attack of fever has left me weak and
+      ailing. I thought it better to bring Fay down to Bombay,
+      where she can get the best medical advice, and her being
+      there will save you the long, tiresome journey to
+      Dariawarpur. It is also most convenient for going home. She
+      is installed in a most comfortable flat, and we brought our
+      own servants, so I hope you will feel that I have done my
+      best for her.
+
+      Fay will explain the whole miserable business to you, and
+      although appearances may be against me, I trust that you
+      will realise how misleading these may be. I cannot thank
+      you enough for responding so promptly to our ardently
+      expressed desire for your presence at this difficult time.
+      It will make all the difference in the world to Fay; and,
+      on her account, to me also.
+
+      Believe me, always yours affectionately,
+
+                                             HUGO TANCRED.
+
+                                          _Bombay, Friday._
+
+      Jan my dear, my dear, are you really on your way? And shall
+      I see your face and hear your kind voice, and be able to
+      cry against your shoulder?
+
+      I can't meet you, my precious, because I don't go out. I'm
+      afraid. Afraid lest I should see anyone who knew us at
+      Dariawarpur. India is so large and so small, and people
+      from everywhere are always in Bombay, and I couldn't bear
+      it.
+
+      Do you know, Jan, that when the very worst has happened,
+      you get kind of numbed. You can't suffer any more. You
+      can't be sorry or angry or shocked or indignant, or
+      anything but just broken, and that's what I am.
+
+      After all, I've one good friend here who knew us at
+      Dariawarpur. He's got a job at the secretariat, and he
+      tries to help me all he can. I don't mind him somehow. He
+      understands. He will meet you and bring you to the
+      bungalow, so look out for him when the boat gets in. He's
+      tall and thin and clean-shaven and yellow, with a grave,
+      stern face and beautiful kind eyes. Peter is an angel, so
+      be nice to him, Jan dear. It has been awful; it will go on
+      being awful; but it will be a little more bearable when you
+      come--for me, I mean--for you it will be horrid. All of us
+      on your hands, and no money, and me such a crock, and
+      presently a new baby. The children are well. It's so queer
+      to think you haven't seen "little Fay." Come soon, Jan,
+      come soon, to your miserable                    FAY.
+
+Jan sat on her bunk under the open porthole. One after the other she
+held the letters open in her hand and stared at them, but she did not
+read. The sentences were burnt into her brain already.
+
+Hugo Tancred's letter was dated. Fay's was not, and neither letter bore
+any address in Bombay. Now, Jan knew that Bombay is a large town; and
+that people like the Tancreds, who, if not actually in hiding, certainly
+did not seek to draw attention to their movements, would be hard to
+find. Fay had wholly omitted to mention the surname of the tall, thin,
+yellow man with the "grave, stern face and beautiful kind eyes." Even in
+the midst of her poignant anxiety Jan found herself smiling at this. It
+was so like Fay--so like her to give no address. And should the tall,
+thin gentleman fail to appear, what was Jan to do? She could hardly go
+about the ship asking if one "Peter" had come to fetch her.
+
+How would she find Fay?
+
+Would they allow her to wait at the landing-place till someone came, or
+were there stringent regulations compelling passengers to leave the
+docks with the utmost speed, as most of them would assuredly desire to
+do?
+
+She knitted her brows and worried a good deal about this; then suddenly
+put the question from her as too trivial when there were such infinitely
+greater problems to solve.
+
+Only one thing was clear. One central fact shone out, a beacon amidst
+the gloom of the "departmental complications" enshrouding the conduct of
+Hugo Tancred, the certainty that he had, for the present anyway, shifted
+the responsibility of his family from his own shoulders to hers. As she
+sat square and upright under the porthole, with the cool air from an
+inserted "wind-sail" ruffling her hair, she looked as though she braced
+herself to the burden.
+
+She wished she knew exactly what had happened, what Hugo Tancred had
+actually done. For some years she had known that he was by no means
+scrupulous in money matters, and that very evening Sir Langham had made
+it clear to her that this crookedness had not stopped short at his
+official work. There had been a scandal, so far-reaching a scandal that
+it had got into the home papers.
+
+This struck Jan as rather extraordinary, for Hugo Tancred was by no
+means a stupid man.
+
+It is one thing to be pleasantly oblivious of private debts, to omit
+cheques in repayment of various necessaries got at the Stores by an
+obliging sister-in-law. One thing to muddle away in wild-cat
+speculations a wife's money that, but for the procrastination of an
+easy-going father, would have been tightly tied up--quite another to
+bring himself so nearly within the clutches of the law as to make it
+possible for the Government of India to dismiss him.
+
+And what was he to do? What did the future hold for him?
+
+Who would give employment to however able a man with such a career
+behind him?
+
+Jan's imagination refused to take such flights. Resolutely she put the
+subject from her and began to consider what her own best course would be
+with Fay, her nephew and niece, and, very shortly, a new baby on her
+hands.
+
+Jan was not a young woman to let things drift. She had kept house for a
+whimsical, happy-go-lucky father since she was fourteen; mothered her
+beautiful young sister; and, at her father's death, two years before,
+had with quiet decision arranged her own life, wholly avoiding the
+discussion and the friction which generally are the lot of an unmarried
+woman of five-and-twenty left without natural guardians and with a large
+circle of friends and relations.
+
+It was nearly two o'clock when she undressed and went to bed, and before
+that she had drafted two cablegrams--one to a house-agent, the other to
+her bankers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+BOMBAY
+
+
+For Jan the next two days passed as in a more or less disagreeable
+dream. She could never afterwards recall very clearly what happened,
+except that Sir Langham Sykes seemed absolutely omnipresent, and made
+her, she felt, ridiculous before the whole ship, by proclaiming far and
+wide that she had bestowed upon him the healing gift of sleep.
+
+He was so effusive, so palpably grateful, that she simply could not
+undeceive him by telling him that after they parted the night before she
+had never given him another thought.
+
+When he was not doing this he was pursuing, with fulminations against
+the whole tribe of missionaries, two kindly, quiet members of the
+Society of Friends.
+
+In an evil moment they had gratified his insatiable curiosity as to the
+object of their voyage to India, which was to visit and report upon the
+missionary work of their community. Once he discovered this he never let
+them alone, and the deck resounded with his denunciations of all
+Protestant missionaries as "self-seeking, oily humbugs."
+
+They bore it with well-mannered resignation, and a common dislike for
+Sir Langham formed quite a bond of union between them and Jan.
+
+There was the usual dance on New Year's Eve, the usual singing of "Auld
+Lang Syne" in two huge circles; and Jan would have enjoyed it all but
+for the heavy foreboding in her heart; for she was a simple person who
+responded easily to the emotions of others. Before she could slip away
+to bed Sir Langham cornered her again, conjuring her to "will" him to
+sleep and "to go on doin' it" after they parted in Bombay. He became
+rather maudlin, and she seized the opportunity of telling him that her
+best efforts would be wholly unavailing if he at all relaxed the
+temperate habits, so necessary for the cure of his gout, that he had
+acquired during the voyage. She was stern with Sir Langham, and her
+admonitions had considerable effect. He sought his cabin chastened and
+thoughtful.
+
+The boat was due early in the morning. Jan finished most of her packing
+before she undressed; then, tired and excited, she could not sleep. A
+large cockroach scuttling about her cabin did not tend to calm her
+nerves. She plentifully besprinkled the floor with powdered borax, kept
+the electric light turned on and the fan whirring, and lay down
+wide-awake to wait for the dawn.
+
+The ship was unusually noisy, but just about four o'clock came a new
+sound right outside her porthole--the rush alongside of the boat bearing
+the pilot and strange loud voices calling directions in an unknown
+tongue. She turned out her light (first peering fearfully under her
+berth to make sure no borax-braving cockroach was in ambush) and knelt
+on her bed to look out and watch the boat with its turbaned occupants:
+big brown men, who shouted to one another in a liquid language full of
+mystery.
+
+For a brief space the little boat was towed alongside the great liner,
+then cast off, and presently--far away on the horizon--Jan saw a streak
+of pearly pinkish light, as though the soft blue curtain of the night
+had been lifted just a little; and against that luminous streak were
+hills.
+
+In spite of her anxiety, in spite of her fears as to the future, Jan's
+heart beat fast with pleasurable excitement. She was young and strong
+and eager, and here at last was the real East. A little soft wind
+caressed her tired forehead and she drank in the blessed coolness of the
+early morning.
+
+Both day and night come quickly in the East. Jan got up, had her bath,
+dressed, and by half-past six she was on deck. The dark-blue curtain was
+rolled up, and the scene set was the harbour of Bombay.
+
+Such a gracious haven of strange multi-coloured craft, with its double
+coast-line of misty hills on one side, and clear-cut, high-piled
+buildings, domes and trees upon the other.
+
+A gay white-and-gold launch, with its attendants in scarlet and white,
+came for certain passengers, who were guests of the Governor. The police
+launch, trim and business-like with its cheerful yellow-hatted sepoys,
+came for others. Jan watched these favoured persons depart in stately
+comfort, and went downstairs to get some breakfast. Then came the rush
+of departure by the tender. So many had friends to meet them, and all
+seemed full of pleasure in arrival. Jan was just beginning to feel
+rather forlorn and anxious when the Purser, fussed and over-driven as he
+always is at such times, came towards her, followed by a tall man
+wearing a pith helmet and an overcoat.
+
+"Mr. Ledgard has come to meet you, Miss Ross, so you'll be all right."
+
+It was amazing how easy everything became. Mr. Ledgard's servants
+collected Jan's cabin baggage and took it with them in the tender and,
+on arrival, in a tikka-gharri--the little pony-carriage which is the
+gondola of Bombay--and almost before she quite realised that the voyage
+was over she found herself seated beside Peter in a comfortable
+motor-car, with a cheerful little Hindu chauffeur at the steering-wheel,
+sliding through wide, well-watered streets, still comparatively empty
+because it was so early.
+
+By mutual consent they turned to look at one another, and Jan noted that
+Peter Ledgard _was_ thin and extremely yellow. That his eyes (hollow and
+tired-looking as are the eyes of so many officials in the East) _were_
+kind, and she thought she had never before beheld a firmer mouth or more
+masterful jaw.
+
+What Peter saw evidently satisfied him as to her common sense, for he
+plunged _in medias res_ at once: "How much do you know of this
+unfortunate affair?" he asked.
+
+"Very little," she answered, "and that little extremely vague. Will you
+tell me has Hugo come to total grief or not?"
+
+"Officially, yes. He is finished, done for--may thank his lucky stars
+he's not in gaol. It's well you should know this at the very beginning,
+for of course he won't allow it, and poor Fay--Mrs. Tancred (I'm afraid
+we're rather free-and-easy about Christian names in India)--doesn't know
+the whole facts by a very long way. From what she tells me, I fear he
+has made away with most of her money, too. Was any of it tied up?"
+
+Jan shook her head. "We both got what money there was absolutely on my
+father's death."
+
+"Then," said Peter, "I fear you've got the whole of them on your hands,
+Miss Ross."
+
+"That's what I've come for," Jan said simply, "to take care of Fay and
+the children."
+
+Peter Ledgard looked straight in front of him.
+
+"It's a lot to put on you," he said slowly, "and I'm afraid you'll find
+it a bit more complicated than you expect. Will you remember that I'd
+like to help you all I can?"
+
+Jan looked at the stern profile beside her and felt vaguely comforted.
+"I shall be most grateful for your advice," she said humbly. "I know I
+shall need it."
+
+The motor stopped, and as she stepped from it in front of the tall block
+of buildings, Jan knew that the old easy, straightforward life was over.
+Unconsciously she stiffened her back and squared her shoulders, and
+looked very tall and straight as she stood beside Peter Ledgard in the
+entrance. The pretty colour he had admired when he met her had faded
+from her cheeks, and the face under the shady hat looked grave and
+older.
+
+Peter said something to the smiling lift-man in an extremely dirty dhoti
+who stood salaaming in the entrance.
+
+"I won't come up now," he said to Jan. "Please tell Mrs. Tancred I'll
+look in about tea-time."
+
+As Jan entered the lift and vanished from his sight, Peter reflected,
+"So that's the much-talked-of Jan! Well, I'm not surprised Fay wanted
+her."
+
+The lift stopped. An elderly white-clad butler stood salaaming at an
+open door, and Jan followed him.
+
+A few steps through a rather narrow passage and she was in a large light
+room opening on to a verandah, and in the centre stood her sister Fay,
+with outstretched arms.
+
+A pathetic, inarticulate, worn and faded Fay: her pretty freshness
+dimmed. A Fay with dark circles round her hollow eyes and all the living
+light gone from her abundant fair hair. It was as though her face was
+covered by an impalpable grey mask.
+
+There was no doubt about it. Fay looked desperately ill. Ill in a way
+not to be accounted for by her condition.
+
+Clinging together they sat down on an immense sofa, exchanging trivial
+question and answer as to the matters ordinary happy folk discuss when
+they first meet after a long absence. Jan asked for the children, who
+had not yet returned from their early morning walk with the ayah. Fay
+asked about the voyage and friends at home, and told Jan she had got
+dreadfully grey; then kissed her and leant against her just as she used
+to do when they were both children and she needed comfort.
+
+Jan said nothing to Fay about _her_ looks, and neither of them so much
+as mentioned Hugo Tancred. But Jan felt a wild desire to get away by
+herself and cry and cry over this sad wraith of the young sister whose
+serene and happy beauty had been the family pride.
+
+And yet she was so essentially the same Fay, tender and loving and
+inconsequent, and full of pretty cares for Jan's comfort.
+
+The dining-room was behind the sitting-room, with only a curtain
+between, and as they sat at breakfast Fay was so eager Jan should
+eat--she ate nothing herself--so anxious lest she should not like the
+Indian food, that poor Jan, with a lump in her throat that choked her at
+every morsel, forced down the carefully thought-out breakfast and meekly
+accepted everything presented by the grey-haired turbaned butler who
+bent over her paternally and offered every dish much as one would tempt
+a shy child with some amusing toy.
+
+Presently Fay took her to see her room, large, bare and airy, with
+little furniture save the bed with its clean white mosquito curtains
+placed under the electric fan in the centre of the ceiling. Outside the
+window was a narrow balcony, and Jan went there at once to look out; and
+though her heart was so heavy she was fain to exclaim joyfully at the
+beauty of the view.
+
+Right opposite, across Back Bay, lay the wooded villa-crowned slopes of
+Malabar Hill, flung like a garland on the bosom of a sea deeply blue and
+smiling, smooth as a lake, while below her lay the pageant of the
+street, with its ever-changing panorama of vivid life. The whole so
+brilliant, so various, so wholly unlike any beautiful place she had ever
+seen before that, artist's daughter she was, she cried eagerly to Fay,
+"Oh, come and look! Did you ever see anything so lovely? How Dad would
+have rejoiced in this!"
+
+Fay followed slowly: "I thought you'd like it," she said, evidently
+pleased by Jan's enthusiasm, "that's why I gave you this room. Look,
+Jan! There are the children coming, those two over by the band-stand.
+They see us. _Do_ wave to them."
+
+The children were still a long way off. Jan could only see an ayah in
+her white draperies pushing a little go-cart with a child in it, and a
+small boy trotting by her side, but she waved as she was bidden.
+
+The room had evidently at one time been used as a nursery, for inside
+the stone balustrade was a high trellis of wood. Jan and Fay were both
+tall women, but even on them the guarding trellis came right up to their
+shoulders. Neither of them could really lean over, though Fay tried, in
+her eagerness to attract the attention of the little group. Jan watched
+her sister's face and again felt that cruel constriction of the throat
+that holds back tears. Fay's tired eyes were so sad, so out of keeping
+with the cheerful movement of her hand, so shadowed by some knowledge
+she could not share.
+
+"You mustn't stand here without a hat," she said, turning to go in. "The
+sun is getting hot. You must get a topee this afternoon. Peter will take
+you and help to choose it."
+
+"Couldn't you come, if we took a little carriage? Does driving tire you
+when it's cool?" Jan asked as she followed her sister back into the
+room.
+
+"I never go out," Fay said decidedly. "I never shall again ... I mean,"
+she added, "till it's all over. I couldn't bear it just now--I might
+meet someone I know."
+
+"But, Fay, it's very bad for you to be always indoors. Surely, in the
+early morning or the evening--you'll come out then?"
+
+Fay shook her head. "Peter has taken me out in the motor once or twice
+at night--but I don't really like it. It makes me so dreadfully tired.
+Don't worry me about that, Jan. I get plenty of air in the verandah.
+It's just as pretty there as in your balcony, and we can have
+comfortable chairs. Let's go there now. _You_ shall go out as much as
+you like. I'll send Lalkhan with you, or Ayah and the children; and
+Peter will take you about all he can--he promised he would. Don't think
+I want to be selfish and keep you here with me all the time."
+
+The flat, weak voice, so nervous, so terrified lest her stronger sister
+should force her to some course of action she dreaded, went to Jan's
+heart.
+
+"My dear," she said gently, "I haven't come here to rush about. I've
+come to be with you. We'll do exactly what you like best."
+
+Fay clung to her again and whispered, "Later on you'll understand
+better--I'll be able to tell you things, and perhaps you'll understand
+... though I'm not sure--you're not weak like me, you'd never go under
+... you'd always fight...."
+
+There was a pattering of small feet in the passage. Little high voices
+called for "Mummy," and the children came in.
+
+Tony, a grave-eyed, pale-faced child of five, came forward instantly,
+with his hand held out far in front of him. Jan, who loved little
+children, knew in a minute that he was afraid she would kiss him; so she
+shook hands with gentlemanly stiffness. Little Fay, on the contrary, ran
+forward, held up her arms "to be taken" and her adorably pretty little
+face to be kissed. She was startlingly like her mother at the same age,
+with bobbing curls of feathery gold, beseeching blue eyes and a
+complexion delicately coloured as the pearly pink lining of certain
+shells. She was, moreover, chubby, sturdy and robust--quite unlike Tony,
+who looked nervous, bleached and delicate.
+
+Tony went and leant against his mother, regarding Jan and his small
+sister with dubious, questioning eyes.
+
+Presently he remarked, "I wish she hadn't come."
+
+"Oh, Tony," Fay exclaimed reproachfully, "you must both love Auntie Jan
+very dearly. She has come such a long way to be good to us all."
+
+"I wish she hadn't," Tony persisted.
+
+"_I_ sall love Auntie Dzan," Fay remarked, virtuously.
+
+It was pleasant to be cuddled by this friendly baby, and Jan laid her
+cheek against the fluffy golden head; but all the time she was watching
+Tony. He reminded her of someone, and she couldn't think who. He
+maintained his aloof and unfriendly attitude till Ayah came to take the
+children to their second breakfast. Little Fay, however, refused to
+budge, and when the meekly salaaming ayah attempted to take her, made
+her strong little body stiff, and screamed vigorously, clinging so
+firmly to her aunt that Jan had herself to carry the obstreperous baby
+to the nursery, where she left her lying on the floor, still yelling
+with all the strength of her evidently healthy lungs.
+
+When Jan returned, rather dishevelled--for her niece had seized a
+handful of her hair in the final struggle not to be put down--Fay said
+almost complacently, "You see, the dear little soul took a fancy to you
+at once. Tony is much more reserved and not nearly so friendly. He's
+very Scotch, is Tony."
+
+"He does what he's told, anyway."
+
+"Oh, not always," Fay said reassuringly, "only when he doesn't mind
+doing it. They've both got very strong wills."
+
+"So have I," said Jan.
+
+Fay sighed. "It was time you came to keep them in order. I can't."
+
+This was evident, for Fay had not attempted to interfere with her
+daughter beyond saying, "I expect she's hungry, that's why she's so
+fretty, poor dear."
+
+That afternoon Peter went to the flat and was shown as usual into the
+sitting-room.
+
+Jan and the children were in the verandah, all with their backs to the
+room, and did not notice his entrance as Jan was singing nursery-rhymes.
+Fay sat on her knee, cuddled close as though there were no such thing as
+tempers in the world. Tony sat on a little chair at her side, not very
+near, but still near enough to manifest a more friendly spirit than in
+the morning. Peter waited in the background while the song went on.
+
+    I saw a ship a-sailing, a-sailing on the sea,
+    And it was full of pretty things for Tony, Fay and me.
+    There was sugar in the cabin and kisses in the hold----
+
+"Whose kisses?" Tony asked suspiciously.
+
+"Mummy's kisses, of course," said Jan.
+
+"Why doesn't it _say_ so, then?" Tony demanded.
+
+"Mummy's kisses in the hold," Jan sang obediently--
+
+    The sails were made of silk and the masts were made of gold.
+    Gold, gold, the masts were made of gold.
+
+"What nelse?" Fay asked before Jan could start the second verse.
+
+    There were four-and-twenty sailors a-skipping on the deck,
+    And they were little white mice with rings about their neck.
+    The captain was a duck, with a jacket on his back,
+    And when the ship began to sail, the captain cried, "Quack! Quack!
+    Quack! Quack!" The captain cried, "Quack! Quack!"
+
+"What nelse?" Fay asked again.
+
+"There isn't any nelse, that's all."
+
+"Adain," said Fay.
+
+"Praps," Tony said thoughtfully, "there was _some_ auntie's kisses in
+that hold ... just a few...."
+
+"I'm sure there were," said a new voice, and Peter appeared on the
+verandah.
+
+The children greeted him with effusion, and when he sat down Tony sat on
+his knee. He was never assailed by fears lest Peter should want to kiss
+him. Peter was not that sort.
+
+"Sing nunner song," little Fay commanded.
+
+"Not now," Jan said; "we've got a visitor and must talk to him."
+
+"Sing nunner song," little Fay repeated firmly, just as though she had
+not heard.
+
+"Not now; some other time," Jan said with equal firmness.
+
+"Mack!" said the baby, and suited the action to the word by dealing her
+aunt a good hard smack on the arm.
+
+"You mustn't do that," said Jan; "it's not kind."
+
+"Mack, mack, mack," in _crescendo_ with accompanying blows.
+
+Jan caught the little hand, while Peter and Tony, interested spectators,
+said nothing. She held it firmly. "Listen, little Fay," she said, very
+gently. "If you do that again I shall take you to Ayah in the nursery.
+Just once again, and you go."
+
+Jan loosed the little hand, and instantly it dealt her a resounding slap
+on the cheek.
+
+It is of no avail to kick and scream and wriggle in the arms of a
+strong, decided young aunt. For the second time that day, a vociferously
+struggling baby was borne back to the nursery.
+
+As the yells died away in the distance, Tony turned right round on
+Peter's knee and faced him: "She does what she says," he remarked in an
+awestruck whisper.
+
+"And a jolly good thing too," answered Peter.
+
+When Jan came back she brought her sister with her. Lalkhan brought tea,
+and Tony went with him quite meekly to the nursery. They heard him
+chattering to Lalkhan in Hindustani as they went along the passage.
+
+Fay looked a thought less haggard than in the morning. She had slept
+after tiffin; the fact that her sister was actually in the bungalow had
+a calming effect upon her. She was quite cheerful and full of plans for
+Jan's amusement; plans in which, of course, she proposed to take no part
+herself. Jan listened in considerable dismay to arrangements which
+appeared to her to make enormous inroads into Peter Ledgard's leisure
+hours. He and his motor seemed to be quite at Fay's disposal, and Jan
+found the situation both bewildering and embarrassing.
+
+"What a nuisance for him," she reflected, "to have a young woman thrust
+upon him in this fashion. It won't do to upset Fay, but I must tell him
+at the first opportunity that none of these projects hold good."
+
+Directly tea was over Fay almost hustled them out to go and buy a topee
+for Jan, and suggested that, having accomplished this, they should look
+in at the Yacht Club for an hour, "because it was band-night," and Jan
+would like the Yacht Club lawn, with the sea and the boats and all the
+cheerful people.
+
+As the car slid into the crowded traffic of the Esplanade Road, Peter
+pointed to a large building on the left, saying, "There's the Army and
+Navy Stores, quite close to you, you see. You can always get anything
+you want there. I'll give you my number ... not that it matters."
+
+"I've belonged for years to the one at home," said Jan, "and I
+understand the same number will do."
+
+She felt she really could not be beholden to this strange young man for
+everything, even a Stores number; and that she had better make the
+situation clear at once that she had come to take care of Fay and not to
+be an additional anxiety to him. At that moment she felt almost jealous
+of Peter. Fay seemed to turn to him for everything.
+
+When they reached the shop where topees were to be got, she heard a
+familiar, booming voice. Had she been alone she would certainly have
+turned and fled, deferring her purchase till Sir Langham Sykes had
+concluded his, but she could hardly explain her rather complicated
+reasons to Peter, who told the Eurasian assistant to bring topees for
+her inspection.
+
+Jan tried vainly to efface herself behind a tailor's dummy, but her back
+was reflected in the very mirror which also reproduced Sir Langham in
+the act of trying on a khaki-coloured topee. He saw her and at once
+hurried in her direction, exclaiming:
+
+"Ah, Miss Ross, run to earth! You slipped off this morning without
+bidding me good-bye, and I've been wonderin' all day where we should
+meet. Now let me advise you about your topee. _I'll_ choose it for you,
+then you can't go wrong. Get a large one, mind, or the back of your nice
+little neck will be burnt the colour of the toast they gave us on the
+_Carnduff_--shockin' toast, wasn't it? No, not that shape, idiot ...
+unless you're goin' to ride, are you? If so, you must have one of
+each--a large one, I said--what the devil's the use of that? You must
+wear it _well_ on your head, mind; you can't show much of that pretty
+grey hair that puzzled us all so--eh, w'at?"
+
+Jan had been white enough as she entered the shop, for she was beginning
+to feel quite amazingly tired; but now the face under the overshadowing
+topee was crimson and she was hopelessly confused and helpless in the
+overpowering of Sir Langham, who, when he could for a moment detach his
+mind from Jan, looked with considerable curiosity at Peter.
+
+Peter stood there silent, aloof, detached; and he appeared quite cool.
+Jan felt the atmosphere to be almost insufferably close, and heaved a
+sigh of gratitude when he suddenly turned on an electric fan above her
+head.
+
+"I think this will do," she said, in a faint voice to the assistant,
+though the crinkly green lining round the crown seemed searing her very
+brain.
+
+Peter intervened, asking: "Is it comfortable? No ..." as she took it
+off. "I can see it isn't. It has marked your forehead already. Don't be
+in a hurry. They'll probably need to alter the lining. Some women have
+it taken out altogether. Pins keep it on all right."
+
+Thus encouraged, she tried on others, and all the time Sir Langham held
+forth at the top of his voice, interrupting his announcement that he was
+dining at Government House that very night to swear at the assistant
+when he brought topees that did not fit, and giving his opinion of her
+appearance with the utmost frankness, till Jan found one that seemed
+rather less uncomfortable than the rest. Then in desperation she
+introduced Sir Langham to Peter.
+
+"Your sister-in-law looks a bit tucked up," he remarked affably. "We'd
+better take her to the Yacht Club and give her a peg--she seems to feel
+the heat."
+
+Jan cast one despairing, imploring glance at Peter, who rose to the
+occasion nobly.
+
+"You're quite right," he said. "This place is infernally stuffy. Come
+on. They know where to send it. Good afternoon sir," and before she
+realised what had happened Peter seized her by the arm and swept her out
+of the shop and into the front seat of the car, stepped over her and
+himself took the steering-wheel.
+
+While Sir Langham's voice bayed forth a mixture of expostulation and
+assignation at the Yacht Club later on.
+
+"Now where shall we go?" asked Peter.
+
+"Not the Yacht Club," Jan besought him. "He's coming there; he said so.
+Isn't he dreadful? Did you mind very much being taken for my
+brother-in-law? He has no idea who he really is, or I wouldn't have let
+it pass ... but I felt I could never explain ... I'm so sorry...."
+
+Her face was white enough now.
+
+"It would have been absurd to explain, and it's I who should apologise
+for the free-and-easy way I carried you off, but it was clearly a case
+for strong measures, or he'd have insisted on coming with us. What an
+awful little man! Did you have him all the voyage? No wonder you look
+tired.... I hope he didn't sit at your table...."
+
+Once out of doors, the delicious breeze from the sea that springs up
+every evening in Bombay revived her. She forgot Sir Langham, for a few
+minutes she even forgot Fay and her anxieties in sheer pleasure in the
+prospect, as the car fell into its place in the crowded traffic of the
+Queen's Road.
+
+Jan never forgot that drive. He ran her out to Chowpatty, where the
+road lies along the shore and the carriages of Mohammedan, Hindu and
+Parsee gentlemen stand in serried rows while their picturesque occupants
+"eat the air" in passive and contented Eastern fashion; then up to Ridge
+Road on Malabar Hill, where he stopped that she might get out and walk
+to the edge of the wooded cliff and look down at the sea and the great
+city lying bathed in that clear golden light only to be found at sunset
+in the East.
+
+Peter enjoyed her evident appreciation of it all. She said very little,
+but she looked fresh and rested again, and he was conscious of a quite
+unusual pleasure in her mere presence as they stood together in the
+green garden, got and kept by such infinite pains and care, that borders
+the road running along the top of Malabar Hill.
+
+Suddenly she turned. "We mustn't wait another minute," she said. "You,
+doubtless, want to go to the club. It has been very good of you to spend
+so much time with me. What makes it all so beautiful is that everywhere
+one sees the sea. I will tell Fay how much I have enjoyed it."
+
+Peter's eyes met hers and held them: "Try to think of me as a friend,
+Miss Ross. I can see you are thoroughly capable and independent; but,
+believe me, India is not like England, and a white woman needs a good
+many things done for her here if she's to be at all comfortable. I don't
+want to butt in and be a nuisance; but just remember I'm there when the
+bell rings----"
+
+"I am not likely to forget," said Jan.
+
+Lights began to twinkle in the city below. The soft monotonous throb of
+tom-toms came beating through the ambient air like a pulse of teeming
+life; and when he left her at her sister's door the purple darkness of
+an Eastern night had curtained off the sea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE BEGINNING OF THE JOB
+
+
+Fay was still lying on her long chair in the verandah when Jan got in.
+She had turned on the electric light above her head and had, seemingly,
+been working at some diminutive garment of nainsook and lace. She looked
+up at Jan's step, asking eagerly, "Well, did you like it? Did you see
+many people? Was the band good?"
+
+Jan sat down beside her and explained that Peter had taken her for a
+drive instead. She made her laugh over her encounter with Sir Langham,
+and was enthusiastic about the view from Malabar Hill. Then Fay sent her
+to say good night to the children, who were just getting ready for bed.
+
+As she went down the long passage towards the nursery, she heard small
+voices chattering in Hindustani, and as she opened the door little Fay
+was in the act of stepping out of all her clothes.
+
+Tony was already clad in pink pyjamas, which made him look paler than
+ever.
+
+Little Fay, naked as any shameless cherub on a Renaissance festoon,
+danced across the tiled floor, and, pausing directly in front of her
+aunt, announced:
+
+"I sall mack Ayah as muts as I like."
+
+The good-natured Goanese ayah salaamed and, beaming upon her charge,
+murmured entire acquiescence.
+
+Jan looked down at the absurd round atom who defied her, and, trying
+hard not to laugh, said:
+
+"Oh, no, you won't."
+
+"I sall!" the baby declared even more emphatically, and, lifting up her
+adorable, obstinate little face to look at Jan, nodded her curly head
+vigorously.
+
+"I think not," Jan remarked rather unsteadily, "because if you do,
+people won't like you. We can none of us go about smacking innocent
+folks just for the fun of it. Everybody would be shocked and horrified."
+
+"Socked and hollified," echoed little Fay, delighted with the new words,
+"socked and hollified!... What nelse?"
+
+"What usually follows is that the disagreeable little girl gets smacked
+herself."
+
+"No," said Fay, but a thought doubtfully. "No," more firmly. Then with a
+smile that was subtly compounded of pathos and confidence, "Nobody would
+mack plitty little Fay ... 'cept ... plapse ... Auntie Dzan."
+
+The stern aunt in question snatched up her niece to cover her with
+kisses. Ayah escaped chastisement that evening, for, arrayed in a white
+nighty, "plitty little Fay" sat good as gold on Jan's knee, absorbed in
+the interest of "This little pig went to market," told on her own toes.
+Even Tony, the aloof and unfriendly, consented to unbend to the extent
+of being interested in the dialogue of "John Smith and Minnie Bowl, can
+you shoe a little foal?" and actually thrust out his own bare feet that
+Jan might make them take part in the drama of the "twa wee doggies who
+went to the market," and came back "louper-scamper, louper-scamper."
+
+At the end of every song or legend came the inevitable "What nelse?"
+from little Fay--and Jan only escaped after the most solemn promises had
+been exacted for a triple bill on the morrow.
+
+When she had changed and went back to the sitting-room, dinner was
+ready. Lalkhan again bent over her with fatherly solicitude as he
+offered each course, and this time Jan, being really hungry, rather
+enjoyed his ministrations. A boy assisted at the sideboard, and another
+minion appeared to bring the dishes from the kitchen, for the butler and
+the boy never left the room for an instant.
+
+Fay looked like a tired ghost, and Jan could see that it was a great
+effort to her to talk cheerfully and seem interested in the home news.
+
+After dinner they went back to the sitting-room. Lalkhan brought coffee
+and Fay lit a cigarette. Jan wandered round, looking at the photographs
+and engravings on the walls.
+
+"How is it," she asked, "that Mr. Ledgard seems to come in so many of
+these groups? Did you rent the flat from a friend of his?"
+
+"I didn't 'rent' the flat from anybody," Fay answered. "It's Peter's own
+flat. He lent it to us."
+
+Jan turned and stared at her sister. "Mr. Ledgard's flat!" she
+repeated. "And what is he doing?"
+
+"He's living at the club just now. He turned out when we came. Don't
+look at me like that, Jan.... There was nothing else to be done."
+
+Jan came back and sat on the edge of the big sofa. "But I understood
+Hugo's letter to say...."
+
+"Whatever Hugo said in his letter was probably lies. If Peter hadn't
+lent us his flat, I should have had nowhere to lay my head. Who do you
+suppose would let us a flat here, after all that has happened, unless we
+paid in advance, and how could we do that without any ready money? Why,
+a flat like this unfurnished costs over three hundred rupees a month. I
+don't know what a furnished flat would be."
+
+"But--isn't it ... taking a great deal from Mr. Ledgard?" Jan asked
+timidly.
+
+Fay stretched out her hand and suddenly switched off the lights, so that
+they were left together on the big sofa in the soft darkness.
+
+"Give me your hand, Jan. I shall be less afraid of you when I just feel
+you and can't see you."
+
+"Why should you be afraid of me?... Dear, dear Fay, you must remember
+how little I really know. How can I understand?"
+
+Fay leant against her sister and held her close. "Sometimes I feel as if
+I couldn't understand it all myself. But you mustn't worry about Peter's
+flat. We'll all go home the minute I can be moved. He doesn't mind,
+really ... and there was nothing else to be done."
+
+"Does Hugo know you are here?"
+
+Fay laughed, a sad, bitter little laugh. "It was Hugo who asked Peter to
+lend his flat."
+
+"Then what about his servants? What has he done with them while you are
+here?"
+
+"These are his servants."
+
+"But Hugo said...."
+
+"Jan, dear, it is no use quoting Hugo to me. I can tell you the sort of
+thing he would say.... Did he mention Peter at all?"
+
+"Certainly not. He said you were 'installed in a most comfortable flat'
+and had brought your own servants."
+
+"I brought Ayah--naturally, Peter hadn't an ayah. But why do you object
+to his servants? They're very good."
+
+"But don't they think it ... a little odd?"
+
+"Oh, you can't bother about what servants think in India. They think us
+all mad anyway."
+
+There was silence for a few minutes while Jan realised the fact that,
+dislike it as she might, she seemed fated to be laid under considerable
+obligation to Mr. Peter Ledgard.
+
+"Where is Hugo?" she asked at last.
+
+"My dear, you appear to have heard from Hugo since I have. As to his
+whereabouts I haven't the remotest idea."
+
+"Do you mean to say, Fay, that he hasn't let you know where he is?"
+
+"He didn't come with us to the flat because he was afraid he'd be seized
+for debts and things. We've only been here a fortnight. He's probably
+on board ship somewhere--there hasn't been much time for him to let me
+know...."
+
+Fay spoke plaintively, as though Jan were rather hard on Hugo in
+expecting him to give his wife any account of his movements.
+
+Jan was glad it was dark. She felt bewildered and oppressed and very,
+very angry with her brother-in-law, who seemed to have left his entire
+household in the care of Peter Ledgard. Was Peter paying for their very
+food, she wondered? She'd put a stop to that, anyhow.
+
+"Jan"--she felt Fay lean a little closer--"don't be down on me. You've
+no idea how hard it has all been. You're such a daylight person
+yourself."
+
+"Hard on you, my precious! I could never feel the least little bit hard.
+Only it's all so puzzling. And what do you mean by a 'daylight person'?"
+
+"You know, Jan, for three months now I've been a lot alone, and I've
+done a deal of thinking--more than ever in all my life before; and it
+seems to me that the world is divided into three kinds of people--the
+daylight people, and the twilight people and the night people."
+
+Fay paused. Jan stroked her hot, thin hand, but did not speak, and the
+tired, whispering voice went on: "_We_ were daylight people--Daddie was
+very daylight. There were never any mysteries; we all of us knew always
+where each of us was, and there were no secrets and no queer people
+coming for interviews, and it wouldn't have mattered very much if
+anyone _had_ opened one of our letters. Oh, it's such an _easy_ life in
+the daylight country...."
+
+"And in the twilight country?" asked Jan.
+
+"Ah, there it's very different. Everything is mysterious. You never know
+where anyone has gone, and if he's away queer people--quite horrid
+people--come and ask for him and won't go away, and sit in the verandah
+and cheek the butler and the boy and insist on seeing the 'memsahib,'
+and when she screws up her courage and goes to them, they ask for money,
+and show dirty bits of paper and threaten, and it's all awful--till
+somebody like Peter comes and kicks them out, and then they simply fly."
+
+In spite of her irritation at being beholden to him, Jan began to feel
+grateful to Peter.
+
+"Sometimes," Fay continued, "I think it would be easier to be a night
+person. They've no appearances to keep up. You see, what makes it so
+difficult for the twilight people is that they _want_ to live in the
+daylight, and it's too strong for them. All the night people whom they
+know--and if you're twilight you know lots of 'em--come and drag them
+back. _They_ don't care. They rather like to go right in among the
+daylight folk and scare and shock them, and make them uncomfortable. You
+_can't_ suffer in the same way when you've gone under altogether."
+
+"But, Fay dear," Jan interposed, "you talk as though the twilight people
+couldn't help it...."
+
+"They can't--they truly can't."
+
+"But surely there's right and wrong, straightness and crookedness, and
+no one _need_ be crooked."
+
+"People like you needn't--but everybody isn't strong like that. Hugo
+says every man has his price, and every woman too--Peter says so, too."
+
+"Then Peter ought to be ashamed of himself. Do you suppose _he_ has his
+price?"
+
+"No, not in that way. He'd think it silly to be pettifogging and
+dishonest about money, or to go in for mad speculations run by shady
+companies; but he wouldn't think it _extraordinary_ like you."
+
+"I'm afraid my education has been neglected. A great many things seem
+extraordinary to me."
+
+"You think it funny I should be living in Peter's flat, waited on by
+Peter's servants--but what else could I do?"
+
+Jan smiled in the darkness. She saw where her niece had got "what
+nelse?"
+
+"Isn't it just a little--unusual?" she asked gently. "Is there no money
+at all, Fay? What has become of all your own?"
+
+"It's not all gone," Fay said eagerly. "I think there's nearly two
+thousand pounds left, but Peter made me write home--that was at
+Dariawarpur, before he came down here--and say no more was to be sent
+out, not even if I wrote myself to ask for it--and _he_ wrote to Mr.
+Davidson too----"
+
+"I know somebody wrote. Mr. Davidson was very worried ... but what _can_
+Hugo have done with eight thousand pounds in two years? Besides his
+pay...."
+
+"Eight thousand pounds doesn't go far when you've dealings with
+money-lenders and mines in Peru--but _I_ don't understand it--don't ask
+me. I believe he left me a little money--I don't know how much--at a
+bank in Elphinstone Circle--but I haven't liked to write and find out,
+lest it should be very little ... or none...."
+
+"Mercy!" exclaimed Jan. "It surely would be better to know for certain."
+
+"When you've lived in the twilight country as long as I have you'll not
+want to know anything for certain. It's only when things are wrapped up
+in a merciful haze of obscurity that life is tolerable at all. Do you
+suppose I _wanted_ to find out that my husband was a rascal? I shut my
+eyes to it as long as I could, and then Truth came with all her cruel
+tools and pried them open. Oh, Jan, it did hurt so!"
+
+If Fay had cried, if her voice had even broken or she had seemed deeply
+moved, it would have been more bearable. It was the poor thing's
+calm--almost indifference--that frightened Jan. For it proved that her
+perceptions were numbed.
+
+Fay had been tortured till she could feel nothing acutely any more. Jan
+had the feeling that in some dreadful, inscrutable way her sister was
+shut away from her in some prison-house of the mind.
+
+And who shall break through those strange, intangible, impenetrable
+walls of unshared experience?
+
+Jan swallowed her tears and said cheerfully: "Well, it's all going to be
+different now. You needn't worry about anything any more. If Hugo has
+left no money we'll manage without. Mr. Davidson will let me have what I
+want ... but we must be careful, because of the children."
+
+"And you'll try not to mind living in Peter's flat?" Fay said, rubbing
+her head against Jan's shoulder. "It's India, you know, and men are very
+kind out here--much friendlier than they are at home."
+
+"So it seems."
+
+"You needn't think there's anything wrong, Jan. Peter isn't in love with
+me now."
+
+"Was he ever in love with you?"
+
+"Oh, yes, a bit, once; when he first came to Dariawarpur ... lots of
+them were then. I really was very pretty, and I had quite a little court
+... but when the bad times came and people began to look shy at
+Hugo--everybody was nice to me always--then Peter seemed different.
+There was no more philandering, he was just ... Oh, Jan, he was just
+such a daylight person, and might have been Daddie. I should have died
+without him."
+
+"Fay, tell me--I'll never ask again--was Hugo unkind to you?"
+
+"No, Jan, truly not unkind. He shut me away from the greater part of his
+life ... and there were other people ... not ladies"--Fay felt the
+shoulder she leant against stiffen--"but I didn't know that for quite a
+long time ... and he wasn't ever surly or cross or grudging. He always
+wanted me to have everything very nice, and I really believe he always
+hoped the mines and things would make lots of money.... You know, Jan,
+I'd _rather_ believe in people. I daresay you think I'm weak and stupid
+... but I can never understand wives who set detectives on their
+husbands."
+
+"It isn't done by the best people," Jan said with a laugh that was half
+a sob. "Let's hope it isn't often necessary...."
+
+Fay drew a little closer: "Oh, you are dear not to be stern and
+scolding...."
+
+"It's not you I feel like scolding."
+
+"If you scolded him, he'd agree with every word, so that you simply
+couldn't go on ... and then he'd go away and do just the same things
+over again, and fondly hope you'd never hear of it. But he _was_ kind in
+lots of ways. He didn't drink----"
+
+"I don't see anything so very creditable in that," Jan interrupted.
+
+"Well, it's one of the things he didn't do--and we had the nicest
+bungalow in the station and by far the best motor--a much smarter motor
+than the Resident. And it was only when I discovered that Hugo had made
+out I was an heiress that I began to feel uncomfortable."
+
+"Was he good to the children?"
+
+"He hardly saw them. Children don't interest him much. He liked little
+Fay because she's so pretty, but I don't think he cared a great deal for
+Tony. Tony is queer and judging. Don't take a dislike to Tony, Jan; he
+needs a long time, but once you've got him he stays for ever--will you
+remember that?"
+
+Again, Jan felt that cold hand laid on her heart, the hand of chill
+foreboding. She had noticed many times already that when Fay was off her
+guard she always talked as though, for her, everything were ended, and
+she was only waiting for something. There seemed no permanence in her
+relations with them all.
+
+A shadowy white figure lifted the curtain between the two rooms and
+stood salaaming.
+
+Jan started violently. She was not yet accustomed to the soundless naked
+feet of the servants whose presence might be betrayed by a rustle, never
+by a step.
+
+It was Ayah waiting to know if Fay would like to go to bed.
+
+"Shall I go, Jan? Are you tired?"
+
+Jan was, desperately tired, for she had had no sleep the night before,
+but Fay's voice had in it a little tremor of fear that showed she
+dreaded the night.
+
+"Send her to bed, poor thing. I'll look after you, brush your hair and
+tuck you up and all.... Fay, oughtn't you to have somebody in your room?
+Couldn't my cot be put in there, just to sleep?"
+
+"Oh, Jan, would you? Don't you mind?"
+
+"Shall I help her to move it?" Jan said, getting up.
+
+Fay pulled her down again. "You funny Jan, you can't do that sort of
+thing here. The servants will do it."
+
+She sat up, gave a rapid, eager order to Ayah, and in a few minutes Jan
+heard her bed being wheeled down the passage. Every room had wide
+double doors--like French rooms--and there was no difficulty.
+
+Fay sank down again among her cushions with a great sigh of relief: "I
+don't mind now how soon I go to bed. I shan't be frightened in the long
+dark night any more. Oh, Jan, you _are_ a dear daylight person!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE CHILDREN
+
+
+Jan made headway with Tony and little Fay. An aunt who carried one
+pick-a-back; who trotted, galloped, or curvetted to command as an
+animated steed; who provided spades and buckets, and herself, getting up
+very early, took them and the children to an adorable sandy beach,
+deserted save for two or three solitary horsemen; an aunt who dug holes
+and built castles and was indirectly the means of thrilling rides upon a
+real horse, when Peter was encountered as one of the mounted few taking
+exercise before breakfast; such an aunt could not be regarded otherwise
+than as an acquisition, even though she did at times exert authority and
+insist upon obedience.
+
+She got it, too; especially from little Fay, who, hitherto, had obeyed
+nobody. Tony, less wilful and not so prone to be destructive, was
+secretly still unwon, though outwardly quite friendly. He waited and
+watched and weighed Jan in the balance of his small judgment. Tony was
+never in any hurry to make up his mind.
+
+One great hold Jan had was a seemingly inexhaustible supply of rhymes,
+songs, and stories, and she was, moreover, of a telling disposition.
+
+Both children had a quite unusual passion for new words. Little Fay
+would stop short in the midst of the angriest yells if anyone called her
+conduct in question by some new term of opprobrium. Ayah's vocabulary
+was limited, even in the vernacular, and nothing would have induced her
+to return railing for railing to the children, however sorely they
+abused her. But Jan occasionally freed her mind, and at such times her
+speech was terse and incisive. Moreover, she quickly perceived her power
+over her niece in this respect, and traded on the baby's quick ear and
+interest.
+
+One day there was a tremendous uproar in the nursery just after tiffin,
+when poor Fay usually tried to get the sleep that would partially atone
+for her restless night. Jan swept down the passage and into the room, to
+find her niece netted in her cot, and bouncing up and down like a
+newly-landed trout, while Ayah wrestled with a struggling Tony, who
+tried to drown his sister's screams with angry cries of "Let me get at
+her to box her," and, failing that, vigorously boxing Ayah.
+
+Jan closed the door behind her and stood where she was, saying in the
+quiet, compelling voice they had both already learned to respect: "It's
+time for Mummy's sleep, and how can Mummy sleep in such a pandemonium?"
+
+Little Fay paused in the very middle of a yell and her face twinkled
+through the restraining net.
+
+"Pandemolium," she echoed, joyously rolling it over on her tongue with
+obvious gusto.
+
+"Pandemolium."
+
+"She kickened and fit with me," Tony cried angrily. "I _must_ box her."
+
+"Pandemolium?" little Fay repeated inquiringly. "What nelse?"
+
+"Yes," said Jan, trying hard not to laugh; "that's exactly what it was
+... disgraceful."
+
+"What nelse?" little Fay persisted. She had heard disgraceful before. It
+lacked novelty.
+
+"All sorts of horrid things," said Jan. "Selfish and odious and
+ill-bred----"
+
+"White bled, blown bled, ill-bled," the person under the net chanted.
+"What nother bled?"
+
+"There's well-bred," said Jan severely, "and that's what neither you nor
+Tony are at the present moment."
+
+"There's toas' too," said the voice from under the net, ignoring the
+personal application. "Sall we have some?"
+
+"Certainly not," Jan answered with great sternness. "People who riot and
+brawl----"
+
+"Don't like zose words," the netted one interrupted distastefully (R's
+always stumped her), "naughty words."
+
+"Not so naughty as the people who do it. Has Ayah had her dinner? No?
+Then poor Ayah must go and have it, and I shall stay here and tell a
+very soft, whispery story to people who are quiet and good, who lie in
+their cots and don't quarrel----"
+
+"Or blawl" came from the net in a small determined voice. She could not
+let the new word pass after all.
+
+"Exactly ... or brawl," Jan repeated in tones nothing like so firm.
+
+"She kickened and fit me, she did," Tony mumbled moodily as he climbed
+into his cot: "Can't I box her nor nothing?"
+
+"Not now," Jan said, soothingly. Ayah salaamed and hurried away. She, at
+all events, had cause to bless Jan, for now she got her meals with fair
+regularity and in peace.
+
+In a few minutes the room was as quiet as an empty church, save for a
+low voice that related an interminable story about "Cockie-Lockie and
+Henny-Penny going to tell the King the lift's fallen," till one, at all
+events, of the "blawlers" was sound asleep.
+
+The voice ceased and Tony's head appeared over the rail of his cot.
+
+"Hush!" Jan whispered. "Sister's asleep. Just wait a few minutes till
+Ayah comes, then I'll take you away with me."
+
+Faithful Ayah didn't dawdle over her food. She returned, sat down on the
+floor beside little Fay's cot and started her endless mending.
+
+Jan carried Tony away with her along the passage and into the
+drawing-room. The verandah was too hot in the early afternoon.
+
+"Now what shall we do?" she asked, with a sigh, as she sat down on the
+big sofa. "_I'd_ like to sleep, but I suppose you won't let me."
+
+Tony got off her knee and looked at her gravely.
+
+"You can," he said, magnanimously, "because you brought me. I hate bed.
+I'll build a temple with my bricks and I won't knock it down. Not
+loud."
+
+And like his aunt he did what he said.
+
+Jan put her feet up and lay very still. For a week now she had risen
+early every morning to take the children out in the freshest part of the
+day. She seldom got any rest in the afternoon, as she saw to it that
+they should be quiet to let Fay sleep, and she went late to bed because
+the cool nights in the verandah were the pleasant time for Fay.
+
+Tony murmured to himself, but he made little noise with his stone
+bricks. And presently Jan was sleeping almost as soundly as her
+obstreperous niece.
+
+Tony did not repeat new words aloud as did his sister. He turned them
+over in his mind and treasured some simply because he liked the sound of
+them.
+
+There were two that he had carried in his memory for nearly half his
+life; two that had for him a mysterious fascination, a vaguely agreeable
+significance that he couldn't at all explain. One was "Piccadilly" and
+the other "Coln St. Aldwyn's." He didn't even know that they were the
+names of places at first, but he thought they had a most beautiful
+sound. Gradually the fact that they were places filtered into his mind,
+and for Tony Piccadilly seemed particularly rural. He connected it in
+some way with the duck-slaying Mrs. Bond of the Baby's Opera, a book he
+and Mummy used to sing from before she grew too tired and sad to sing.
+Before she lay so many hours in her long chair, before the big man he
+called Daddie became so furtive and disturbing. Then Mummy used to tell
+him things about a place called Home, and though she never actually
+mentioned Piccadilly he had heard the word very often in a song that
+somebody sang in the drawing-room at Dariawarpur.
+
+Theatricals had been towards and Mummy was acting, and people came to
+practise their songs with her, for not only did she sing herself
+delightfully, but she played accompaniments well for other people. The
+play was a singing play, and the Assistant Superintendent of Police, a
+small, fair young man with next to no voice and a very clear
+enunciation, continually practised a song that described someone as
+walking "down Piccadilly with a tulip or a lily in his mediæval hand."
+
+Tony rather liked "mediæval" too, but not so much as Piccadilly. A
+flowery way, he was sure, with real grass in it like the Resident's
+garden. Besides, the "dilly" suggested "daffy-down dilly come up to town
+in a yellow petticoat and a green gown."
+
+But not even Piccadilly could compete with Coln St. Aldwyn's in Tony's
+affections. There was something about that suggestive of exquisite peace
+and loveliness, no mosquitoes and many friendly beasts. He had only
+heard the word once by chance in connection with the mysterious place
+called Home, in some casual conversation when no one thought he was
+listening. He seized upon it instantly and it became a priceless
+possession, comforting in times of stress, soothing at all times, a sort
+of refuge from a real world that had lately been very puzzling for a
+little boy.
+
+He was certain that at Coln St. Aldwyn's there was a mighty forest
+peopled by all the nicest animals. Dogs that were ever ready to extend a
+welcoming paw, elephants and mild clumsy buffaloes that gave good milk
+to the thirsty. Little grey squirrels frolicked in the branches of the
+trees, and the tiny birds Mummy told him about that lived in the yew
+hedge at Wren's End. Tony had himself been to Wren's End he was told,
+but he was only one at the time, and beyond a feeling that he liked the
+name and that it was a very green place his ideas about it were hazy.
+
+Sometimes he wished it had been called "Wren St. Endwyn's," but after
+mature reflection he decided it was but a poor imitation of the real
+thing, so he kept the two names separate in his mind.
+
+He had added two more names to his collection since he came to Bombay.
+"Mahaluxmi," the road running beside the sea, where Peter sometimes took
+them and Auntie Jan for a drive after tea when it was high tide; and
+"Taraporevala," who owned a famous book-shop in Medow Street where he
+had once been in a tikka-gharri with Auntie Jan to get some books for
+Mummy. Peter had recommended the shop, and the name instantly seized
+upon Tony's imagination and will remain with it evermore. He never for
+one moment connected it with the urbane gentleman in eyeglasses and a
+funny little round hat who owned the shop. For Tony "Taraporevala" will
+always suggest endless vistas of halls, fitted with books, shelves, and
+tall stacks of books, and counters laden with piles of books. It seemed
+amazing to find anything so vast in such a narrow street. There was
+something magic about it, like the name. Tony was sure that some day
+when he should explore the forest of Coln St. Aldwyn he would come upon
+a little solid door in a great rock. A little solid door studded with
+heavy nails and leading to a magic cave full of unimaginable treasure.
+This door should only open to the incantation of "Taraporevala." None of
+your "abracadabras" for him.
+
+And just as Mummy had talked much of "Wren's End" in happier days, so
+now Auntie Jan told them endless stories about it and what they would
+all do there when they went home. Some day, when he knew her better, he
+would ask her about Coln St. Aldwyn's. He felt he didn't know her
+intimately enough to do so yet, but he was gradually beginning to have
+some faith in her. She was a well-instructed person, too, on the whole,
+and she answered a straight question in a straight way.
+
+It was one of the things Tony could never condone in the big man called
+Daddie, that he could never answer the simplest question. He always
+asked another in return, and there was derision of some sort concealed
+in this circuitous answer. Doubtless he meant to be pleasant and
+amusing--Tony was just enough to admit that--but he was, so Tony felt,
+profoundly mistaken in the means he sought. He took liberties, too;
+punching liberties that knocked the breath out of a small boy's body
+without actually hurting much; and he never, never talked sense. Tony
+resented this. Like the Preacher, he felt there was a time to jest and a
+time to refrain from jesting, and it didn't amuse him a bit to be
+punched and rumpled and told he was a surly little devil if he attempted
+to punch back. In some vague way Tony felt that it wasn't playing the
+game--if it was a game. Often, too, for the past year and more, he
+connected the frequent disappearances of the big man with trouble for
+Mummy. Tony understood Hindustani as well as and better than English.
+His extensive vocabulary in the former would have astonished his
+mother's friends had they been able to translate, and he understood a
+good deal of the servants' talk. He felt no real affection for the big,
+tiresome man, though he admired him, his size, his good looks, and a way
+he had with grown-up people; but he decided quite dispassionately, on
+evidence and without any rancour, that the big man was a "budmash," for
+he, unlike Auntie Jan, never did anything he said he'd do. And when,
+before they left Dariawarpur, the big man entirely disappeared, Tony
+felt no sorrow, only some surprise that having said he was going he
+actually had gone. Auntie Jan never mentioned him, Mummy had reminded
+them both always to include him when they said their prayers, but
+latterly Mummy had been too tired to come to hear prayers. Auntie Jan
+came instead, and Tony, watching her face out of half-shut eyes, tried
+leaving out "bless Daddie" to see if anything happened. Sure enough
+something did; Auntie Jan looked startled. "Say 'Bless Daddie,' Tony,
+'and please help him.'"
+
+"To do what?" Tony asked. "Not to come back here?"
+
+"I don't think he'll come back here just now," Auntie Jan said in a
+frightened sort of whisper, "but he needs help badly."
+
+Tony folded his hands devoutly and said, "Bless Daddie and please help
+him--to stay away just now."
+
+And low down under her breath Jan said, "Amen."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE SHADOW BEFORE
+
+
+Jan had been a week in Bombay, and her grave anxiety about Fay was in no
+way lessened. Rather did it increase and intensify, for not only did her
+bodily strength seem to ebb from her almost visibly day by day, but her
+mind seemed so detached and aloof from both present and future.
+
+It was only when Jan talked about the past, about their happy girlhood
+and their lovable comrade-father, that Fay seemed to take hold and
+understand. All that had happened before his death seemed real and vital
+to her. But when Jan tried to interest her in plans for the future, the
+voyage home, the children, the baby that was due so soon, Fay looked at
+her with tired, lack-lustre eyes and seemed at once to become
+absent-minded and irrelevant.
+
+She was ready enough to discuss the characters of the children, to
+impress upon Jan the fact that Tony was not unloving, only cautious and
+slow before he really gave his affection. That little Fay was exactly
+what she appeared on the surface--affectionate, quick, wilful, and
+already conscious of her own power through her charm.
+
+"I defy anybody to quarrel with Fay when she is willing to make it up,"
+her mother said. "Tony melts like wax before the warmth of her
+advances. She may have behaved atrociously to him five minutes
+before--Ayah lets her, and I am far too weak with her--but if _she_
+wants to be friends Tony forgets and condones everything. Was I very
+naughty to you, Jan, as a baby?"
+
+"Not that I can remember. I think you were very biddable and good."
+
+"And you?"
+
+Jan laughed--"There you have me. I believe I was most naughty and
+obstreperous, and have vivid recollections of being sent to bed for
+various offences. You see, Mother was far too strong and wise to spoil
+me as little Fay is spoilt. Father tried his best, but you remember
+Hannah? Could you imagine Hannah submitting for one moment to the sort
+of treatment that baby metes out to poor, patient Ayah every single
+day?"
+
+"By the way, how is Hannah?"
+
+"Hannah is in her hardy usual. She is going strong, and has developed
+all sorts of latent talent as a cook. She was with me in the furnished
+flat I rented till the day I left (I only took it by the month), and
+she'll be with us again when we all get back to Wren's End."
+
+"But I thought Wren's End was let?"
+
+"Only till March quarter-day, and I've cabled to the agent not to
+entertain any other offer, as we want it ourselves."
+
+"I like to think of the children at Wren's End," Fay said dreamily.
+
+"Don't you like to think of yourself there, too? Would you like any
+other place better?"
+
+Jan's voice sounded constrained and a little hard. People sometimes
+speak crossly when they are frightened, and just then Jan felt the cold,
+skinny hands of some unnameable terror clutching her heart. Why did Fay
+always exclude herself from all plans?
+
+They were, as usual, sitting in the verandah after dinner, and Fay's
+eyes were fixed on the deeply blue expanse of sky. She hardly seemed to
+hear Jan, for she continued: "Do you remember the sketch Daddie did of
+me against the yew hedge? I'd like Tony to have that some day if you'd
+let him."
+
+"Of course that picture is yours," Jan said, hastily. "We never divided
+the pictures when he died. Some were sold and we shared the money, but
+our pictures are at Wren's End."
+
+"I remember that money," Fay interrupted. "Hugo was so pleased about it,
+and gave me a diamond chain."
+
+"Fay, where do you keep your jewellery?"
+
+"There isn't any to keep now. He 'realised' it all long before we left
+Dariawarpur."
+
+"What do you mean, Fay? Has Hugo pawned it? All Mother's things, too?"
+
+"I don't know what he did with it," Fay said, wearily. "He told me it
+wasn't safe in Dariawarpur, as there were so many robbers about that hot
+weather, and he took all the things in their cases to send to the bank.
+And I never saw them again."
+
+Jan said nothing, but she reflected rather ruefully that when Fay
+married she had let her have nearly all their mother's ornaments, partly
+because Fay loved jewels as jewels, and Jan cared little for them
+except as associations. "If I'd kept more," Jan thought, "they'd have
+come in for little Fay. Now there's nothing except what Daddie gave me."
+
+"Are you sorry, Jan?" Fay asked, presently. "I suppose there again you
+think I ought to have stood out, to have made inquiries and insisted on
+getting a receipt from the bank. But I knew very well they were not
+going to the bank. I don't think they fetched much, but Hugo looked a
+little less harassed after he'd got them. I've nothing left now but my
+wedding ring and the little enamel chain like yours, that Daddie gave us
+the year he had that portrait of Meg in the Salon and took us over to
+see it. Where is Meg? Has she come back yet?"
+
+"Meg is still in Bremen with an odious German family, but she leaves at
+the end of the Christmas holidays, as the girl is going to school, and
+Meg will be utilised to bring her over. Then she's to have a rest for a
+month or two, and I daresay she'd come to Wren's End and help us with
+the babies when we get back."
+
+Fay leant forward and said eagerly, "Try to get her, Jan. I'd love to
+think she was there to help you."
+
+"To help us," Jan repeated firmly.
+
+Fay sighed. "I can never think of myself as of much use any more;
+besides ... Oh, Jan, won't you face it? You who are so brave about
+facing things ... I don't believe I shall come through--this time."
+
+Jan got up and walked restlessly about the verandah. She tried to make
+herself say, heard her own voice saying without any conviction, that it
+was nonsense; that Fay was run down and depressed and no wonder; and
+that she would feel quite different in a month or two. And all the time,
+though her voice said these preposterously banal things, her brain
+repeated the doctor's words after his last visit: "I wish there was a
+little more stamina, Miss Ross. I don't like this complete inertia. It's
+not natural. Can't you rouse her at all?"
+
+"My sister has had a very trying time, you know. She seems thoroughly
+worn out."
+
+"I know, I know," the doctor had said. "A bad business and cruelly hard
+on her; but I wish we could get her strength up a bit somehow. I don't
+like it--this lack of interest in everything--I don't like it." And the
+doctor's thin, clever face looked lined and worried as he left.
+
+His words rang in Jan's ears, drowning her own spoken words that seemed
+such a hollow sham.
+
+She went and knelt by Fay's long chair. Fay touched her cheek very
+gently (little Fay had the same adorable tender gestures). "It would
+make it easier for both of us if you'd face it, my dear," she said. "I
+could talk much more sensibly then and make plans, and perhaps really be
+of some use. But I feel a wretched hypocrite to talk of sharing in
+things when I know perfectly well I shan't be there."
+
+"Don't you want to be there?" Jan asked, hoarsely.
+
+[Illustration: "It would make it easier for both of us if you'd face it,
+my dear."]
+
+Fay shook her head. "I know it's mean to shuffle out of it all, but I
+_am_ so tired. Do you think it very horrid of me, Jan?"
+
+In silence Jan held her close; and in that moment she faced it.
+
+The days went on, strange, quiet days of brilliant sunshine. Their daily
+life shrouded from the outside world even as the verandah was shrouded
+from the sun when Lalkhan let down the chicks every day after tiffin.
+
+Peter was their only visitor besides the doctor, and Peter came
+practically every day. He generally took Jan out after tea, sometimes
+with the children, sometimes alone. He even went with her to the bank in
+Elphinstone Circle, so like a bit of Edinburgh, with its solid stone
+houses, and found that Hugo actually had lodged fifty pounds there in
+Fay's name. The clerks looked curiously at Jan, for they thought she was
+Mrs. Tancred. Every one in business or official circles in Bombay knew
+about Hugo Tancred. His conduct had, for a while, even ousted the usual
+topics of conversation--money, food, and woman--from the bazaars; and an
+exhaustive discussion of it was only kept out of the Native Press by the
+combined efforts of the Police and his own Department. Jan gained from
+Peter a fairly clear idea of the _débâcle_ that had occurred in Hugo
+Tancred's life. She no longer wondered that Fay refused to leave the
+bungalow. She began to feel branded herself.
+
+For Jan, Peter's visits had come to have something of the relief the
+loosening of a too-tight bandage gives to a wounded man. He generally
+came at tea-time when Fay was at her best, and he brought her news of
+her little world at Dariawarpur. To her sister he seemed the one link
+with reality. Without him the heavy dream would have gone on unbroken.
+Fay was always most eager he should take Jan out, and, though at first
+Jan had been unwilling, she gradually came to look upon such times as a
+blessed break in the monotonous restraint of her day. With him she was
+natural, said what she felt, expressed her fears, and never failed to
+return comforted and more hopeful.
+
+One night he took her to the Yacht Club, and Jan was glad she had gone,
+because it gave her so much to tell Fay when she got back.
+
+It was a very odd experience for Jan, this tea on the crowded lawn of
+the Yacht Club. She turned hot when people looked at her, and Jan had
+always felt so sure of herself before, so proud to be a daughter of
+brilliant, lovable Anthony Ross.
+
+Here, she knew that her sole claim to notice was that she had the
+misfortune to be Hugo Tancred's sister-in-law. Fay, too, had once been
+joyfully proud and confident--and now!
+
+Sometimes in the long, still days Jan wondered whether their father had
+brought them up to expect too much from life, to take their happiness
+too absolutely as a matter of course. Anthony Ross had fully subscribed
+to the R.L.S. doctrine that happiness is a duty. When they were both
+quite little girls he had loved to hear them repeat:
+
+    If I have faltered more or less
+    In my great task of happiness;
+    If I have moved among my race
+    And shown no glorious morning face;
+    If beams from happy human eyes
+    Have moved me not; if morning skies,
+    Books, and my food and summer rain
+    Knocked on my sullen heart in vain;
+    Lord, Thy most pointed pleasure take,
+    And stab my spirit broad awake.
+
+Surely as young girls they had both shown a "glorious morning face." Who
+more so than poor Fay? So gay and beautiful and kind. Why had this come
+upon her, this cruel, numbing disgrace and sorrow? Jan was thoroughly
+rebellious. Again she went over that time in Scotland six years before,
+when, at a big shooting-box up in Sutherland, they met, among other
+guests, handsome Hugo Tancred, home on leave. How he had, almost at
+first sight, fallen violently in love with Fay. How he had singled her
+out for every deferent and delicate attention; how she, young,
+enthusiastic, happy and flattered, had fallen quite equally in love with
+him. Jan recalled her father's rather comical dismay and astonishment.
+His horror when they pressed an immediate marriage, so that Fay might go
+out with Hugo in November. And his final giving-in to everything Fay
+wanted because Fay wanted it.
+
+Did her father really like Hugo Tancred? she wondered. And then came the
+certainty that he wouldn't ever have liked anybody much who wanted to
+marry either of them; but he was far too just and too imaginative to
+stand in the way where, what seemed, the happiness of his daughter was
+concerned.
+
+"What a gamble it all is," thought Jan, and felt inclined to thank
+heaven that she was neither so fascinating nor as susceptible as Fay.
+
+How were they to help to set Hugo Tancred on his legs again, and
+reconstruct something of a future for Fay? And then there always
+sounded, like a knell, Fay's tired, pathetic voice: "Don't bother to
+make plans for me, Jan. For the children, yes, as much as you like. You
+are so clever and constructive--but leave me out, dear, for it's just a
+waste of time."
+
+And the dreadful part of it was that Jan felt a growing conviction that
+Fay was right. And what was more, that Peter felt about it exactly as
+Fay did, in spite of his matter-of-fact optimism at all such times as
+Jan dared to express her dread.
+
+Peter learned a good deal about the Ross family in those talks with Jan.
+She was very frank about her affairs, told him what money she had and
+how it was invested. That the old house in Gloucestershire was hers,
+left directly to her and not to her father, by a curious freak on the
+part of his aunt, one Janet Ross, who disapproved of Anthony's habit of
+living up to whatever he made each year by his pictures, and saving
+nothing that he earned.
+
+"My little girls are safe, anyway," he always said. "Their mother's
+money is tied up on them, though they don't get it except with my
+sanction till my death. I can't touch the capital. Why, then, shouldn't
+we have an occasional flutter when I have a good year, while we are all
+young and can enjoy things?"
+
+They had a great many flutters--for Anthony's pictures sold well among a
+rather eclectic set. His portraits had a certain _cachet_ that gave them
+a vogue. They were delicate, distinguished, and unlike other work. The
+beauties without brains never succeeded in getting Anthony Ross to paint
+them, bribed they never so. But the clever beauties were well satisfied,
+and the clever who were not at all beautiful felt that Anthony Ross
+painted their souls, so they were satisfied, too. Besides, he made their
+sittings so delightful and flirted with them with such absolute
+discretion always. The year that Hugo Tancred met Fay was a particularly
+good year, and Anthony had bought a touring-car, and they all went up to
+Scotland in it. The girls were always well dressed and went out a good
+deal. Young as she was, Jan was already an excellent manager and a
+pleasant hostess. She had been taking care of her father from the time
+she was twelve years old, and knew exactly how to manage him. When there
+was plenty of money she let him launch out; when it was spent she made
+him draw in again, and he was always quite ready to do so. Money as
+money had no charms for Anthony Ross, but the pleasures it could
+provide, the kindnesses it enabled him to do, the easy travel and the
+gracious life were precious to him. He abhorred debt in any form and
+paid his way as he went; lavishly when he had it, justly and exactly
+always.
+
+On hearing all this Peter came to the conclusion that Hugo Tancred was
+not altogether to blame if he had expected a good deal more financial
+assistance from his father-in-law than he got. Anthony made no marriage
+settlement on Fay. He allowed her two hundred a year for her personal
+expenses and considered that Hugo Tancred should manage the running of
+his own house out of his quite comfortable salary. He had, of course, no
+smallest inkling of Hugo's debts or gambling propensities. And all might
+have gone well if only Anthony Ross had made a new will when Fay
+married; a will which tied up her mother's money and anything he might
+leave her, so that she couldn't touch the capital. But nothing of the
+kind was done.
+
+It never occurred to Jan to think of wills.
+
+Anthony Ross was strong and cheerful and so exceedingly young at
+fifty-two that it seemed absurd that he should have grown-up daughters,
+quite ludicrous that he should be a grandfather.
+
+Many charming ladies would greatly like to have occupied the position of
+stepmother to "those nice girls," but Anthony, universal lover as he was
+within strictly platonic limits, showed no desire to give his girls
+anything of the sort. Jan satisfied his craving for a gracious and
+well-ordered comfort in all his surroundings. Fay gratified his æsthetic
+appreciation of beauty and gentleness. What would he do with a third
+woman who might introduce discord into these harmonies?
+
+Fay came home for a short visit when Tony was six months old, as Hugo
+had not got a very good station just then. She was prettier than ever,
+seemed perfectly happy, and both Anthony and Jan rejoiced in her.
+
+After she went out the Tancreds moved to Dariawarpur, which was
+considered one of the best stations in their province, and there little
+Fay was born, and it was arranged that Jan and her father were to visit
+India and Fay during the next cold weather.
+
+But early in the following November Anthony Ross got influenza,
+recovered, went out too soon, got a fresh chill, and in two days
+developed double pneumonia.
+
+His heart gave out, and before his many friends had realised he was at
+all seriously ill, he died.
+
+Jan, stunned, bewildered, and heart-broken, yet contrived to keep her
+head. She got rid of the big house in St. George's Square and most of
+the servants, finally keeping only Hannah, her old Scottish nurse. She
+paid everybody, rendered a full account of her stewardship to Fay and
+Hugo, and then prepared to go out to India as had been arranged. Her
+heart cried out for her only sister.
+
+To her surprise this proposition met with but scant enthusiasm. It
+seemed the Tancreds' plans were uncertain; perhaps it might be better
+for Fay and the children to come home in spring instead of Jan going out
+to them. Hugo's letters were ambiguous and rather cold; Fay's a curious
+mixture of abandonment and restraint; but the prevailing note of both
+was "would she please do nothing in a hurry, but wait."
+
+So, of course, Jan waited.
+
+She waited two years, growing more anxious and puzzled as time went on.
+Her lawyer protested unavailingly at Hugo's perpetual demands (of
+course, backed up by Fay) for more and more capital that he might
+"re-invest" it. Fay's letters grew shorter and balder and more
+constrained. At last, quite suddenly, came the imperative summons to go
+out at once to be with Fay when the new baby should arrive.
+
+And now after three weeks in Bombay Jan felt that she had never known
+any other life, that she never would know any other life than this
+curious dream-like existence, this silent, hopeless waiting for
+something as afflicting as it was inevitable.
+
+There had been a great fire in the cotton green towards Colaba. It had
+blazed all night, and, in spite of the efforts of the Bombay firemen and
+their engines, was still blazing at six o'clock the following evening.
+
+Peter took Jan in his car out to see it. There was an immense crowd, so
+they left the car on its outskirts and plunged into the throng on foot.
+On either side of the road were tall, flimsy houses with a wooden
+staircase outside; those curious tenements so characteristic of the
+poorer parts of Bombay, and in such marked contrast to the "Fort," the
+European quarter of the town. They were occupied chiefly by Eurasians
+and very poor Europeans. That the road was a sea of mud, varied by quite
+deep pools of water, seemed the only possible reason why such houses
+were not also burning.
+
+Jan splashed bravely through the mud, interested and excited by the
+people and the leaping flames so dangerously near. It was growing dusk;
+the air was full of the acrid smell of burnt cotton, and the red glow
+from the sky was reflected on the grave brown faces watching the fire.
+
+Any crowd in Bombay is always extremely varied, and Jan almost forgot
+her anxieties in her enjoyment of the picturesque scene.
+
+"I don't think the people ought to be allowed to throng on the top of
+that staircase," Peter said suddenly. "They aren't built to hold a
+number at once; there'll be an accident," and he left her side for a
+moment to speak to an inspector of police.
+
+Jan looked up at a tall house on her left, where sightseers were
+collecting on the staircase to get a better view. Every window was
+crowded with gazers, all but one. From one, quite at the top, a solitary
+watcher looked out.
+
+There was a sudden shout from the crowd below, a redder glow as more
+piled cotton fell into the general furnace and blazed up, and in that
+moment Jan saw that the solitary watcher was Hugo Tancred, and that he
+recognised her. She gave a little gasp of horror, which Peter heard as
+he joined her again. "What is it?" he said. "What has frightened you?"
+
+Jan pointed upwards. "I've just seen Hugo," she whispered. "There, in
+one of those windows--the empty one. Oh, what can he be doing in those
+dreadful houses, and why is he in Bombay all this time and never a word
+to Fay?"
+
+Jan was trembling. Peter put his hand under her arm and walked on with
+her.
+
+"I knew he was in Bombay," he said, "but I didn't think the poor devil
+was reduced to this."
+
+"What is to be done?" Jan exclaimed. "If he comes and worries Fay for
+money now, it will kill her. She thinks he is safely out of India. What
+_is_ to be done?"
+
+"Nothing," said Peter. "He'll go the very minute he can, and you may be
+sure he'll raise the wind somehow. He's got all sorts of queer irons in
+the fire. He daren't appear at the flat, or some of his creditors would
+cop him for debt--it's watched day and night, I know. Just let it alone.
+I'd no idea he was hiding in this region or I wouldn't have brought you.
+We all want him to get clear. He might file his petition, but it would
+only rake up all the old scandals, and they know pretty well there's
+nothing to be got out of him."
+
+"He looked so dreadful, so savage and miserable," Jan said with a
+half-sob.
+
+"Well--naturally," said Peter. "You'd feel savage and miserable if you
+were in his shoes."
+
+"But oughtn't I to help him? Send him money, I mean."
+
+"Not one single anna. It'll take you all your time to get his family
+home and keep them when you get there. Have you seen enough? Shall we go
+back?"
+
+"You don't think he'll molest Fay?"
+
+"I'm certain of it."
+
+"Please take me home. I shall never feel it safe to leave Fay again for
+a minute."
+
+"That's nonsense, you know," said Peter.
+
+"It's what I feel," said Jan.
+
+It was that night Tony's extempore prayer was echoed so earnestly by his
+aunt.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE HUMAN TOUCH
+
+
+Three days later Jan got a note from Peter telling her that Hugo Tancred
+had left Bombay and was probably leaving India at once from one of the
+smaller ports.
+
+He had not attempted to communicate in person or by letter with either
+Jan or his wife.
+
+Early in the morning, just a week from the time Jan had seen Hugo
+Tancred at the window of that tall house near the cotton green, Fay's
+third child, a girl, was still-born; and Fay, herself, never recovered
+consciousness all day. A most competent nurse had been in the house
+nearly a week, the doctor had done all that human skill could do, but
+Fay continued to sink rapidly.
+
+About midnight the nurse, who had been standing by the bed with her
+finger on Fay's pulse, moved suddenly and gently laid down the weak hand
+she had been holding. She looked warningly across at Jan, who knelt at
+the other side, her eyes fixed on the pale, beautiful face that looked
+so wonderfully young and peaceful.
+
+Suddenly Fay opened her eyes and smiled. She looked right past Jan,
+exclaiming joyfully, "There you are at last, Daddie, and it's broad
+daylight."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For Jan it was still the middle of the Indian night and very dark
+indeed.
+
+The servants were all asleep; the little motherless children safely
+wrapped in happy unconsciousness in their nursery with Ayah.
+
+The last sad offices had been done for Fay, and the nurse, tired out,
+was also sleeping--on Jan's bed.
+
+Jan, alone of all the household, kept watch, standing in the verandah, a
+ghostly figure, still in the tumbled white muslin frock she had had no
+time all day to change.
+
+It was nearly one o'clock. Motors and carriages were beginning to come
+back from Government House, where there was a reception. The motor-horns
+and horses' hoofs sounded loud in the wide silent street, and the head
+lights swept down the Queen's Road like fireflies in flight.
+
+Jan turned on the light in the verandah. Peter would perhaps look up and
+see her standing there, and realise why she kept watch. Perhaps he would
+stop and come up.
+
+She wanted Peter desperately.
+
+Compassed about with many relatives and innumerable friends at home, out
+here Jan was singularly alone. In all that great city she knew no one
+save Peter, the doctor and the nurse. Some few women, knowing all the
+circumstances, had called and were ready to be kind and helpful and
+friendly, as women are all over India, but Fay would admit none but
+Peter--even to see Jan; and always begged her not to return the calls
+"till it was all over."
+
+Well, it was all over now. Fay would never be timid and ashamed any
+more.
+
+Jan had not shed a tear. The longing to cry that had assailed her so
+continuously in her first week had entirely left her. She felt
+clear-headed and cold and bitterly resentful. She would like to have
+made Hugo Tancred go in front of her into that quiet room and forced him
+to look at the girlish figure on the bed--his handiwork. She wanted to
+hurt him, to make him more wretched than he was already.
+
+A car stopped in the street below. Jan went very quietly to the door of
+the flat and listened at the top of the staircase.
+
+Steps were on the stairs, but they stopped at one of the flats below.
+
+Presently another car stopped. Again she went out and listened. The
+steps came up and up and she switched on the light in the passage.
+
+This time it was Peter.
+
+He looked very tired.
+
+"I thought you would come," Jan said. "She died at midnight."
+
+Peter closed the outer door, and taking Jan by the arm led her back into
+the sitting-room, where he put her in a corner of the big sofa and sat
+down beside her.
+
+He could not speak, and Jan saw that the tears she could not shed were
+in his eyes, those large dark eyes that could appear so sombre and then
+again so kind.
+
+Jan watched him enviously. She was acutely conscious of trifling things.
+She even noticed what very black eyebrows he had and how--as always,
+when he was either angry or deeply moved--the veins in his forehead
+stood out in a strongly-marked V.
+
+"It was best, I think," Jan said, and even to herself her voice sounded
+like the voice of a stranger. "She would have been very unhappy if she
+had lived."
+
+Peter started at the cool, hard tones, and looked at her. Then, simply
+and naturally, like a child, he took her hand and held it; and there was
+that in the human contact, in the firm, comfortable clasp, that seemed
+to break something down in Jan, and all at once she felt weak and faint
+and trembling. She leaned her head against the pillows piled high in the
+corner where Fay had always rested. The electric light in the verandah
+seemed suddenly to recede to an immense distance and became a tiny
+luminous pin-head, like a far lone star.
+
+She heard Peter moving about in the dining-room behind and clinking
+things, but she felt quite incapable of going to see what he was doing
+or of trying to be hospitable--besides, it was his house, he knew where
+things were, and she was so tired.
+
+And then he was standing over her, holding a tumbler against her
+chattering teeth.
+
+"Drink it," he said, and, though his voice sounded far away, it was firm
+and authoritative. "Quick; don't pretend you can't swallow, for you
+can."
+
+He tipped the glass, and something wet and cold ran over her chin:
+anything was better than that, and she tried to drink. As she did so
+she realised she was thirsty, drank it all eagerly and gasped.
+
+"Have you had anything to eat all day?" the dominating voice went on; it
+sounded much nearer now.
+
+"I can't remember," she said, feebly. "Oh, why did you give me all that
+brandy, it's made me so muzzy and confused, and there's so much I ought
+to see to."
+
+"You rest a bit first--you'll be all right presently."
+
+Someone lifted her by the knees and put the whole of her on the sofa. It
+was very comfortable; she was not so cold now. She lay quite still and
+closed her eyes. She had not had a real night's sleep since she reached
+Bombay. Fay was always restless and nervous, and Jan had not had her
+clothes off for forty-eight hours. The long strain was over, there was
+nothing to watch and wait for now. She would do as that voice said, rest
+for a few minutes.
+
+There was a white chuddah shawl folded on the end of the sofa. Fay had
+liked it spread over her knees, for she was nearly always chilly.
+
+Peter opened it and laid it very lightly over Jan, who never stirred.
+
+Then he sat down in a comfortable chair some distance off, where she
+would see him if she woke, and reviewed the situation, which was
+unconventional, certainly.
+
+He had sent his car away when he arrived, as it was but a step to the
+Yacht Club where he slept. Now, he felt he couldn't leave, for if Jan
+woke suddenly she would feel confused and probably frightened.
+
+"I never thought so little brandy could have had such an effect," Peter
+reflected half ruefully. "I suppose it's because she'd had nothing to
+eat. It's about the best thing that could have happened, but I never
+meant to hocus her like this."
+
+There she lay, a long white mound under the shawl. She had slipped her
+hand under her cheek and looked pathetically young and helpless.
+
+"I wonder what I'd better do," thought Peter.
+
+Mrs. Grundy commanded him to go at once. Common humanity bade him stay.
+
+Peter was very human, and he stayed.
+
+About half-past five Jan woke. She was certainly confused, but not in
+the least frightened. It was light, not brilliantly light as it would be
+a little later on, but clear and opalescent, as though the sun were
+shining through fold upon fold of grey-blue gauze.
+
+The electric light in the verandah and the one over Peter's head were
+still burning and looked garish and wan, and Jan's first coherent
+thought was, "How dreadfully wasteful to have had them on all
+night--Peter's electric light, too"--and then she saw him.
+
+His body was crumpled up in the big chair; his legs were thrust out
+stiffly in front of him. He looked a heartrending interpretation of
+discomfort in his evening clothes, for he hadn't even loosened the
+collar. He had thought of it, but felt it might be disrespectful to Jan.
+Besides, there was something of the chaperon about that collar.
+
+Jan's tears that had refused to soften sorrow during the anguish of the
+night came now, hot and springing, to blur that absurd, pathetic figure
+looped sideways in the big chair.
+
+It was so plain why he was there.
+
+She sniffed helplessly (of course, she had lost her handkerchief), and
+thrust her knuckles into her eyes like any schoolboy.
+
+When she could see again she noticed how thin was the queer, irregular
+face, with dark hollows round the eyes.
+
+"I wonder if they feed him properly at that Yacht Club," thought Jan.
+"And here are we using his house and his cook and everything."
+
+She swung her feet off the sofa and disentangled them from the shawl,
+folded it neatly and sat looking at Peter, who opened his eyes.
+
+For a full minute they stared at each other in silence, then he
+stretched himself and rose.
+
+"I say, have you slept?" he asked.
+
+"Till a minute ago ... Mr. Ledgard ... why did you stay? It was angelic
+of you, but you must be so dreadfully tired. I feel absolutely rested
+and, oh, so grateful--but so ashamed...."
+
+"Then you must have some tea," said Peter, inconsequently. "I'll go and
+rouse up Lalkhan and the cook. We can't get any ourselves, for he locks
+up the whole show every blessed night."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the East burial follows death with the greatest possible speed. Peter
+and the doctor and the nurse arranged everything. A friend of Peter's
+who had little children sent for Ayah and Tony and little Fay to spend
+the day, and Jan was grateful.
+
+Fay and her baby were laid in the English cemetery, and Jan was left to
+face the children as best she could.
+
+They had been happy, Ayah said, with the kind lady and her children.
+Tony went straight to his mother's room, the room that had been closed
+to him for three whole days.
+
+He came back to Jan and stood in front of her, searching her face with
+his grave, judging gaze.
+
+"What have you done with my Mummy?" he asked. "Have you carried her away
+and put her somewhere like you do Fay when she's naughty? You're strong
+enough."
+
+"Oh, Tony!" Jan whispered piteously. "I would have kept her if I could,
+but I wasn't strong enough for that."
+
+"Who has taken her, then?" Tony persisted. "Where is she? I've been
+everywhere, and she isn't in the bungalow."
+
+"God has taken her, Tony."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"I think," Jan said, timidly, "it was because she was very tired and ill
+and unhappy----"
+
+"But is she happier now and better?"
+
+"I hope so, I believe she is ... quite happy and well."
+
+"You're sure?" And Tony's eyes searched Jan's face. "You're sure _you_
+haven't put her somewhere?"
+
+"Tony, I want Mummy every bit as much as you do. Be a little good to
+me, sonny, for I'm dreadfully sad."
+
+Jan held out her hand and Tony took it doubtfully. She drew him nearer.
+
+"Try to be good to me, Tony, and love me a little ... it's all so hard."
+
+"I'll be good," he said, gravely, "because I promised Mummy ... but I
+can't love you yet--because--" here Tony sighed deeply, "I don't seem to
+feel like it."
+
+"Never mind," said Jan, lifting him on to her knee. "Never mind. I'll
+love you an extra lot to make up."
+
+"And Fay?" he asked.
+
+"And Fay--we must both love Fay more than ever now."
+
+"I do love Fay," Tony said, "because I'm used to her. She's been here a
+long time...."
+
+Suddenly his mouth went down at the corners and he leant against Jan's
+shoulder to hide his face. "I do want Mummy so," he whispered, as the
+slow, difficult tears welled over and fell. "I like so much to look at
+her."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was early afternoon, the hot part of the day. The children were
+asleep and Jan sat on the big sofa, finishing a warm jersey for little
+Fay to wear towards the end of the voyage. Peter, by means of every
+scrap of interest he possessed, had managed to secure her a three-berth
+cabin in a mail boat due to leave within the next fortnight. He insisted
+that she must take Ayah, who was more than eager to go, and that Ayah
+could easily get a passage back almost directly with people he knew who
+were coming out soon after Jan got home. He had written to them, and
+they would write to meet the boat at Aden.
+
+There was nothing Peter did not seem able to arrange.
+
+In the flat below a lady was singing the "Indian Love Lyrics" from the
+"Garden of Khama." She had a powerful voice and sang with considerable
+passion.
+
+    Less than the dust beneath thy chariot wheel,
+    Less than the rust that never stained thy sword.
+
+Jan frowned and fidgeted.
+
+The song went on, finished, and then the lady sang it all over again.
+Jan turned on the electric fan, for it was extremely hot, and the strong
+contralto voice made her feel even hotter. The whirr of the fan in no
+way drowned the voice, which now went on to proclaim with much _brio_
+that the temple bells were ringing and the month of marriages was
+drawing near. And then, very slowly and solemnly, but quite as loudly as
+before, came "When I am dying, lean over me tenderly----"
+
+Jan got up and stamped. Then she went swiftly for her topee and gloves
+and parasol, and fled from the bungalow.
+
+Lalkhan rushed after her to ask if she wanted a "tikka-gharri." He
+strongly disapproved of her walking in the streets alone, but Jan shook
+her head. The lift-man was equally eager to procure one, but again Jan
+defeated his desire and walked out into the hot street. Somehow she
+couldn't bear "The Garden of Khama" just then. It was Hugo Tancred's
+favourite verse, and was among the few books Fay appeared to possess,
+Fay who was lying in the English cemetery, and so glad to be there ...
+at twenty-five.
+
+What was the good of life and love, if that was all it led to? In spite
+of the heat Jan walked feverishly and fast, down the shady side of the
+Mayo Road into Esplanade Road, where the big shops were, and, just then,
+no shade at all.
+
+The hot dust seemed to rise straight out of the pavement and strike her
+in the face, and all the air was full of the fat yellow smell that
+prevails in India when its own inhabitants have taken their mid-day
+meal.
+
+Each bare-legged gharri-man slumbered on the little box of his carriage,
+hanging on in that amazingly precarious fashion in which natives of the
+East seem able to sleep anywhere.
+
+On Jan went, anywhere, anywhere away from the garden of Khama and that
+travesty of love, as she conceived it. She remembered the day when she
+thought them such charming songs and thrilled in sympathy with Fay when
+Hugo sang them. Oh, why did that woman sing them to-day? Would she ever
+get the sound out of her ears?
+
+She had reached Churchgate Street, which was deserted and deep in shade.
+She turned down and presently came to the Cathedral standing in its trim
+garden bright with English flowers. The main door was open and Jan went
+in.
+
+Here the haunting love-lyrics were hushed. It was so still, not even a
+sweeper to break the blessed peace.
+
+Restlessly, Jan walked round the outer aisles, reading the inscriptions
+on marble tablets and brasses, many of them dating back to the later
+eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Men died young out in India
+in those days; hardly any seemed to live beyond forty-two, many died in
+the twenties. On nearly all the tablets the words "zeal" or "zealous"
+regularly appeared. With regard to their performance of their duties
+these dead and gone men who had helped to make the India of to-day had
+evidently had a very definite notion as to their own purpose in life.
+The remarks were guarded and remarkably free from exaggerated tributes
+to the virtues they celebrated. One Major-General Bellasis was described
+as "that very respectable Officer--who departed this life while he was
+in the meritorious discharge of his duty presiding at the Military
+Board." Others died "from exposure to the sun"; nearly all seemed to
+have displayed "unremitting" or "characteristic zeal" in the discharge
+of their duties.
+
+Jan sat down, and gradually it seemed as though the spirits and souls of
+those departed men, those ordinary everyday men--whose descendants might
+probably be met any day in the Yacht Club now--seemed to surround her in
+a great company, all pointing in one direction and with one voice
+declaring, "This is the WAY."
+
+Jan fell on her knees and prayed that her stumbling feet might be
+guided upon it, that she should in no wise turn aside, however steep and
+stony it might prove.
+
+And as she knelt there came upon her the conviction that here was the
+true meaning of life as lived upon the earth; just this, that each
+should do his job.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE END OF THE DREAM
+
+
+She walked back rather slowly. It was a little cooler, but dusty, and
+the hot pavements made her feet ache. She was just wondering whether she
+would take a gharri when a motor stopped at the curb and Peter got out.
+
+"What are you doing?" he asked crossly. "Why are you walking in all this
+heat? You can't play these games in India. Get in."
+
+He held the door open for her.
+
+"Good afternoon, Mr. Ledgard," Jan said, sweetly. "Is it worth while for
+such a little way?"
+
+"Get in," Peter said again, and Jan meekly got in.
+
+"I was just coming to see you, and I could have taken you anywhere you
+wanted to go, if only you'd waited. Why didn't you take a gharri?"
+
+"Since you must know," Jan said, smiling at the angry Peter, "I went out
+because I wanted to go out. And I walked because I wanted to walk."
+
+"You can't do things just because you want to do 'em in this infernal
+country--you must consider whether it's a suitable time."
+
+Jan made no answer, and silence reigned till they reached the bungalow.
+
+Peter followed her in.
+
+"Where did you go?" he asked. "And why?"
+
+"I went to the Cathedral, and my reason was that I simply couldn't stay
+in the bungalow because the lady below was singing 'Less than the
+dust.'"
+
+"I know," Peter said grimly. "Just the sort of thing she would sing."
+
+"She sang very well," Jan owned honestly, "but when Fay was first
+engaged she and Hugo used to sing those songs to each other--it seemed
+all day long--and this afternoon I couldn't bear it. It seemed such a
+sham somehow--so false and unreal, if it only led--to this."
+
+"It's real enough while it lasts, you know," Peter remarked in the
+detached, elderly tone he sometimes adopted. "That sort of thing's all
+right for an episode, but it's a bit too thin for marriage."
+
+"But surely episodes often end in marriage?"
+
+"Not that sort, and if they do it's generally pretty disastrous. A woman
+who felt she was less than the dust and rust and weeds and all that rot
+wouldn't be much good to a man who had to do his job, for she wouldn't
+do hers, you know."
+
+"Then you, too, think that's the main thing--to do your job?"
+
+"It seems to me it's the only thing that justifies one's existence.
+Anyway, to try to do it decently."
+
+"And you don't think one ought to expect to be happy and have things go
+smoothly?"
+
+"Well, they won't always, you know, whether you expect it or not; but
+the job remains, so it's just as well to make up your mind to it."
+
+"I suppose," Jan said thoughtfully, "that's a religion."
+
+"It pans out as well as most," said Peter.
+
+The days that had gone so slowly went quickly enough now. Jan had much
+to arrange and no word came from Hugo. She succeeded in getting the
+monthly bills from the cook, and paid them, and very timidly she asked
+Peter if she might pay the wages for the time his servants had waited
+upon them; but Peter was so huffy and cross she never dared to mention
+it again.
+
+The night before they all sailed Peter dined with her, and, after
+dinner, took her for one last drive over Malabar Hill. The moon was
+full, and when they reached Ridge Road he stopped the car and they got
+out and stood on the cliff, looking over the city just as they had done
+on her first evening in Bombay.
+
+Some scented tree was in bloom and the air was full of its soft
+fragrance.
+
+For some minutes they stood in silence, then Jan broke it by asking:
+"Mr. Ledgard, could Hugo take the children from me?"
+
+"He could, of course, legally--but I don't for a minute imagine he will,
+for he couldn't keep them. What about his people? Will they want to
+interfere?"
+
+"I don't think so; from the little he told us they are not very well
+off. They live in Guernsey. His father was something in salt, I think,
+out here. We've none of us seen them. They didn't come to Fay's
+wedding. I gather they are very strict in their views--both his father
+and mother--and there are two sisters. But Fay said Hugo hardly ever
+wrote--or heard from them."
+
+"There's just one thing you must face, Miss Ross," and Peter felt a
+brute as he looked at Jan pale and startled in the bright moonlight.
+"Hugo Tancred might marry again."
+
+"Oh, surely no one would marry him after all this!"
+
+"Whoever did would probably know nothing of 'all this.' Remember Hugo
+Tancred has a way with women; he's a fascinating chap when he likes,
+he's good-looking and plausible, and always has an excellent reason for
+all his misfortunes. If he does marry again he'll marry money, and
+_then_ he might demand the children."
+
+"Perhaps she wouldn't want them."
+
+"We'll hope not."
+
+"And I can do nothing--nothing to make them safe?"
+
+"I fear--nothing--only your best for them."
+
+"I'll do that," said Jan.
+
+They stood shoulder to shoulder in the scented stillness of the night.
+The shadows were black and sharp in the bright moonlight and the
+tom-toms throbbed in the city below.
+
+"I wonder," Jan said presently, "if I shall ever be able to do anything
+for you, Mr. Ledgard. You have done everything for us out here."
+
+"Would you really like to do something?" Peter asked eagerly. "I
+wouldn't have mentioned it if you hadn't said that just now. Would you
+write pretty often? You see, I've no people of my very own. Aunts and
+uncles and cousins don't keep in touch with one out here. They're kind,
+awfully kind when I go home on leave, but it takes a man's own folk to
+remember to write every mail."
+
+"I'll write every mail," Jan promised eagerly, "and when you take your
+next leave, remember we expect you at Wren's End."
+
+"I'll remember," said Peter, "and it may be sooner than you think."
+
+They sailed next day. Jan had spent six weeks in Bombay, and the whole
+thing seemed a dream.
+
+The voyage back was very different from the voyage out. The boat was
+crowded, and nearly all were Service people going home on leave. Jan
+found them very kind and friendly, and the children, with plenty of
+others to play with, were for the most part happy and good.
+
+The journey across France was rather horrid. Little Fay was as
+obstreperous as Tony was disagreeably silent and aloof. Jan thanked
+heaven when the crowded train steamed into Charing Cross.
+
+There, at the very door of their compartment, a girl was waiting. A girl
+so small, she might have been a child except for a certain decision and
+capability about everything she did. She seized Jan, kissed her
+hurriedly and announced that she had got a nice little furnished flat
+for them till they should go to the country, and that Hannah had tea
+ready; this young person, herself, helped to carry their smaller
+baggage to a taxi, packed them in, demanded Jan's keys and announced
+that she would bring the luggage in another taxi. She gave the address
+to the man, and a written slip to Jan, and vanished to collect their
+cabin baggage.
+
+It was all done so briskly and efficiently that it left Ayah and the
+children quite breathless, accustomed as they were to the leisurely
+methods of the East.
+
+"Who is vat mem?" asked little Fay, as the taxi door was slammed by this
+energetic young person.
+
+"Is she quite a mem?" suggested the accurate Tony. "Is she old enough or
+big enough?"
+
+"Who is vat mem?" little Fay repeated.
+
+"That," said Jan with considerable satisfaction in her voice, "is Meg."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+MEG
+
+
+It was inevitable as the refrain of a _rondeau_ that when Jan said
+"that's Meg" little Fay should demand "What nelse?"
+
+Now there was a good deal of "nelse" about Meg, and she requires some
+explanation, going back several years.
+
+Like most Scots, Anthony Ross had been faithful to his relations whether
+he felt affection for them or not; sometimes even when they had not a
+thought in common with him and he rather disliked them than otherwise.
+
+And this was so in the case of one Amelia Ross, his first cousin, who
+was head-mistress of a flourishing and well-established school for
+"young ladies," in the Regent's Park district.
+
+She had been a head-mistress for many years, and was well over fifty
+when she married a meek, small, nothingly man who had what Thackeray
+calls "a little patent place." And it appeared that she added the
+husband to the school in much the same spirit as she would have
+increased the number of chairs in her dining-room, and with no more
+appreciable result in her life. On her marriage she became Mrs.
+Ross-Morton, and Mr. Morton went in and out of the front door,
+breakfasted and dined at Ribston Hall, caught his bus at the North Gate
+and went daily to his meek little work. It is presumed that he lived on
+terms of affectionate intimacy with his wife, but no one who saw them
+together could have gathered this.
+
+Now Anthony Ross disliked his cousin Amelia. He detested her school,
+which he considered was one of the worst examples of a bad old period.
+He suspected her of being hard and grasping, he knew she was dull, and
+her husband bored him--not to tears, but to profanity. Yet since she was
+his cousin and a hard-working, upright woman, and since they had played
+together as children in Scotland and her father and mother had been kind
+to him then, he could never bring himself to drop Amelia. Not for worlds
+would he have allowed Jan or Fay to go to her school, but he did allow
+them, or rather he humbly entreated them, to visit it occasionally when
+invited to some function or other. Jan's education after her mother's
+death had been the thinnest scrape sandwiched between many household
+cares and much attendance upon her father's whims. Fay was allowed
+classes and visiting governesses, but their father could never bring
+himself to spare either of them to the regular discipline of school, and
+Cousin Amelia bewailed the desultory training of Anthony's children.
+
+In 1905, Jan and Fay had been to a party at Ribston Hall: tea in the
+garden followed by a pastoral play. Anthony was sitting in the balcony,
+smoking, when the girls came back. He saw their hansom and ran
+downstairs to meet them, as he always did. They were a family who went
+in for affectionate greetings.
+
+"Daddie," cried Fay, seizing her father by the arm, "one of the seven
+wonders of the world has happened. We have found an interesting person
+at Ribston Hall."
+
+Jan took the other arm. "We can't possibly tell you all about it under
+an hour, so we'd better go and sit in the balcony." And they gently
+propelled him towards the staircase.
+
+"Not if you're going to discuss Cousin Amelia," Anthony protested. "You
+have carrying voices, both of you."
+
+"Cousin Amelia is only incidental," Jan said, when they were all three
+seated in the balcony. "The main theme is concerned with a queer little
+pixie creature called Meg Morton. She's a pupil-governess, and she's
+sixteen and a half--just the same age as Fay."
+
+"She doesn't reach up to Jan's elbow," Fay added, "and she chaperons the
+girls for music and singing, and sits in the drawing-class because the
+master can't be quite seventy yet."
+
+"She's the wee-est thing you ever saw, and they dress her in Cousin
+Amelia's discarded Sunday frocks."
+
+"That's impossible," Anthony interrupted. "Amelia is so massive and
+square; if the girl's so small she'd look like 'the Marchioness.'"
+
+"She does, she does!" Jan cried delightedly. "Of course the garments are
+'made down,' but in the most elderly way possible. Daddie, can you
+picture a Botticelli angel of sixteen, with masses of Titian-red hair,
+clad in a queer plush garment once worn by Cousin Amelia, that retains
+all its ancient frumpiness of line. And it's not only her appearance
+that's so quaint, _she_ is quaint inside."
+
+"We were attracted by her hair," Fay went on "(You'll go down like a
+ninepin before that hair), and we got her in a corner and hemmed her in
+and declared it was her duty to attend to us because we were strangers
+and shy, and in three minutes we were friends. Sixteen, Daddie! And a
+governess-pupil in Cousin Amelia's school. She's a niece of the little
+husband, and Cousin Amelia is preening herself like anything because she
+takes her for nothing and makes her work like ten people."
+
+"Did the little girl say so?"
+
+"Of course not," Jan answered indignantly, "but Cousin Amelia did. Oh,
+how thankful I am she is _your_ cousin, dear, and once-removed from us!"
+
+"How many generations will it take to remove her altogether?" Fay asked.
+"However," she added, "if we can have the pixie out and give her a good
+time I shan't mind the relationship so much. We _must_ do something,
+Daddie. What shall it be?"
+
+Anthony Ross smoked thoughtfully and said very little. Perhaps he did
+not even listen with marked attention, because he was enjoying his
+girls. Just to see them healthy and happy; to know that they were
+naturally kind and gay; to hear them frank and eager and
+loquacious--sometimes gave him a sensation of almost physical pleasure.
+He was like an idler basking in the sun, conscious of nothing but just
+the warmth and comfort of it.
+
+Whatever those girls wanted they always got. Anthony's diplomacy was
+requisitioned and was, as usual, successful; for, in spite of her
+disapproval, Mrs. Ross-Morton could never resist her cousin's charm.
+This time the result was that one Saturday afternoon in the middle of
+June little Meg Morton, bearing a battered leather portmanteau and clad
+in the most-recently-converted plush abomination, appeared at the tall
+house in St. George's Square to stay over the week-end.
+
+It was the mid-term holiday, and from the first moment to the last the
+visit was one almost delirious orgy of pleasure to the little
+pupil-governess.
+
+It was also a revelation.
+
+It would be hard to conceive of anything odder than the appearance of
+Meg Morton at this time. She just touched five feet in height, and was
+very slenderly and delicately made, with absurd, tiny hands and feet.
+Yet there was a finish about the thin little body that proclaimed her
+fully grown. Her eyes, with their thick, dark lashes, looked overlarge
+in the pale little pointed face; strange eyes and sombre, with big,
+bright pupil, and curious dark-blue iris flecked with brown. Her
+features were regular, and her mouth would have been pretty had the lips
+not lacked colour. As it was, all the colour about Meg seemed
+concentrated in her hair; red as a flame and rippled as a river under a
+fresh breeze. There was so much of it, too, the little head seemed bowed
+in apology beneath its weight.
+
+Yet for the time being Meg forgot to be apologetic about her hair, for
+Anthony and his girls frankly admired it.
+
+These adorable, kind, amusing people actually admired it, and said so.
+Hitherto Meg's experience had been that it was a thing to be slurred
+over, like a deformity. If mentioned, it was to be deprecated. In the
+strictly Evangelical circles where hitherto her lot had been cast, they
+even tried vainly to explain it away.
+
+She had, of course, heard of artists, but she never expected to meet
+any. That sort of thing lay outside the lives of those who had to make
+their living as quickly as possible in beaten tracks; tracks so
+well-beaten, in fact, that all the flowers had been trodden underfoot
+and exterminated.
+
+Meg, at sixteen, had received so little from life that her expectations
+were of the humblest. And as she stood before the glass in a pretty
+bedroom, fastening her one evening dress (of shiny black silk that
+crackled, made with the narrow V in front affected by Mrs. Ross-Morton),
+preparatory to going to the play for the first time in her life, she
+could have exclaimed, like the little old woman of the story, "This be
+never I!"
+
+Anthony Ross was wholly surprising to Meg.
+
+This handsome, merry gentleman with thick, brown hair as crinkly as her
+own; who was domineered over and palpably adored by these two, to her,
+equally amazing girls--seemed so very, very young to be anybody's
+father.
+
+He frankly owned to enjoying things.
+
+Now, according to Meg's experience, grown-up people--elderly
+people--seldom enjoyed anything; above all, never alluded to their
+enjoyment.
+
+Life was a thing to be endured with fortitude, its sorrows borne with
+Christian resignation; its joys, if there were any joys, discreetly
+slurred over. Joys were insidious, dangerous things that might lead to
+the leaving undone of obvious duties. To seek joy and insure its being
+shared by others, bravely and honestly believing it to be an excellent
+thing, was to Meg an entirely unknown frame of mind.
+
+After the play, in Meg's room the three girls were brushing their hair
+together; to be accurate, Jan was brushing Fay's and Meg admiring the
+process.
+
+"Have you any sisters?" Jan asked. She was always interested in people's
+relations.
+
+"No," said Meg. "There are, mercifully, only three of us, my two
+brothers and me. If there had been any more I don't know what my poor
+little Papa would have done."
+
+"Why do you call him your 'poor little papa'?" Fay asked curiously.
+
+"Because he is poor--dreadfully--and little, and very melancholy. He
+suffers so from depression."
+
+"Why?" asked the downright Jan.
+
+"Partly because he has indigestion, _constant_ indigestion, and then
+there's us, and boys are so expensive, they will grow so. It upsets him
+dreadfully."
+
+"But they can't help growing," Fay objected.
+
+"It wouldn't matter so much if they didn't both do it at once. But you
+see, there's only a year between them, and they're just about the same
+size. If only one had been smaller, he could have worn the outgrown
+things. As it is, it's always new clothes for both of them. Papa's are
+no sort of use, and even the cheapest suits cost a lot, and boots are
+perfectly awful."
+
+Meg looked so serious that Fay and Jan, who were like the lilies of the
+field, and expected new and pretty frocks at reasonable intervals as a
+matter of course, looked serious too; for the first time confronted by a
+problem whose possibility they had never even considered before.
+
+"He must be pleased with you," Jan said, encouragingly. "_You're_ not
+too big."
+
+"Yes, but then I'm not a boy. Papa's clothes would have made down for me
+beautifully if I'd been a boy; as it is, they're no use." Meg sighed,
+then added more cheerfully. "But I cost less in other ways, and several
+relations send old clothes to me. They are never too small."
+
+"Do you like the relations' clothes?" Fay asked.
+
+"Of course not," said Meg, simply. "They are generally hideous; but,
+after all, they cover me and save expense."
+
+The spoiled daughters of Anthony Ross gazed at Meg with horror-stricken
+eyes. To them this seemed a most tragic state of things.
+
+"Do they all," Fay asked timidly, "wear such ... rich materials--like
+Cousin Amelia?"
+
+"They're fond of plush, as a rule, but there's velveteen as well, and
+sometimes a cloth dress. One was mustard-coloured, and embittered my
+life for a whole year."
+
+Jan suddenly ceased to brush Fay's hair and went and sat on the bed
+beside Meg and put her arm round her. Fay's pretty face, framed in
+fluffy masses of fair hair, was solemn in excess of sympathy.
+
+"I shouldn't care a bit if only the boys were through Sandhurst and
+safely into the Indian Army--but I do hate them having to go without
+nearly everything. Trevor's a King's Cadet, but they wouldn't give us
+two cadetships ... Still," she added, more cheerfully, "it's cheaper
+than anything else for a soldier's son."
+
+"Is your father a soldier?" asked Jan.
+
+"Oh, yes, a major in the Westshires; but he had to leave the Army
+because of his health, and his pension is very small, and mother had so
+little money. I sometimes think it killed her trying to do everything on
+nothing."
+
+"Were you quite small when she died?" Fay asked in a sympathetic
+whisper.
+
+"Oh, no; I was nearly twelve, and quite as big as I am now. Then I kept
+house while the boys were at Bedford, but when they went to Sandhurst
+poor little Papa thought I'd better get some education, too, and Uncle
+John's wife offered to take me for nothing, so here I am. HERE, it's too
+wonderful. Who could have dreamed that Ribston Hall would lead to this?"
+And Meg snuggled down in Jan's kind embrace, her red hair spread around
+her like a veil.
+
+"Are some of the richly-dressed relations nice?" Jan asked hopefully.
+
+"I don't know if you'd think them nice--you seem to expect such a lot
+from people--but they're quite kind--only it's a different sort of
+kindness from yours here. They don't laugh and expect you to enjoy
+yourself, like _your_ father. My brothers say they are dull ... they
+call them--I'm afraid it's very ungrateful--the weariful rich. But I
+expect we're weariful to them too. I suppose poor relations _are_ boring
+if you're well-off yourself. But we get pretty tired, too, when they
+talk us over."
+
+"But do you mean to say they talk you over _to_ you?"
+
+"Always," Meg said firmly. "How badly we manage, how improvident we are,
+how Papa ought to rouse himself and I ought to manage better, and how
+foolish it is to let the boys go into the Army instead of banks and
+things ... And yet, you know, it hasn't cost much for Trevor, and once
+he's in he'll be able to manage, and Jo said he'd enlist if there was
+any more talk of banks, and poor little Papa had to give in--so there it
+is."
+
+"How much older are they than you?" Jan asked.
+
+"Trevor's nineteen and Jo's eighteen, and they are the greatest darlings
+in the world. They always lifted the heavy saucepans for me at Bedford,
+and filled the buckets and did the outsides of the windows, and carried
+up the coals to Papa's sitting-room before they went to school in the
+morning, and they very seldom grumbled at my cooking...."
+
+"But where were the servants?" Fay asked innocently.
+
+Meg laughed. "Oh, we couldn't have any servants. A woman came in the
+morning. Papa dined at his club, and I managed for the boys and me. But,
+oh dear, they do eat a lot, and joints are so dear. Sheep's heads and
+things pall if you have them more than once a week. They're such a mixty
+sort of meat, so gummy."
+
+"_I_ can cook," Jan announced, then added humbly, "at least, I've been
+to classes, but I don't get much practice. Cook isn't at all fond of
+having me messing in her kitchen."
+
+"It isn't the cooking that's so difficult," said Meg; "it's getting
+things to cook. It's all very well for the books to say 'Take' this and
+that. My experience is that you can never 'take' anything. You have to
+buy every single ingredient, and there's never anything like enough. We
+tried being fruitarians and living on dates and figs and nuts all
+squashed together, but it didn't seem to come a bit cheaper, for the
+boys were hungry again directly and said it was hog-wash."
+
+"Was your papa a fruitarian too?" Fay asked.
+
+"Oh, no, he can't play those tricks; he has to be most careful. He never
+had his meals with us. Our meals would have been too rough for him. I
+got him breakfast and afternoon tea. He generally went out for the
+others."
+
+Jan and Fay looked thoughtful.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Amelia Ross-Morton was a fair judge of character. When she consented to
+take her husband's niece as a governess-pupil she had been dubious as to
+the result. She very soon discovered, however, that the small red-haired
+girl was absolutely trustworthy, that she had a power of keeping order
+quite disproportionate to her size, that she got through a perfectly
+amazing amount of work, and did whatever she was asked as a matter of
+course. Thus she became a valuable factor in the school, receiving
+nothing in return save her food and such clothes as Mrs. Ross-Morton
+considered too shabby for her own wear.
+
+At the end of the first year Meg ceased to receive any lessons. Her day
+was fully occupied in teaching the younger and chaperoning the elder
+girls. Only one stipulation did she make at the beginning of each
+term--that she should be allowed to accept, on all reasonable occasions,
+the invitations of Anthony Ross and his daughters, and she made this
+condition with so much firmness that Anthony's cousin knew better than
+to be unreasonably domineering, as was her usual habit. Moreover, though
+it was against her principles to do anything to further the enjoyment
+of persons in a subordinate position, she was, in a way, flattered that
+Anthony and his girls should thus single out her "niece by marriage" and
+appear to enjoy her society.
+
+Thus it came about that Meg went a good deal to St. George's Square and
+nearly always spent part of each holiday with Fay and Jan wherever they
+happened to be.
+
+The queer clothes were kept for wear at Ribston Hall, and by
+degrees--although she never had any money--she became possessed of
+garments more suitable to her age and colouring.
+
+Again and again Anthony painted her. She sat for him with untiring
+patience and devotion. She was always entirely at her ease with him, and
+prattled away quite simply of the life that seemed to him so
+inexpressibly hard and dreary.
+
+Only once had he interfered on her behalf at Ribston Hall, and then
+sorely against Meg's will. She was sitting for him one day, with her
+veil of flaming hair spread round her, when she said, suddenly, "I
+wonder why it is incorrect to send invitations by post to people living
+in the same town?"
+
+"But it isn't," Anthony objected. "Everybody does it."
+
+"Not in schools," Meg said firmly. "Mrs. Ross-Morton will never send
+invitations to people living in London through the post--she says it
+isn't polite. They must go by hand."
+
+"I never heard such nonsense," Anthony exclaimed crossly. "If she
+doesn't send 'em by post, how _does_ she send them?"
+
+"I take them generally, in the evening, after school, and deliver them
+at all the houses. Some are fairly near, of course--a lot of her friends
+live in Regent's Park--but sometimes I have to go quite a long way by
+bus. I don't mind that in summer, when it's light, but in winter it's
+horrid going about the lonely roads ... People speak to one...."
+
+Anthony Ross stepped from behind his easel.
+
+"And what do you do?" he asked.
+
+"I run," Meg said simply, "and I can generally run much faster than they
+do ... but it's a little bit frightening."
+
+"It's infernal," Anthony said furiously. "I shall speak to Amelia at
+once. You are never to do it again."
+
+In vain did Meg plead, almost with tears, that he would do nothing of
+the kind. He was roused and firm.
+
+He did "speak to Amelia." He astonished that good lady as much as he
+annoyed her. Nevertheless Mrs. Ross-Morton used the penny post for her
+invitations as long as Meg remained at Ribston Hall.
+
+At the end of two years Major Morton, who had removed from Bedford to
+Cheltenham, wrote a long, querulous letter to his sister-in-law to the
+effect that if--like the majority of girls nowadays--his daughter chose
+to spend her life far from his sheltering care, it was time she earned
+something.
+
+Mrs. Ross-Morton replied that only now was Meg beginning to repay all
+the expense incurred on her behalf in the way of board, clothing and
+tuition; and it was most unreasonable to expect any salary for quite
+another year.
+
+Major Morton decided to remove Meg from Ribston Hall.
+
+Many acrimonious letters passed between her aunt and her father before
+this was finally accomplished, and Meg left "under a cloud."
+
+To her great astonishment, her meek little uncle appeared at Paddington
+to see her off. Just as the train was starting he thrust an envelope
+into her hand.
+
+"It hasn't been fair," he almost shouted--for the train was already
+beginning to move. "You worked hard, you deserved some pay ... a little
+present ... but please don't mention it to your aunt ... She is so
+decided in her views...."
+
+When Meg opened the envelope she found three ten-pound notes. She had
+never seen so much money before, and burst into tears; but it was not
+because of the magnitude of the gift. She felt she had never properly
+appreciated her poor little uncle, and her conscience smote her.
+
+This was at Christmas.
+
+The weariful rich sat in conclave over Meg, and it was decided that she
+should in March go as companion and secretary to a certain Mrs. Trent
+slightly known to one of them.
+
+Mrs. Trent was kindly, careless, and quite generous as regards money.
+She had grown-up daughters, and they lived in one of the Home Counties
+where there are many country-houses and plenty of sport. Meg proved to
+be exceedingly useful, did whatever she was asked to do, and a great
+many things no one had ever done before. She shared in the fun, and for
+the first time since her mother died was not overworked.
+
+Her employer was as keen on every form of pleasure as her own daughters.
+She exercised the very smallest supervision over them and none at all
+over the "quite useful" little companion.
+
+Many men came to the easy-going, lavish house, and Meg, with pretty
+frocks, abundant leisure and deliriously prim Ribston-Hallish manners,
+came in for her full share of admiration.
+
+It happened that at the end of July Anthony Ross came up to London in
+the afternoon to attend and speak at a dinner in aid of some artists'
+charity. He and Jan were staying with friends at Teddington; Fay, an
+aunt and the servants were already at Wren's End--all but Hannah, the
+severe Scottish housemaid, who remained in charge. She was grim and
+gaunt and plain, with a thick, black moustache, and Anthony liked her
+less than he could have wished. But she had been Jan's nurse, and was
+faithful and trustworthy beyond words. He would never let Jan go to the
+country ahead of him, for without her he always left behind everything
+most vital to his happiness, so she was to join him next day and see
+that his painting-tackle was all packed.
+
+The house in St. George's Square was nominally shut up and shrouded in
+dust-sheets, but Hannah had "opened up" the dining-room on Anthony's
+behalf, and there he sat and slumbered till she should choose to bring
+him some tea.
+
+He was awakened by an opening door and Hannah's voice announcing, not
+tea, but:
+
+"Miss Morton to see you, sir."
+
+There seemed a thousand "r's" in both the Morton and the sir, and
+Anthony, who felt that there was something ominous and arresting in
+Hannah's voice, was wide-awake before she could shut the door again.
+
+Sure enough it was Meg, clad in a long grey dust-cloak and motor bonnet,
+the grey veil flung back from a very pale face.
+
+Meg, looking a wispy little shadow of woe.
+
+Anthony came forward with outstretched hands.
+
+"Meg, my child, what good wind has blown you here this afternoon? I
+thought you were having ever such a gay time down in the country."
+
+But Meg made no effort to grasp the greeting hands. On the contrary, she
+moved so that the whole width of the dining-room table was between them.
+
+"Wait," she said, "you mustn't shake hands with me till I tell you what
+I've done ... perhaps you won't want to then."
+
+And Anthony saw that she was trembling.
+
+"Come and sit down," he said. "Something's wrong, I can see. What is
+it?"
+
+But she stood where she was, looking at him with large, tragic eyes;
+laid down a leather despatch-case she was carrying, and seized the edge
+of the table as if for support.
+
+"I'd rather not sit down yet," she said. "Perhaps when you've heard what
+I've got to tell you, you'll never want me to sit down in your house
+again ... and yet ... I did pray so you'd be here ... I knew it was most
+unlikely ... but I did pray so ... And you _are_ here."
+
+Anthony was puzzled. Meg was not given to making scenes or going into
+heroics.
+
+It was evident that something had happened to shake her out of her usual
+almost cynical calm.
+
+"You'd be much better to sit down," he said, soothingly. "You see, if
+you stand, so must I, and it's such an uncomfortable way of talking."
+
+She pulled out a chair and sat down at the table, took off her gloves,
+and two absurd small thumbs appeared above its edge, the knuckles white
+and tense with the strength of her grip.
+
+Anthony seated himself in a deep chair beside the fireplace. He was in
+shadow. Meg faced the light, and he was shocked at the appearance of the
+little smitten face.
+
+"Now tell me," he said gently, "just as little or as much as you like."
+
+"This morning," she said hoarsely, "I ran away with a man ... in a
+motor-car."
+
+Anthony was certainly startled, but all he said was, "That being the
+case, why are you here, my dear, and what have you done with him?"
+
+"He was married...."
+
+"Have you only just found that out?"
+
+"No, I knew it all along. His wife is hard and disagreeable and older
+than he is ... and he's thirty-five ... and they can't live together,
+and she won't divorce him and he can't divorce her ... and I loved him
+so much and thought how beautiful it would be to give up everything and
+make it up to him."
+
+"Yes?" said Anthony, for Meg paused as though unable to go on.
+
+"And it seemed very wonderful and noble to do this, and I forgot my poor
+little Papa and those boys in India, and you and Jan and Fay and ... I
+was very mad and very happy ... till this morning, when we actually went
+off in his car."
+
+"But where," Anthony asked in a voice studiously even and quiet, "_are_
+he and his car?"
+
+"I don't know," Meg said hopelessly, "unless they're still at the place
+where we had lunch ... and I don't suppose he'd stay there all this
+time...."
+
+Anthony felt a great desire to laugh, but Meg looked so woebegone and
+desperately serious that he restrained the impulse and said very kindly:
+"I don't yet understand how, having embarked upon such an enterprise,
+you happen to be here ... alone. Did you quarrel at lunch, or what?"
+
+"We didn't _have_ lunch," Meg exclaimed with a sob. "At least, I didn't
+... it was the lunch that did it."
+
+"Did what?"
+
+"Made me realise what I had done, and go away."
+
+"Meg dear," said Anthony, striving desperately to keep his voice steady,
+"was it a very bad lunch?"
+
+"I don't know," she answered with the utmost seriousness. "We hadn't
+begun; we were just going to, when I noticed his hands, and his nails
+were dirty, and they looked horrid, and suddenly it came over me that if
+I stayed ... those hands...."
+
+She let go of the table, put her elbows upon it and hid her face in her
+hands.
+
+Anthony made no sound, and presently, still with hidden face, she went
+on again:
+
+"And in that minute I saw what I was doing, and that I could never be
+the same again, and I remembered my poor little dyspeptic Papa, and my
+dear, dear brothers so far away in India ... and you and Jan and
+Fay--_all_ the special people I pray for every single night and
+morning--and I felt that if I didn't get away that minute I should
+die...."
+
+"And how did you get away?"
+
+"It was quite simple. There was something wrong with the car (that's how
+he got his hands so dirty), and he'd sent for a mechanic, and just as we
+were sitting down to lunch, the waiter said the motor-man had come ...
+and he went out to the garage to speak to him...."
+
+"Yes?" Anthony remarked, for again Meg paused.
+
+"So I just walked out of the front door. No one saw me, and the station
+was across the road, and I went right in and asked when there was a
+train to London, and there _was_ one going in five minutes; so I took a
+ticket and came straight here, for I knew somehow, even if you were all
+away, Hannah would let me stay ... just to-night. I knew she would ..."
+and Meg began to sob feebly.
+
+And, as if in response to the mention of her name, Hannah appeared,
+bearing a tray with tea upon it. Hannah was short and square; she
+stumped as she walked, and she carried a tray very high and stately, as
+though it were a sacrifice. As she came in Meg rose and hastily moved to
+the window, standing there with her back to the room.
+
+"I thocht," said Hannah, as though challenging somebody to contradict
+her, "that Miss Morton would be the better for an egg to her tea. She
+looks just like a bit soap after a hard day's washing."
+
+"I had no lunch," said a muffled, apologetic voice from the window.
+
+"Come away, then, and take yer tea," Hannah said sharply. "Young leddies
+should have more sense than go fasting so many hours."
+
+As it was evident that Hannah had no intention of leaving the room till
+she saw Meg sitting at the table, the girl came back and sat down.
+
+"See that she gets her tea, sir," she said in a low, admonitory voice to
+Anthony. "She's pretty far through."
+
+The tray was set at the end of the table. Anthony came and sat down
+behind it.
+
+"I'll pour out," he said, "and until you've drunk one cup of tea, eaten
+one piece of bread-and-butter and one egg, you're not to speak one word.
+_I_ will talk."
+
+He tried to, disjointedly and for the most part nonsense. Meg drank her
+tea, and to her own amazement ate up her egg and several pieces of
+bread-and-butter with the utmost relish.
+
+As the meal proceeded, Anthony noted that she grew less haggard. The
+tears still hung on her eyelashes, but the eyes themselves were a
+thought less tragic.
+
+When Hannah came for the tray she gave a grunt of satisfaction at the
+sight of the egg-shell and the empty plates.
+
+"Now," said Anthony, "we must thresh this subject out and settle what's
+to be done. I suppose you left a message for the Trents. What did you
+tell them?"
+
+"Lies," said Meg. "He said we must have a good start. His yacht was at
+Southampton. And I left a note that I'd been suddenly summoned to Papa,
+and would write from there. They'd all gone for a picnic, you know--and
+it was arranged I was to have a headache that morning ... I've got it
+now with a vengeance ... It seemed rather fun when we were planning it.
+Now it all looks so mean and horrid ... Besides, lots of people saw us
+in his motor ... and people always know me again because of my hair.
+Everyone knew him ... the whole county made a fuss of him, and it seemed
+so wonderful ... that he should care like that for me...."
+
+"Doubtless it did," said Anthony drily. "But we must consider what is to
+be done now. If you said you were going to your father, perhaps the best
+thing you can do is to go to him, and write to the Trents from there. I
+hope you didn't inform _him_ of your intention?"
+
+"No," she faltered. "I was to write to him just before we sailed ... But
+you may be perfectly sure the Trents will find out ... He will probably
+go back there to look for me ... I expect he is awfully puzzled."
+
+"I expect he is, and I hope," Anthony added vindictively, "the fellow is
+terrified out of his life as well. He ought to be horsewhipped, and I'd
+like to do it. A babe like you!"
+
+"No," said Meg, firmly; "there you're wrong. I'm not a babe ... I knew
+what I was doing; but up to to-day it seemed worth it ... I never seemed
+to see till to-day how it would hurt other people. Even if he grew tired
+of me--and I had faced that--there would have been some awfully happy
+months ... and so long as it was only me, it didn't seem to matter. And
+when you've had rather a mouldy life...."
+
+"It can never be a case of 'only me.' As society is constituted, other
+people are always involved."
+
+"Yet there was Marian Evans ... he told me about her ... she did it, and
+everyone came round to think it was very fine of her really. She wrote,
+or something, didn't she?"
+
+"She did," said Anthony, "and in several other respects her case was
+not at all analogous to yours. She was a middle-aged woman--you are a
+child...."
+
+"Perhaps, but I'm not an ignorant child...."
+
+"Oh, Meg!" Anthony protested.
+
+"I daresay about books and things I am, but I mean I haven't been
+wrapped in cotton-wool, and taken care of all my life, like Jan and Fay
+... I know about things. Oh dear, oh dear, will you forbid Jan ever to
+speak to me again?"
+
+"Jan!" Anthony repeated. "Jan! Why, she's the person of all others we
+want. We'll do nothing till she's here. Let's get her." And he pushed
+back his chair and rushed to the bell.
+
+Meg rushed after him: "You'll let her see me? You'll let her talk to me?
+Oh, are you sure?"
+
+The little hands clutched his arm, her ravaged, wistful face was raised
+imploringly to his.
+
+Anthony stooped and kissed the little face.
+
+"It's just people like Jan who are put into the world to straighten
+things out for the rest of us. We've wasted three-quarters of an hour
+already. Now we'll get her."
+
+"Is she on the telephone?" asked the practical Meg. "Not far off?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan was quite used to being summoned to her father in a tremendous
+hurry. She was back in St. George's Square before he started for the
+dinner. Meg was lying down in one of the dismantled bedrooms, and when
+Jan arrived she went straight to her father in his dressing-room.
+
+She found him on his knees, pursuing a refractory collar-stud under the
+wash-stand.
+
+"It's well you've come," he said as he got up. "I can't fasten my collar
+or my tie. I've had a devil of a time. My fingers are all thumbs and I'm
+most detestably sticky."
+
+He told Jan about Meg. She fastened his collar and arranged his tie in
+the neatest of bows. Then she kissed him on both cheeks and told him not
+to worry.
+
+"How can one refrain from worrying when the works of the devil and the
+selfishness of man are made manifest as they have been to-day? But for
+the infinite mercy of God, where would that poor silly child have been?"
+
+"It's just because the infinite mercy of God is so much stronger than
+the works of the devil or the selfishness of man, that you needn't
+worry," said Jan.
+
+Anthony put his hands on Jan's shoulders and held her away from him.
+
+"Do you know," he said, "I shall always like Hannah better after this.
+In spite of her moustache and her grimness, that child was sure Hannah
+would take her in, whether any of us were here or not. Now, how did she
+know?"
+
+"Because," said Jan, "things are revealed to babes like Meg that are
+hidden from men of the world like you. Hannah is all right--you don't
+appreciate Hannah, and you are rather jealous of her moustache."
+
+Anthony leant forward and kissed his tall young daughter: "You are a
+great comfort, Jan," he said. "How do you do it?"
+
+Jan nodded at him. "It will all straighten out--don't you worry," she
+said.
+
+All the same, there was plenty of worry for everybody. The man, after
+his fashion, was very much in love with Meg. He was horribly alarmed by
+her sudden and mysterious disappearance. No one had seen her go, no one
+had noticed her.
+
+He got into a panic, and motored back to the Trents', arriving there
+just before dinner. Mrs. Trent, tired and cross after a wet picnic, had,
+of course, read Meg's note, thought it very casual of the girl and was
+justly incensed.
+
+On finding they knew no more of Meg's movements than he did himself, the
+man--one Walter Brooke--lost his head and confessed the truth to Mrs.
+Trent, who was much shocked and not a little frightened.
+
+Later in the evening she received a telegram from Jan announcing Meg's
+whereabouts.
+
+Jan had insisted on this, lest the Trents should suspect anything and
+wire to Major Morton.
+
+Mrs. Trent, quite naturally, refused to have anything further to do with
+Meg. She talked of serpents, and was very much upset. She wrote a
+dignified letter to Major Morton, explaining her reasons for Meg's
+dismissal. She also wrote to their relative among the weariful rich,
+through whom she had heard of Meg.
+
+Meg was more under a cloud than when she left Ribston Hall.
+
+But for Jan and Anthony she might have gone under altogether; but they
+took her down to Wren's End and kept guard over her. Anthony Ross dealt
+faithfully with the man, who went yachting at once.
+
+Meg recovered her poise, searched the advertisements of the scholastic
+papers industriously, and secured a post in a school for little boys, as
+Anthony forced his cousin Amelia to give her a testimonial.
+
+Here she worked hard and was a great success, for she could keep order,
+and that quality, where small boys are concerned, is much more valuable
+than learning. She stayed there for some years, and then her frail
+little ill-nourished body gave out, and she was gravely ill.
+
+When she recovered, she went as English governess to a rich German
+family in Bremen. The arrangement was only for one year, and at its
+termination she was free to offer to meet Jan and her charges.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+PLANS
+
+
+"Now, chicks, this is London, the friendly town," Jan announced, as the
+taxi drove away from Charing Cross station.
+
+"Flendly little London, dirty little London," her niece rejoined, as she
+bounced up and down on Jan's knee. She had slept during the very good
+crossing and was full of conversation and ready to be pleased with all
+she saw.
+
+Tony was very quiet. He had suffered far more in the swift journey
+across France than during the whole of the voyage, and it was difficult
+to decide whether he or Ayah were the more extraordinary colour.
+Greenish-white and miserable he sat beside his aunt, silent and
+observing.
+
+"Here's dear old Piccadilly," Jan exclaimed, as the taxi turned out of
+St. James's Street. "Doesn't it look jolly in the sunshine?"
+
+Tony turned even greener than before, and gasped:
+
+"This! Piccadilly!"
+
+This not very wide street with shops and great houses towering above
+them, the endless streams of traffic in the road and on the crowded
+pavements!
+
+"Did Mrs. Bond live in one of those houses?" he wondered, "and if so,
+where did she keep her ducks? And where, oh, where, were the tulips and
+the lilies of his dream?"
+
+He uttered no sound, but his mind kept exclaiming, "This! Piccadilly?"
+
+"See," said Jan, oblivious of Tony and intent on keeping her lively
+niece upon her knee. "There's the Green Park."
+
+Tony breathed more freely.
+
+After all, there _were_ trees and grass; good grass, and more of it than
+in the Resident's garden. He took heart a little and summoned up courage
+to inquire: "But where are the tulips?"
+
+"It's too early for tulips yet," Jan answered. "By and by there will be
+quantities. How did you know about them? Did dear Mummy tell you? But
+they're in Hyde Park, not here."
+
+Tony made no answer. He was, as usual, weighing and considering and
+making up his mind.
+
+Presently he spoke. "It's different," he said, slowly, "but I rather
+like to look at it."
+
+Tony never said whether he thought things were pretty or ugly. All he
+knew was that certain people and places, pictures and words, sometimes
+filled him with an exquisite sense of pleasure, while others merely
+bored or exasperated or were positively painful.
+
+His highest praise was "I like to look at it." When he didn't like to
+look at it, he had found it wiser to express no opinion at all, except
+in moments of confidential expansion, and these were rare with Tony.
+
+Meg had found them a nice little furnished flat on the fifth floor in
+one of the blocks behind Kensington High Street, and Hannah must surely
+have been waiting behind the door, so instantaneously was it opened,
+when Jan and her party left the lift.
+
+There were tears in Hannah's eyes and her nose was red as she welcomed
+"Miss Fay's motherless bairns." She was rather shocked that there was no
+sign of mourning about any of them except Jan, who wore--mainly as a
+concession to Hannah's prejudices--a thin black coat and skirt she had
+got just before she left Bombay.
+
+Tony stared stonily at Hannah and decided he did not like to look at
+her. She was as surprising as the newly-found Piccadilly, but she
+gratified no sensuous perception whatsoever.
+
+Ayah might not be exactly beautiful, but she was harmonious. Her body
+was well proportioned, her sari fell in gracious flowing lines, and she
+moved with dignity. Without knowing why, Tony felt that there was
+something pleasing to the eye in Ayah. Hannah, on the contrary, was the
+reverse of graceful; stumpy and heavy-footed, she gave an impression of
+abrupt terminations. Everything about her seemed too short except her
+caps, which were unusually tall and white and starchy. Her afternoon
+aprons, too, were stiffer and whiter and more voluminous than those of
+other folk. She did not regard these things as vain adornings of her
+person, rather were they the outward and visible sign of her office as
+housekeeper to Miss Ross. They were a partial expression of the dignity
+of that office, just as a minister's gown is the badge of his.
+
+By the time everyone was washed and brushed Meg returned with the
+luggage and Hannah brought in tea.
+
+"I thought you'd like to give the bairns their tea yourself the first
+day, Miss Jan. Will that Hindu body have hers in the nursery?"
+
+"That would be best," Jan said hastily. "And Hannah, you mustn't be
+surprised if she sits on the floor. Indian servants always do."
+
+"_Nothing_ she can do will surprise me," Hannah announced loftily. "I've
+not forgotten the body that came back with Mrs. Tancred, with a ring
+through her nose and a red wafer on her forehead."
+
+Jan, herself, went with Ayah to the nursery, where she found that in
+spite of her disparaging sniffs, Hannah had put out everything poor Ayah
+could possibly want.
+
+The children were hungry and tea was a lengthy meal. It was not until
+they had departed with Ayah for more washings that Jan found time to
+say: "Why don't you take off your hat, Meg dear? I can't see you
+properly in that extinguisher. Is it the latest fashion?"
+
+"The very latest."
+
+Meg looked queerly at Jan as she slowly took off her hat.
+
+"There!" she said.
+
+Her hair was cropped as short as a boy's, except for the soft, tawny
+rings that framed her face.
+
+"Meg!" Jan cried. "Why on earth have you cut off your hair?"
+
+"Chill penury's the cause. I've turned it into good hard cash. It
+happens to be the fashionable colour just now."
+
+"Did you really need to? I thought you were getting quite a good salary
+with those Hoffmeyers."
+
+"No English governess gets a _good_ salary in Bremen, and mine was but a
+modest remuneration, so I wanted more. Do you remember Lady Penelope
+Pottinger?"
+
+"Hazily. She was pretty, wasn't she ... and very smart?"
+
+"She was and is ... smarter than ever now--mind, I put you on your
+honour never to mention it--_she's_ got my hair."
+
+"Do you mean she asked you to sell it?"
+
+"No, my child. I offered it for sale and she was all over me with
+eagerness to purchase. Hair's the defective wire in her lighting
+apparatus. Her own, at the best, is skimpy and straight, though very
+much my colour, and what with permanent waving and instantaneous hair
+colouring it was positively dwindling away."
+
+"I wish you had let it dwindle."
+
+"No, I rather like her--so I suggested she should give her own poor
+locks a rest and have an artistic _postiche_ made with mine; it made
+two, one to come and one to go--to the hairdresser. She looks perfectly
+charming. I'd no idea my hair was so decent till I saw it on her head."
+
+"I hope _I_ never shall," Jan said gloomily. "I think it was silly of
+you, for it makes you look younger and more irresponsible than ever; and
+what about posts?"
+
+"I've got a post in view where it won't matter if only I can run things
+my own way."
+
+"Will you have to go at once? I thought, perhaps----"
+
+"I wish to take this post at once," Meg interposed quickly, "but it
+depends on you whether I get it."
+
+"On me?"
+
+"On no one else. Look here, Jan, will you take me on as nurse to Fay's
+children? A real nurse, mind, none of your fine lady arrangements; only
+you must pay me forty pounds a year. I can't manage with less if I'm to
+give my poor little Papa any chirps ... I suppose that's a frightful lot
+for a nurse?"
+
+"Not for a good nurse ... But, Meg, you got eighty when you taught the
+little boys, and I know they'd jump at you again in that school, hair or
+no hair."
+
+"Listen, Jan." Meg put her elbows on the table and leaned her sharp
+little chin on her two hands while she held Jan's eyes with hers. "For
+nine long years, except that time with the Trents, I've been teaching,
+teaching, teaching, and I'm sick of teaching. I'd rather sweep a
+crossing."
+
+"Yet you teach so well; you know the little boys adored you."
+
+"I love children and they usually like me. If you take me to look after
+Tony and little Fay, I'll do it thoroughly, I can promise you. I won't
+teach them, mind, not a thing--I'll make them happy and well-mannered;
+and, Jan, listen, do you suppose there's anybody, even the most
+superior of elderly nurses, who would take the trouble for Fay's
+children that I should? If you let me come you won't regret it, I
+promise you."
+
+Meg's eyes, those curious eyes with the large pupil and blue iris
+flecked with brown, were very bright, her voice was earnest, and when it
+ceased it left a sense of tension in the very air.
+
+Jan put out her hand across the table, and Meg, releasing her sharp
+little chin, clasped it with hers.
+
+"So that's settled," Meg announced triumphantly.
+
+"No." Jan's voice was husky but firm. "It's not settled. I don't think
+you're strong enough; but, even so, if I could pay you the salary you
+ought to have, I'd jump at you ... but, my dear, I can't at present. I
+haven't the least idea what it will all cost, but the fares and things
+have made such a hole in this year's money I'll need to be awfully
+careful."
+
+"That's exactly why I want to come; you've no idea of being careful and
+doing things in a small way. I've done it all my life. You'll be far
+more economical with me than without me."
+
+"Don't tempt me," Jan besought her. "I see all that, but why should I be
+comfortable at your expense? I want you more than I can say. Fay wanted
+it too--she said so."
+
+"Did Fay actually say so? Did she?"
+
+"Yes, she did--not that you should be their nurse, we neither of us ever
+thought of that; but she did want you to be there to help me with the
+children. We used to talk about it."
+
+"Then I'm coming. I must. Don't you see how it is, Jan? Don't you
+realise that nearly all the happiness in my life--_all_ the happiness
+since the boys left--has come to me through Mr. Ross and Fay and you?
+And now when there's a chance for me to do perhaps a little something in
+return ... If you don't let me, it's you who are mean and grudging. I
+shall be perfectly strong, if I haven't got to teach--mind, I won't do
+that, not so much as A.B.C."
+
+"I know it's wrong," Jan sighed, "just because it would be so heavenly
+to have you."
+
+Meg loosed the hand she held and stood up. She lifted her thin arms
+above her head, as though invoking some invisible power, stretched
+herself, and ran round the table to kiss Jan.
+
+"And do you never think, you dear, slow-witted thing, that it will be
+rather lovely for _me_ to be with you? To be with somebody who is kind
+without being patronising, who treats one as a human being and not a
+machine, who sees the funny side of things and isn't condescending or
+improving if she doesn't happen to be cross?"
+
+"I'm often cross," Jan said.
+
+"Well, and what if you are? Can't I be cross back? I'm not afraid of
+your crossness. You never hit below the belt. Now, promise me you'll
+give me a trial. Promise!"
+
+Meg's arms were round her neck, Meg's absurd cropped head was rubbing
+against hers. Jan was very lonely and hungry for affection just then,
+timid and anxious about the future. Even in that moment of time it
+flashed upon her what a tower of strength this small, determined
+creature would be, and how infinitely hard it was to turn Meg from any
+course she had determined on.
+
+"For a little while, then," so Jan salved her conscience. "Just till we
+all shake down ... and your hair begins to grow."
+
+Meg stood up very straight and shook her finger at Jan. "Remember, I'm
+to be a real, proper nurse with authority, and a clinical thermometer
+... and a uniform."
+
+"If you like, and it's a pretty uniform."
+
+Meg danced gleefully round the table.
+
+"It will be lovely, it is lovely. I've got it all ready; green linen
+frocks, big _well_-fitting aprons, and such beautiful caps."
+
+"Not caps, Meg!" Jan expostulated. "Please not caps."
+
+"Certainly caps. How otherwise am I to cover up my head? I can't wear
+hats all the time. And how could I ever inspire those children with
+respect with a head like this? When I get into my uniform you'll see
+what a very superior nurse I look."
+
+"You'll look much more like musical comedy than sober service."
+
+"You mistake the situation altogether," Meg said loftily. "I take my
+position very seriously."
+
+"But you can't go about Wren's End in caps. Everybody knows you down
+there."
+
+"They'll find out they don't know me as well as they thought, that's
+all."
+
+"Meg, tell me, what did Hannah say when she saw your poor shorn head?"
+
+"Hannah, as usual, referred to my Maker, and said that had He intended
+me to have short hair He would either have caused it not to grow or
+afflicted me with some disease which necessitated shearing; and she
+added that such havers are just flying in the face of Providence."
+
+"So they are."
+
+"All the more reason to cover them up, and I wish to impress the
+children."
+
+"Those children will be sadly browbeaten, I can see, and as for their
+poor aunt, she won't be able to call her soul her own."
+
+"That," Meg said, triumphantly, "is precisely why I'm so eager to come.
+When you've been an underling all your life you can't imagine what a joy
+it is to be top dog occasionally."
+
+"In that respect," Jan said firmly, "it must be turn and turn about. I
+won't let you come unless you promise--swear, here and now--that when I
+consider you are looking fagged--'a wispy wraith,' as Daddie used to
+say--if I command you to take a day in bed, in bed you will stay till I
+give you leave to get up. Unless you promise me this, the contract is
+off."
+
+"I'll promise anything you like. The idea of being _pressed_ to remain
+in bed strikes me as merely comic. You have evidently no notion how
+persons in a subordinate position ought to be treated. Bed, indeed!"
+
+"I think you might have waited till I got back before you parted with
+your hair." Jan's tone was decidedly huffy.
+
+"Now don't nag. That subject is closed. What about _your_ hair. Do you
+know it is almost white?"
+
+"And what more suitable for a maiden aunt? As that is to be my _rôle_
+for the future I may as well look the part."
+
+"But you don't--that's what I complain of. The whiter your hair grows
+the younger your face gets. You're a contradiction, a paradox, you
+provoke conjecture, you're indecently noticeable. Mr. Ross would have
+loved to paint you."
+
+Jan shook her head. "No, Daddie never wanted to paint anything about me
+except my arms."
+
+"He'd want to paint you now," Meg insisted obstinately. "_I_ know the
+sort of person he liked to paint."
+
+"He never would paint people unless he _did_ like them," Jan said,
+smiling as at some recollection. "Do you remember how he utterly refused
+to paint that rich Mr. Withells down at Amber Guiting?"
+
+"I remember," and Meg laughed. "He said Mr. Withells was puffy and
+stippled."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tony had been cold ever since he reached the Gulf of Lyons, and he
+wondered what could be the matter with him, for he never remembered to
+have felt like this before. He wondered miserably what could be the
+reason why he felt so torpid and shivery, disinclined to move, and yet
+so uncomfortable when he sat still.
+
+After his bath, on that first night in London, tucked into a little bed
+with a nice warm eiderdown over him, he still felt that horrid little
+trickle of ice-cold water down his spine and could not sleep.
+
+His cot was in Auntie Jan's room with a tall screen round it. The rooms
+in the flat were small, tiny they seemed to Tony, after the lofty
+spaciousness of the bungalow in Bombay, but that didn't seem to make it
+any warmer, because Auntie Jan's window was wide open as it would
+go--top and bottom--and chilly gusts seemed to blow round his head in
+spite of the screen. Ayah and little Fay were in the nursery across the
+passage, where there was a fire. There was no fire in this wind-swept
+chamber of Auntie Jan's.
+
+Tony dozed and woke and woke and dozed, getting colder and more forlorn
+and miserable with each change of position. The sheets seemed made of
+ice, so slippery were they, so unkind and unyielding and unembracing.
+
+Presently he saw a dim light. Auntie Jan had come to bed, carrying a
+candle. He heard her say good night to the little mem who had met them
+at the station, and the door was shut.
+
+In spite of her passion for fresh air, Jan shivered herself as she
+undressed. She made a somewhat hasty toilet, said her prayers, peeped
+round the screen to see that Tony was all right, and hopped into bed,
+where a hot-water bottle put in by the thoughtful Hannah was most
+comforting.
+
+Presently she heard a faint, attenuated sniff. Again it came, this time
+accompanied by the ghost of something like a groan.
+
+Jan sat up in bed and listened. Immediately all was perfectly still.
+
+She lay down again, and again came that sad little sniff, and
+undoubtedly it was from behind the screen that it came.
+
+Had Tony got cold?
+
+Jan leapt out of bed, switched on the light and tore away the screen
+from around his bed.
+
+Yes; his doleful little face was tear-stained.
+
+"Tony, Tony darling, what is the matter?"
+
+"I don't know," he sobbed. "I feel so funny."
+
+Jan put her hand on his forehead--far from being hot, the little face
+was stone-cold. In a moment she had him out of bed and in her warm arms.
+As she took him she felt the chill of the stiff, unyielding small body.
+
+"My precious boy, you're cold as charity! Why didn't you call me long
+ago? Why didn't you tell Auntie Jan?"
+
+"I didn't ... know ... what it was," he sobbed.
+
+In no time Tony was put into the big bed, the bed so warm from Auntie
+Jan's body, with a lovely podgy magic something at his feet that
+radiated heat. Auntie Jan slammed down the window at the bottom, and
+then more fairness! She struck a match, there was a curious sort of
+"plop," and a little fire started in the grate, an amazing little fire
+that grew redder and redder every minute. Auntie Jan put on a blue
+dressing-gown over the long white garment that she wore, and bustled
+about. Tony decided that he "liked to look at her" in this blue robe,
+with her hair in a great rope hanging down. She was very quick; she
+fetched a little saucepan and he heard talking in the passage outside,
+but no one else came in, only Auntie Jan.
+
+Presently she gave him milk, warm and sweet, in a blue cup. He drank it
+and began to feel much happier, drowsy too, and contented. Presently
+there was no light save the red glow of the fairy fire, and Auntie Jan
+got into bed beside him.
+
+She put her arm about him and drew him so that his head rested against
+her warm shoulder. He did not repulse her, he did not speak, but lay
+stiff and straight with his feet glued against that genial podgy
+something that was so infinitely comforting.
+
+"You are kind," Tony said suddenly. "I believe you."
+
+The stiff little body relaxed and lay against hers in confiding
+abandonment, and soon he was sound asleep.
+
+What a curious thing to say! Jan lay awake puzzling. Tragedy lay behind
+it. Only five years old, and yet, to Tony, belief was a more important
+thing than love. She thought of Fay, hectic and haggard, and again she
+seemed to hear her say in her tired voice, trying to explain Tony: "He's
+not a cuddly child; he's queer and reserved and silent, but if he once
+trusts you it's for always; he'll love you then and never change."
+
+Jan could just see, in the red glow from the fire, the little head that
+lay so confidingly against her shoulder, the wide forehead, the
+peacefully closed eyes. And suddenly she realised that the elusive
+resemblance to somebody that had always evaded her was a likeness to
+that face she saw in the glass every time she did her hair. She kissed
+him very softly, praying the while that she might never fail him; that
+he might always have reason to trust her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE STATE OF PETER
+
+
+Meanwhile Peter was making discoveries about himself. He went back to
+his flat on the evening of the day Jan and the children sailed. Swept
+and garnished and exceedingly tidy, it appeared to have grown larger
+during his absence and seemed rather empty. There was a sense of
+unfilled spaces that caused him to feel lonely.
+
+That very evening he decided he must get a friend to chum with him. The
+bungalow was much too big for one person.
+
+This had never struck him before.
+
+In spite of their excessive neatness there remained traces of Jan and
+the children in the rooms. The flowers on the dinner-table proclaimed
+that they had been arranged by another hand than Lalkhan's. He was
+certain of that without Lalkhan's assurance that the Miss-Sahib had done
+them herself before she sailed that very morning.
+
+When he went to his desk after dinner--never before or after did Peter
+possess such an orderly bureau--he found a letter lying on the
+blotting-pad, and on each side of the heavy brass inkstand were placed a
+leaden member of a camel-corps and an India-rubber ball with a face
+painted upon it, which, when squeezed, expressed every variety of
+emotion. These, Lalkhan explained, were parting gifts from the young
+sahib and little Fay respectively, and had been so arranged by them just
+before they sailed.
+
+The day before Jan had told the children that all this time they had
+been living in Peter's house and that she was sure Mummy would want them
+to be very grateful (she was careful to talk a great deal about Mummy to
+the children lest they should forget her); that he had been very kind to
+them all, and she asked if there was anything of their very own they
+would like to leave for Peter as a remembrance.
+
+Tony instantly fetched the camel-corps soldier that kept guard on a
+chair by his cot every night; that Ayah had not been permitted to pack
+because it must accompany him on the voyage. It was, Jan knew, his most
+precious possession, and she assured him that Peter would be
+particularly gratified by such a gift.
+
+Not to be outdone by her brother, little Fay demanded her beloved ball,
+which was already packed for the voyage in Jan's suit-case.
+
+Peter sat at his desk staring at the absurd little toys with very kind
+eyes. He understood. Then he opened Jan's letter and read it through
+quite a number of times.
+
+"Dear Mr. Ledgard," it ran.
+
+"Whatever Mr. Kipling may say of the Celt, the lowland Scot finds it
+very difficult to express strong feeling in words. If I had tried to
+tell you, face to face, how sensible I am of your kindness and
+consideration for us during the last sad weeks--I should have cried. You
+would have been desperately uncomfortable and I--miserably ashamed of
+myself. So I can only try to write something of my gratitude.
+
+"We have been your guests so long and your hospitality has been so
+untiring in circumstances sad and strange enough to try the patience of
+the kindest host, that I simply cannot express my sense of obligation;
+an obligation in no wise burdensome because you have always contrived to
+make me feel that you took pleasure in doing all you have done.
+
+"I wish there had been something belonging to my sister that I could
+have begged you to accept as a remembrance of her; but everything she
+had of the smallest value has disappeared--even her books. When I get
+home I hope to give you one of my father's many portraits of her, but I
+will not send it till I know whether you are coming home this summer.
+Please remember, should you do so, as I sincerely hope you will, that
+nowhere can there be a warmer welcome for you than at Wren's End. It
+would be the greatest possible pleasure for the children and me to see
+you there, and it is a good place to slack in and get strong. And there
+I hope to challenge you to the round of golf we never managed during my
+time in India.
+
+"Please try to realise, dear Mr. Ledgard, that my sense of your kindness
+is deep and abiding, and, believe me, yours, in most true gratitude,
+
+                                             "JANET ROSS."
+
+For a long time Peter sat very still, staring at the cheerful,
+highly-coloured face painted on Fay's ball. Cigarette after cigarette
+did he smoke as he reviewed the experience of the last six weeks.
+
+For the first time since he became a man he had been constantly in the
+society of a woman younger than himself who appeared too busy and too
+absorbed in other things to remember that she was a woman and he a man.
+
+Peter was ordinarily susceptible, and he was rather a favourite with
+women because of his good manners; and his real good-nature made him
+ready to help either in any social project that happened to be towards
+or in times of domestic stress. Yet never until lately had he seen so
+much of any woman not frankly middle-aged without being conscious that
+he _was_ a man and she a woman, and this added, at all events, a certain
+piquancy to the situation.
+
+Yet he had never felt this with Jan.
+
+Quite a number of times in the course of his thirty years he had fallen
+in love in an agreeably surface sort of way without ever being deeply
+stirred. Love-making was the pleasantest game in the world, but he had
+not yet felt the smallest desire to marry. He was a shrewd young man,
+and knew that marriage, even in the twentieth century, at all events
+starts with the idea of permanence; and, like many others who show no
+inclination to judge the matrimonial complications of their
+acquaintance, he would greatly have disliked any sort of scandal that
+involved himself or his belongings.
+
+He was quite as sensitive to criticism as other men in his service, and
+he knew that he challenged it in lending his flat to Mrs. Tancred. But
+here he felt that the necessities of the case far outweighed the
+possibilities of misconception, and after Jan came he thought no more
+about it.
+
+Yet in a young man with his somewhat cynical knowledge of the world, it
+was surprising that the thought of his name being coupled with Jan's
+never crossed his mind. He forgot that none of his friends knew Jan at
+all, but that almost every evening they did see her with him in the
+car--sometimes, it is true, accompanied by the children, but quite as
+often alone--and that during her visit his spare time was so much
+occupied in looking after the Tancred household that his friends saw
+comparatively little of him, and Peter was, as a rule, a very sociable
+person.
+
+Therefore it came upon him as a real shock when people began to ask him
+point-blank whether he was engaged to Jan, and if so, what they were
+going to do about Tancred's children. Rightly or wrongly, he discerned
+in the question some veiled reflection upon Jan, some implied slur upon
+her conduct. He was consequently very short and huffy with these
+inquisitive ones, and when he was no longer present they would shake
+their heads and declare that "poor old Peter had got it in the neck."
+
+If so, poor old Peter was, as yet, quite unconscious of anything of the
+kind.
+
+Nevertheless he found himself constantly thinking about her. Everything,
+even the familiar streets and roads, served to remind him of her, and
+when he went to bed he nearly always dreamed about her. Absurd,
+inconsequent, unsatisfactory dreams they were; for in them she was
+always too busy to pay any attention to him at all; she was wholly
+absorbed by what it is to be feared Peter sometimes called "those
+confounded children." Though even in his dream world he was careful to
+keep his opinion to himself.
+
+Why on earth should he always dream of Jan during the first part of the
+night?
+
+Lalkhan could have thrown some light upon the subject. But naturally
+Peter did not confide his obsession to Lalkhan.
+
+Just before she left Jan asked Lalkhan where the sahib's linen was kept,
+and on being shown the cupboard which contained the rather untidy little
+piles of sheets, pillow-cases, and towels that formed Peter's modest
+store of house linen, she rearranged it and brought sundry flat, square
+muslin bags filled with dried lavender. Lace-edged bags with
+lavender-coloured ribbon run through insertion and tied in bows at the
+two corners. These bags she placed among the sheets, much to the wonder
+of Lalkhan, who, however, decided that it was kindly meant and therefore
+did not interfere.
+
+The odour was not one that commended itself to him. It was far too faint
+and elusive. He could understand a liking for attar of roses, of
+jessamine, of musk, or of any of the strong scents beloved by the native
+of India. Yet had she proposed to sprinkle the sheets with any of these
+essences he would have felt obliged to interfere, as the sahib swore
+violently and became exceedingly hot and angry did any member of his
+household venture into his presence thus perfumed. Even as it was he
+fully expected that his master would irritably demand the cause of the
+infernal smell that pervaded his bed; so keen are the noses of the
+sahibs. Whereupon Lalkhan, strong in rectitude, would relate exactly
+what had happened, produce one of the Jan-incriminating muslin bags,
+escape further censure, and doubtless be commanded to burn it and its
+fellows in the kitchen stove. But nothing of the kind occurred, and, as
+it is always easier to leave a thing where it has been placed than to
+remove it, the lavender remained among the sheets in humble obscurity.
+
+The old garden at Wren's End abounded in great lavender bushes, and
+every year since it became her property Jan made lavender sachets which
+she kept in every possible place. Her own clothes always held a faint
+savour of lavender, and she had packed these bags as much as a matter of
+course as she packed her stockings. It seemed a shame, though, to take
+them home again when she could get plenty more next summer, so she left
+them in the bungalow linen cupboard. They reproduced her atmosphere;
+therefore did Peter dream of Jan.
+
+A fortnight passed, and on their way to catch the homeward mail came
+Thomas Crosbie and his wife from Dariawarpur to stay the night. Next
+morning at breakfast Mrs. Crosbie, young, pretty and enthusiastic,
+expatiated on the comfort of her room, finally exclaiming: "And how,
+Mr. Ledgard, do you manage to have your sheets so deliciously scented
+with lavender--d'you get it sent out from home every year?"
+
+"Lavender?" Peter repeated. "I've got no lavender. My people never sent
+me any, and I've certainly never come across any in India."
+
+"But I'm convinced everything smelt of lavender. It made me think of
+home so. If I hadn't been just going I'd have been too homesick for
+words. I'm certain of it. Think! You must have got some from somewhere
+and forgotten it."
+
+Peter shook his head. "I've never noticed it myself--you really must be
+mistaken. What would I be doing with lavender?"
+
+"It was there all the same," Mrs. Crosbie continued. "I'm certain of it.
+You must have got some from somewhere. Do find out--I'm sure I'm not
+wrong. Ask your boy."
+
+Peter said something to Lalkhan, who explained volubly. Tom Crosbie
+grinned; he understood even fluent Hindustani. His wife did not. Peter
+looked a little uncomfortable. Lalkhan salaamed and left the room.
+
+"Well?" Mrs. Crosbie asked.
+
+"It seems," Peter said slowly, "there _is_ something among the sheets.
+I've sent Lalkhan to get it."
+
+Lalkhan returned, bearing a salver, and laid on the salver was one of
+Jan's lavender bags. He presented it solemnly to his master, who with
+almost equal solemnity handed it to Mrs. Crosbie.
+
+"There!" she said. "Of course I knew I couldn't be mistaken. Now where
+did you get it?"
+
+"It was, I suppose, put among the things when poor Mrs. Tancred had the
+flat. I never noticed, of course--it's such an unobtrusive sort of
+smell...."
+
+"Hadn't she a sister?" Mrs. Crosbie asked, curiously, holding the little
+sachet against her soft cheek and looking very hard at Peter.
+
+"She had. It was she who took the children home, you know."
+
+"Older or younger than Mrs. Tancred?"
+
+"Older."
+
+"How much older?"
+
+"I really don't know," said the mendacious Peter.
+
+"Was she awfully pretty, too?"
+
+"Again, I really don't know. I never thought about her looks ... she had
+grey hair...."
+
+"Oh!" Mrs. Crosbie exclaimed--a deeply disappointed "Oh." "Probably much
+older, then. That explains the lavender bags."
+
+Silent Thomas Crosbie looked from his wife to Peter with considerable
+amusement. He realised, if she didn't, that Peter was most successfully
+putting her off the scent of more than lavender; but men are generally
+loyal to each other in these matters, and he suddenly took his part in
+the conversation and changed the subject.
+
+Among Peter's orders to his butler that morning was one to the effect
+that nothing the Miss-Sahib had arranged in the bungalow was to be
+disturbed, and the lavender bag was returned to rejoin its fellows in
+the cupboard.
+
+It was four years since Peter had had any leave, and it appeared that
+the lavender had the same effect upon him as upon Mrs. Crosbie. He felt
+homesick--and applied for leave in May.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES"
+
+
+Peter had been as good as his word, and had found a family returning to
+India who were glad to take Ayah back to Bombay. And she, though sorry
+to leave Jan and the children, acquiesced in all arrangements made for
+her with the philosophic patience of the East. March was a cold month,
+and she was often rather miserable, in spite of her pride in her shoes
+and stockings and the warm clothes Jan had provided for her.
+
+Before she left Jan interviewed her new mistress and found her kind and
+sensible, and an old campaigner who had made the voyage innumerable
+times.
+
+It certainly occurred to Jan that Peter had been extraordinarily quick
+in making this arrangement, but she concluded that he had written on the
+subject before they left India. She had no idea that he had sent a long
+and costly cable on the subject. His friend thought him very solicitous
+for her comfort, but set it down entirely to her own merits and Peter's
+discriminating good sense.
+
+When the day came Jan took Ayah to her new quarters in a taxi. Of course
+Ayah wept, and Jan felt like weeping herself, as she would like to have
+kept her on for the summer months. But she knew it wouldn't do; that
+apart from the question of expense, Hannah could never overcome her
+prejudices against "that heathen buddy," and that to have explained that
+poor Ayah was a Roman Catholic would only have made matters worse.
+Hannah was too valuable in every way to upset her with impunity, and the
+chance of sending Ayah back to India in such kind custody was too good
+to lose.
+
+Meg had deferred the adoption of the musical-comedy costume until such
+time as she took over Ayah's duties. She in no way interfered, but was
+helpful in so many unobtrusive ways that Jan, while she still felt
+guilty in allowing her to stay at all, acknowledged she could never have
+got through this time without her.
+
+Fortunately the day of Ayah's departure was fine, so that while Jan took
+her to her destination Meg took the children to spend the afternoon at
+the Zoo. To escort little Fay about London was always rather an ordeal
+to anyone of a retiring disposition. She was so fearless, so interested
+in her fellow-creatures, and so ready at all times and in all places to
+enter into conversation with absolute strangers, preferably men, that
+embarrassing situations were almost inevitable; and her speech, high and
+clear and carrying--in spite of the missing "r"--rendered it rarely
+possible to hope people did not understand what she said.
+
+They went by the Metropolitan to Baker Street and sat on one of the
+small seats at right angles to the windows, and a gentleman wearing a
+very shiny top-hat sat down opposite to them.
+
+He looked at little Fay; little Fay looked at him and, smiling her
+adorable, confident smile, leant forward, remarking: "Sahib, you wear a
+very high hat."
+
+Instantly the eyes of all the neighbouring passengers were fixed upon
+the hat and its owner. His, however, were only for the very small lady
+that faced him; the small lady in a close white bonnet and bewitching
+curls that bobbed and fluttered in the swaying of the train.
+
+He took off the immaculate topper and held it out towards her. "There,"
+he said, "would you like to look at it?"
+
+Fay carefully rubbed it the wrong way with a tentative woolly-gloved
+finger. "Plitty, high hat," she cooed. "Can plitty little Fay have it to
+keep?"
+
+But the gentleman's admiration did not carry him as far as this.
+Somewhat hastily he withdrew his hat, smoothed it (it had just been
+ironed) and placed it on his head again. Then he became aware of the
+smiling faces and concentrated gaze of his neighbours; also, that the
+attractive round face that had given him so much pleasure had exchanged
+its captivating smile for a pathetic melancholy that even promised
+tears. He turned extremely red and escaped at the next station.
+Whereupon ungrateful little Fay, who had never had the slightest
+intention of crying, remarked loftily: "Tahsome man dawn."
+
+When at last they reached the Zoo Meg took it upon herself to
+remonstrate with her younger charge.
+
+"You mustn't ask strangers for things, dear; you really mustn't--not in
+the street or in the train."
+
+"What for?" asked Fay. She nearly always said, "What for" when she meant
+"Why"; and it was as hard-worked a phrase as "What nelse?"
+
+"Because people don't do it, you know."
+
+"They do--I've heard 'em."
+
+"Well, beggars perhaps, but not nice little girls."
+
+"Do nasty little girls?"
+
+"_Only_ nasty little girls would do it, I think."
+
+Fay pondered this for a minute, then in a regretfully reflective voice
+she said sadly: "Vat was a nasty, gleedy sahib in a tlain."
+
+"Not at all," Meg argued, struggling with her mirth. "How would you have
+liked it if he'd asked you to give him your bonnet 'to keep'?"
+
+Little Fay hastily put up her hands to her head to be sure her bonnet
+was in its place, then she inquired with great interest: "What's 'is
+place, deah Med?"
+
+"Deah Med" soon found herself followed round by a small crowd of other
+sight-seers who waited for and greeted little Fay's unceasing comments
+with joyful appreciation. Such popular publicity was not at all to Meg's
+taste, and although the afternoon was extremely cold her cheeks never
+ceased to burn till she got the children safely back to the flat again.
+Tony was gloomy and taciturn. Nobody took the slightest notice of him.
+Weather that seemed to brace his sister to the most energetic gaiety
+only made him feel torpid and miserable. He was not naughty, merely
+apathetic, uninterested, and consequently uninteresting. Meg thought he
+might be homesick and sad about Ayah, and was very kind and gentle, but
+her advances met with no response.
+
+By this time Tony was sure of his aunt, but he had by no means made up
+his mind about Meg.
+
+When they got back to Kensington Meg joyously handed over the children
+to Jan while she retired to her room to array herself in her uniform.
+She was to "take over" from that moment, and approached her new sphere
+with high seriousness and an intense desire to be, as she put it, "a
+wild success."
+
+For weeks she had been reading the publications of the P. N. E. U. and
+the "Child-Study Society," to say nothing of Manuals upon "Infant
+Hygiene," "The Montessori Method" and "The Formation of Character."
+Sympathy and Insight, Duty and Discipline, Self-Control and Obedience,
+Regularity and Concentration of Effort--all with the largest
+capitals--were to be her watchwords. And she buttoned on her
+well-fitting white linen apron (newest and most approved hospital
+pattern, which she had been obliged to make herself, for she could buy
+nothing small enough) in a spirit of dedication as sincere as that
+imbuing any candidate for Holy Orders. Then, almost breathlessly, she
+put her cap upon her flaming head and surveyed the general effect in the
+long glass.
+
+Yes, it was all very satisfactory. Well-hung, short, green linen
+frock--was it a trifle short? Yet the little feet in the low-heeled
+shoes were neat as the ankles above them were slim, and one needed a
+short skirt for "working about."
+
+Perhaps there _was_ a touch of musical comedy about her appearance, but
+that was merely because she was so small and the cap, a muslin cap of a
+Quakerish shape, distinctly becoming. Well, there was no reason why she
+should want to look hideous. She would not be less capable because she
+was pleasing to the eye.
+
+She seized her flannel apron from the bed where she had placed it ready
+before she went out, and with one last lingering look at herself went
+swiftly to her new duties.
+
+Tea passed peacefully enough, though Fay asked embarrassing questions,
+such as "Why you wear suts a funny hat?"
+
+"Because I'm an ayah," Meg answered quickly.
+
+"Ayahs don't wear zose kind of hats."
+
+"English ayahs do, and I'm going to be your ayah, you know."
+
+Fay considered Meg for a minute. "No," she said, shaking her head.
+"_No._"
+
+"Have another sponge-finger," Jan suggested diplomatically, handing the
+dish to her niece, and the danger was averted.
+
+They played games with the children after tea and all went well till
+bed-time. Meg had begged Jan to leave them entirely to her, and with
+considerable misgiving she had seen Meg marshal the children to the
+bathroom and shut the door. Tony was asked as a favour to go too this
+first evening without Ayah, lest little Fay should feel lonely. It was
+queer, Jan reflected when left alone in the drawing-room, how she seemed
+to turn to the taciturn Tony for help where her obstreperous niece was
+concerned. Over and over again Tony had intervened and successfully
+prevented a storm.
+
+Meg turned on the bath and began to undress little Fay. She bore this
+with comparative meekness, but when all her garments had been removed
+she slipped from Meg's knees and, standing squarely on the floor,
+announced:
+
+"I want my own Ayah. Engliss Ayah not wass me. Own Ayah muss come bat."
+
+"She can't, my darling; she's gone to other little girls, you know--we
+told you many days ago."
+
+"She muss come bat--'_jaldi_,'" shouted Fay--"jaldi" being Hindustani
+for "quickly."
+
+Meg sighed. "I'm afraid she can't do that. Come, my precious, and let me
+bathe you; you'll get cold standing there."
+
+With a quick movement Meg seized the plump, round body. She was muscular
+though so small, and in spite of little Fay's opposition she lifted her
+into the bath. She felt Tony pull at her skirts and say something, but
+was too busy to pay attention.
+
+Little Fay was in the bath sure enough, but to wash her was quite
+another matter. You may lead a sturdy infant of three to the water in a
+fixed bath, but no power on earth can wash that infant if it doesn't
+choose. Fay screamed and struggled and wriggled and kicked, finally
+slipping right under the water, which frightened her dreadfully; she
+lost her breath for one second, only to give forth ear-splitting yells
+the next. She was slippery as a trout and strong as a leaping salmon.
+
+Jan could bear it no longer and came in. Meg had succeeded in lifting
+the terrified baby out of the bath, and she stood on the square of cork
+defying the "Engliss Ayah," wet from her topmost curl to her pink toes,
+but wholly unwashed.
+
+Tony ran to Jan and under all the din contrived to say: "It's the big
+bath; she's frightened. Ayah never put her in the big bath."
+
+Meg had forgotten this. The little tin bath they had brought from India
+for the voyage stood in a corner.
+
+It was filled, while Fay, wrapped in a Turkish towel, sobbed more
+quietly, ejaculating between the gurgles: "Nasty hat, nasty Engliss
+Ayah. I want my own deah Ayah!"
+
+When the bath was ready poor Meg again approached little Fay, but Fay
+would have none of her.
+
+"No," she wailed, "Engliss Ayah in nasty hat _not_ wass me. Tony wass
+me, _deah_ Tony."
+
+She held out her arms to her brother, who promptly received her in his.
+
+"You'd better let me," he said to the anxious young women. "We'll never
+get her finished else."
+
+So it ended in Tony's being arrayed in the flannel apron which, tied
+under his arm-pits, was not so greatly too long. With his sleeves
+turned up he washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+pointing out somewhat proudly that he "went into all the corners."
+
+[Illustration: He washed his small sister with thoroughness and
+despatch, pointing out ... that he "went into all the corners."]
+
+The washing-glove was very large on Tony's little hand, and he used a
+tremendous lot of soap--but Fay became all smiles and amiability during
+the process. Meg and Jan had tears in their eyes as they watched the
+quaint spectacle. There was something poignantly pathetic in the
+clinging together of these two small wayfarers in a strange country, so
+far from all they had known and shared in their short experience.
+
+Meg's "nasty hat" was rakishly askew upon her red curls, for Fay had
+frequently grabbed at it in her rage, and the beautiful green linen gown
+was sopping wet.
+
+"Engliss Ayah clying!" Fay remarked surprisedly. "What for?"
+
+"Because you wouldn't let me bathe you," said Meg dismally. Her voice
+broke. She really was most upset. As it happened, she did the only thing
+that would have appealed to little Fay.
+
+"Don't cly, deah Med," she said sweetly. "You sall dly me."
+
+And Meg, student of so many manuals, humbly and gratefully accepted the
+task.
+
+It had taken exactly an hour and a quarter to get Fay ready for bed.
+Indian Ayah used to do it in fifteen minutes.
+
+Consistently and cheerfully gracious, Fay permitted Meg to carry her to
+her cot and tuck her in.
+
+Meg lit the night-light and switched off the light, when a melancholy
+voice began to chant:
+
+"_My_ Ayah always dave me a choccly."
+
+Now there was no infant in London less deserving of a choccly at that
+moment than troublesome little Fay. "Nursery Hygiene" proclaimed the
+undeniable fact that sweetmeats last thing at night are most injurious.
+Duty and Discipline and Self-Control should all have pointed out the
+evil of any indulgence of the sort. Yet Meg, with all her theories quite
+fresh and new, and with this excellent opportunity of putting them into
+practice, extracted a choccly from a box on the chest of drawers; and
+when the voice, "like broken music," announced for the third time, "_My_
+Ayah always dave me a choccly," "So will this Ayah," said Meg, and
+popped it into the mouth whence the voice issued.
+
+There was a satisfied smacking and munching for a space, when the voice
+took up the tale:
+
+"Once Tony had thlee----"
+
+But what it was Tony once had "thlee" of Meg was not to know that night,
+for naughty little Fay fell fast asleep.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a week Tony bathed his sister every night. Neither Jan nor Meg felt
+equal to facing and going through again the terrors of that first night
+without Ayah. Little Fay was quite good--she permitted Meg to undress
+her and even to put her in the little bath, but once there she always
+said firmly, "Tony wass me," and Tony did.
+
+Then he burned his hand.
+
+He was never openly and obstreperously disobedient like little Fay. On
+the whole he preferred a quiet life free from contention. But very early
+in their acquaintance Jan had discovered that what Tony determined upon
+that he did, and in this he resembled her so strongly that she felt a
+secret sympathy with him, even when such tenacity of purpose was most
+inconvenient.
+
+He liked to find things out for himself, and no amount of warning or
+prohibition could prevent his investigations. Thus it came about that,
+carefully guarded as the children were from any contact with the fires,
+Tony simply didn't believe what was told him of their dangers.
+
+Fires were new to him. They were so pretty, with their dancing flames,
+it seemed a pity to shut them in behind those latticed guards Auntie Jan
+was so fond of. Never did Tony see the fires without those tiresome
+guards and he wanted to very much.
+
+One afternoon just before tea, while Meg was changing little Fay's
+frock, he slipped across to the drawing-room where Auntie Jan was busy
+writing a letter. Joy! the guard was off the fire; he could sit on the
+rug and watch it undisturbed. He made no noise, but knelt down softly in
+front of it and stretched out his hands to the pleasant warmth. It was
+the sort of fire Tony liked to watch, red at the heart, with little
+curling flames that were mirrored in the tiled hearth.
+
+Jan looked up from her writing and saw him there, saw also that there
+was no guard, but, as little Fay had not yet come, thought Tony far too
+sensible to interfere with the fire in any way. She went on with her
+writing; then when she looked again something in the intentness of his
+attitude caused her to say: "Be sure you don't get too near the fire,
+Tony; it hurts badly to be burned."
+
+"Yes, Auntie Jan," Tony said meekly.
+
+She wrote a few lines more, looked up, and held her breath. It would
+have been an easy matter even then to dash across and put on the guard;
+but in a flash Jan realised that to let Tony burn himself a little at
+that moment might save a very bad accident later on. There was nothing
+in his clothes to catch alight. His woollen jersey fitted closely.
+
+Exactly as though he were going to pick a flower, with curved hand
+outstretched Tony tried to capture and hold one of the dancing flames.
+He drew his hand back very quickly, and Jan expected a loud outcry, but
+none came. He sat back on the hearth-rug and rocked his body to and fro,
+holding the burnt right hand with his left, but he did not utter a
+sound.
+
+"It does hurt, doesn't it?" said Jan.
+
+He started at the quiet voice and turned a little puckered face towards
+her. "Yes," he said, with a big sigh; "but I know now."
+
+"Come with me and I'll put something on it to make it hurt less," said
+Jan, and crossed to the door.
+
+"Hadn't we better," he said, rather breathlessly, "put that thing on for
+fear of Fay?"
+
+Jan carefully replaced the "thing" and took him to her room, where she
+bandaged the poor little hand with carron-oil and cotton-wool. The outer
+edge was scorched from little finger to wrist. She made no remark while
+she did it, and Tony leaned confidingly against her the while.
+
+"Is that better?" she asked, when she had fastened the final safety-pin
+in the bandage. There was one big tear on Tony's cheek.
+
+"It's nice and cool, that stuff. _Why_ does it hurt so, Auntie Jan? It
+looks so kind and pretty."
+
+"It is kind and pretty, only we mustn't go too near. Will you be sure
+and tell Fay how it can hurt?"
+
+"I'll _tell_ her," he promised, but he didn't seem to have much hope of
+the news acting as a deterrent.
+
+When at bed-time Jan announced that Tony could not possibly bathe Fay
+because he mustn't get his hand wet or disturb the dressing, she and Meg
+tremblingly awaited the awful fuss that seemed bound to follow.
+
+But Fay was always unexpected. "Then Med muss wass me," she remarked
+calmly. The good custom was established and Meg began to perk up again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE WHEELS OF CHANCE
+
+
+Meg was out walking with the children in Kensington Gardens, and Hannah
+was paying the tradesmen's books. It was the only way to make Hannah
+take the air, to send her, as she put it, "to do the messages." She
+liked paying the books herself, for she always suspected Jan of not
+counting the change.
+
+Jan was alone in the flat and was laying tea for the children in the
+dining-room when "ting" went the electric bell. She opened the door to
+find upon the threshold an exceedingly tall young man; a well-set-up,
+smart young man with square shoulders, who held out his hand to her,
+saying in a friendly voice: "You may just happen to remember me, Miss
+Ross, but probably not. Colonel Walcote's my uncle, and he's living in
+your house, you know. My name's Middleton ... I _hope_ you remember me,
+for I've come to ask a favour."
+
+As he spoke he gave Jan his card, and on it was "Captain Miles
+Middleton, R. H. A.," and the addresses of two clubs.
+
+She led him to the little drawing-room, bracing herself the while to be
+firm in her refusal if the Walcotes wanted the house any longer, good
+tenants though they were.
+
+She was hopelessly vague about her guest, but felt she had met him
+somewhere. She didn't like to confess how slight her recollection was,
+for he looked so big and brown and friendly it seemed unkind.
+
+He sat down, smoothed his hat, and then with an engaging smile that
+showed his excellent teeth, began: "I've come--it sounds rather
+farcical, doesn't it--about a dog?"
+
+"A dog?" Jan repeated vaguely. "What dog?"
+
+"Well, he's my dog at present, but I want him to be your dog--if you'll
+have him."
+
+"You want to give me a dog--but why? Or do you only want me to keep him
+a bit for you?"
+
+"Well, it's like this, Miss Ross; it would be cheek to ask you to keep a
+young dog, and when you'd had all the trouble of him and got fond of
+him--and you'll get awfully fond of him, if you have him--to take him
+away again. It wouldn't be fair, it really wouldn't ... so...."
+
+"Wait a bit," said the cautious Jan. "What sort of a dog is he ... if it
+is a he...."
+
+"He's a bull-terrier...."
+
+"Oh, but I don't think I'm very fond of bull-terriers ... aren't they
+fierce and doesn't one always associate them with public-houses? I
+couldn't have a fierce dog, you know, because of the two children."
+
+"They're always nice with children," Captain Middleton said firmly. "And
+as for the pothouse idea--that's quite played out. I suppose it was that
+picture with the mug and the clay pipe. He'd _love_ the children; he's
+only a child himself, you know."
+
+"A puppy! Oh, Captain Middleton, wouldn't he eat all our shoes and
+things and tear up all the rugs?"
+
+"I think he's past that, I do really--he'll be a year old on Monday.
+He'll be a splendid watchdog, and he's not a bit deaf--lots of 'em are,
+you know--and he's frightfully well-bred. Just you look at the
+pedigree ..." and Captain Middleton produced from his breast-pocket a
+folded foolscap document which he handed to Jan.
+
+She gazed at it with polite interest, though it conveyed but little to
+her mind. The name "Bloomsbury" seemed to come over and over again.
+There were many dates and other names, but "Bloomsbury" certainly
+prevailed, and it was evident that Captain Middleton's dog had a long
+pedigree; it was all quite clearly set down, and, to Jan, very
+bewildering.
+
+"His points are on the back page," Captain Middleton said proudly, "and
+there isn't a single one a perfect bull-terrier ought to have that
+William Bloomsbury hasn't got."
+
+"Is that his name?"
+
+"Yes, but I call him William, only he is of the famous Bloomsbury
+strain, you know, and one can't help being a bit proud of it."
+
+"But," Jan objected, "if he's so well-bred and perfect, he must be
+valuable--so why should you want to give him to me?"
+
+"I'll explain," said Captain Middleton. "You see, ever since they've
+been down at Wren's End, my aunt kept him for me. He's been so happy
+there, Miss Ross, and grown like anything. We're stationed in St. John's
+Wood just now, you know, and he'd be certain to be stolen if I took him
+back there. And now my aunt's coming to London to a flat in Buckingham
+Gate. Now London's no life for a dog--a young dog, anyway--he'd be
+miserable. I've been down to Wren's End very often for a few days'
+hunting, and I can see he's happy as a king there, and we may be ordered
+anywhere any day ... and I don't want to sell him ... You see, I know if
+you take him you'll be good to him ... and he _is_ such a nice beast."
+
+"How do you know I'd be good to him? You know nothing about me."
+
+"Don't I just! Besides, I've seen you, I'm seeing you now this
+minute ... I don't want to force him on you, only ... a lady living
+alone in the country ought to have a dog, and if you take William you
+won't be sorry--I can promise you that. He's got the biggest heart, and
+he's the nicest beast ... and the most faithful...."
+
+"Are you sure he'll be quite gentle with the children?"
+
+"He's gentle with everybody, and they're well known to be particularly
+good with children ... you ask anyone who knows about dogs. He was given
+me when he was three weeks old, and I could put him in my pocket."
+
+Captain Middleton was rather appealing just then, so earnest and big and
+boyish. His face was broad though lean, the features rather blunt, the
+eyes set wide apart; clear, trustworthy, light-blue eyes. He looked just
+what he was--a healthy, happy, prosperous young Englishman without a
+real care in the world. After all, Jan reflected, there was plenty of
+room at Wren's End, and it was good for the children to grow up with
+animals.
+
+"I had thought of an Airedale," she said thoughtfully, "but----"
+
+"They're good dogs, but quarrelsome--fight all the other dogs round
+about. Now William isn't a fighter unless he's unbearably provoked,
+then, of course, he fights to kill."
+
+"Oh dear!" sighed Jan, "that's an awful prospect. Think of the trouble
+with one's neighbours----"
+
+"But I assure you, it doesn't happen once in a blue moon. I've never
+known him fight yet."
+
+"I'll tell you what, Captain Middleton; let me keep him for the present,
+till you know where you're going to be stationed, and then, if you find
+you can have him, he's there for you to take. I'll do my best for him,
+but I want you to feel he's still your dog...."
+
+"It's simply no end good of you, Miss Ross. I'd like you to have him
+though ... May I put it this way? If you don't like him, find him a
+nuisance or want to get rid of him, you send for me and I'll fetch him
+away directly. But if you like him, he's your dog. There--may I leave it
+at that?"
+
+"We'll try to make him happy, but I expect he'll miss you dreadfully....
+I know nothing about bull-terriers; do they need any special
+treatment?"
+
+"Oh dear, no. William's as strong as a young calf. Just a bone
+occasionally and any scraps there are. There's tons of his biscuits down
+there ... only two meals a day and no snacks between, and as much
+exercise as is convenient--though, mind you, they're easy dogs in that
+way--they don't need you to be racing about all day like some."
+
+The present fate of William Bloomsbury with the lengthy and exalted
+pedigree being settled, Jan asked politely for her tenants, Colonel and
+Mrs. Walcote, heard that it had been an excellent and open season, and
+enjoyed her guest's real enthusiasm about Wren's End.
+
+After a few minutes of general conversation he got up to go. She saw him
+out and rang up the lift, but no lift came. She rang again and again.
+Nothing happened. Evidently something had gone wrong, and she saw people
+walking upstairs to the flats below. Just as she was explaining the
+mishap to her guest, the telephone bell sounded loudly and persistently.
+
+"Oh dear!" she cried. "Would you mind very much stopping a young lady
+with two little children, if you meet them at the bottom of the stairs,
+and tell her she is on no account to carry up little Fay. It's my
+friend, Miss Morton; she's out with them, and she's not at all strong;
+tell her to wait for me. I'll come the minute I've answered this
+wretched 'phone."
+
+"Don't you worry, Miss Ross, I'll stop 'em and carry up the kiddies
+myself," Captain Middleton called as he started to run down, and Jan
+went back to answer the telephone.
+
+He ran fast, for Jan's voice had been anxious and distressed. Five long
+flights did he descend, and at the bottom he met Meg and the children
+just arrived to hear the melancholy news from the hall porter.
+
+Meg always wheeled little Fay to and from the gardens in the funny
+little folding "pram" they had brought from India. The plump baby was a
+tight fit, but the queer little carriage was light and easily managed.
+The big policeman outside the gate often held up the traffic to let Meg
+and her charges get across the road safely, and she would sail serenely
+through the avenue of fiercely panting monsters with Tony holding on to
+her coat, while little Fay waved delightedly to the drivers. That
+afternoon she was very tired, for it had started to rain, cold, gusty
+March rain. She had hurried home in dread lest Tony should take cold. It
+seemed the last straw, somehow, that the lift should have gone wrong.
+She left the pram with the porter and was just bracing herself to carry
+heavy little Fay when this very tall young man came dashing down the
+staircase, saw them and raised his hat. "Miss Morton? Miss Ross has just
+entrusted me with a message ... that I'm to carry her niece upstairs,"
+and he took little Fay out of Meg's arms.
+
+Meg looked up at him. She had to look up a long way--and he looked down
+into a very small white face.
+
+The buffeting wind that had given little Fay the loveliest colour, and
+Tony a very pink nose, only left Meg pallid with fatigue; but she smiled
+at Captain Middleton, and it was a smile of such radiant happiness as
+wholly transfigured her face. It came from the exquisite knowledge that
+Jan had thought of her, had known she would be tired.
+
+To be loved, to be remembered, to be taken care of was to Meg the most
+wonderful thing in the world. It went to her head like wine.
+
+Therefore did she smile at Captain Middleton in this distracting
+fashion. It started tremblingly at the corners of her mouth, and
+then--quite suddenly--her wan little face became dimpled and beseeching
+and triumphant all at once.
+
+It had no connection whatsoever with Captain Middleton, but how was he
+to know that?
+
+It fairly bowled him, middle stump, first ball.
+
+No one had ever smiled at him like that before. It turned him hot and
+cold, and gave him a lump in his throat with the sheer heartrending
+pathos of it. And he felt an insane desire to lie down and ask this
+tiny, tired girl to walk upon him if it would give her the smallest
+satisfaction.
+
+The whole thing passed in a flash, but for him it was one of those
+illuminating beams that discovers a hitherto undreamed-of panorama.
+
+He caught up little Fay, who made no objection, and ran up all five
+flights about as fast as he had run down. Jan was just coming out of the
+flat.
+
+"Here's one!" he cried breathlessly, depositing little Fay. "And now
+I'll go down and give the little chap a ride as well."
+
+He met them half-way up. "Now it's your turn," he said to Tony. "Would
+you like to come on my back?"
+
+Tony, though taciturn, was not unobservant. "I think," he said solemnly,
+"Meg's more tired nor me. P'raps you'd better take her."
+
+Meg laughed, and what the rain and wind could not do, Tony managed. Her
+cheeks grew rosy.
+
+"I'm afraid I should be rather heavy, Tony dear, but it's kind of you to
+think of it."
+
+She looked up at Captain Middleton and smiled again. What a kind world
+it was! And really that tall young man was rather a pleasant person. So
+it fell out that Tony was carried the rest of the way, and he had a
+longer ride than little Fay; for his steed mounted the staircase
+soberly, keeping pace with Meg; they even paused to take breath on the
+landings. And it came about that Captain Middleton went back into the
+flat with the children, showing no disposition to go away, and Jan could
+hardly do less than ask him to share the tea she had laid in the
+dining-room.
+
+There he got a shock, for Meg came to tea in her cap and apron.
+
+Out of doors she wore a long, warm coat that entirely covered the green
+linen frock, and a little round fur hat. This last was a concession to
+Jan, who hated the extinguisher. So Meg looked very much like any other
+girl. A little younger, perhaps, than any young woman of twenty-five
+has any business to look, but pretty in her queer, compelling way.
+
+That she looked even prettier in her uniform Captain Middleton would
+have been the first to allow; but he hated it nevertheless. There seemed
+to him something incongruous and wrong for a girl with a smile like that
+to be anybody's nursemaid.
+
+To be sure, Miss Ross was a brick, and this queer little servant of hers
+called her by her Christian name and contradicted her flatly twice in
+the course of tea. Miss Morton certainly did not seem to be downtrodden
+... but she wore a cap and an apron--a very becoming Quakerish cap ...
+without any strings ... and--"it's a d----d shame," was the outcome of
+all Captain Middleton's reflections.
+
+"Would the man never go?" Jan wondered, when after a prolonged and
+hilarious tea he followed the enraptured children back to the
+drawing-room and did tricks with the fire-irons.
+
+Meg had departed in order to get things ready for the night, and he hung
+on in the hope that she would return. Vain hope; there was no sign of
+her.
+
+He told the children all about William Bloomsbury and exacted promises
+that they would love him very much. He discussed, with many
+interruptions from Fay, who wanted all his attention, the entire
+countryside round about Wren's End; and, at last, as there seemed really
+no chance of that extraordinary girl's return, he heaved his great
+length out of his chair and bade his hostess a reluctant farewell
+several times over.
+
+In the passage he caught sight of Meg going from one room to another
+with her arms full of little garments.
+
+"Ah," he cried, striding towards her. "Good night, Miss Morton. I hope
+we shall meet again soon," and he held out his hand.
+
+Meg ignored the hand, her own arms were so full of clothes: "I'm afraid
+that's not likely," she said, with unfeeling cheerfulness. "We all go
+down to the country on Monday."
+
+"Yes, yes, I know. Jolly part of the world it is, too. I expect I shall
+be thereabouts a good deal this summer, my relations positively swarm in
+that county."
+
+"Good-bye," said Meg, and turned to go. Jan stood at the end of the
+passage, holding the door open.
+
+"I say, Miss Morton, you'll try and like my William, won't you?"
+
+"I like all sensible animals," was Meg's response, and she vanished into
+a bedroom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+PERPLEXITIES
+
+
+"Don't you think it is very extraordinary that I have never had one line
+from Hugo since the letter I got at Aden?" asked Jan.
+
+It was Friday evening, the Indian mail was in, and there was a letter
+from Peter--the fourth since her return.
+
+"But you've heard of him from Mr. Ledgard," Meg pointed out.
+
+"Only that he had gone to Karachi from Bombay just before Fay
+died--surely he would see papers there. It seems so heartless never to
+have written me a line--I can't believe it, somehow, even of Hugo--he
+must be ill or something."
+
+"Perhaps he was ashamed to write. Perhaps he felt you would simply
+loathe him for being the cause of it all."
+
+"I did, I do," Jan exclaimed; "but all the same he is the children's
+father, and he was her husband--I don't want anything very bad to happen
+to him."
+
+"It would simplify things very much," Meg said dreamily.
+
+Jan held up her hand as if to ward off a blow.
+
+"Don't, Meg; sometimes I find myself wishing something of the kind, and
+I know it's wrong and horrible. I want as far as I can to keep in the
+right with regard to Hugo, to give him no grievance against me. I've
+written to that bank where he left the money, and asked them to forward
+the letters if he has left any address. I've told him exactly where we
+are and what we propose to do. Beyond the bare facts of Fay's death--I
+told him all about her illness as dispassionately as I could--I've never
+reproached him or said anything cruel. You see, the man is down and out;
+though Mr. Ledgard always declared he had any amount of mysterious wires
+to pull. Yet, I can't help wondering whether he is ill somewhere, with
+no money and no friends, in some dreadful native quarter."
+
+"What about the money in the bank, then? Did you use it?"
+
+Jan blushed. "No, I couldn't bear to touch his money ... Mr. Ledgard
+said it was idiotic...."
+
+"So it was; it was Fay's money, not his. For all your good sense, Jan,
+sometimes you're sentimental as a schoolgirl."
+
+"I daresay it was stupid, and I didn't dare to tell Mr. Ledgard I'd left
+it," Jan said humbly; "but I felt that perhaps that money might help him
+if things got very desperate; I left it in his name and a letter telling
+him I had done so ... I didn't _give_ him any money...."
+
+"It was precisely the same thing."
+
+"And he may never have got the letter."
+
+"I hope he hasn't."
+
+"Oh, Meg, I do so hate uncertainty. I'd rather know the worst. I always
+have the foreboding that he will suddenly turn up at Wren's End and
+threaten to take the children away ... and get money out of me that way
+... and there's none to spare...."
+
+"Jan, you've got into a thoroughly nervous, pessimistic state about
+Hugo. Why in the world should he _want_ the children? They'd be terribly
+in his way, and wherever he put them he'd have to pay _something_. You
+know very well his people wouldn't keep them for nothing, even if he
+were fool enough (for the sake of blackmailing you) to threaten to place
+them there. His sisters wouldn't--not for nothing. What did Fay say
+about his sisters? I remember one came to the wedding, but she has left
+no impression on my mind. He has two, hasn't he?"
+
+"Yes, but only one came, the Blackpool one. But Fay met both of them,
+for she spent a week-end with each, with Hugo, after she was married."
+
+"Well, and what did she say?"
+
+Jan laughed and sighed: "She said--you remember how Fay could say the
+severest things in the softest, gentlest voice--that 'for social
+purposes they were impossible, but they were doubtless excellent and
+worthy of all esteem and that they were exactly suited to the _milieu_
+in which they lived.'"
+
+"And where do they live?"
+
+"One lives at Blackpool--she's married to ... I forget exactly what he
+is--but it's something to do with letting houses. They're quite well off
+and all her towels had crochet lace at the ends. Fay was much impressed
+by this, as it scratched her nose. They also gave you 'doylies' at
+afternoon tea and no servant ever came into the room without knocking."
+
+"Any children?"
+
+"Yes, three."
+
+"And the other sister?"
+
+"She lives at Poulton-le-Fylde, and her husband had to do with a
+newspaper syndicate. Quite amusing he was, Fay says, but very shaky as
+to the letter 'H.'"
+
+"Would they like the children?"
+
+"They might, for they've none of their own, but they certainly wouldn't
+take them unless they were paid for, as they were not well off. They
+were rather down on the Blackpool sister, Fay said, for extravagance and
+general swank."
+
+"What about the grandparents?"
+
+"In Guernsey? They're quite nice old people, I believe, but
+curiously--of course I'm quoting Fay--comatose and uninterested in
+things, 'behindhand with the world,' she said. They thought Hugo very
+wonderful, and seemed rather afraid of him. What he has told them lately
+I don't know. He wrote very seldom, they said; but _I've_ written to
+them, saying I've got the children and where we shall be. If they
+express a wish to see the children I'll ask them to Wren's End. If, as
+would be quite reasonable, they say it's too far to come--they're old
+people, you know--I suppose one of us would need to take them over to
+Guernsey for a visit. I do so want to do the right thing all round, and
+then they can't say I've kept the children away from their father's
+relations."
+
+"Scotch people always think such a lot about relations," Meg grumbled.
+"I should leave them to stew in their own juice. Why should you bother
+about them if he doesn't?"
+
+"They're all quite respectable, decent folk, you know, though they
+mayn't be our kind. The father, I fancy, failed in business after he
+came back from India. Fay said he was very meek and depressed always. I
+think she was glad none of them came to the wedding except the Blackpool
+sister, for she didn't want Daddie to see them. He thought the Blackpool
+sister dreadful (he told me afterwards that she 'exacerbated his mind
+and offended his eye'), but he was charming to her and never said a word
+to Fay."
+
+"I don't see much sign of Hugo and his people in the children."
+
+"We can't tell, they're so little. One thing does comfort me, they show
+no disposition to tell lies; but that, I think, is because they have
+never been frightened. You see, everyone bowed down before them; and
+whatever Indian servants may be in other respects, they seem to me
+extraordinarily kind and patient with children."
+
+"Jan, what are your views about the bringing up of children?... You've
+never said ... and I should like to know. You see, we're both"--here Meg
+sighed deeply and looked portentously grave--"in a position of awful
+responsibility."
+
+They were sitting on each side of the hearth, with their toes on the
+fender. Meg had been sewing at an overall for little Fay, but at that
+moment she laid it on her knee and ran her hands through her cropped
+hair, then about two inches long all over her head, so that it stood on
+end in broken spirals and feathery curls above her bright eyes. In the
+evening the uniform was discarded "by request."
+
+Jan looked across at her and laughed.
+
+So funny and so earnest; so small, and yet so great with purpose.
+
+"I don't think I've any views. R. L. S. summed up the whole duty of
+children ages ago, and it's our business to see that they do it--that's
+all. Don't you remember:
+
+    A child should always say what's true,
+    And speak when he is spoken to,
+    And behave mannerly at table:
+    At least as far as he is able.
+
+It's no use to expect too much, is it?"
+
+"If you expect to get the second injunction carried out in the case of
+your niece you're a most optimistic person. For three weeks now I've
+been perambulating Kensington Gardens with those children, and I have
+never in the whole course of my life entered into conversation with so
+many strangers, and it's always she who begins it. Then complications
+arise and I have to intervene. I don't mind policemen and park-keepers
+and roadmen, but I rather draw the line at idly benevolent old gentlemen
+who join our party and seem to spend the whole morning with us...."
+
+"But, Meg, that never happens when I'm with you. I confess I've left
+you to it this last week...."
+
+"And what am I here for except to be left to it--I don't mean that
+anyone's rude or pushing--but Miss Tancred _is_ so friendly, and I'm not
+dignified and awe-inspiring like you, you great big Jan; and the poor
+men are encouraged, directly and deliberately encouraged, by your niece.
+I never knew a child with such a continual flow of conversation."
+
+"Poor Meg," said Jan, "you won't have much more of it. Little Fay _is_ a
+handful, I confess; but I always feel it must be a bit hard to be hushed
+continually--and just when one feels particularly bright and sparkling,
+to have all one's remarks cut short...."
+
+"You needn't pity that child. No amount of hushing has any effect; you
+might just as well hush a blackbird or a thrush. Don't look so worried,
+Jan. Did Mr. Ledgard say anything about Hugo in that letter to-night?"
+
+"Only that he was known to have left Karachi in a small steamer going
+round the coast, but after that nothing more. Mr. Ledgard has a friend
+in the Police, and even there they've heard nothing lately. I think
+myself the Indian Government _wants_ to lose sight of Hugo. He's
+inconvenient and disgraceful, and they'd like him blotted out as soon as
+possible."
+
+"What else does Mr. Ledgard say? He seems to write good long letters."
+
+"He is coming home at the end of April for six months."
+
+"Oh ... then we shall see him, I suppose?"
+
+"I hope so."
+
+Meg looked keenly at Jan, who was staring into the fire, her eyes soft
+and dreamy; and almost as if she was unconsciously thinking aloud, she
+said: "I do hope, if Hugo chooses to turn up, he'll wait till Mr.
+Ledgard is back in England."
+
+"You think he could manage him?"
+
+"I know he could."
+
+"Then let us pray for his return," said Meg.
+
+The clock on the mantelpiece struck eleven.
+
+"Bed-time," said Meg, "but I must have just one cigarette first. That's
+what's so lovely about being with you, Jan--you don't mind. Of course
+I'd never do it before the children."
+
+"You wouldn't shock them if you did. Fay smoked constantly."
+
+Meg lit her cigarette and clearly showed her real enjoyment. She had
+taken to it first when she was about fifteen, as she found it helped her
+to feel less hungry. Now it had become as much a necessity to her as to
+many men, and the long abstinence of term-time had always been a
+penance.
+
+She made some good rings, and, leaning forward to look through them at
+Jan, said: "By the way, I must just tell you that for the last three
+afternoons we've met that Captain Middleton in the Gardens."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"And he talks everlastingly about his dog--that William Bloomsbury
+creature. I know _all_ the points of a bull-terrier now--'Well-set head
+gradually tapering to muzzle, which is very powerful and well-filled up
+in front of the eyes. Nose large and black. Teeth dead-level and big'
+... oh! and reams more, every bit of him accurately described."
+
+"I'm a little afraid of those teeth so 'dead-level and big'--I foresee
+trouble."
+
+"Oh, no," said Meg easily. "He's evidently a most affectionate brute.
+That young man puzzles me. He's manifestly devoted to the dog, but he's
+so sure he'd be stolen he'd rather have him away from him down at Wren's
+End than here with him, to run that risk."
+
+"Surely," said Jan, "Kensington Gardens are some distance from St.
+John's Wood."
+
+"So one would think, but the rich and idle take taxis, and he seems to
+think he can in some way insure the welfare of his dog through the
+children and me."
+
+"And what about the old gentlemen? Do they join the party as well?"
+
+"Oh, dear no; no old gentlemen would dare to come within miles of us
+with that young man in charge of little Fay. He's like your Mr.
+Ledgard--very protective."
+
+"I like him for being anxious about his dog, but I'm not quite so sure
+that I approve of the means he takes to insure its happiness."
+
+"I didn't encourage him in the least, I assure you. I pointed out that
+he most certainly ought not to be walking about with a nurse and two
+children. That the children without the nurse would be all right, but
+that my being there made the whole thing highly inexpedient, and _infra
+dig_."
+
+"Meg!... you didn't!"
+
+"I did, indeed. There was no use mincing matters."
+
+"And what did he say?"
+
+"He said, 'Oh, that's all bindles'--whatever that may mean."
+
+"You mustn't go to the Gardens alone any more. I'll come with you
+to-morrow, or, better still, we'll all go to Kew if it's fine."
+
+"I _should_ be glad, though I grudge the fares; but you needn't come. I
+know how busy you are, with Hannah away and so much to see to--and what
+earthly use am I if I can't look after the children without you?"
+
+"You do look after the children without me for hours and hours on end. I
+could never trust anyone else as I do you."
+
+"I _am_ getting to manage them," Meg said proudly; "but just to-day I
+must tell you--it was rather horrid--we came face to face with the
+Trents in the Baby's Walk. Mrs. Trent and Lotty, the second girl, the
+big, handsome one--and he evidently knows them...."
+
+"Who evidently knows them?"
+
+"Captain Middleton, silly! (I told you he was with us, talking about his
+everlasting dog)--and they greeted him with effusion, so he had to stop.
+But you can imagine how they glared at me. Of course I walked on with
+Tony, but little Fay had his hand--I was wheeling the go-cart thing and
+she stuck firmly to him, and I heard her interrupting the conversation
+all the time. He followed us directly, I'll say that for him, but it was
+a bad moment ... You see, they had a right to glare...."
+
+"They had nothing of the kind. I wish I got the chance of glaring at
+them. Daddie _saw_ Mrs. Trent; he explained everything, and she said she
+quite understood."
+
+"She would, to him, he was so nice always; but you see, Jan, I know what
+she believes and what she has said, and what she will probably say to
+Captain Middleton if she gets the chance."
+
+Meg's voice broke. "Of course I don't care----"
+
+She held her tousled head very high and stuck out her sharp little chin.
+
+"My dear," said Jan, "what with my gregarious niece and my
+too-attractive nurse, I think it's a good thing we're all going down to
+Wren's End, where the garden-walls are high and the garden fairly large.
+Besides all that, there will be that dog with the teeth 'dead-level and
+big.'"
+
+"Remember," said Meg. "He treated me like a princess always."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+WREN'S END
+
+
+It stands just beyond the village of Amber Guiting, on the side furthest
+from the station, which is a mile from the village.
+
+"C. C. S. 1819" is carved above the front door, but the house was built
+a good fifty years previous to that date.
+
+One Charles Considine Smith, who had been a shipper of sherry in
+Billiter Street, in the City of London, bought it in that year from a
+Quaker called Solomon Page, who planted the yew hedge that surrounds the
+smooth green lawn seen from the windows of the morning-room. There was a
+curious clause attached to the title-deeds, which stipulated that no
+cats should be kept by the owner of Wren's End, lest they should
+interfere with the golden-crested wrens that built in the said yew
+hedge, or the brown wrens building at the foot of the hedges in the
+orchard. Appended to this injunction were the following verses:
+
+    If aught disturb the wrens that build,
+    If ever little wren be killed
+    By dweller in Wren's End--
+
+    Misfortunes--whence he shall not know--
+    Shall fall on him like noiseless snow,
+    And all his steps attend.
+
+    Peace be upon this house; and all
+    That dwell therein good luck befall,
+    That do the wrens befriend.
+
+Charles Considine Smith faithfully kept to his agreement regarding the
+protection of the wrens, and much later wrote a series of articles upon
+their habits, which appeared in the _North Cotswold Herald_. He seems to
+have been on friendly terms with Solomon Page, who, having inherited a
+larger property in the next county, removed thence when he sold Wren's
+End.
+
+In 1824 Smith married Tranquil Page, daughter of Solomon. She was then
+thirty-seven years old, and, according to one of her husband's diaries,
+"a staid person like myself." She was twenty years younger than her
+husband and bore him one child, a daughter also named Tranquil.
+
+She, however, appears to have been less staid than her parents, for she
+ran away before she was twenty with a Scottish advocate called James
+Ross.
+
+The Smiths evidently forgave the wilful Tranquil, for, on the death of
+Charles, she and her husband left Scotland and settled with her mother
+at Wren's End. She had two children, Janet, the great-aunt who left Jan
+Wren's End, and James, Jan's grandfather, who was sent to Edinburgh for
+his education, and afterwards became a Writer to the Signet. He married
+and settled in Edinburgh, preferring Scotland to England, and it was
+with his knowledge and consent that Wren's End was left to his sister
+Janet.
+
+Janet never married. She was energetic, prudent, and masterful, having
+an excellent head for business. She was kind to her nephews and nieces
+in a domineering sort of way, and had always a soft place in her heart
+for Anthony, though she regarded him as more or less of a scatter-brain.
+When she was nearly eighty she commanded his little girls to visit her.
+Jan was then fourteen and Fay eleven. She liked them because they had
+good manners and were neither of them in the least afraid of her. And at
+her death, six years later, she left Wren's End to Jan absolutely--as it
+stood; but she left her money to Anthony's elder brother, who had a
+large family and was not particularly well off.
+
+That year was a good artistic year for Anthony, and he spent over five
+hundred pounds in--as he put it--"making Jan's house habitable."
+
+This proved not a bad investment, for they had let it every winter since
+to Colonel Walcote for the hunting season, as three packs of hounds met
+within easy reach of it; and although the stabling accommodation at
+Wren's End was but small, plenty of loose boxes were always obtainable
+from Farmer Burgess quite near.
+
+Amber Guiting is a big village, almost a little town. It possesses an
+imposing main street wherein are several shops, among them a stationer's
+with a lending library in connection with Mudie's; a really beautiful
+old inn with a courtyard; and grave-looking, dignified houses occupied
+by the doctor, a solicitor, and several other persons of acknowledged
+gentility.
+
+There were many "nice places" round about, and altogether the
+inhabitants of Amber Guiting prided themselves, with some reason, on the
+social and æsthetic advantages of their neighbourhood. Moreover, it is
+not quite three hours from Paddington. You catch the express from the
+junction.
+
+Notwithstanding all these agreeable circumstances, William Bloomsbury
+was very lonely and miserable.
+
+All the friends he knew and loved had gone, leaving him in the somewhat
+stepmotherly charge of a caretaker from the village, who was supposed to
+be getting the house ready for its owner. To join her came
+Hannah--having left her young ladies with an "orra-buddy" in the flat.
+And after Hannah came the caretaker-lady did not stop long, for their
+ideas on the subject of cleanliness were diametrically opposed. Hannah
+was faithful and punctual as regarded William's meals; but though his
+body was more comfortable than during the caretaker's reign, his heart
+was empty and hungry, and he longed ardently for social intercourse and
+an occasional friendly pat.
+
+Presently in Hannah's train came Anne Chitt, a meek young assistant from
+the village, who did occasionally gratify William's longing for a little
+attention; but so soon as she began to pat him and say he was a good
+dog, she was called away by Hannah to sweep or dust or wash something.
+In William's opinion the whole house was a howling wilderness where
+pails of water easily upset, and brooms that fell upon the unsuspecting
+with resounding blows lay ambushed in unexpected places.
+
+Men and dogs alike abhor "spring-cleaning," and William's heart died
+within him.
+
+There came a day, however, when things were calmer. The echoing,
+draughty house grew still and warm, and a fire was lit in the hall.
+William lay in front of it unmolested; but he felt dejected and lonely,
+and laid his head down on his crossed paws in patient melancholy.
+
+Late in the afternoon, there came a sound of wheels in the drive. Hannah
+and Anne Chitt, decorous in black dresses and clean aprons, came into
+the hall and opened the front door, and in three minutes William knew
+that happier times were in store for him. The "station-fly" stopped at
+the door, and regardless of Hannah's reproving voice he rushed out to
+welcome the strangers. Two children, nice children, who appeared as glad
+to see him as he was to see them, who wished him many happy returns of
+his birthday--William had forgotten it was his birthday--and were as
+lavish with pats and what little Fay called "stlokes" as Hannah had been
+niggardly. There were also two young ladies, who addressed him kindly
+and seemed pleasantly aware of his existence, and William liked young
+ladies, for the three Miss Walcotes had thoroughly spoiled him. But he
+decided to attach himself most firmly to the children and the very small
+young lady. Perhaps they would stay. In his short experience grown
+people had a cruel way of disappearing. There was that tall young man
+... William hardly dared let himself think about that tall young man who
+had allowed him to lie upon his bed and was so kind and jolly. "Master"
+William had called him. Ah, where was he? Perhaps he would come back
+some day. In the meantime here were plenty of people to love. William
+cheered up.
+
+[Illustration: William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ... nice
+children.]
+
+He wished to ingratiate himself, and proceeded to show off his one
+accomplishment. With infinite difficulty and patience the Miss Walcotes
+had taught him to "give a paw"; so now, on this first evening, William
+followed the children about solemnly offering one paw and then the
+other; a performance which was greeted with acclamation.
+
+When the children went to the bathroom he somehow got shut outside. So
+he lay down and breathed heavily through the bottom of the door and
+varied this by thin, high-pitched yelps--which were really squeals, and
+very extraordinary as proceeding from such a large and heavy dog.
+
+"William wants to come in," Tony said. He still always accompanied his
+sister to the bath.
+
+Meg was seized with an inspiration. "I know why," she exclaimed. "He
+expects to see little Fay in the big bath."
+
+Fay looked from Meg to her brother and from her brother to Meg.
+
+Another dismal squeal from under the door.
+
+"Does he tluly espect it?" she asked anxiously.
+
+"I think so," Meg said gravely, "and we can't let him in if you're going
+to be washed in the little bath; he'd be so disappointed."
+
+The little bath stood ready on its stand. Fay turned her back upon it
+and went and looked over the edge of the big bath. It was a very big
+bath, white and beautiful, with innumerable silvered handles that
+produced sprays and showers and waves and all sorts of wonders. An
+extravagance of Anthony's.
+
+"Will William come in, too?" she asked.
+
+"No; he'd make such a mess; but he'd love to see you. We'll all bathe
+William some other time."
+
+More squeals from outside, varied by dolorous snores.
+
+"Let him in," said little Fay. "I'll show him me."
+
+Quick as thought Meg lifted her in, opened the door to the delighted
+William, who promptly stood on his hind legs, with his front paws on the
+bath, and looked over the edge at little Fay.
+
+"See me swim," she exclaimed proudly, sitting down in the water, while
+William, with his tongue hanging out and a fond smile of admiration on
+his foolish countenance, tried to lick the plump pink shoulders
+presented to his view. "This is a muts nicer baff than the nasty little
+one. I can't think what you bringed it for, deah Med."
+
+"Deah Med" and Tony nodded gaily to one another.
+
+Hannah had made William sleep in the scullery, which he detested. She
+put his basket there and his blanket, and he was warm enough, but
+creature comforts matter little to the right kind of dog. It's human
+fellowship he craves. That night she came to fetch him at bed-time, and
+he refused point-blank to go. He put his head on Meg's knee and gazed at
+her with beseeching eyes that said as plainly as possible: "Don't banish
+me--where you go I go--don't break my heart and send me away into the
+cold."
+
+Perhaps the cigarette smoke that hung about Meg gave him confidence. His
+master smelt like that. And William went to bed with his master.
+
+"D'you think he might sleep in the dressing-room?" Meg asked. "I know
+how young dogs hate to be alone at night. Put his basket there,
+Hannah--I'll let him out and see to him, and you could get him first
+thing in the morning."
+
+Hannah gave a sniff of disapproval, but she was always very careful to
+do whatever Meg asked her at once and ungrudgingly. It was partly an
+expression of her extreme disapproval of the uniform. But Meg thought it
+was prompted entirely by Hannah's fine feeling, and loved her dearly in
+consequence.
+
+Nearly all the bedrooms at Wren's End had dressing-rooms. Tony slept in
+Jan's, with the door between left open. Fay's little cot was drawn up
+close to Meg's bed. William and his basket occupied the dressing-room,
+and here, also, the door was left open.
+
+While Meg undressed, William was quite still and quiet, but when she
+knelt down to say her prayers he was overcome with curiosity, and,
+getting out of his basket, lurched over to her to see what she was
+about. Could she be crying that she covered her face? William couldn't
+bear people to cry.
+
+He thrust his head under her elbow. She put her arm round his neck and
+he sat perfectly still.
+
+"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"I like to look at it," said Tony.
+
+"Oh, London may be very gay, but it's nothing to the countryside," sang
+Meg.
+
+"What nelse?" inquired little Fay, who could never be content with a
+mere snatch of song.
+
+"Oh, there's heaps and heaps of nelse," Jan answered. "Come along,
+chicks, we'll go and see everything. This is home, you know, where dear
+Mummy wanted you to be."
+
+It was their first day at Wren's End, and the weather was kind. They
+were all four in the drive, looking back at the comfortable
+stone-fronted Georgian house. The sun was shining, a cheerful April sun
+that had little warmth in it but much tender light; and this showed how
+all around the hedges were getting green; that buds were bursting from
+brown twigs, as if the kind spring had covered the bare trees with a
+thin green veil; and that all sorts of green spears were thrusting up in
+the garden beds.
+
+Down the drive they all four ran, accompanied by a joyfully galumphing
+William, who was in such good spirits that he occasionally gave vent to
+a solemn deep-chested bark.
+
+When they came to the squat grey lodge, there was Mrs. Earley standing
+in her doorway to welcome them. Mrs. Earley was Earley's mother, and
+Earley was gardener and general factotum at Wren's End. Mrs. Earley
+looked after the chickens, and when she had exchanged the news with Jan,
+and rather tearfully admired "poor Mrs. Tancred's little 'uns," she
+escorted them all to the orchard to see the cocks and hens and chickens.
+Then they visited the stable, where Placid, the pony, was sole occupant.
+In former years Placid had been kept for the girls to drive in the
+governess-cart and to pull the heavy lawn-mower over the lawns. And
+Hannah had been wont to drive him into Amesberrow every Sunday, that she
+might attend the Presbyterian church there. She put him up at a
+livery-stable near her church and always paid for him herself. Anthony
+Ross usually had hired a motor for the summer months. Now they would
+depend entirely on Placid and a couple of bicycles for getting about.
+All round the walled garden did they go, and Meg played horses with the
+children up and down the broad paths while Jan discussed vegetables with
+Earley. And last of all they went to the back door to ask Hannah for
+milk and scones, for the keen, fresh air had made them all hungry.
+
+Refreshed and very crumby, they were starting out again when Hannah laid
+a detaining hand on Jan's arm: "Could you speak a minute, Miss Jan?"
+
+The children and Meg gone, Hannah led the way into the kitchen with an
+air of great mystery; but she did not shut the doors, as Anne Chitt was
+busy upstairs.
+
+"What is it, Hannah?" Jan asked nervously, for she saw that this
+summons portended something serious.
+
+"It's about Miss Morton I want to speak, Miss Jan. I was in hopes she'd
+never wear they play-acting claes down here ..." (when Hannah was deeply
+earnest she always became very Scotch), "but it seems I hoped in vain.
+And what am I to say to ither folk when they ask me about her?"
+
+"What is there to say, Hannah, except that she is my dear friend, and by
+her own wish is acting as nurse to my sister's children?"
+
+"I ken that; I'm no sayin' a word against that; but first of all she
+goes and crops her hair--fine hair she had too, though an awfu-like
+colour--and not content with flying in the face of Providence that way,
+she must needs dress like a servant. And no a weiss-like servant,
+either, but one o' they besoms ye see on the hoardings in London wha act
+in plays. Haven't I seen the pictures mysel'? 'The Quaker Gerrl,' or
+some such buddy."
+
+"Oh, I assure you, Hannah, Miss Morton in no way resembles those ladies,
+and I can't see that it's any business of ours what she wears. You know
+that she certainly does what she has undertaken to do in the best way
+possible."
+
+"I'm no saying a word against her wi' the children, and there never was
+a young lady who gave less trouble, save in the way o' tobacco ash, and
+was more ready to help--but yon haverals is very difficult to explain.
+_You_ may understand, Miss Jan. I may _say_ I understand--though I
+don't--but who's to make the like o' that Anne Chitt understand? Only
+this morning she keeps on at me wi' her questions like the clapper o' a
+bell. 'Is she a servant? If she's no, why does she wear servants' claes?
+Why does she have hair like a boy? Has she had a fever or something
+wrong wi' her heid? Is she one of they suffragette buddies and been in
+prison?'--till I was fair deeved and bade the lassie hold her tongue.
+But so it will be wherever Miss Morton goes in they fantastic claes.
+Now, Miss Jan, tell me the honest truth--did you ever see a
+self-respecting, respectable servant in the like o' yon? Does she _look_
+like any servant you've ever heard tell of out of a stage-play?"
+
+"Not a bit, Hannah; she looks exactly like herself, and therefore not in
+the least like any other person. Don't you worry. Miss Morton requires
+no explanation. All we must do is to see that she doesn't overwork
+herself."
+
+"Then ye'll no speak to her, Miss Jan?"
+
+"Not I, Hannah. Why should I dictate to her as to what she wears? She
+doesn't dictate to me."
+
+This was not strictly true, for Meg was most interfering in the matter
+of Jan's clothes. Hannah shook her head. "I thocht it my duty to speak,
+Miss Jan, and I'll say no more. But it's sheer defiance o' her Maker to
+crop her heid and to clothe herself in whim-whams, when she could be
+dressed like a lady; and I'm real vexed she should make such an object
+of herself when she might just be quite unnoticeable, sae wee and
+shelpit as she is."
+
+"I'm afraid," said Jan, "that Miss Morton will never be quite
+unnoticeable, whatever she may wear. But don't let us talk about it any
+more. You understand, don't you, Hannah?"
+
+When Jan's voice took that tone Hannah knew that further argument was
+unavailing.
+
+Jan turned to go, and saw Tony waiting for her in the open doorway.
+Neither of them had either heard or seen him come.
+
+Quite silently he took her hand and did not speak till they were well
+away from the house. Meg and little Fay were nowhere in sight. Jan
+wondered how much he had heard.
+
+"She's a very proud cook, isn't she?" he said presently.
+
+"She's a very old servant," Jan explained, "who has known me all my
+life."
+
+"If," said Tony, as though after deep thought, "she gets very
+chubbelsome, you send for me. Then I will go to her and say '_Jāŏ!_'"
+Tony followed this up by some fluent Hindustani which, had Jan but known
+it, seriously reflected on the character of Hannah's female ancestry.
+"I'll say '_Jāŏ!_'," he went on. "I'll say it several times very loud,
+and point to the door. Then she'll roll up her bedding, and you'll give
+her money and her chits, and she will depart."
+
+They had reached a seat. On this Jan sank, for the vision of Tony
+pointing majestically down the drive while little Hannah staggered into
+the distance under a rolled-up mattress, was too much for her.
+
+"But I don't want her to go," she gasped. "I love her dearly."
+
+"She should not speak to you like that; she scolded you," he said
+firmly. "She is a servant ... She _is_ a servant?" he added doubtfully.
+
+"How much did you hear of what she said? Did you understand?"
+
+"I came back directly to fetch you, I thought she _sounded_ cross. Mummy
+was afraid when people were cross; she liked me to be with her. I
+thought you would like me to be with you. If she was very rude I could
+beat her. I beat the boy--not Peter's boy, our boy--he was rude to
+Mummy. He did not dare to touch me because I am a sahib ... I will beat
+Hannah if you like."
+
+Tony stood in front of Jan, very earnest, with an exceedingly pink nose,
+for the wind was keen. He had never before said so much at one time.
+
+"Shall I go back and beat her?" he asked again.
+
+"Certainly not," Jan cried, clutching Tony lest he should fly off there
+and then. "We don't _do_ such things here at home. Nobody is beaten,
+ever. I'm sure Peter never beats his servants."
+
+"No," Tony allowed. "A big sahib must not strike a servant, but I can,
+and I do if they are rude. She was rude about Meg."
+
+"She didn't mean to be rude."
+
+"She found fault with her clothes and her hair. She is a very proud and
+impudent cook."
+
+"Tony dear, you really don't understand. She wasn't a bit rude. She was
+afraid other people might mistake Meg for a servant. She was all _for_
+Meg--truly she was."
+
+"She scolded you," he rejoined obstinately.
+
+"Not really, Tony; she didn't mean to scold."
+
+Tony looked very hard at Jan.
+
+In silence they stared at one another for quite a minute. Jan got up off
+the seat.
+
+"Let's go and find the others," she said.
+
+"She is a very proud cook," Tony remarked once more.
+
+Jan sighed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+That night while she was getting ready for bed Tony woke up. His cot was
+placed so that he could see into Jan's room, and the door between was
+always left open. She was standing before the dressing-table, taking
+down her hair.
+
+Unlike the bedrooms at the flat, the room was not cold though both the
+windows were open. Wren's End was never cold, though always fresh, for
+one of Anthony's earliest improvements had been a boiler-house and
+central heating, with radiators set under the windows, so that they
+could always stand open.
+
+Jan had not put on her dressing-gown, and her night-dress had rather
+short, loose sleeves that fell back from her arms as she raised them.
+
+He watched the white arm wielding the brush with great pleasure; he
+decided he liked to look at it.
+
+"Auntie Jan!"
+
+She turned and flung her hair back from her face in a great silver
+cloud.
+
+"You awake, sonny! Did I make a noise?"
+
+"No, I just woke. Auntie Jan, will Daddie ever come here?"
+
+"I expect so."
+
+"Well, listen. If he does, he shan't take your things, your pretty
+twinkly things. I won't let him."
+
+Jan stood as if turned to stone.
+
+"He took Mummy's. I saw him; I couldn't stop him, I was so little. But
+she _said_--she said it twice before she went away from that last
+bungalow--she said: 'Take care of Auntie Jan, Tony; don't let Daddie
+take her things.' So I won't."
+
+Tony was sitting up. His room was all in darkness; two candles were lit
+on Jan's dressing-table. He could see her, but she couldn't see him.
+
+She came to him, stooped over him, and laid her cheek against his so
+that they were both veiled with her hair. "Darling, I don't think poor
+Daddie would want to take my things. You must try not to think hardly of
+Daddie."
+
+Tony parted the veil of hair with a gentle hand so that they could both
+see the candles.
+
+"You don't know my Daddie ... much," he said, "do you?"
+
+Jan shuddered.
+
+"I saw him," he went on in his queer little unemotional voice. "I saw
+him take all her pretty twinkly things; and her silver boxes. I'm glad I
+sleep here."
+
+"Did she mind much?" Jan whispered.
+
+"I don't know. She didn't see him take them, only me. She hadn't come to
+bed. She never said nothing to me--only about you."
+
+"I don't expect," Jan made a great effort to speak naturally, "that
+Daddie would care about my things ... It's different, you see."
+
+"I'm glad I sleep here," Tony repeated, "and there's William only just
+across the passage."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+"THE BLUDGEONINGS OF CHANCE"
+
+
+They had been at Wren's End nearly three weeks, and sometimes Jan
+wondered if she appeared to Tony as unlike her own conception of herself
+as Tony's of his father was unlike what she had pictured him.
+
+She knew Hugo Tancred to be dishonest, shifty, and wholly devoid of a
+sense of honour, but she had up till quite lately always thought of him
+as possessing a lazy sort of good-nature.
+
+Tony was changing this view.
+
+He was not yet at all talkative, but every now and then when he was
+alone with her he became frank and communicative, as reserved people
+often will when suddenly they let themselves go. And his very simplicity
+gave force to his revelations.
+
+During their last year together in India it was evident that downright
+antagonism had existed between Hugo Tancred and his little son. Tony had
+weighed his father and found him wanting; and it was clear that he had
+tried to insert his small personality as a buffer between his father and
+mother.
+
+Jan talked constantly to the children of their mother. Her portraits,
+Anthony's paintings and sketches, were all over the house, in every
+variety of happy pose. One of the best was hung at the foot of Tony's
+cot. The gentle blue eyes seemed to follow him in wistful benediction,
+and alone in bed at night he often thought of her, and of his home in
+India. It was, then, quite natural that he should talk of them to this
+Auntie Jan who had evidently loved his mother well; and from Tony Jan
+learned a good deal more about her brother-in-law than she had ever
+heard from his wife.
+
+Tony loved to potter about with his aunt in the garden. She worked
+really hard, for there was much to do, and he tried his best to assist,
+often being a very great hindrance; but she never sent him away, for she
+desired above all things to gain his confidence.
+
+One day after a hard half-hour's weeding, when Tony had wasted much time
+by pulling up several sorts of the wrong thing, Jan felt her temper
+getting edgy, so they sat down to rest upon one of the many convenient
+seats to be found at Wren's End. Anthony hated a garden where you
+couldn't sit comfortably and smoke, wheresoever the prospect was
+pleasing.
+
+Tony sat down too, looking almost rosy after his labours.
+
+He didn't sit close and cuddly, as little Fay would have done, but right
+at the other end of the seat, where he could stare at her. Every day was
+bringing Tony more surely to the conclusion that "he liked to look at"
+his aunt.
+
+"You like Meg, don't you?" he said.
+
+"No," Jan shook her head. "I don't like her. I love her; which is quite
+a different thing."
+
+"Do you like people and love them?"
+
+"I like some people--a great many people--then there are others, not so
+many, that I love--you're one of them."
+
+"Is Fay?"
+
+"Certainly, dear little Fay."
+
+"And Peter?"
+
+For a moment Jan hesitated. With heightened colour she met Tony's grave,
+searching eyes. Above everything she desired to be always true and
+sincere with him, that he might, as on that first night in England, feel
+that he "believed" her. "I have every reason to love Mr. Ledgard," she
+said slowly: "he was so wonderfully kind to all of us." She was
+determined to be loyal to Peter with poor Fay's children. Jan hated
+ingratitude. To have said she only liked Peter must have given Tony the
+impression that she was both forgetful and ungrateful. She would not
+risk that even though she might risk misunderstanding of another kind if
+he ever repeated her words to anybody else.
+
+Her heart beat rather faster than was comfortable, and she was thankful
+that she and Tony were alone.
+
+"Who _do_ you like?" he asked.
+
+"Nearly everybody; the people in the village, our good neighbours ...
+Can't you see the difference yourself? Now, you love your dear Mummy and
+you like ... say, William----"
+
+"No," Tony said firmly, "I love William. I don't think," he went on, "I
+like people ... much. Either I love them like you said, or I don't care
+about them at all ... or I hate them."
+
+"That," said Jan, "is a mistake. It's no use to hate people."
+
+"But if you feel like it ... I hate people if they cheat me."
+
+"But who on earth would cheat you? What do you mean?"
+
+"Once," said Tony, and by the monotonous, detached tone of his voice Jan
+knew he was going to talk about his father, "my Daddie asked me if I'd
+like to see smoke come out of his ears ... an' he said: 'Put your hand
+here on me and watch very careful.'" Tony pointed to Jan's chest. "I put
+my hand there and I watched and watched an' he hurt me with the end of
+his cigar. There's the mark!" He held out a grubby little hand, back
+uppermost, for Jan's inspection, and there, sure enough, was the little
+round white scar.
+
+"And what did you do?" she asked.
+
+"I bit him."
+
+"Oh, Tony, how dreadful!"
+
+"I shouldn't of minded so much if he'd really done it--the smoke out of
+his ears, I mean; but not one teeniest little puff came. I watched so
+careful ... He cheated me."
+
+Jan said nothing. What could she say? Hot anger burned in her heart
+against Hugo. She could have bitten him herself.
+
+"Peter was there," Tony went on, "and Peter said it served him right."
+
+"Yes," said Jan, grasping at this straw, "but what did Peter say to
+you?"
+
+"He said, 'Sahibs don't cry and sahibs don't bite,' and if I was a sahib
+I mustn't do it, so I don't. I don't bite people often."
+
+"I should hope not; besides, you know, sometimes quite good-natured
+people will do things in fun, never thinking it will hurt."
+
+Tony gazed gloomily at Jan. "He cheated me," he repeated. "He said he
+would make it come out of his ears, and it didn't. He didn't like
+me--that's why."
+
+"I don't think you ought to say that, and be so unforgiving. I expect
+Daddie forgot all about your biting him directly, and yet you remember
+what he did after this long time."
+
+Poor Jan did try so hard to be fair.
+
+"I wasn't afraid of him," Tony went on, as though he hadn't heard, "not
+really. Mummy was. She was drefully afraid. He said he'd whip me because
+I was so surly, and she was afraid he would ... I _knew_ he wouldn't,
+not unless he could do it some cheaty way, and you can't whip people
+that way. But it frightened Mummy. She used to send me away when he
+came...."
+
+Tony paused and knitted his brows, then suddenly he smiled. "But I
+always came back very quick, because I knew she wanted me, and I liked
+to look at him. He liked Fay, I suppose he liked to look at her, so do
+I. Nobody wants to look at me ... much ... except Mummy."
+
+"I do," Jan said hastily. "I like to look at you just every bit as much
+as I like to look at Fay. I think you care rather too much what people
+look like, Tony."
+
+"It does matter a lot," Tony said obstinately.
+
+"Other things matter much more. Courage and kindness and truth and
+honesty. Look at Mr. Ledgard--he's not what you'd call a beautiful
+person, and yet I'm sure we all like to look at him."
+
+"Sometimes you say Peter, and sometimes Mr. Ledgard. Why?"
+
+Again Jan's heart gave that queer, uncomfortable jump. She certainly
+always _thought_ of him as Peter. Quite unconsciously she occasionally
+spoke of him as Peter. Meg had observed this, but, unlike Tony, made no
+remark.
+
+"Why?" Tony repeated.
+
+"I suppose," Jan mumbled feebly, "it's because I hear the rest of you do
+it. I've no sort of right to."
+
+"Auntie Jan," Tony said earnestly. "What is a devil?"
+
+"I haven't the remotest idea, Tony," Jan replied, with the utmost
+sincerity.
+
+"It isn't anything very nice, is it, or nice to look at?"
+
+"It might be," said Jan, with Scottish caution.
+
+"Daddie used to call me a surly little devil--when I used to come back
+because Mummy was frightened ... she was always frightened when he
+talked about money, and he did it a lot ... When he saw me, he would
+say: 'Wot you doing here, you surly little devil--listening, eh?'"
+Tony's youthful voice took on such a snarl that Jan positively jumped,
+and put out her hand to stop him. "'I'll give you somefin to listen
+to....'"
+
+"Tony, Tony, couldn't you try to forget all that?"
+
+Tony shook his head. "No! I shall never forget it, because, you see,
+it's all mixed up with Mummy so, and you said"--here Tony held up an
+accusing small finger at Jan--"you said I was never to forget her, not
+the least little bit."
+
+"I know I did," Jan owned, and fell to pondering what was best to be
+done about these memories. Absently she dug her hoe into the ground,
+making ruts in the gravel, while Tony watched her solemnly.
+
+"Then why," he went on, "do you not want me to remember Daddie?"
+
+"Because," said Jan, "everything you seem to remember sounds so unkind."
+
+"Well, I can't help that," Tony answered.
+
+Jan arose from the seat. "If we sit idling here all afternoon," she
+remarked severely, "we shall never get that border weeded for Earley."
+
+The afternoon post came in at four, and when Jan went in there were
+several letters for her on the hall-table, spread out by Hannah in a
+neat row, one above the other. It was Saturday, and the Indian mail was
+in. There was one from Peter, but it was another letter that Jan seized
+first, turning it over and looking at the post-mark, which was
+remarkably clear. She knew the excellent handwriting well, though she
+had seen it comparatively seldom.
+
+It was Hugo Tancred's; and the post-mark was Port Said. She opened it
+with hands that trembled, and it said:
+
+      "MY DEAR JAN,
+
+      "In case other letters have miscarried, which is quite
+      possible while I was up country, let me assure you how
+      grateful I am for all you did for my poor wife and the
+      children--and for me in letting me know so faithfully what
+      your movements have been. I sent to the bank for your
+      letters while passing through Bombay recently, and but for
+      your kindness in allowing the money I had left for my
+      wife's use to remain to my credit, I should have been
+      unable to leave India, for things have gone sadly against
+      me, and the world is only too ready to turn its back upon a
+      broken man.
+
+      "When I saw by the notice in the papers that my beloved
+      wife was no more, I realised that for me the lamp is
+      shattered and the light of my life extinguished. All that
+      remains to me is to make the best of my poor remnant of
+      existence for the sake of my children.
+
+      "We will talk over plans when we meet. I hope to be in
+      England in about another month, perhaps sooner, and we will
+      consult together as to what is best to be done.
+
+      "I have no doubt it will be possible to find a good and
+      cheap preparatory school where Tony can be safely bestowed
+      for the present, and one of my sisters would probably take
+      my precious little Fay, if you find it inconvenient to have
+      her with you. A boy is always better at school as soon as
+      possible, and I have strong views as to the best methods of
+      education. I never for a moment forget my responsibilities
+      towards my children and the necessity for a father's
+      supreme authority.
+
+      "You may be sure that, in so far as you make it possible
+      for me to do so, I will fall in with your wishes regarding
+      them in every way.
+
+      "It will not be worth your while writing to me here, as my
+      plans are uncertain. I will try to give you notice of my
+      arrival, but may reach you before my next letter.
+
+                           "Yours affectionately,
+
+                                           "HUGO TANCRED."
+
+Still as a statue sat Jan. From the garden came the cheerful chirruping
+of birds and constant, eager questioning of Earley by the children.
+Earley's slow Gloucestershire speech rumbled on in muffled _obbligato_
+to the higher, carrying, little voices.
+
+The whirr of a sewing-machine came from the morning-room, now the
+day-nursery, where Meg was busy with frocks for little Fay.
+
+In a distant pantry somebody was clinking teacups. Jan shivered, though
+the air from the open window was only fresh, not cold. At that moment
+she knew exactly how an animal feels when caught in a trap. Hugo
+Tancred's letter was the trap, and she was in it. With the exception of
+the lie about other letters--Jan was perfectly sure he had written no
+other letters--and the stereotyped phrases about shattered lamps and the
+wife who was "no more," the letter was one long menace--scarcely veiled.
+That sentence, "in so far as you make it possible for me to do so, I
+will fall in with your wishes regarding them in every way," simply meant
+that if Jan was to keep the children she must let Hugo make ducks and
+drakes of her money; and if he took her money, how could she do what she
+ought for the children?
+
+And he was at Port Said; only a week's journey.
+
+Why had she left that money in Bombay? Why had she not listened to
+Peter? Sometimes she had thought that Peter held rather a cynically low
+view of his fellow-creatures--some of his fellow-creatures. Surely no
+one could be all bad? Jan had hoped great things of adversity for Hugo
+Tancred. Peter indulged in no such pleasant illusions, and said so.
+"Schoolgirl sentimentality" Meg had called it, and so it was. "No doubt
+it will be possible to find some cheap preparatory school for Tony."
+
+Would he try to steal Tony?
+
+From the charitable mood that hopeth all things Jan suddenly veered to a
+belief in all things evil of her brother-in-law. At that moment she felt
+him capable of murdering the child and throwing his little body down a
+well, as they do in India.
+
+Again she shivered.
+
+What was she to do?
+
+So helpless, so unprotected; so absolutely at his mercy because she
+loved the children. "Never let him blackmail you," Peter had said.
+"Stand up to him always, and he'll probably crumple up."
+
+Suddenly, as though someone had opened shutters in a pitch-dark room,
+letting in the blessed light, Jan remembered there was also a letter
+from Peter.
+
+She crossed the hall to get it, though her legs shook under her and her
+knees were as water.
+
+She felt she couldn't get back to the window-seat, so she sat on the
+edge of the gate-table and opened the letter.
+
+A very short letter, only one side of a page.
+
+      "DEAR MISS ROSS,
+
+      "This is the last mail for a bit, for I come myself by the
+      next, the _Macedonia_. You may catch me at Aden, but
+      certainly a note will get me at Marseilles, if you are kind
+      enough to write. Tancred has been back in Bombay and gone
+      again in one of the smaller home-going boats. Where he got
+      the money to go I can't think, for from many sources lately
+      I've heard that his various ventures have been far from
+      prosperous, and no one will trust him with a rupee.
+
+      "So look out for blackmail, and be firm, mind.
+
+      "I go to my aunt in Artillery Mansions on arrival. When may
+      I run down to see you all?
+
+                         "Yours always sincerely,
+
+                                          "PETER LEDGARD."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+"THOUGH AN HOST SHOULD ENCAMP AGAINST ME"
+
+
+The flap of the gate-leg table creaked under Jan's weight, but she dug
+her heels into the rug and balanced, for she felt incapable of moving.
+
+Peter was coming home; if the worst came to the worst he would deal with
+Hugo, and a respite would be gained. But Peter would go out to India
+again and Hugo would not. The whole miserable business would be
+repeated--and how could she continue to worry Peter with her affairs?
+What claim had she upon him? As though she were some stranger seeing it
+for the first time, Jan looked round the square, comfortable hall. She
+saw it with new eyes sharpened by apprehension; yet everything was
+solidly the same.
+
+The floor with its draught-board pattern of large, square, black and
+white stones; the old dark chairs; the high bookcases at each side of
+the hearth; the wide staircase with its spacious, windowed turning and
+shallow steps, so easily traversed by little feet; the whole steeped in
+that atmosphere of friendly comfort that kind old houses get and keep.
+
+Such a good place to be young in.
+
+Such a happy place, so safe and sheltered and pleasant.
+
+Outside the window a wren was calling to his mate with a note that
+sounded just like a faint kiss; such a tender little song.
+
+The swing door was opened noisily and Anne Chitt appeared bearing the
+nursery tea-tray, deposited it in the nursery, opened the front door,
+thumped on the gong and vanished again. Meg came out from the nursery
+with two pairs of small slippers in her hand: "Where are my children? I
+left little Fay with Earley while I finished the overalls; he's a most
+efficient under-nurse--I suppose you left Tony with him too. Such a lot
+of letters for you. Did you get your mail? I heard from both the boys.
+Ah, sensible Earley's taking them round to the back door. Where's
+William's duster? Hannah does make such a fuss about paw-marks." And
+Meg, too, vanished through the swing door.
+
+Slowly Jan dragged herself off the table, gathered up her unread
+letters, and went into the nursery. She felt as though she were
+dreadfully asleep and couldn't awake to realise the wholesome everyday
+world around her.
+
+Vaguely she stared round the room, the most charming room in Wren's End.
+Panelled in wood long since painted white, with two delightful rounded
+corner cupboards, it gave straight on to the wrens' sunk lawn from a big
+French window with steps, an anachronism added by Miss Janet Ross. Five
+years ago Anthony had brought a beautiful iron gate from Venice that
+fitted into the archway, cut through the yew hedge and leading to the
+drive. Jan had given this room to the children because in summer they
+could spend the whole day in its green-walled garden, quite safe and
+shut in from every possibility of mischief. A sun-dial was in the
+centre, and in one corner a fat stone cherub upheld a bath for the
+birds. Daffodils were in bloom on the banks, and one small single tulip
+of brilliant red. Jan went out and stood on the top step.
+
+Long immunity from menace of any kind had made all sorts of little birds
+extraordinarily bold and friendly. Even the usually shy and furtive
+golden-crested wrens fussed in and out under the yew hedge quite
+regardless of Jan.
+
+Through an open window overhead came the sound of cheerful high voices,
+and little Fay started to sing at the top of her strong treble:
+
+    Thlee mice went into a hole to spin,
+    Puss came by, and puss peeped in;
+    What are you doing, my littoo old men?
+    We're weaving coats for gentoomen.
+
+"Is that what I've been doing?" thought Jan. "Weaving coats of many
+colours out of happy dreams?" Were she and the children the mice, she
+wondered.
+
+Marauding cats had been kept away from Wren's End for over a hundred
+years. "The little wrens that build" had been safe enough. But what of
+these poor human nestlings?
+
+"Shall I come and help loo to wind up loo thleds?" sang little Fay. "Oh,
+no, Missis Pussy, you'd bite off our heads!" And Tony joined in with a
+shout: "Oh, no, Missis Pussy, you'd bite off our heads."
+
+The voices died away, the children were coming downstairs.
+
+Jan drank three cups of tea and crumbled one piece of bread and butter
+on her plate. The rest of the party were hungry and full of adventures.
+Before she joined Earley little Fay had been to the village with Meg to
+buy tape, and she had a great deal to say about this expedition. Meg saw
+that something was troubling Jan, and wondered if Mr. Ledgard had given
+her fresh news of Hugo. But Meg never asked questions or worried people.
+She chattered to the children, and immediately after tea carried them
+off for the usual washing of hands.
+
+Jan went out into the hall; the door was open and the sunny spring
+evening called to her. When she was miserable she always wanted to walk,
+and she walked now; swiftly down the drive she went and out along the
+road till she came to the church, which stood at the end of the village
+nearest to Wren's End.
+
+She turned into the churchyard, and up the broad pathway between the
+graves to the west door.
+
+Near the door was a square headstone marking the grave of Charles
+Considine Smith; and she paused beside it to read once more the somewhat
+strange inscription.
+
+Under his name and age, cut deep in the moss-grown stone, were the
+words: "_Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not
+fear._"
+
+Often before Jan had wondered what could have caused Tranquil, his wife,
+to choose so strenuous an epitaph. Tranquil, who had never stirred
+twenty miles from the place where she was born; whose very name, so far
+as they could gather, exemplified her life.
+
+What secret menace had threatened this "staid person," this prosperous
+shipper of sherry who, apparently, had spent the evening of his life in
+observing the habits of wrens.
+
+Why should his gentle wife have thus commemorated his fighting spirit?
+
+Be the reason what it might, Jan felt vaguely comforted. There was
+triumph as well as trust in the words. Whatever it was that had
+threatened him, he had stood up to it. His wife knew this and was proud.
+
+Jan tried the heavy oak door and it yielded, and from the soft mildness
+of the spring evening, so full of happy sounds of innocent life, she
+passed into the grey and sacred silence of the church.
+
+It was cold in the beautiful old fourteenth-century church, with that
+pervading smell of badly-burning wood that is so often found in country
+churches till all attempt at heating ceases for the summer. But nothing
+could mar the nobility of its austerely lovely architecture; the
+indefinable, exquisite grace that soothes and penetrates.
+
+She went and knelt in the Wren's End pew where Charles Considine Smith's
+vast prayer-book still stood on the book-board. And even as in the
+Bombay Cathedral she had prayed that strength might be given to her to
+walk in the Way, so now she prayed for courage and a quiet, steadfast
+mind.
+
+Her head was bowed and buried in her hands: "_My heart shall not
+fear_," she whispered; but she knew that it did fear, and fear
+grievously.
+
+The tense silence was broken by an odd, fitful, pattering sound; but
+Jan, absorbed in her petition for the courage she could not feel, heard
+nothing.
+
+Something clumsy, warm, and panting pushed against her, and she
+uncovered her face and looked down upon William trying to thrust his
+head under her arm and join in her devotions.
+
+And William became a misty blur, for her eyes filled with tears; he
+looked so anxious and foolish and kind with his tongue hanging out and
+his absurd, puzzled expression.
+
+He was puzzled. Part of the usual ritual had been omitted.
+
+She ought, by all known precedents, to have put her arm round his neck
+and have admonished him to "pray for his Master." But she did nothing of
+the kind, only patted him, with no sort of invitation to join in her
+orisons.
+
+William was sure something was wrong somewhere.
+
+Then Jan saw Tony sitting at the far end of the seat, hatless, coatless,
+in his indoor strap shoes; and he was regarding her with grave,
+understanding eyes.
+
+In a moment she was back in the present and vividly alive to the fact
+that here was chilly, delicate Tony out after tea, without a coat and
+sitting in an ice-cold church.
+
+She rose from her knees, much to William's satisfaction, who did not
+care for religious services in which he might not take an active part.
+He trotted out of the pew and Jan followed him, stooping to kiss Tony as
+she passed.
+
+"It's too cold for you here, dear," she whispered; "let us come out."
+
+She held out her hand and Tony took it, and together they passed down
+the aisle and into the warmer air outside.
+
+"How did you know I was here?" she asked, as they hurried into the road.
+
+"I saw you going down the drive from the bathroom window, and so I
+runned after you, and William came too."
+
+"But what made you come after me?"
+
+"Because I thought you looked frightened, and I didn't like it; you
+looked like Mummy did sometimes."
+
+No one who has seen fear stamped upon a woman's face ever forgets it.
+Tony had watched his aunt all tea-time, and this quite new expression
+troubled him. Mummy had always seemed to want him when she looked like
+that; perhaps Auntie Jan would want him too. The moment his hands were
+dried he had rushed past Meg and down the stairs with William in his
+wake. Meg had not tried to stop him, for she, too, realised that
+something worried Jan, and she knew that already there had arisen an
+almost unconscious _entente_ between these two. But she had no idea that
+he had gone out of doors. She dressed little Fay and took her out to the
+garden, thinking that Tony and Jan were probably in the nursery, and she
+was careful not to disturb them.
+
+"Are you cold, Tony?" Jan asked anxiously, walking so fast that Tony
+had almost to run to keep up with her.
+
+"No, not very; it's a nice coldness rather, don't you think?"
+
+"Tony, will you tell me--when Daddie was angry with you, were you never
+frightened?"
+
+Tony pulled at her hand to make her go more slowly. "Yes," he said, "I
+used to feel frightened inside, but I wouldn't let him know it, and
+then--it was funny--but quite sunn'ly I wasn't frightened any more. You
+try it."
+
+"You mean," Jan asked earnestly, "that if you don't let anyone else know
+you are frightened, you cease to be frightened?"
+
+"Something like that," Tony said; "it just happens."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+MEG AND CAPTAIN MIDDLETON
+
+
+Meg had worked hard and faithfully ever since Ayah left. Very soon after
+she took over the children entirely she discovered that, however naughty
+and tiresome they were in many respects, they were quick-witted and
+easily interested. And she decided there and then that to keep them good
+she must keep them well amused, and it acted like a charm.
+
+She had the somewhat rare power of surrounding quite ordinary everyday
+proceedings with a halo of romance, so that the children's day developed
+into a series of entrancing adventures.
+
+With Meg, enthusiastic make-believe had never wholly given place to
+common sense. Throughout the long, hard days of her childhood and early
+apprenticeship to a rather unkindly world she had pretended joyously,
+and invented for herself all sorts of imaginary pleasures to take the
+place of those tangible ones denied to her. She had kept the width and
+wistfulness of the child's horizon with a good deal of the child's
+finality and love of detail; so that she was as responsive to the drama
+of common things as the children themselves.
+
+Thus it came about that the daily donning of the uniform was in very
+truth symbolic and inspiring; and once the muslin cap was adjusted, she
+felt herself magically surrounded by the atmosphere most conducive to
+the production of the Perfect Nurse.
+
+For Tony and little Fay getting up and going to bed resolved themselves
+into feats of delicious dexterity that custom could not stale. The
+underneaths of tables were caves and dungeons, chairs became chariots at
+will, and every night little Fay waved a diminutive pocket-handkerchief
+to Tony from the deck of an ocean-going P. and O.
+
+The daily walks, especially since they came to Wren's End, were filled
+with hopeful possibilities. And to hunt for eggs with Mrs. Earley, or
+gather vegetables with her son, partook of the nature of a high and
+solemn quest. It was here Meg showed real genius. She drew all the
+household into her net of interest. The children poked their busy
+fingers into everybody's pies, and even stern Hannah was compelled,
+quite unconsciously, to contribute her share in the opulent happiness of
+their little world.
+
+But it took it out of Meg.
+
+For weeks she had been on the alert to prevent storms and tempests. Now
+that the children's barometer seemed at "set fair" she suddenly felt
+very tired.
+
+Jan had been watching her, and on that particular Sunday, had she been
+able to catch Meg before she got up, Jan would have dressed the children
+and kept her in bed. But Meg was too nimble for her, washed and dressed
+her charges, and appeared at breakfast looking a "wispy wraith."
+
+She had slept badly; a habit formed in her under-nourished youth which
+she found hard to break; and she had, in consequence, been sitting up in
+bed at five in the morning to make buttonholes in garden smocks for
+Tony.
+
+This would have enraged Jan had she but known it. But Meg, frank and
+honest as the day in most things, was, at times, curiously secretive;
+and so far had entirely eluded Jan's vigilance. By the time Anne Chitt
+came with the awakening tea there wasn't a vestige of smock, needles, or
+cotton to be seen, and so far lynx-eyed little Fay had never awoke in
+time to catch her at it.
+
+This morning, however, Jan exerted her authority. She slung the hammock
+between two trees in the sunniest part of the garden; she wrapped Meg in
+her own fur coat, which was far too big for Meg; covered her with a
+particularly soft, warm rug, gave her a book, a sun-umbrella, and her
+cigarette case; and forbade her to move till lunch-time unless it
+rained.
+
+Then she took the two children and William into Squire Walcote's woods
+for the morning and Meg fell fast asleep.
+
+Warm with the double glow that came from being wrapped in Jan's coat
+because Jan loved her; lulled by the songs of birds and a soft, shy wind
+that ruffled the short hair about her forehead, little Meg was supremely
+happy. To be tired, to be made to rest, to be kissed and tucked in and
+sternly commanded to stay where she was till she was fetched--all this,
+so commonplace to cherished, cared-for folk, seemed quite wonderful to
+Meg, and she snuggled down among the cushions in blissful content.
+
+Meanwhile, on that same Sunday morning, Captain Middleton, at Amber
+Guiting Manor, was trying to screw his courage up to the announcement
+that he did not intend to accompany his aunt and uncle to church. Lady
+Mary Walcote was his mother's only sister, and Mrs. Walcote, wife of
+Jan's tenant, was one of his father's, so that he spoke quite truly when
+he told Meg he had "stacks of relations down at Amber Guiting."
+
+Colonel Walcote was much better off than his elder brother, the squire
+of Amber Guiting, for he benefited by the Middleton money.
+
+Miles Middleton's father was the originator of "Middleton's Made
+Starch," which was used everywhere and was supposed to be superior to
+all other starches. Why "Made" scoffers could never understand, for it
+required precisely the same treatment as other starches. But the British
+Public believed in it, the British Public also bought it in large
+quantities, and George Middleton, son of Mutton-Pie Middleton, a
+well-to-do confectioner in Doncaster, became an exceedingly rich man. He
+did not marry till he was forty, and then he married "family," for Lady
+Agnes Keills, younger daughter of Lord Glencarse, had a long pedigree
+and no dower at all. She was a good wife to him, gentle, upright, and
+always affectionate. She adored their only child, Miles, and died quite
+suddenly from heart failure, just after that cheerful youth had joined
+at Woolwich. George Middleton died some three years later, leaving his
+money absolutely to his son, who came of age at twenty-five. And, so
+far, Miles had justified his father's faith in him, for he had never
+done anything very foolish, and a certain strain of Yorkshire shrewdness
+prevented him from committing any wild extravagance.
+
+He was generous, kindly, and keen on his profession, and he had reached
+the age of thirty-two without ever having felt any overwhelming desire
+to marry; though it was pretty well known that considerable efforts to
+marry him suitably had been made by both mothers and daughters.
+
+The beautiful and level-headed young ladies of musical comedy had failed
+to land this considerable fish, angled they never so skilfully; though
+he frankly enjoyed their amusing society and was quite liberal, though
+not lavish, in the way of presents.
+
+Young women of his own rank were pleasant to him, their mothers cordial,
+and no difficulty was ever put in the way of his enjoying their society.
+But he was not very susceptible. Deep in his heart, in some dim,
+unacknowledged corner, there lay a humble, homely desire that he might
+_feel_ a great deal more strongly than he had felt yet, when the time
+and the woman came to him.
+
+Never, until Meg smiled at him when he offered to carry little Fay up
+that long staircase, had the thought of a girl thoroughly obsessed him;
+and it is possible that even after their meetings in Kensington Gardens
+her image might gradually have faded from his mind, had it not occurred
+to Mrs. Trent to interfere.
+
+He had seen a good deal of the Trents while hunting with the Pytchley
+two winters ago. Lotty was a fearless rider and what men called "a real
+good sort." At one time it had sometimes crossed Captain Middleton's
+mind that Lotty wouldn't make half a bad wife for a Horse Gunner, but
+somehow it had always stopped at the idea, and when he didn't see Lotty
+he never thought about her at all.
+
+Now that he no longer saw Meg he thought about her all day and far into
+the night. His sensations were so new, so disturbing and unpleasant, his
+life was so disorganised and upset, that he asked himself in varying
+degrees of ever-accumulating irritation: "What the deuce was the
+matter?"
+
+Then Mrs. Trent asked him to luncheon.
+
+She was staying with her daughters at the Kensington Palace Hotel, and
+they had a suite of rooms. Lotty and her sister flew away before coffee
+was served, as they were going to a _matinée_, and Miles was left
+_tête-à-tête_ with Mrs. Trent.
+
+She was most motherly and kind.
+
+Just as he was wondering whether he might now decently take leave of
+her, she said: "Captain Middleton, I'm going to take a great liberty and
+venture to say something to you that perhaps you will resent ... but I
+feel I must do it because your mother was such a dear friend of mine."
+
+This was a piece of information for Miles, who knew perfectly well that
+Lady Agnes Middleton's acquaintance with Mrs. Trent had been of the
+slightest. However, he bowed and looked expectant.
+
+"I saw you the other day walking with Miss Morton in Kensington Gardens;
+apparently she is now in charge of somebody's children. May I ask if you
+have known her long?"
+
+Mrs. Trent looked searchingly at Miles, and there was an inflection on
+the "long" that he felt was in some way insulting to Meg, and he
+stiffened all over.
+
+"Before I answer that question, Mrs. Trent, may I ask why you should
+want to know?"
+
+"My dear boy, I see perfectly well that it must seem impertinent
+curiosity on my part. But I assure you my motive for asking is quite
+justifiable. Will you try not to feel irritated and believe that what I
+am doing, I am doing for the best?"
+
+"I have not known Miss Morton very long; why?"
+
+"Do you know the people she is living with at present?"
+
+Again that curious inflection on the "present."
+
+"Oh, yes, and so do my people; they think all the world of her."
+
+"Of Miss Morton?" Shocked astonishment was in Mrs. Trent's voice.
+
+"I was not speaking of Miss Morton just then, but of the lady she is
+with. I've no doubt, though," said Miles stoutly, "they'd think just
+the same of Miss Morton if they knew her. They may know her, too; it's
+just a chance we've never discussed her."
+
+"It is very difficult and painful for me to say what I have got to say
+... but if Miss Morton is in charge of the children of a friend of your
+family, I think you ought to know she is not a suitable person to be
+anything of the kind."
+
+"I say!" Miles exclaimed, "that's a pretty stiff thing to say about any
+girl; a dangerous thing to say; especially about one who seems to need
+to earn her own living."
+
+"I know it is; I hate to say it ... but it seemed to me the other day--I
+hope I was mistaken--that you were rather ... attracted, and knowing
+what I do I felt I must speak, must warn you."
+
+Miles got up. He seemed to tower above the table and dwarf the whole
+room. "I'd rather not hear any more, Mrs. Trent, please. It seems too
+beastly mean somehow for me to sit here and listen to scandal about a
+poor little unprotected girl who works hard and faithfully--mind you,
+I've seen her with those children, and she's perfectly wonderful. Don't
+you see yourself how I can't _do_ it?"
+
+Mrs. Trent sat on where she was and smiled at Miles, slowly shaking her
+head. "Sit down, my dear boy. Your feelings do you credit; but we
+mustn't be sentimental, and facts are facts. I have every reason to know
+what I'm talking about, for some years ago Miss Morton was in my
+service."
+
+Miles did not sit down. He stood where he was, glowering down at Mrs.
+Trent.
+
+"That doesn't brand her, does it?" he asked.
+
+Still smiling maternally at him, Mrs. Trent continued: "She left my
+service when she ran away with Mr. Walter Brooke--you know him, I think?
+Disgraceful though it was, I must say this of him, that he never made
+any concealment of the fact that he was a married man. She did it with
+her eyes open."
+
+"If," Miles growled, "all this happened 'some years ago' she must have
+been about twelve at the time, and Brooke ought to have been hounded out
+of society long ago."
+
+"I needn't say that _we_ have cut him ever since. She was, I believe,
+about nineteen at the time. She did not remain with him, but you can
+understand that, naturally, I don't want _you_ to get entangled with a
+girl of that sort."
+
+Miles picked up his hat and stick. "I wish you hadn't told me," he
+groaned. "I don't think a bit less highly of her, but you've made _me_
+feel such a low-down brute, I can't bear it. Good-bye--I've no doubt you
+did it for the best ... but----" And Miles fairly ran from the room.
+
+Mrs. Trent drummed with her fingers on the table and looked thoughtful.
+"It was quite time somebody interfered," she reflected. And then she
+remembered with annoyance that she had not found out the name of Meg's
+employer.
+
+Miles strode through Kensington Gore and past Knightsbridge, when he
+turned down Sloane Street till he came to a fencing school he
+frequented. Here he went in and had a strenuous half-hour with the
+instructor, but nothing served to restore his peace of mind. He was
+angry and hurt and horribly worried. If it was true, if the whole
+miserable story was true, then he knew that something had been taken
+from him. Something he had cherished in that dim, secret corner of his
+heart. Its truth or untruth did not affect his feeling for Meg. But if
+it were true, then he had irretrievably lost something intangible, yet
+precious. Young men like Miles never mention ideals, but that's not to
+say that in some very hidden place they don't exist, like buried
+treasure.
+
+All the shrewd Yorkshire strain in him shouted that he must set this
+doubt at rest. That whatever was to be his action in the future he must
+know and face the truth. All the delicacy, the fine feeling, the
+sensitiveness he got from his mother, made him loathe any investigation
+of the kind, and his racial instincts battled together and made him very
+miserable indeed.
+
+When he left the fencing school, he turned into Hyde Park. The Row was
+beginning to fill, and suddenly he came upon his second cousin, Lady
+Penelope Pottinger, sitting all alone on a green chair with another
+empty one beside it. Miles dropped into the empty chair. He liked Lady
+Pen. She was always downright and sometimes very amusing. Moreover she
+took an intelligent interest in dogs, and knew Amber Guiting and its
+inhabitants. So Miles dexterously led the conversation round to Jan and
+Wren's End.
+
+Lady Pen was looking very beautiful that afternoon. She wore a
+broad-leaved hat which did not wholly conceal her glorious hair. Hair
+the same colour as certain short feathery rings that framed a pale,
+pathetic little face that haunted him.
+
+"Talking of Amber Guiting," he said, "did you ever come across a Miss
+Morton down there? A friend of Miss Ross."
+
+Lady Pen turned and looked hard at him. "Oh dear, yes; she's rather a
+pal of mine. I knew her long before I met her at the Ross's. Why, I knew
+her when she was companion at the Trents, poor little devil."
+
+"Did she have a bad time there? Weren't they nice to her?"
+
+"At first they were nice enough, but afterwards it was rotten. Clever
+little thing she is, but poor as a rat. What do you know about her?"
+
+Again Lady Pen looked hard at Miles. She was wondering whether Meg had
+ever given away the reason for that short hair of hers.
+
+"Oh, I've met her just casually, you know, with Miss Ross. She strikes
+me as a ... rather unusual sort of girl."
+
+"Ever mention me?"
+
+"No, never that I can remember. I haven't seen much of her, you know."
+
+"Well, my son, the less you see of her the better, for her, I should
+say. She's a clever, industrious, good little thing, but she's not in
+your row. After all, these workin' girls have their feelin's."
+
+"I don't fancy Miss Morton is at all the susceptible idiot you appear
+to think her. It's other people's feelings I should be afraid of, not
+hers."
+
+"Oh, I grant you she's attractive enough to some folks. Artists, for
+instance, rave over her. At least, Anthony Ross did. Queer chap, that;
+would never paint me. Now can you understand any man in his senses
+refusin' to paint me?"
+
+"It seems odd, certainly."
+
+"He painted her, for nothin' of course, over an' over again ... just
+because he liked doin' it. Odd chap he was, but very takin'. You
+couldn't dislike him, even when he refused to paint you. Awful swank
+though, wasn't it?"
+
+"Were his pictures of Miss Morton--sold?"
+
+"Some were, I believe; but Janet Ross has got a lot of 'em down at
+Wren's End. She always puts away most of her father's paintin's when she
+lets the house. But you take my advice, Miley, my son: you keep clear of
+that little girl."
+
+This was on Thursday, and, of course, after two warnings in one
+afternoon, Miles went down to Amber Guiting on Saturday night.
+
+"Aunt Mary, it's such a lovely morning, should you mind very much if I
+go for a stroll in the woods--or slack about in the fresh air, instead
+of going to church?"
+
+At the word "stroll" he had seen an interested expression lighten up
+Squire Walcote's face, and the last thing he wanted was his uncle's
+society for the whole morning.
+
+"I don't feel up to much exercise," Miles went on, trying to look
+exhausted and failing egregiously. "I've had rather a hard week in town.
+I'll give the vicar a turn in the evening, I will truly."
+
+Lady Mary smiled indulgently on this large young man, who certainly
+looked far from delicate. But only a hard-hearted woman could have
+pointed this out at such a moment, and where her nephew was concerned
+Lady Mary's heart was all kindly affection. So she let him off church.
+
+Miles carried out a pile of books to a seat in the garden and appeared
+to be settled down to a studious morning. He waved a languid hand to his
+aunt and uncle as they started for church, and the moment they were out
+of sight laid down his book and clasped his hands behind his head.
+
+The vicar of Amber Guiting was a family man and merciful. The school
+children all creaked and pattered out of church after morning prayer,
+and any other small people in the congregation were encouraged to do
+likewise, the well-filled vicarage pew setting the example. Therefore,
+Miles reckoned, that even supposing Miss Morton took the little boy to
+church (he couldn't conceive of anyone having the temerity to escort
+little Fay thither), they would come out in about three-quarters of an
+hour after the bell stopped. But he had no intention of waiting for
+that. The moment the bell ceased he--unaccompanied by any of the dogs
+grouped about him at that moment--was going to investigate the Wren's
+End garden. He knew every corner of it, and he intended to unearth Meg
+and the children if they were to be found.
+
+Besides, he ardently desired to see William.
+
+William was a lawful pretext. No one could see anything odd in his
+calling at Wren's End to see William. It was a perfectly natural thing
+to do.
+
+Confound Mrs. Trent.
+
+Confound Pen, what did she want to interfere for?
+
+Confound that bell. Would it never stop?
+
+Yes it had. No it hadn't. Yes ... it had.
+
+Give a few more minutes for laggards, and then----
+
+Three melancholy and disappointed dogs were left in the Manor Garden,
+while Miles swung down the drive, past the church, and into the road
+that led to Wren's End.
+
+What a morning it was!
+
+The whole world seemed to have put on its Sunday frock. There had been
+rain in the night, and the air was full of the delicious fresh-washed
+smell of spring herbage. Wren's End seemed wonderfully quiet and
+deserted as Miles turned into the drive. As he neared the house he
+paused and listened, but there was no sound of high little voices
+anywhere.
+
+Were they at church, then?
+
+They couldn't be indoors on such a beautiful day.
+
+Miles whistled softly, knowing that if William were anywhere within
+hearing, that would bring him at the double.
+
+But no joyfully galumphing William appeared to welcome him.
+
+He had no intention of ringing to inquire. No, he'd take a good look
+round first, before he went back to hang about outside the church.
+
+It was pleasant in the Wren's End garden.
+
+Presently he went down the broad central path of the walled garden, with
+borders of flowers and beds of vegetables. Half-way down, in the
+sunniest, warmest place, he came upon a hammock slung between an
+apple-tree not quite out and a pear-tree that was nearly over, and a
+voice from the hammock called sleepily: "Is that you, Earley? I wish
+you'd pick up my cigarette case for me; it's fallen into the lavender
+bush just below."
+
+"Yes, Miss," a voice answered that was certainly not Earley's.
+
+Meg leaned out of the hammock to look behind her.
+
+"Hullo!" she said. "Why are you not in church? I can't get up because
+I'm a prisoner on _parole_. Short of a thunderstorm nothing is to move
+me from this hammock till Miss Ross comes back."
+
+Miles stood in the pathway looking down at the muffled figure in the
+hammock. There was little to be seen of Meg save her rumpled, hatless
+head. She was much too economical of her precious caps to waste one in a
+hammock. She had slept for nearly two hours, then Hannah roused her with
+a cup of soup. She was drowsy and warm and comfortable, and her usually
+pale cheeks were almost as pink as the apple-blossom buds above her
+head.
+
+"Do you want to sleep? Or may I stop and talk to you a bit?" Miles
+asked, when he had found the somewhat battered cigarette case and
+restored it to her.
+
+"As I'm very plainly off duty, I suppose you may stay and talk--if I
+fall asleep in the middle you must not be offended. You'll find plenty
+of chairs in the tool house."
+
+When Miles returned Meg had lit her cigarette, and he begged a light
+from her.
+
+What little hands she had! How fine-grained and delicate her skin!
+
+Again he felt that queer lump in his throat at the absurd, sweet pathos
+of her.
+
+He placed his chair where he had her full in view, not too near, yet
+comfortably so for conversation. Jan had swung the hammock very high,
+and Meg looked down at Miles over the edge.
+
+"It is unusual," she said, "to find a competent nurse spending her
+morning in this fashion, but if you know Miss Ross at all, you will
+already have realised that under her placid exterior she has a will of
+iron."
+
+"I shouldn't say _you_ were lacking in determination."
+
+"Oh, I'm nothing to Jan. _She_ exerts physical force. Look at me perched
+up here! How can I get down without a bad fall, swathed like a mummy in
+wraps; while my employer does my work?"
+
+"But you don't want to get down. You look awfully comfortable."
+
+"I am awfully comfortable--but it's most ... unprofessional--please
+don't tell anybody else."
+
+Meg closed her eyes, looking rather like a sleepy kitten, and Miles
+watched her in silence with a pain at his heart. Something kept saying
+over and over again: "Six years ago that girl there ran off with Walter
+Brooke. Six years ago that apparently level-headed, sensible little
+person was dazzled by the pinchbeck graces of that epicure in
+sensations." Miles fully granted his charm, his gentle melancholy, his
+caressing manner; but with it all Miles felt that he was so plainly "a
+wrong-'un," so clearly second-rate and untrustworthy--and a nice girl
+ought to recognise these things intuitively.
+
+Miles looked very sad and grave, and Meg, suddenly opening her eyes,
+found him regarding her with this incomprehensible expression.
+
+"You are not exactly talkative," she said.
+
+"I thought, perhaps, you wanted to rest, and would rather not talk.
+Maybe I'm a bit of a bore, and you'd rather I went away?"
+
+"You have not yet asked after William."
+
+"I hoped to find William, but he's nowhere to be seen."
+
+"He's with Jan and the children. I think"--here Meg lifted her curly
+head over the edge of the hammock--"he is the very darlingest animal in
+the world. I love William."
+
+"You do! I knew you would."
+
+"I do. He's so faithful and kind and understanding."
+
+"Has he been quite good?"
+
+"Well ... once or twice he may have been a little--destructive--but you
+expect that with children."
+
+"I hope you punish him."
+
+"Jan does. Jan has a most effectual slap, but there's always a dreadful
+disturbance with the children on these occasions. Little Fay roars the
+house down when William has to be chastised."
+
+"What has he done?"
+
+"I'm not going to tell tales of William."
+
+Miles and Meg smiled at one another, and Walter Brooke faded from his
+mind.
+
+"Perhaps," he said, and paused, "you will by and by allow to William's
+late master a small portion of that regard?"
+
+"If William's master on further acquaintance proves half as loyal and
+trustworthy as William--I couldn't help it."
+
+"I wonder what you mean exactly by loyal and trustworthy?"
+
+"They're not very elastic terms, are they?"
+
+"Don't you think they mean rather the same thing?"
+
+"Not a bit," Meg cried eagerly; "a person might be ever so trustworthy
+and yet not loyal. I take it that trustworthy and honest in tangible
+things are much the same. Loyalty is something intangible, and often
+means belief in people when everything seems against them. It's a much
+rarer quality than to be trustworthy. William would stick to one if one
+hadn't a crust, just because he liked to be there to make things a bit
+less wretched."
+
+Miles smoked in silence for a minute, and again Meg closed her eyes.
+
+"By the way," he said presently, "I didn't know you and my cousin Pen
+were friends. I met her in the Park the day before yesterday. Her hair's
+rather the same colour as yours--handsome woman, isn't she?"
+
+Meg opened her eyes and turned crimson. Had the outspoken Lady Pen said
+anything about her hair, she wondered.
+
+Miles, noting the sudden blush, put it down to Lady Pen's knowledge of
+what had happened at the Trents, and the miserable feelings of doubt and
+apprehension came surging back.
+
+"She's quite lovely," said Meg.
+
+"A bit too much on the big side, don't you think?"
+
+"I admire big women."
+
+Silence fell again. Meg pulled the rug up under her chin.
+
+Surely it was not quite so warm as a few minutes ago.
+
+Miles stood up. "I have a guilty feeling that Miss Ross will strongly
+disapprove of my disturbing you like this. If you will tell me which way
+they have gone I will go and meet them."
+
+"They've gone to your uncle's woods, and I think they must be on their
+way home by now. If you call William he'll answer."
+
+"I won't say good-bye," said Miles, "because I shall come back with
+them."
+
+"I shall be on duty then," said Meg. "Good-bye."
+
+She turned her face from him and nestled down among her cushions. For a
+full minute he stood staring at the back of her head, with its crushed
+and tumbled tangle of short curls.
+
+Then quite silently he took his way out of the Wren's End garden.
+
+Meg shut her eyes very tight. Was it the light that made them smart so?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE YOUNG IDEA
+
+
+Squire Walcote had given the Wren's End family the run of his woods,
+and, what was even more precious, permission to use the river-path
+through his grounds. Lady Mary, who had no children of her own, was
+immensely interested in Tony and little Fay, and would give Jan more
+advice as to their management in an hour than the vicar's wife ever
+offered during the whole of their acquaintance. But then _she_ had a
+family of eight.
+
+But the first time Tony went to the river Jan took him alone; and not to
+the near water in Squire Walcote's grounds, but to the old bridge that
+crossed the Amber some way out of the village. It was the typical
+Cotswold bridge, with low parapets that make such a comfortable seat for
+meditative villagers. Just before they reached it she loosed Tony's
+hand, and held her breath to see what he would do. Would he run straight
+across to get to the other side, or would he look over?
+
+Yes. He went straight to the low wall; stopped, looked over, leaned
+over, and stared and stared.
+
+Jan gave a sigh of relief.
+
+The water of the Amber just there is deep and clear, an infinite thing
+for a child to look down into; but it was not of that Jan was thinking.
+
+Hugo was no fisherman. Water had no attraction for him, save as a
+pleasant means of taking exercise. He was a fair oar; but for a stream
+that wouldn't float a boat he cared nothing at all.
+
+Charles Considine Smith had angled diligently. In fact, he wrote almost
+as much about the habits of trout as about wrens. James Ross, the
+gallant who carried off the second Tranquil, had been fishing at Amber
+Guiting when he first saw her. Anthony's father fished and so did
+Anthony; and Jan, herself, could throw a fly quite prettily. Yet, your
+true fisherman is born, not made; it is not a question of environment,
+but it is, very often, one of heredity; for the tendency comes out when,
+apparently, every adverse circumstance has combined to crush it.
+
+And no mortal who cares for or is going to care for fishing can ever
+cross a bridge without stopping to look down into the water.
+
+"There's a fish swimming down there," Tony whispered (was it instinct
+made him whisper? Jan wondered), "brown and speckledy, rather like the
+thrushes in the garden."
+
+Jan clutched nervously at the little coat while Tony hung over so far
+that only his toes were on the ground. She had brought a bit of bread in
+her pocket, and let him throw bits to the greedy, wily old trout who had
+defied a hundred skilful rods. On that first day old Amber whispered her
+secret to Tony and secured another slave.
+
+For Jan it was only another proof that Tony possessed a sterling
+character. Since her sister's disastrous marriage she had come to look
+upon a taste for fishing as more or less of a moral safeguard. She had
+often reflected that if only Fay had not been so lukewarm with regard to
+the gentle craft--and so bored in a heavenly place where, if it did rain
+for twenty-three of the twenty-four hours, even a second-rate rod might
+land fourteen or fifteen pounds of good sea-trout in an afternoon--she
+could never have fallen in love with Hugo Tancred, who was equally
+without enthusiasm and equally bored till he met Fay. Jan was ready
+enough now to blame herself for her absorption at this time, and would
+remember guiltily the relief with which she and her father greeted Fay's
+sudden willingness to remain a week longer in a place she previously had
+declared to be absolutely unendurable.
+
+The first time Tony's sister went to Amber Bridge Meg took them both.
+Little Fay descended from her pram just before they reached it,
+declaring it was a "nice dly place to walk." She ran on a little ahead,
+and before Meg realised what she was doing, she had scrambled up on to
+the top of the low wall and run briskly along it till her progress was
+stopped by a man who was leaning over immersed in thought. He nearly
+fell in himself, when a clear little voice inquired, "Do loo mind if I
+climb over loo?"
+
+It was Farmer Burgess, and he clasped the tripping lady of the white
+woolly gaiters in a pair of strong arms, and lifted her down just as the
+terrified Meg reached them.
+
+"Law, Missie!" gasped Mr. Burgess, "you mustn't do the like o' that
+there. It's downright fool'ardy."
+
+"Downlight foolardy," echoed little Fay. "And what nelse?"
+
+According to Mr. Burgess it was dangerous and a great many other things
+as well, but he lost his heart to her in that moment, and she could
+twist him round her little finger ever after.
+
+To be told that a thing was dangerous was to add to its attractions. She
+was absolutely without fear, and could climb like a kitten. She hadn't
+been at Wren's End a week before she was discovered half-way up the
+staircase on the outside of the banisters. And when she had been caught
+and lifted over by a white-faced aunt, explained that it was "muts the
+most instasting way of going up tairs."
+
+When asked how she expected to get to the other side at the top, she
+giggled derisively and said "ovel."
+
+Jan seriously considered a barbed-wire entanglement for the outside edge
+of her staircase after that.
+
+While Meg rested in the hammock Jan spent a strenuous morning in Guiting
+Woods with the children and William. Late windflowers were still in
+bloom, and early bluebells made lovely atmospheric patches under the
+trees, just as though a bit of the sky had fallen, as in the oft-told
+tale of "Cockie Lockie." There were primroses, too, and white violets,
+so that there were many little bunches with exceedingly short stalks to
+be arranged and tied up with the worsted provident Auntie Jan had
+brought with her; finally they all sat down on a rug lined with
+mackintosh, and little Fay demanded "Clipture."
+
+"Clipture" was her form of "Scripture," which Auntie Jan "told" every
+morning after breakfast to the children. Jan was a satisfactory
+narrator, for the form of her stories never varied. The Bible stories
+she told in the actual Bible words, and all children appreciate their
+dramatic simplicity and directness.
+
+That morning Joseph and his early adventures and the baby Moses were the
+favourites, and when these had been followed by "The Three Bears" and
+"Cock Robin," it was time to collect the bouquets and go home. And on
+the way home they met Captain Middleton. William spied him afar off, and
+dashed towards him with joyful, deep-toned barks. He was delighted to
+see William, said he had grown and was in the pink of condition; and
+then announced that he had already been to Wren's End and had seen Miss
+Morton. There was something in the tone of this avowal that made Jan
+think. It was shy, it was proud, it seemed to challenge Jan to find any
+fault in his having done so, and it was supremely self-conscious. He
+walked back with them to the Wren's End gate, and then came a moment of
+trial for William.
+
+He wanted to go with his master.
+
+He wanted to stay with the children.
+
+Captain Middleton settled it by shaking each offered paw and saying very
+seriously: "You must stay and take care of the ladies, William. I trust
+you." William looked wistfully after the tall figure that went down the
+road with the queer, light, jumpetty tread of all men who ride much.
+
+Then he trotted after Jan and the children and was exuberantly glad to
+see Meg again.
+
+She declared herself quite rested; heard that they had seen Captain
+Middleton, and met unmoved the statement that he was coming to tea.
+
+But she didn't look nearly so well rested as Jan had hoped she would.
+
+After the children's dinner Meg went on duty, and Jan saw no more of the
+nursery party till later in the afternoon. The creaking wheels of two
+small wheelbarrows made Jan look up from the letters she was writing at
+the knee-hole table that stood in the nursery window, and she beheld
+little Fay and Tony, followed by Meg knitting busily, as they came
+through the yew archway on to the lawn.
+
+Meg subsided into one of the white seats, but the children processed
+solemnly round, pausing under Jan's window.
+
+"I know lots an' lots of Clipture," her niece's voice proclaimed proudly
+as she sat down heavily in her wheelbarrow on the top of some garden
+produce she had collected.
+
+"How much do you know?" Tony asked sceptically.
+
+"Oh, lots an' lots, all about poor little Jophez in the bullushes, and
+his instasting dleams."
+
+"Twasn't Jophez," Tony corrected. "It was Mophez in the bulrushes, and
+he didn't have no dreams. That was Jophez."
+
+"How d'you know," Fay persisted, "that poor little Mophez had no dleams?
+Why _shouldn't_ he have dleams same as Jophez?"
+
+"It doesn't say so."
+
+"It doesn't say he _didn't_ have dleams. He _had_ dleams, I tell you; I
+know he had. Muts nicer dleams van Jophez."
+
+"Let's ask Meg; she'll know."
+
+Jan gave a sigh of relief. The children had not noticed her, and Meg had
+a fertile mind.
+
+The wheelbarrows were trundled across the lawn and paused in front of
+Meg, while a lively duet demanded simultaneously:
+
+  {"_Did_ little Mophez have dleams?"
+  {"_Didn't_ deah littoo Mophez have dleams?"
+
+When Meg had disentangled the questions and each child sat down in a
+wheelbarrow at her feet, she remarked judicially: "Well, there's nothing
+said about little Moses' dreams, certainly; but I should think it's
+quite likely the poor baby did have dreams."
+
+"What sort of dleams? Nicer van sheaves and sings, wasn't they?"
+
+"I should think," Meg said thoughtfully, "that he dreamed he must cry
+very quietly lest the Egyptians should hear him."
+
+"Deah littoo Mophez ... and what nelse?"
+
+Meg was tempted and fell. It was very easy for her to invent "dleams"
+for "deah littoo Mophez" lying in his bulrush ark among the flags at the
+river's edge. And, wholly regardless of geography, she transported him
+to the Amber, where the flags were almost in bloom at that moment, such
+local colour adding much to the realism of her stories.
+
+Presently William grew restless. He ran to Anthony's Venetian gate in
+the yew hedge and squealed (William never whined) to get out. Tony let
+him out, and he fled down the drive to meet his master, who had come a
+good half-hour too soon for tea.
+
+Jan continued to try and finish her letters while Captain Middleton,
+coatless, on all-fours, enacted an elephant which the children rode in
+turn. When he had completely ruined the knees of his trousers he arose
+and declared it was time to play "Here we go round the mulberry-bush,"
+and it so happened that once or twice he played it hand-in-hand with
+Meg.
+
+Jan left her letters and went out.
+
+The situation puzzled her. She feared for Meg's peace of mind, for
+Captain Middleton was undoubtedly attractive; and then she found herself
+fearing for his.
+
+After tea and more games with the children Captain Middleton escorted
+his hostess to church, where he joined his aunt in the Manor seat.
+
+During church Jan found herself wondering uneasily:
+
+"Was everybody going to fall in love with Meg?"
+
+"Would Peter?"
+
+"What a disagreeable idea!"
+
+And yet, why should it be?
+
+Resolutely she told herself that Peter was at perfect liberty to fall
+in love with Meg if he liked, and set herself to listen intelligently to
+the Vicar's sermon.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Meg started to put her children to bed, only to find that her fertility
+of imagination in the afternoon was to prove her undoing in the evening;
+for her memory was by no means as reliable as her powers of invention.
+
+Little Fay urgently demanded the whole cycle of little Mophez' dleams
+over again. And for the life of her Meg couldn't remember them either in
+their proper substance or sequence--and this in spite of the most
+persistent prompting, and she failed utterly to reproduce the
+entertainment of the afternoon. Both children were disappointed, but
+little Fay, accustomed as she was to Auntie Jan's undeviating method of
+narrating "Clipture," was angry as well. She fell into a passion of rage
+and nearly screamed the house down. Since the night of Ayah's departure
+there had not been such a scene.
+
+Poor Meg vowed (though she knew she would break her vow the very first
+time she was tempted) that never again would she tamper with Holy Writ,
+and for some weeks she coldly avoided both Jophez and Mophez as topics
+of conversation.
+
+Meg could never resist playing at things, and what "Clipture" the
+children learned from Jan in the morning they insisted on enacting with
+Meg later in the day.
+
+Sometimes she was seized with misgiving as to the propriety of these
+representations, but dismissed her doubts as cowardly.
+
+"After all," she explained to Jan, "we only play the very human bits. I
+never let them pretend to be anybody divine ... and you know the
+people--in the Old Testament, anyway--were most of them extremely human,
+not to say disreputable at times."
+
+It is possible that "Clipture's" supreme attraction for the children was
+that it conveyed the atmosphere of the familiar East. The New Testament
+was more difficult to play at, but, being equally dramatic, the children
+couldn't see it.
+
+"Can't we do one teeny miracle?" Tony would beseech, but Meg was firm;
+she would have nothing to do with either miracles nor yet with angels.
+Little Fay ardently desired to be an angel, but Meg wouldn't have it at
+any price.
+
+"You're not in the least _like_ an angel, you know," she said severely.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"Because angels are _perfectly_ good."
+
+"I could _pletend_ to be puffectly good."
+
+"Let's play Johnny Baptist," suggested the ever-helpful Tony, "and we
+could pittend to bring in his head on a charger."
+
+"Certainly not," Meg said hastily. "That would be a horrid game."
+
+"Let me be the daughter!" little Fay implored, "and dance in flont of
+Helod."
+
+This was permitted, and Tony, decorated with William's chain, sat
+gloomily scowling at the gyrations of "the daughter," who, assisted by
+William, danced all over the nursery: and Meg, watching the
+representation, decided that if the original "daughter" was half as
+bewitching as this one, there really might have been some faint excuse
+for Herod.
+
+Hannah had no idea of these goings-on, or she would have expected the
+roof to fall in and crush them. Yet she, too, was included among the
+children's prophets, owing to her exact and thorough knowledge of
+"Clipture." Hannah's favourite part of the Bible was the Book of Daniel,
+which she knew practically by heart; and her rendering of certain
+chapters was--though she would have hotly resented the phrase--extremely
+dramatic.
+
+It is so safe and satisfying to know that your favourite story will run
+smoothly, clause for clause, and word for word, just as you like it
+best, and the children were always sure of this with Hannah.
+
+Anne Chitt would listen open-mouthed in astonishment, exclaiming
+afterwards, "Why, 'Annah, wot a tremenjous lot of Bible verses you 'ave
+learned to be sure."
+
+The children once tried Anne Chitt as a storyteller, but she was a
+failure.
+
+As she had been present at several of Hannah's recitals of the Three
+Children and the burning fiery furnace, they thought it but a modest
+demand upon her powers. But when--instead of beginning with the sonorous
+"_Then an herald cried aloud, To you it is commanded, O people, nations
+and languages_"--when she wholly omitted any reference to "_the sound of
+cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer_, and all kinds of
+musick"--and essayed to tell the story in broad Gloucestershire and her
+own bald words, the disappointed children fell upon her and thumped her
+rudely upon the back; declaring her story to be "_kutcha_" and she,
+herself, a _budmash_. Which, being interpreted, meant that her story was
+most badly made and that she, herself, was a rascal.
+
+Anne Chitt was much offended, and complained tearfully to Jan that she
+"wouldn't 'ave said nothin' if they'd called 'er or'nery names, but them
+there Injian words was more than she could abear."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+"ONE WAY OF LOVE"
+
+
+Among the neighbours there was none more assiduous in the matter of
+calls and other friendly manifestations than Mr. Huntly
+Withells--emphasis on the "ells"--who lived at Guiting Grange, about a
+couple of miles from Wren's End. Mr. Withells was settled at the Grange
+some years before Miss Janet Ross left her house to Jan, and he was
+already a person of importance and influence in that part of the county
+when Anthony Ross and his daughters first spent a whole summer there.
+
+Mr. Withells proved most neighbourly. He had artistic leanings himself,
+and possessed some good pictures; among them, one of Anthony's, which
+naturally proved a bond of union. He did not even so much as sketch,
+himself--which Anthony considered another point in his favour--but he
+was a really skilled photographer, possessed the most elaborate cameras,
+and obtained quite beautiful results.
+
+Since Jan's return from India he had completely won her heart by taking
+a great many photographs of the children, pictures delightfully natural,
+and finished as few amateurs contrive to present them.
+
+It was rumoured in Amber Guiting that Mr. Withells' views on the
+subject of matrimony were "peculiar"; but all the ladies, especially the
+elderly ladies, were unanimous in declaring that he had a "beautiful
+mind."
+
+Mrs. Fream, the vicar's wife, timidly confided to Jan that Mr. Withells
+had told her husband that he cared only for "spiritual marriage"--
+whatever that might be; and that, as yet, he had met no woman whom he
+felt would see eye to eye with him on this question. "He doesn't approve
+of caresses," she added.
+
+"Well, who wants to caress him?" Jan asked bluntly.
+
+Meg declared there was one thing she could not bear about Mr. Withells,
+and that was the way he shook hands, "exactly as if he had no thumbs. If
+he's so afraid of touching one as all that comes to, why doesn't he let
+it alone?"
+
+Yet the apparently thumbless hands were constantly occupied in bearing
+gifts of all kinds to his friends.
+
+In appearance he was dapper, smallish, without being undersized, always
+immaculately neat in his attire, with a clean-shaven, serious, rather
+sallow face, which was inclined to be chubby as to the cheeks. He wore
+double-sighted pince-nez, and no mortal had ever seen him without them.
+His favourite writer was Miss Jane Austen, and he deplored the
+licentious tendency of so much modern literature; frequently, and with
+flushed countenance, denouncing certain books as an "outrage." He was
+considered a very well-read man. He disliked anything that was "not
+quite nice," and detested a strong light, whether it were thrown upon
+life or landscape; in bright sunshine he always carried a white umbrella
+lined with green. The game he played best was croquet, and here he was
+really first class; but he was also skilled in every known form of
+Patience, and played each evening unless he happened to be dining out.
+
+As regards food he was something of a faddist, and on the subject of
+fresh air almost a monomaniac. He declared that he could not exist for
+ten minutes in a room with closed windows, and that the smell of apples
+made him feel positively faint; moreover, he would mention his somewhat
+numerous antipathies as though there were something peculiarly
+meritorious in possessing so many. This made his entertainment at any
+meal a matter of agitated consideration among the ladies of Amber
+Guiting.
+
+Nevertheless, he kept an excellent and hospitable table himself, and in
+no way forced his own taste upon others. He disliked the smell of
+tobacco and hardly ever drank wine, yet he kept a stock of excellent
+cigars and his cellar was beyond reproach.
+
+He had been observing Jan for several years, and was rapidly coming to
+the conclusion that she was an "eminently sensible woman." Her grey hair
+and the way she had managed everything for her father led him to believe
+that she was many years older than her real age. Recently he had taken
+to come to Wren's End on one pretext and another almost every day. He
+was kind and pleasant to the children, who amused and pleased
+him--especially little Fay; but he was much puzzled by Meg, whom he had
+known in pre-cap-and-apron days while she was staying at Wren's End.
+
+He couldn't quite place Meg, and there was an occasional glint in her
+queer eyes that he found disconcerting. He was never comfortable in her
+society, for he objected to red hair almost as strongly as to a smell of
+apples.
+
+He really liked the children, and since he knew he couldn't get Jan
+without them he was beginning to think that in such a big house as the
+Grange they would not necessarily be much in the way. He knew nothing
+whatever about Hugo Tancred.
+
+Jan satisfied his fastidious requirements. She was dignified, graceful,
+and, he considered, of admirable parts. He felt that in a very little
+while he could imbue Jan with his own views as to the limitations and
+delicate demarcations of such a marriage as he contemplated.
+
+She was so sensible.
+
+Meanwhile the object of these kind intentions was wholly unaware of
+them. She was just then very much absorbed in her own affairs and
+considerably worried about Meg's. For Captain Middleton's week-end was
+repeated on the following Saturday and extended far into the next week.
+He came constantly to Wren's End, where the children positively adored
+him, and he seemed to possess an infallible instinct which led him to
+the village whensoever Meg and her charges had business there.
+
+On such occasions Meg was often quite rude to Captain Middleton, but the
+children and William more than atoned for her coldness by the warmth of
+their welcome, and he attached himself to them.
+
+In fact, as regards the nursery party at Wren's End, Miles strongly
+resembled William before a fire--you might drive him away ninety and
+nine times, he always came thrusting back with the same expression of
+deprecating astonishment that you could be other than delighted to see
+him.
+
+Whither was it all tending? Jan wondered.
+
+No further news had come from Hugo; Peter, she supposed, had sailed and
+was due in London at the end of the week.
+
+Then Mr. Huntly Withells asked her one afternoon to bicycle over to see
+his spring irises--he called them "_irides_," and invariably spoke of
+"_croci_," and "_delphinia_"--and as Meg was taking the children to tea
+at the vicarage, Jan went.
+
+To her surprise, she found herself the sole guest, but supposed she was
+rather early and that his other friends hadn't come yet.
+
+They strolled about the gardens, so lovely in their spring blossoming,
+and it happened that from one particular place they got a specially good
+view of the house.
+
+"How much larger it is than you would think, looking at the front," Jan
+remarked. "You don't see that wing at all from the drive."
+
+"There's plenty of room for nephews and nieces," Mr. Withells said
+jocularly.
+
+"Have you many nephews and nieces?" she asked, turning to look at him,
+for there was something in the tone of his voice that she could not
+understand.
+
+"Not of my own," he replied, still in that queer, unnatural voice, "but
+you see my wife might have ... if I was married."
+
+"Are you thinking of getting married?" she asked, with the real interest
+such a subject always rouses in woman.
+
+"That depends," Mr. Withells said consciously, "on whether the lady I
+have in mind ... er ... shall we sit down, Miss Ross? It's rather hot in
+the walks."
+
+"Oh, not yet," Jan exclaimed. She couldn't think why, but she began to
+feel uncomfortable. "I must see those Darwin tulips over there."
+
+"It's very sunny over there," he objected. "Come down the nut-walk and
+see the _myosotis arvensis_; it is already in bloom, the weather has
+been so warm.
+
+"Miss Ross," Mr. Withells continued seriously, as they turned into the
+nut-walk which led back towards the house, "we have known each other for
+a considerable time...."
+
+"We have," said Jan, as he had paused, evidently expecting a reply.
+
+"And I have come to have a great regard for you...."
+
+Again he paused, and Jan found herself silently whispering, "Curtsy
+while you're thinking--it saves time," but she preserved an outward
+silence.
+
+"You are, if I may say so, the most sensible woman of my acquaintance."
+
+"Thank you," said Jan, but without enthusiasm.
+
+"We are neither of us quite young"--(Mr. Withells was forty-nine, but it
+was a little hard on Jan)--"and I feel sure that you, for instance,
+would not expect or desire from a husband those constant outward
+demonstrations of affection such as handclaspings and kisses, which are
+so foolish and insanitary."
+
+Jan turned extremely red and walked rather faster.
+
+"Do not misunderstand me, Miss Ross," Mr. Withells continued, looking
+with real admiration at her downcast, rosy face--she must be quite
+healthy he thought, to look so clean and fresh always--"I lay down no
+hard-and-fast rules. I do not say should my wife desire to kiss me
+sometimes, that I should ... repulse her."
+
+Jan gasped.
+
+"But I have the greatest objection, both on sanitary and moral grounds
+to----"
+
+"I can't imagine anyone _wanting_ to kiss you," Jan interrupted
+furiously; "you're far too puffy and stippled."
+
+And she ran from him as though an angry bull were after her.
+
+Mr. Withells stood stock-still where he was, in pained astonishment.
+
+He saw the fleeing fair one disappear into the distance and in the
+shortest time on record he heard the clanging of her bicycle bell as she
+scorched down his drive.
+
+"Puffy and stippled"--"Puffy and stippled"!
+
+Mr. Withells repeated to himself this rudely personal remark as he
+walked slowly towards the house.
+
+What could she mean?
+
+And what in the world had he said to make her so angry?
+
+Women were really most unaccountable.
+
+He ascended his handsome staircase and went into his dressing-room, and
+there he sought his looking-glass, which stood in the window, and
+surveyed himself critically. Yes, his cheeks _were_ a bit puffy near the
+nostrils, and, as is generally the case in later life, the pores of the
+skin were a bit enlarged, but for all that he was quite a personable
+man.
+
+He sighed. Miss Ross, he feared, was not nearly so sensible as he had
+thought.
+
+It was distinctly disappointing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For the first mile and a quarter Jan scorched all she knew. The angry
+blood was thumping in her ears and she exclaimed indignantly at
+intervals, "How dared he! How dared he!"
+
+Then she punctured a tyre.
+
+There was no hope of getting it mended till she reached Wren's End, when
+Earley would do it for her. As she pushed her bicycle along the lane she
+recovered her sense of humour and she laughed. And presently she became
+aware of a faint, sweet, elusive perfume from some flowering shrub on
+the other side of somebody's garden wall.
+
+It strongly resembled the smell of a blossoming tree that grew on Ridge
+Road, Malabar Hill. And in one second Jan was in Bombay, and was
+standing in the moonlight, looking up into a face that was neither puffy
+nor stippled nor prim; but young and thin and worn and very kind. And
+the exquisite understanding of that moment came back to her, and her
+eyes filled with tears.
+
+Yet in another moment she was again demanding indignantly, "How dared
+he!"
+
+She went straight to her room when she got in, and, like Mr. Withells,
+she went and looked at herself in the glass.
+
+Unlike Mr. Withells, she saw nothing there to give her any satisfaction.
+She shook her head at the person in the glass and said aloud:
+
+"If that's all you get by trying to be sensible, the sooner you become a
+drivelling idiot the better for your peace of mind--and your vanity."
+
+The person in the glass shook her head back at Jan, and Jan turned away
+thoroughly disgusted with such a futile sort of _tu quoque_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE
+
+
+Meg and the children, returning from their tea-party at the vicarage,
+were stopped continually in their journey through the main street by
+friendly folk who wanted to greet the children. It was quite a triumphal
+progress, and Meg was feeling particularly proud that afternoon, for her
+charges, including William, had all behaved beautifully. Little Fay had
+refrained from snatching other children's belongings with the cool
+remark, "Plitty little Fay would like 'at"; Tony had been quite merry
+and approachable; and William had offered paws and submitted to
+continual pullings, pushings and draggings with exemplary patience.
+
+Once through the friendly, dignified old street, they reached the main
+road, which was bordered by rough grass sloping to a ditch surmounted by
+a thick thorn hedge. They were rather late, and Meg was wheeling little
+Fay as fast as she could, Tony trotting beside her to keep up, when a
+motor horn was sounded behind them and a large car came along at a good
+speed. They were all well to the side of the road, but William--with the
+perverse stupidity of the young dog--above all, of the young
+bull-terrier--chose that precise moment to gambol aimlessly right into
+the path of the swiftly-coming motor, just as it seemed right upon him;
+and this, regardless of terrified shouts from Meg and the children,
+frantic sounding of the horn and violent language from the driver of the
+car.
+
+It seemed that destruction must inevitably overtake William when the car
+swerved violently as the man ran it down the sloping bank, where it
+stuck, leaving William, unscathed and rather alarmed by all the clamour,
+to run back to his family.
+
+Meg promptly whacked him as hard as she could, whereupon, much
+surprised, he turned over on his back, waving four paws feebly in the
+air.
+
+"Why don't you keep your dog at the side?" the man shouted with very
+natural irritation as he descended from his seat.
+
+"He's a naughty--stupid--puppy," Meg ejaculated between the whacks. "It
+wasn't your fault in the least, and it was awfully good of you to avoid
+him."--Whack--whack.
+
+The man started a little as she spoke and came across the road towards
+them.
+
+Meg raised a flushed face from her castigation of William, but the
+pretty colour faded quickly when she saw who the stranger was.
+
+"Meg!" he exclaimed. "_You!_"
+
+For a tense moment they stared at one another, while the children stared
+at the stranger. He was certainly a handsome man; melancholy,
+"interesting." Pale, with regular features and sleepy, smallish eyes set
+very near together.
+
+"If you knew how I have searched for you," he said.
+
+His voice was his great charm, and would have made his fortune on the
+stage. It could convey so much, could be so tender and beseeching, so
+charged with deepest sadness, so musical always.
+
+"Your search cannot have been very arduous," Meg answered drily. "There
+has never been any mystery about my movements." And she looked him
+straight in the face.
+
+"At first, I was afraid ... I did not try to find you."
+
+"You were well-advised."
+
+"Who is 'at sahib?" little Fay interrupted impatiently. "Let us go
+home." She had no use for any sahib who ignored her presence.
+
+"Yes, we'd better be getting on," Meg said hurriedly, and seized the
+handle of the pram.
+
+But he stood right in their path.
+
+"You were very cruel," the musical voice went on. "You never seemed to
+give a thought to all _I_ was suffering."
+
+Meg met the sleepy eyes, that used to thrill her very soul, with a look
+of scornful amusement in hers that was certainly the very last
+expression he had ever expected to see in them.
+
+She had always dreaded this moment.
+
+Realising the power this man had exercised over her, she always feared
+that should she meet him again the old glamour would surround him; the
+old domination be reasserted. She forgot that in five years one's
+standards change.
+
+Now that she did meet him she discovered that he held no bonds with
+which to bind her. That what she had dreaded was a chimera. The real
+Walter Brooke, the moment he appeared in the flesh, destroyed the image
+memory had set up; and Meg straightened her slender shoulders as though
+a heavy burden had dropped from them.
+
+The whole thing passed like a flash.
+
+"You were very cruel," he repeated.
+
+"There is no use going into all that," Meg answered in a cheerful,
+matter-of-fact tone. "Good-bye, Mr. Brooke. We are most grateful to you
+for not running over William, who is," here she raised her voice for the
+benefit of the culprit, "a naughty--tiresome dog."
+
+"But you can't leave me like this. When can I see you again--there is so
+much I want to explain...."
+
+"But I don't want any explanations, thank you. Come children, we _must_
+go."
+
+"Meg, listen ... surely you have some little feeling of kindness towards
+me ... after all that happened...."
+
+He put his hand on Meg's arm to detain her, and William, who had never
+been known to show enmity to human creature, gave a deep growl and
+bristled. A growl so ominous and threatening that Meg hastily loosed the
+pram and caught him by the collar with both hands.
+
+Tony saw that Meg was flustered and uncomfortable. "Why does he not go?"
+he asked. "I thought he was a sahib, but I suppose he is the
+gharri-wallah. We have thanked him--does he want backsheesh? Give him a
+rupee."
+
+"He _does_ want backsheesh," the deep, musical voice went on--"a little
+pity, a little common kindness."
+
+It was an embarrassing situation. William was straining at his collar
+and growling like an incipient thunderstorm.
+
+"We have thanked you," Tony said again with dignity. "We have no money,
+or we would reward you. If you like to call at the house, Auntie Jan
+always has money."
+
+The man smiled pleasantly at Tony.
+
+"Thank you, young man. You have told me exactly what I wanted to know.
+So you are with your friends?"
+
+"I can't hold this dog much longer," Meg gasped. "If you don't
+go--you'll get bitten."
+
+William ceased to growl, for far down the road he had heard a footstep
+that he knew. He still strained at his collar, but it was in a direction
+that led away from Mr. Walter Brooke. Meg let go and William swung off
+down the road.
+
+"Shall we all have a lide in loo ghalli?" little Fay asked--it seemed to
+her sheer waste of time to stand arguing in the road when a good car was
+waiting empty. The children called every form of conveyance a "gharri."
+
+"We shall meet again," said this persistent man. "You can't put me off
+like this."
+
+He raised his voice, for he was angry, and its clear tones carried far
+down the quiet road.
+
+"There's Captain Middleton with William," Tony said suddenly. "Perhaps
+_he_ has some money."
+
+Meg paled and crimsoned, and with hands that trembled started to push
+the pram at a great pace.
+
+The man went back to his car, and Tony, regardless of Meg's call to him,
+ran to meet William and Miles.
+
+The back wheels of the car had sunk deeply into the soft wet turf. It
+refused to budge. Miles came up. He was long-sighted, and he had seen
+very well who it was that was talking to Meg in the road. He had also
+heard Mr. Brooke's last remark.
+
+Till lately he had only known Walter Brooke enough to dislike him
+vaguely. Since his interview with Mrs. Trent this feeling had
+intensified to such an extent as surprised himself. At the present
+moment he was seething with rage, but all the same he went and helped to
+get the car up the bank, jacking it up, and setting his great shoulders
+against it to start it again.
+
+All this Tony watched with deepest interest, and Meg waited, fuming, a
+little way down the road, for she knew it was hopeless to get Tony to
+come till the car had once started. Once on the hard road again, it
+bowled swiftly away and to her immense relief passed her without
+stopping.
+
+She saw that Miles was bringing Tony, and started on again with little
+Fay.
+
+Fury was in her heart at Tony's disobedience, and behind it all a dull
+ache that Miles should have heard, and doubtless misunderstood, Walter
+Brooke's last remark.
+
+Tony was talking eagerly as he followed, but she was too upset to listen
+till suddenly she heard Miles say in a tone of the deepest satisfaction,
+"Good old William."
+
+This was too much.
+
+She stopped and called over her shoulder: "He isn't good at all; he's a
+thoroughly tiresome, disobedient, badly-trained dog."
+
+They came up with her at that, and William rolled over on his back, for
+he knew those tones portended further punishment.
+
+"He's an ass in lots of ways," Miles allowed, "but he is an excellent
+judge of character."
+
+And as if in proof of this William righted himself and came cringing to
+Meg to try and lick the hand that a few minutes ago had thumped him so
+vigorously.
+
+Meg looked up at Miles and he looked down at her, and his gaze was
+pained, kind and grave. _His_ eyes were large and well-opened and set
+wide apart in his broad face. Honest, trustworthy eyes they were.
+
+Very gently he took the little pram from her, for he saw that her hands
+were trembling: "You've had a fright," he said. "I know what it is. I
+had a favourite dog run over once. It's horrible, it takes months to get
+over it. I can't think why dogs are so stupid about motors ... must have
+been a near shave that ... very decent of Brooke--he's taken pounds off
+his car with that wrench."
+
+While Miles talked he didn't look at Meg.
+
+"I say, little Fay," he suddenly suggested, "wouldn't you like to walk a
+bit?" and he lifted her out. "There, that's better. Now, Miss Morton,
+you sit down a minute; you've had a shake, you know. I'll go on with the
+kiddies."
+
+Meg was feeling a horrible, humiliating desire to cry. Her eyes were
+bright with unshed tears, her knees refused to bear her. Thankfully she
+sat down on the foot-board of Fay's little pram. The tall figure between
+the two little ones suddenly grew blurred and dim. Furtively she blew
+her nose and wiped her eyes. They were not a stone's throw from the
+lodge at Wren's End.
+
+How absurd to be sitting there!
+
+And yet she didn't feel inclined to move just yet.
+
+"'Ere, my dear, you take a sip o' water; the gentleman's told me all
+about it. Them sort o' shocks fair turns one over."
+
+And kind Mrs. Earley was beside her, holding out a thick tumbler. Meg
+drank the deliciously cold water and arose refreshed.
+
+And somehow the homely comfort of Mrs. Earley's presence made her
+realise wherein lay the essential difference between these two men.
+
+"He still treats me like a princess," she thought, "even though he
+thinks ... Oh, what _can_ he think?" and Meg gave a little sob.
+
+"There, there!" said Mrs. Earley, "don't you take on no more, Miss. The
+dear dog bain't 'urted not a 'air of him. 'E cum frolicking in that
+friendly--I sometimes wonders if there do be anyone as William 'ud ever
+bite. 'E ain't much of a watchdog, I fear."
+
+"He nearly bit someone this afternoon," Meg said.
+
+"Well, I'm not sorry to yer it. It don't do for man nor beast to be too
+trustful--not in this world it don't."
+
+At the drive gate Miles was standing.
+
+Mrs. Earley took the pram with her for Earley to clean, and Meg and
+Miles walked on together.
+
+"I'm sorry you've had this upset," he said. "I've talked to William like
+a father."
+
+"It wasn't only William," Meg murmured.
+
+They were close to the house, and she stopped.
+
+"Good night, Captain Middleton. I must go and put my children to bed;
+we're late."
+
+"I don't want to seem interfering, Miss Morton, but don't you let anyone
+bully you into picking up an acquaintance you'd rather drop."
+
+"I suppose," said Meg, "one always has to pay for the things one has
+done."
+
+"Well, yes, sooner or later; but it's silly to pay Jew prices."
+
+"Ah," said Meg, "you've never been poor enough to go to the Jews, so you
+can't tell."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Miles walked slowly back to Amber Guiting that warm May evening. He had
+a good deal to think over, for he had come to a momentous decision. When
+he thought of Meg as he had just seen her--small and tremulous and
+tearful--he clenched his big hands and made a sound in his throat not
+unlike William's growl. When he pictured her angry onslaught upon
+William, he laughed. But the outcome of his reflections was this--that
+whether in the past she had really done anything that put her in Walter
+Brooke's power, or whether he was right to trust to that intangible
+quality in her that seemed to give the direct lie to the worst of Mrs.
+Trent's story, Meg appeared to him to stand in need of some hefty chap
+as a buffer between her and the hard world, and he was very desirous of
+being that same for Meg.
+
+His grandfather, "Mutton-Pie Middleton," had married one of his own
+waitresses for no other reason than that he found she was "the lass for
+him"--and he might, so the Doncaster folk thought, have looked a good
+deal higher for a wife, for he was a "warm" man at the time. Miles
+strongly resembled his grandfather. He was somewhat ruefully aware that
+in appearance there was but little of the Keills about him. He could
+just remember the colossal old man who must have weighed over twenty
+stone in his old age, and Miles, hitherto, had refused to buy a motor
+for his own use because he knew that if he was to keep his figure he
+must walk, and walk a lot.
+
+Like his grandfather, he was now perfectly sure of himself; Meg "was the
+lass for him"; but he was by no means equally sure of her. By some
+infallible delicacy of instinct--and this he certainly did not get from
+the Middletons--he knew that what the world would regard as a
+magnificent match for Meg, might be the very circumstance that would
+destroy his chance with her. The Middletons were all keenly alive to the
+purchasing powers of money, and saw to it that they got their money's
+worth.
+
+All the same, a man's a man, whether he be rich or poor, and Miles still
+remembered the way Meg had smiled upon him the first time they ever met.
+Surely she could never have smiled at him like that unless she had
+rather liked him.
+
+It was the pathos of Meg herself--not the fact that she had to
+work--that appealed to Miles. That she should cheerfully earn her own
+living instead of grousing in idleness in a meagre home seemed to him
+merely a matter of common sense. He knew that if he had to do it he
+could earn his, and the one thing he could neither tolerate nor
+understand about a good many of his Keills relations was their
+preference for any form of assistance to honest work. He helped them
+generously enough, but in his heart of hearts he despised them, though
+he did not confess this even to himself.
+
+As he drew near the Manor House he saw Lady Mary walking up and down
+outside, evidently waiting for him.
+
+"Where have you been, Miles?" she asked, impatiently. "Pen has been
+here, and wanted specially to see you, but she couldn't stay any longer,
+as it's such a long run back. She motored over from Malmesbury."
+
+"What did she want?" Miles asked. "She's always in a stew about
+something. One of her Pekinese got pip, or what?"
+
+Lady Mary took his arm and turned to walk along the terrace. "I think,"
+she said, and stopped. "Where _were_ you, Miles?"
+
+"I strolled down the village to get some tobacco, and then I saw a chap
+who'd got his motor stuck, and helped him, and then ..." Here Miles
+looked down at his aunt, who looked up at him apprehensively. "I caught
+up with Miss Morton and the children, and walked back to Wren's End with
+them. There, Aunt Mary, that's a categorical history of my time since
+tea."
+
+Lady Mary pressed his arm. "Miles, dear, do you think it's quite wise to
+be seen about so much with little Miss Morton ... wise for her I mean?"
+
+"I hope I'm not the sort of chap it's bad to be seen about with...."
+
+"Of course not, dear Miles, but, you see, her position...."
+
+"What's the matter with her position?"
+
+"Of course I know it's most creditable of her and all that ... but ...
+when a girl has to go out as a sort of nursery governess, it is
+different, isn't it, dear? I mean...."
+
+"Yes, Aunt Mary, I'm awfully interested--different from what?"
+
+"From girls who lead the sheltered life, girls who don't work ... girls
+of our own class."
+
+"I don't know," Miles said thoughtfully, "that I should say Pen, for
+instance, lives exactly a _sheltered_ life, should you?"
+
+"Pen is married."
+
+"Yes, but before she was married ... eh, Aunt Mary? Be truthful, now."
+
+Miles held his aunt's arm tightly within his, and he stooped and looked
+into her face.
+
+"And does the fact that Pen is married explain or excuse her deplorable
+taste in men? Which does it do, Aunt Mary? Speak up, now."
+
+Lady Mary laughed. "I'm not here to defend Pen; I'm here to get your
+answer as to whether you think it's ... quite fair to make that little
+Miss Morton conspicuous by running after her and making her the talk of
+the entire county, for that's what you're doing."
+
+"What good old Pen has been telling you I'm doing, I suppose."
+
+"I had my own doubts about it without any help from Pen ... but she said
+Alec Pottinger had been talking...."
+
+"Pottinger's an ass."
+
+"He doesn't talk _much_, anyhow, Miles, and she felt if _he_ said
+anything...."
+
+"Look here, Aunt Mary, how's a chap to go courting seriously if he
+doesn't run after a girl?... he can't work it from a distance ... not
+unless he's one of those poet chaps, and puts letters in hollow trees
+and so on. And you don't seem to have provided any hollow trees about
+here."
+
+"Courting ... seriously!" Lady Mary repeated with real horror in her
+tones. "Oh, Miles, you can't mean that!"
+
+"Surely you'd not prefer I meant the other thing?"
+
+"But, Miles dear, think!"
+
+"I have thought, and I've thought it out."
+
+"You mean you want to _marry_ her?"
+
+Lady Mary spoke in an awed whisper.
+
+"Just exactly that, and I don't care who knows it; but I'm not at all
+sure she wants to marry me ... that's why I don't want to rush my fences
+and get turned down. I'm a heavy chap to risk a fall, Aunt Mary."
+
+"Oh, Miles! this is worse than anything Pen even dreamt of."
+
+"What is? If you mean that she probably won't have me--I'm with you."
+
+"Of course she'd jump at you--any girl would.... But a little
+nursemaid!"
+
+"Come now, Aunt Mary, you know very well she's just as good as I am;
+better, probably, for she's got no pies nor starch in her pedigree. Her
+father's a Major and her mother was of quite good family--and she's got
+lots of rich, stingy relations ... and she doesn't sponge on 'em. What's
+the matter with her?"
+
+"Please don't do anything in a hurry, dear Miles."
+
+"I shan't, if you and Pen and the blessed 'county,' with its criticism
+and gossip, don't drive me into it ... but the very first word you
+either say or repeat to me against Miss Morton, off I go to her and to
+the old Major.... So now we understand each other, Aunt Mary--eh?"
+
+"There are things you ought to know, Miles."
+
+"You may depend," said Miles grimly, "that anything I ought to know I
+shall be told ... over and over again ... confound it.... And remember,
+Aunt Mary, that what I've told you is not in the least private. Tell
+Pen, tell Mrs. Fream, tell Withells, but just leave me to tell Miss
+Ross, that's all I beg."
+
+"Miles, I shall tell nobody, for I hope ... I hope----"
+
+"'Hope told a flattering tale,'" said Miles, and kissed his aunt ... but
+to himself he said: "I've shut their mouths for a day or two anyway."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE ENCAMPMENT
+
+
+It was the morning of the first Monday in June, and Tony had wandered
+out into the garden all by himself. Monday mornings were very busy, and
+once Clipture was over Jan and Meg became socially useless to any
+self-respecting boy.
+
+There was all the washing to sort and divide into two large heaps: what
+might be sent to Mrs. Chitt in the village, and what might be kept for
+the ministrations of one Mrs. Mumford, who came every Monday to Wren's
+End. And this division was never arrived at without a good deal of
+argument between Jan and Meg.
+
+If Jan had had her way, Mrs. Mumford's heap would have been very small
+indeed, and would have consisted chiefly of socks and handkerchiefs. If
+Meg had had hers, nothing at all would have gone to Mrs. Chitt. Usually,
+too, Hannah was called in as final arbitrator, and she generally sided
+with Meg. Little Fay took the greatest interest in the whole ceremony,
+chattered continually, and industriously mixed up the heaps when no one
+was looking.
+
+At such times Tony was of the opinion that there were far too many women
+in the world. On this particular morning, too, he felt injured because
+of something that had happened at breakfast.
+
+It was always a joy to Meg and Jan that whatever poor Fay might have
+left undone in the matter of disciplining her children, she had at least
+taught them to eat nicely. Little Fay's management of a spoon was a joy
+to watch. The dimpled baby hand was so deft, the turn of the plump wrist
+so sure and purposeful. She never spilled or slopped her food about. Its
+journey from bowl to little red mouth was calculated and assured. Both
+children had a horror of anything sticky, and would refuse jam unless it
+was "well covelled in a sangwidge."
+
+That very morning Jan and Meg exchanged congratulatory glances over
+their well-behaved charges, sitting side by side.
+
+Then, all at once, with a swift, sure movement, little Fay stretched up
+and deposited a spoonful of exceedingly hot porridge exactly on the top
+of her brother's head, with a smart tap.
+
+Tony's hair was always short, and had been cut on Saturday, and the hot
+mixture ran down into his eyes, which filled him with rage.
+
+He tried to get out of his high chair, exclaiming angrily, "Let me get
+at her to box her!"
+
+Jan held him down with one hand while she wiped away the offending mess
+with the other, and all the time Tony cried in _crescendo_, "Let me get
+at her!"
+
+Little Fay, quite unmoved, continued to eat her porridge with studied
+elegance, and in gently reproachful tones remarked, "Tony velly closs
+littoo boy."
+
+Jan and Meg, who wanted desperately to laugh, tried hard to look
+shocked, and Meg asked, "What on earth possessed you to do such a
+thing?"
+
+"Tony's head so shiny and smoove."
+
+Tony rubbed the shiny head ruefully.
+
+"Can't I do nuffin to her?" he demanded.
+
+"No," his sister answered firmly, "loo can't, 'cos I'm plitty littoo
+Fay."
+
+"Can't I plop some on _her_ head?" he persisted.
+
+"It certainly seems unfair," Jan said thoughtfully, "but I think you'd
+better not."
+
+"It _is_ unfair," Tony grumbled.
+
+Jan loosed his hands. "Now," she said, "you can do what you like."
+
+Little Fay leaned towards her brother, smiling her irresistible,
+dimpled, twinkling smile, and held out a spoonful of her porridge.
+
+"Deah littoo Tony," she cooed, "taste it."
+
+And Tony meekly accepted the peace-offering.
+
+"You haven't smacked her," Jan remarked.
+
+Tony sighed. "It's too late now--I don't feel like it any more."
+
+All the same he felt aggrieved as he set out to seek Earley in the
+kitchen garden.
+
+Earley was not to be found. He saw Mrs. Mumford already hanging kitchen
+cloths on a line in the orchard, but he felt no desire for Mrs.
+Mumford's society.
+
+Tony's tormented soul sought for something soothing.
+
+The garden was pleasant, but it wasn't enough.
+
+Ah! he'd got it!
+
+He'd go to the river; all by himself he'd go, and not tell anybody. He'd
+look over the bridge into that cool deep pool and perhaps that big fat
+trout would be swimming about. What was it he had heard Captain
+Middleton say last time he was down at Amber Guiting? "The Mayfly was
+up."
+
+He had seemed quite delighted about it, therefore it must mean something
+pleasant.
+
+After all, on a soft, not too sunny morning in early June, with a west
+wind rustling the leaves in the hedges, the world was not such a bad
+place; for even if there were rather too many women in it, there were
+dogs and rivers and country roads where adventurous boys could see life
+for themselves.
+
+William agreed with Tony in his dislike of Monday mornings. He went and
+lay on the front door mat so that he was more than ready to accompany
+anyone who happened to be going out.
+
+By the time they reached the bridge all sense of injury had vanished,
+and buoyant expectation had taken its place.
+
+Three men were fishing. One was far in the distance, one about three
+hundred yards up stream, and one Tony recognised as Mr. Dauncey,
+landlord of "The Full Basket," the square white house standing in its
+neat garden just on the other side of the bridge. The fourth gentleman,
+who had forgotten his hat, and was clad in a holland smock, sandals,
+and no stockings, leaned over luxuriously, with his elbows on the low
+wall and his bare legs thrust out. He was very still, even trying not to
+twitch when William licked his bare legs, as he did at intervals just to
+show he was there on guard.
+
+There had been heavy rain in the night and the water was discoloured.
+Nobody noticed Tony, and for about an hour nothing happened. Then Mr.
+Dauncey got a rise. The rigid little figure on the bridge leaned further
+over as Mr. Dauncey's reel screamed and he followed his cast down
+stream.
+
+Presently, with a sense of irritation, Tony was aware of footsteps
+coming over the bridge. He felt that he simply could not bear it just
+then if anyone leaned over beside him and talked. The footsteps came up
+behind him and passed; and William, who was lying between Tony's legs
+and the wall, squeezed as close to him as possible, gave a low growl.
+
+"Hush, William, naughty dog!" Tony whispered crossly.
+
+William hushed, and drooped as he always did when rebuked.
+
+It occurred to Tony to look after this amazing person who could cross a
+bridge without stopping to look over when a reel was joyfully
+proclaiming that some fisherman was having luck.
+
+It was a man, and he walked as though he were footsore and tired. There
+was something dejected and shabby in his appearance, and his clothes
+looked odd somehow in Amber Guiting. Tony stared after the stranger,
+and gradually he realised that there was something familiar in the back
+of the tall figure that walked so slowly and yet seemed trying to walk
+fast.
+
+The man had a stick and evidently leant upon it as he went. He wore an
+overcoat and carried nothing in his hand.
+
+Mr. Dauncey's reel chuckled and one of the other anglers ran towards him
+with a landing-net.
+
+But Tony still stared after the man. Presently, with a deep sigh, he
+started to follow him.
+
+Just once he turned, in time to see that Mr. Dauncey had landed his
+trout.
+
+The sun came out from behind the clouds. "The Full Basket," the river,
+brown and rippled, the bridge, the two men talking eagerly on the bank
+below, the muddy road growing cream-coloured in patches as it dried,
+were all photographed upon Tony's mind. When he started to follow the
+stranger he was out of sight, but now Tony trotted steadily forward and
+did not look round again.
+
+William was glad. He had been lying in a puddle, and, like little Fay,
+he preferred "a dly place."
+
+Meanwhile, at Wren's End the washing had taken a long time to count and
+to divide. There seemed a positively endless number of little smocks and
+frocks and petticoats and pinafores, and Meg wanted to keep them all for
+Mrs. Mumford to wash, declaring that she (Meg) could starch and iron
+them beautifully. This was quite true. She could iron very well, as she
+did everything she undertook to do. But Jan knew that it tired her
+dreadfully, that the heat and the wielding of the heavy iron were very
+bad for her, and after much argument and many insulting remarks from Meg
+as to Jan's obstinacy and extravagance generally, the things were
+divided. Meg put on little Fay's hat and swept her out into the garden;
+whereupon Jan plunged into Mrs. Mumford's heap, removed all the things
+to be ironed that could not be tackled by Anne Chitt, stuffed them into
+Mrs. Chitt's basket, fastened it firmly and rang for Anne and Hannah to
+carry the things away.
+
+She washed her hands and put on her gardening gloves preparatory to
+going out, humming a gay little snatch of song; and as she ran down the
+wide staircase she heard the bell ring, and saw the figure of a man
+standing in the open doorway.
+
+The maids were carrying the linen down the back stairs, and she went
+across the hall to see what he wanted.
+
+"Well, Jan," he said, and his voice sounded weak and tired. "Here I am
+at last."
+
+He held out his hand, and as she took it she felt how hot and dry it
+was.
+
+"Come in, Hugo," she said quietly. "Why didn't you let me know you were
+coming, and I'd have met you."
+
+The man followed her as she led the way into the cool, fragrant
+drawing-room. He paused in the doorway and passed his hand across his
+eyes. "It does bring it all back," he said.
+
+He sat down in a deep chair and leaned his head against the back,
+closing his eyes. Jan saw that he was thin to emaciation, and that he
+looked very ill; shabby, too, and broken.
+
+The instinct of the nurse that exists in any woman worth her salt was
+roused in Jan. All the passionate indignation she had felt against her
+brother-in-law was merged at the moment in pity and anxiety.
+
+"Hugo," she said gently, "I fear you are ill. Have you had any
+breakfast?"
+
+"I came by the early train to avoid ordering breakfast; I couldn't have
+paid for it. I'd only enough for my fare. Jan, I haven't a single rupee
+left."
+
+He sat forward in the chair with his hands on the arms and closed his
+eyes again.
+
+Jan looked keenly at the handsome, haggard face. There was no pretence
+here. The man was gravely ill. His lips (Jan had always mistrusted his
+well-shaped mouth because it would never really shut) were dry and
+cracked and discoloured, the cheekbones sharp, and there was that deep
+hollow at the back of the neck that always betrays the man in
+ill-health.
+
+She went to him and pressed him back in the chair.
+
+"What do you generally do when you have fever?" she asked.
+
+"Go to bed--if there is a bed; and take quinine and drink hot tea."
+
+"That's what you'd better do now. Where are your things?"
+
+"There's a small bag at the station. They promised to send it up. I
+couldn't carry it and I had no money to pay a boy. I came the long way
+round, Jan, not through the village. No one recognised me."
+
+"I'll get you some tea at once, and I have quinine in the house. Will
+you take some now?"
+
+Hugo laughed. "Your quinine would be of no earthly use to me, but I've
+already taken it this morning. I've got some here in my pocket. The
+minute my bag comes I'll go to bed--if you don't mind."
+
+Someone fumbled at the handle of the door, and Tony, followed by
+William, appeared on the threshold.
+
+Hugo Tancred opened his eyes. "Hullo!" he said. "Do you remember me,
+young shaver?"
+
+Tony came into the room holding out his hand. "How do you do?" he said
+solemnly.
+
+Hugo took it and stared at his son with strange glazed eyes. "You look
+fit enough, anyhow," he said, and dropped the little hand.
+
+"I came as quick as I could," Tony said eagerly to Jan. "But Mr. Dauncey
+caught a trout, and I _had_ to wait a minute."
+
+"Good heavens!" Hugo exclaimed irritably. "Do you all _still_ think and
+talk about nothing but fishing?"
+
+"Come," said Jan, holding out her hand to Tony, "and we'll go and see
+about some breakfast for Daddie."
+
+William, who had been sniffing dubiously at the man in the chair, dashed
+after them.
+
+As they crossed the hall Tony remarked philosophically: "Daddie's got
+fever. He'll be very cross, then he'll be very sad, and then he'll want
+you to give him something, and if you do--p'raps he'll go away."
+
+Jan made no answer.
+
+Tony followed her through the swing door and down the passage to speak
+to Hannah, who was much moved and excited when she heard Mr. Tancred had
+arrived. Hannah was full of sympathy for the "poor young widower," and
+though she could have wished that he had given them notice of his
+coming, still, she supposed him to be so distracted with grief that he
+forgot to do anything of the kind. She and Anne Chitt went there and
+then to make up his bed, while Jan boiled the kettle and got him some
+breakfast.
+
+While she was doing this Meg and little Fay came round to the back to
+look for Tony, whom they found making toast.
+
+"Who's tum?" asked little Fay, while Jan rapidly explained the situation
+to Meg.
+
+"Your Daddie's come."
+
+Little Fay looked rather vague. "What sort of a Daddie?" she asked.
+
+"You take her to see him, Tony, and I'll finish the toast," said Jan,
+taking the fork out of his hand.
+
+When the children had gone Meg said slowly: "And Mr. Ledgard comes
+to-morrow?"
+
+"He can't. I must telegraph and put him off for a day or two. Hugo is
+really ill."
+
+"I shouldn't put him off long, if I were you."
+
+Jan seized the tray: "I'll send a wire now, if you and the children will
+take it down to the post-office for me."
+
+"Why send it at all?" said Meg. "Let him come."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+TACTICS
+
+
+It was a fortnight since Hugo Tancred arrived at Wren's End, and Jan had
+twice put off Peter's visit.
+
+During the first few days Hugo's temperature remained so high that she
+grew thoroughly alarmed; and in spite of his protestations that he was
+"quite used to it," she sent for the doctor. Happily the doctor in his
+youth had been in the East and was able to reassure her. His opinion,
+too, had more weight with Hugo on this account, and though he grumbled
+he consented to do what the doctor advised. And at the end of a week
+Hugo was able to come downstairs, looking very white and shaky. He lay
+out in the garden in a deck-chair for most of the day and managed to eat
+a good many of the nourishing dishes Hannah prepared for him.
+
+It had been a hard time for Jan, as Hugo was not an invalid who excited
+compassion in those who had to wait upon him. He took everything for
+granted, was somewhat morose and exacting, and made no attempt to
+control the extreme irritability that so often accompanies fever.
+
+When the fever left him, however, his tone changed, and the second
+stage, indicated by Tony as "sad," set in with severity.
+
+His depression was positively overwhelming, and he seemed to think that
+its public manifestation should arouse in all beholders the most
+poignant and respectful sympathy.
+
+Poor Jan found it very difficult to behave in a manner at all calculated
+to satisfy her brother-in-law. She had not, so far, uttered one word of
+reproach to him, but she _would_ shrink visibly when he tried to discuss
+his wife, and she could not even pretend to believe in the deep
+sincerity of a grief that seemed to find such facile solace in
+expression. The mode of expression, too, in hackneyed, commonplace
+phrases, set her teeth on edge.
+
+She knew that poor Hugo--she called him "poor Hugo" just then--thought
+her cold and unsympathetic because she rather discouraged his
+outpourings; but Fay's death was too lately-lived a tragedy to make it
+possible for her to talk of it--above all, with him; and after several
+abortive attempts Hugo gave up all direct endeavour to make her.
+
+"You are terribly Scotch, Jan," he said one day. "I sometimes wonder
+whether anything could make you _really_ feel."
+
+Jan looked at him with a sort of contemptuous wonder that caused him to
+redden angrily, but she made no reply.
+
+He was her guest, he was a broken man, and she knew well that they had
+not yet even approached their real difference.
+
+Two people, however, took Hugo's attitude of profound dejection in the
+way he expected and liked it to be taken. These were Mr. Withells and
+Hannah.
+
+Mr. Withells did not bear Jan a grudge because of her momentary lapse
+from good manners. In less than a week from the unfortunate interview in
+the nut-walk he had decided that she could not properly have understood
+him; and that he had, perhaps, sprung upon her too suddenly the high
+honour he held in store for her.
+
+So back he came in his neat little two-seater car to call at Wren's End
+as if nothing had happened, and Jan, guiltily conscious that she _had_
+been very rude, was only too thankful to accept the olive-branch in the
+spirit in which it was offered.
+
+He took to coming almost as often as before, and was thoroughly
+interested and commiserating when he heard that poor Mrs. Tancred's
+husband had come home from India and been taken ill almost immediately
+on arrival. He sent some early strawberries grown in barrels in the
+houses, and with them a note conjuring Jan "on no account to leave them
+in the sickroom overnight, as the smell of fruit was so deleterious."
+
+Hannah considered Hugo's impenetrable gloom a most proper and husbandly
+tribute to the departed. She felt that had there been a Mr. Hannah she
+could not have wished him to show more proper feeling had Providence
+thought fit to snatch her from his side. So she expressed her admiration
+in the strongest of soups, the smoothest of custards, and the most
+succulent of mutton-chops. Gladly would she have commanded Mrs. Earley
+to slay her fattest cockerels for the nourishment of "yon poor
+heartbroken young man," but that she remembered (from her experience of
+Fay's only visit) that no one just home from India will give a thank-you
+for chickens.
+
+Jan had cause to bless kind Mr. Withells, for directly Hugo was able for
+it, he came with his largest and most comfortable car, driven by his
+trustworthy chauffeur, to take the invalid for a run right into
+Wiltshire. He pressed Jan to go too, but she pleaded "things to see to"
+at home.
+
+Hugo had seen practically nothing of Meg. She was fully occupied in
+keeping the children out of their father's way. Little Fay "pooah
+daddied" him when they happened to meet, and Tony stared at him in the
+weighing, measuring way Hugo found so trying, but Meg neither looked at
+him nor did she address any remark whatever to him unless she positively
+could not help it.
+
+Meg was thoroughly provoked that he should have chosen to turn up just
+then. She had been most anxious that Peter should come. Firstly,
+because, being sharply observant, she had come to the conclusion that
+his visit would be a real pleasure to Jan, and secondly, because she
+ardently desired to see him herself that she might judge whether he was
+"at all good enough."
+
+And now her well-loved Jan, instead of looking her best, was growing
+thin and haggard, losing her colour, and her sweet serenity, and in
+their place a patient, tired expression in her eyes that went to Meg's
+heart.
+
+She had hardly seen Jan alone for over a week; for since Hugo came
+downstairs Meg had taken all her meals with the children in the nursery,
+while Jan and Hugo had theirs in the rarely-used dining-room. The girls
+breakfasted together, as Hugo had his in his room, but as the children
+were always present there was small chance of any confidential
+conversation.
+
+The first afternoon Mr. Withells took Hugo for a drive, Meg left her
+children in Earley's care the minute she heard the car depart, and went
+to look for Jan in the house.
+
+She found her opening all the windows in the dining-room. Meg shut the
+door and sat on the polished table, lit a cigarette and regarded her own
+pretty swinging feet with interest.
+
+"How long does Mr. Tancred propose to stay?" she asked.
+
+"How can I tell," Jan answered wearily, as she sat down in one of the
+deep window-seats. "He has nowhere to go and no money to go with; and,
+so far, except for a vague allusion to some tea-plantation in Ceylon, he
+has suggested no plans. Oh, yes! I forgot, there was something about
+fruit-farming or vine-growing in California, but I fancy considerable
+capital would be needed for that."
+
+"And how much longer do you intend to keep Mr. Ledgard waiting for _his_
+visit?"
+
+"It would be small pleasure for Mr. Ledgard to come here with Hugo, and
+horrid for Hugo, for he knows perfectly well what Peter ... Mr. Ledgard
+thinks of him."
+
+"But if friend Hugo knew Mr. Ledgard was coming, might it not have an
+accelerating effect upon his movements? You could give him his
+fare--single, mind--to Guernsey. Let him go and stay with his people for
+a bit."
+
+Jan shook her head. "I can't turn him out, Meg; and I'm not going to let
+Mr. Ledgard waste his precious leave on an unpleasant visit. If I could
+give him a good time it would be different; but after all he did for us
+while we were in Bombay, it would be rank ingratitude to let him in for
+more worries at home."
+
+"Perhaps he wouldn't consider them worries. Perhaps he'd _like_ to
+come."
+
+Jan's strained expression relaxed a little and she smiled with her eyes
+fixed on Meg's neat swinging feet. "He _says_ he would."
+
+"Well, then, take him at his word. We can turn the excellent Withells on
+to Hugo. Let him instruct Hugo in the importance of daily free
+gymnastics after one's bath and the necessity for windows being left
+open at the top 'day and night, but _especially_ at night.' Let's tell
+that Peter man to come."
+
+Jan shook her head.
+
+"No, I've explained the situation to him and begged him not to consider
+us any more for the present. We must think of the maids too. You see,
+Hugo makes a good deal of extra work, and I'm afraid Hannah might turn
+grumpy if there was yet another man to do for."
+
+Meg thoughtfully blew beautiful rings of smoke, carefully poked a small
+finger exactly into the centre of each and continued to swing her feet
+in silence.
+
+Jan leaned her head against the casement and closed her eyes.
+
+Without so much as a rustle Meg descended from the table. She went over
+to Jan and dropped a light kiss on the top of the thick wavy hair that
+was so nearly white. Jan opened her tired eyes and smiled.
+
+This quaint person in the green linen frock and big white apron always
+looked so restfully neat and clean, so capable and strong with that
+inward shining strength that burns with a steady light. Jan put her arms
+round Meg and leaned her head against the admirable apron's cool, smooth
+bib.
+
+"You're here, anyway," she said. "You don't know how I thank God for
+that."
+
+Meg held her close. "Listen to me," she said. "You're going on quite a
+wrong tack with that brother-in-law. You are, Jan--I grieve to say
+it--standing between him and his children--you don't allow him to see
+his children, especially his adored daughter, nearly enough. Now that he
+is well enough to take the air with Mr. Withells I propose that we allow
+him to _study_ his children--and how can he study them if they are never
+left with him? Let him realise what it would be if he had them with him
+constantly, and no interfering aunt to keep them in order--do you
+understand, Jan? Have you tumbled to it? You are losing a perfectly
+magnificent opportunity."
+
+Jan pushed Meg a little away from her and looked up: "I believe there's
+a good deal in what you say."
+
+"There's everything in what I say. As long as the man was ill one
+couldn't, of course, but now we can and will--eh, Jan?"
+
+"Not Tony," Jan said nervously. "Hugo doesn't care much for Tony, and
+I'm always afraid what he may say or do to the child."
+
+"If you let him have them both occasionally he may discover that Tony
+has his points."
+
+"They're _both_ perfect darlings," Jan said resentfully. Meg laughed and
+danced a two-step to the door.
+
+"They're darlings that need a good deal of diplomatic managing, and if
+they don't get it they'll raise Cain. I'm going to take them down to the
+post-office directly with my Indian letters. Why not come with us for
+the walk?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hugo quite enjoyed his run with Mr. Withells and Mr. Withells enjoyed
+being consulted about Hugo's plans. He felt real sympathy for a young
+man whose health, ruined by one bad station after another, had forced
+him to give up his career in India. He suggested various ameliorating
+treatments to Hugo, who received his advice with respectful gratitude,
+and they arranged to drive again together on Saturday, which was next
+day but one.
+
+Hugo sought the sofa in the drawing-room for a quiet hour before dinner
+and lit a cigar. He had hardly realised his pleasantly tired and rather
+somnolent condition when his daughter entered carrying a large
+Teddy-bear, two dolls, a toy trumpet and a box containing a wooden
+tea-set. She dropped several of these articles just inside the door.
+"Come and help me pick up my sings," she commanded. "I've come to play
+wis loo, Daddie."
+
+Hugo did not move. He was fond of little Fay; he admired her good looks
+and her splendid health, but he didn't in the least desire her society
+just then.
+
+"Poor Daddie's tired," he said in his "saddest" tone. "I think you'd
+better go and play in the nursery with Tony."
+
+"No," said little Fay, "Tony's not zere; _loo_ mus' play wis me.
+Or"--she added as a happy alternative--"loo can tell me sumfin
+instastin."
+
+"Surely," said Hugo, "it's your bed-time?"
+
+"No," little Fay answered, and the letters were never formed that could
+express the finality of that "no," "Med will fesh me when it's time.
+I've come to play wis _loo_. Det up, Daddie; loo can't play p'oply lying
+zere."
+
+"Oh, yes, I can," Hugo protested eagerly. "You bring all your nice toys
+one by one and show them to me."
+
+"'At," she remarked with great scorn, "would be a velly stupid game. Det
+up!"
+
+"Why can't Meg play with you?" Hugo asked irritably. "What's she doing?"
+
+Little Fay stared at her father. She was unaccustomed to be addressed
+in that tone, and she resented it. Earley and Mr. Burgess were her
+humble slaves. Captain Middleton did as he was told and became an
+elephant, a camel, or a polar bear on the shortest notice, moreover he
+threw himself into the part with real goodwill and enjoyment. The lazy
+man lying there on the sofa, who showed no flattering pleasure in her
+society, must be roused to a sense of his shortcomings. She seized the
+Teddy-bear, swung it round her head and brought it down with a
+resounding thump on Hugo's chest. "Det up," she said more loudly. "Loo
+don't seem to know any stolies, so you _mus'_ play wis me."
+
+Hugo swung his legs off the sofa and sat up to recover his breath, which
+had been knocked out of him by the Teddy-bear.
+
+"You're a very rude little girl," he said crossly. "You'll have to be
+punished if you do that sort of thing."
+
+"What sort of sing?"
+
+"What you did just now; it's very naughty indeed."
+
+"What nelse?"
+
+Little Fay stood with her head on one side like an inquisitive sparrow.
+One of the things she had not dropped was the tin trumpet. She raised it
+to her lips now, and blew a blast that went through Hugo's head like a
+knife.
+
+He snatched it from her. "You're not to do that," he said. "I can't
+stand it. Go and pick up those other things and show them to me."
+
+"Loo can see zem from here."
+
+"Not what's in the box," he suggested diplomatically.
+
+"I'm tah'ed too," she said, suddenly sitting down on the floor. "You
+fesh 'em."
+
+"Will you play with them if I do?"
+
+She shook her head. "Not if loo're closs, and lude and naughty and ...
+stupid."
+
+Hugo groaned and stalked over to collect the two dolls and the
+tea-things. He brought them back and put them down on one end of the
+sofa while he sat down at the other.
+
+"Now," he said, "show me how you play with them."
+
+His cigar had gone out and he struck a match to light it again. Little
+Fay scrambled to her feet and blew it out before he had touched his
+cigar with it.
+
+"Adain," she said joyously. "Make anozer light."
+
+He struck another match, but sheltered it with his hand till he'd got
+his cigar going, his daughter blowing vigorously all the time.
+
+"Now," she said, "you can be a nengine and I'll be the tlain."
+
+Round that drawing-room the unfortunate Hugo ran, encouraged in his
+efforts by blasts upon the trumpet. The chairs were arranged as
+carriages, the dolls as passengers, and the box of tea-things was
+luggage. None of these transformations were suggested by Hugo, but
+little Fay had played the game so often under Meg's brilliant
+supervision that she knew all the properties by heart.
+
+At the end of fifteen minutes Hugo was thoroughly exhausted and audibly
+thanked God when Meg appeared to fetch her charge. But he hadn't
+finished even then, for little Fay, aided and abetted by Meg, insisted
+that every single thing should be tidily put back exactly where it was
+before.
+
+At the door, just as they were on the point of departure, Meg paused.
+"You must enjoy having her all to yourself for a little while," she said
+in honeyed, sympathetic tones such as Hugo, certainly, had never heard
+from her before. "I fear we've been rather selfish about it, but for the
+future we must not forget that you have the first right to her.... Did
+you kiss your dear Daddie, my darling?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Through the shut door Hugo heard his daughter's voice proclaiming in
+lofty, pitying tones, "Pooah Daddie velly stupid man, he was a velly bad
+nengine, he did it all long."
+
+"Damn!" said Hugo Tancred.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+During dinner that night Jan talked continually about the children. She
+consulted Hugo as to things in which he took not the smallest interest,
+such as what primers he considered the best for earliest instruction in
+reading, and whether he thought the Montessori method advantageous or
+not.
+
+As they sat over dessert he volunteered the remark that little Fay was
+rather an exhausting child.
+
+"All children are," Jan answered, "and I've just been thinking that
+while you are here to help me, it would be such a good chance to give
+Meg a little holiday. She has not had a day off since I came back from
+India, and it would be so nice for her to go to Cheltenham for a few
+days to see Major Morton."
+
+"But surely," Hugo said uneasily, "that's what she's here for, to look
+after the children. She's very highly paid; you could get a good nurse
+for half what you pay her."
+
+"I doubt it, and you must remember that, because she loved Fay, she is
+accepting less than half of what she could earn elsewhere to help me
+with Fay's children."
+
+"Of course, if you import sentiment into the matter you must pay for
+it."
+
+"But I fear that's just what I don't do."
+
+"My dear Jan, you must forgive me if I venture to think that both you
+and your father, and even Fay, were quite absurd about Meg Morton. She's
+a nice enough little girl, but nothing so very wonderful, and as for her
+needing a holiday after a couple of months of the very soft job she has
+with you ... that's sheer nonsense."
+
+There was silence for a minute. Hugo took another chocolate and said,
+"You know I don't believe in having children all over the place. The
+nursery is the proper place for them when they're little, and school is
+the proper place--most certainly the proper place, anyway, for a boy--as
+soon as ever any school can be found to take him."
+
+"I quite agree with you as to the benefit of a good school," Jan said
+sweetly. "I am painfully conscious myself of how much I lost in never
+having had any regular education. Have you thought yet what preparatory
+school you'd prefer for Tony?"
+
+"Hardly yet. I've not been home long enough, and, as you know, at
+present, I've no money at all...."
+
+"I shall be most pleased to help with Tony's education, but in that case
+I should expect to have some voice in the school selected."
+
+"Certainly, certainly," Hugo agreed. "But what I really want to know is
+what you propose to do to help me to attain a position in which I _can_
+educate my children as we both should wish."
+
+"I don't quite see where I come in."
+
+"My dear Jan, that's absurd. You have money--and a few hundreds now will
+start me again...."
+
+"Start you again in what direction?"
+
+"That's what we've got to thresh out. I've several propositions to lay
+before you."
+
+"All propositions will have to be submitted to Mr. Davidson."
+
+"That's nonsense. You must remember that I could contest Fay's will if I
+liked--it was grossly unfair to leave that two thousand pounds away from
+me."
+
+"She left it to her children, Hugo, and _you_ must remember you spent
+eight thousand pounds of her money."
+
+"_I_ didn't spend it. Do you think _I_ benefited? The investments were
+unfortunate, I grant you, but that's not to say I had it."
+
+"Anyway that money is gone."
+
+"And the sooner I set about making some more to replace it the better,
+but I must have help."
+
+"It takes every penny of my income to run things here."
+
+"Well, you know, Jan, to be quite candid, I think it's rather ridiculous
+of you to live here. You could let this place easily and for a good
+rent. In a smaller house you'd be equally comfortable and in easier
+circumstances. I'm not at all sure I approve of my children being
+brought up with the false ideas they will inevitably acquire if they
+continue to live in a big place like this."
+
+"You see, Hugo, it happens to be my house, and I'm fond of it."
+
+"No doubt, but if you make a fetish of the house, if the house stands in
+the way of your helping your own flesh and blood...."
+
+"I don't think I've ever refused to help my _own_ relations."
+
+"Which means, I suppose, that your sister's husband is nothing to you."
+
+Jan rose. "You are rather unjust, I think," she said quietly. "I must
+put the children first."
+
+"And suppose you marry----"
+
+"I certainly wouldn't marry any man who would object to my doing all I
+could for my sister's children."
+
+"You think so now, but wait till a man comes along. You're just getting
+to the age, Jan, when a woman is most apt to make a fool of herself over
+a man. And, remember this, I'd much rather my children were brought up
+simply with my people in Guernsey than that they should grow up with all
+sorts of false ideas with nothing to back them."
+
+Jan clenched her teeth, and though outwardly she was silent, her soul
+was repeating, "I _will_ not fear," over and over again.
+
+"Perhaps you are right, Hugo," she said quietly. "You must arrange as
+you think best; only please remember that you can hardly expect me to
+contribute to the keeping of the children if I am allowed no voice in
+their upbringing. Have you consulted your parents as to their living
+with them in Guernsey? Shall we go out? It's such a beautiful evening."
+
+Hugo followed her into the hall and out into the garden. Involuntarily
+he looked after her with considerable admiration. She held herself well,
+that quiet woman. She waited for him in the drive, and as she did so
+Tony's words came back to her: "I used to feel frightened inside, but I
+wouldn't let him know it, and then--it was funny--but quite sunnly I
+wasn't frightened any more. You try it."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan had tried it, and, again to quote Tony, "it just happened."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+"THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID"
+
+
+Peter began to feel annoyed. More and more clearly did he realise that
+his chief object in coming home was to see Jan again; and here was he,
+still in London in the third week of June, and never so much as a
+glimpse of her.
+
+Her last letter, too, had postponed his visit indefinitely, and he
+almost thought she was not treating him quite fairly. It was, of course,
+a confounded bore that Hugo Tancred should have turned up just now, but
+Peter saw no reason for staying away for ever on that account. He knew
+Wren's End was a good-sized house, and though he appreciated Jan's
+understanding of the fact that he wouldn't exactly choose to be a
+fellow-guest with such a thoroughly bad hat as Hugo Tancred, still he
+considered it was laying too much stress upon the finer shades of
+feeling to keep him away so long.
+
+His aunt was delighted to have him; London was very pleasant; he had
+dined out quite a number of times, attended some big parties, seen all
+the best plays, and bought or ordered all the new clothes he needed, and
+a good deal that he didn't need at all. He had also bought a motor to
+take out with him. It was more than time to get within range of the main
+objective of his leave.
+
+Suggestions that Jan _must_ have shopping to do and might as well come
+up for a day or two to do it only elicited the reply that she had no
+money for shopping and that it was most unlikely that she would be in
+London again for ages.
+
+She hadn't answered his last letter, either, which was another
+grievance.
+
+Then came a letter with the Amber Guiting post-mark, and in a
+handwriting he did not know--a funny little, clear, square handwriting
+with character in every stroke.
+
+He opened it and read:
+
+      "DEAR MR. LEDGARD,
+
+      "It is just possible you may have heard of me from Mrs.
+      Tancred or Miss Ross, but in case you haven't I will
+      explain that I am nurse to the little Tancreds and that
+      Miss Ross is my dearest friend. I think it would be a very
+      good thing if you came down to see her, for her
+      brother-in-law is here, and I am never quite sure what he
+      might persuade her to do if he put the screw on about the
+      children. There is a comfortable inn called 'The Green
+      Hart,' and there's another called 'The Full Basket,' but I
+      fear you'd not get a room there as it's very small and
+      always chock-full at this time of year with fishing people.
+
+      "You see, if you came down to 'The Green Hart,' Jan
+      couldn't say anything, for you've a perfect right to stay
+      there if you choose, and I know it would help her and
+      strengthen her hands to talk things over with you. She has
+      spoken much of your kindness to them all in India.
+
+      "Do you fish, I wonder? I'm sure Squire Walcote would be
+      amiable to any friend of Jan's.
+
+                        "Believe me, yours truly,
+
+                                        "MARGARET MORTON."
+
+Peter put the letter in his pocket and left the rest of his
+correspondence till after breakfast, and his aunt decided that he really
+was a most amusing and agreeable companion, and that she must have been
+mistaken last night in thinking he seemed rather depressed and worried.
+
+After breakfast he went out to send a reply-paid telegram, and then to
+the garage, where he kept his car. Among other places he drove to "Hardy
+Brothers" in Pall Mall, where he stayed over an hour.
+
+By the time he got back to Artillery Mansions it was lunch time. More
+letters awaited him, also a telegram.
+
+During lunch he mentioned casually that he was going down into the
+country for the week-end to fish. He was going to motor down.
+
+"Yes," in answer to his aunt's inquiry, "I do know people down there,
+but I'm not going to stay with them. I'm going to the inn--one's freer,
+you know, and if the sport's good I may stay on a few days."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Withells came again for Hugo on Saturday morning and proposed a run
+right over to Cheltenham for a rose show. Hugo declined the rose show,
+but gratefully accepted the drive. He would potter about the town while
+Mr. Withells inspected the flowers. The Grange head-gardener had
+several exhibits, and was to be taken on the front seat.
+
+They started soon after breakfast and would be gone the whole day, for
+it was an hour and three-quarters run by road and two by train.
+
+"I wish he had offered to take you," Jan said to Meg when the big motor
+had vanished out of the drive. "It would have been so nice for you to
+see Major Morton."
+
+"And sit bodkin between Hugo and Mr. Withells or on one of those horrid
+little folding-seats--no, thank you! When I go to see my poor little
+papa I shall go by train by myself. I'll choose a day when their dear
+father can help you with the children."
+
+After lunch Meg began to find fault with Jan's appearance. "I simply
+won't see you in that old grey skirt a minute longer--go and put on a
+white frock--a nice white frock. You've got plenty."
+
+"Who is always grumbling about the washing? Besides, I want to garden."
+
+"You can't garden this afternoon. On such a lovely day it's your duty to
+dress in accordance with it. I'm going to clean up my children, and then
+we'll all go down to the post-office to buy stamps and show ourselves.
+_You_ ought to call on Lady Mary--you know you ought. Go and change, and
+then come and see if I approve of you. You might leave a card at the
+vicarage, too. I know they're going to the rose show, so you'd be quite
+safe."
+
+"You're a nuisance, Meg," Jan complained. "Let you and little Fay go
+swanking down the village if you like, but why can't you leave Tony and
+me to potter comfortably in our old clothes?"
+
+"I'm tired of your old clothes; I want you to look decent for once. You
+haven't done anything I asked you for ages. You might as well do this."
+
+Jan sighed. "It seems rather absurd when you yourself say every soul we
+know will be at the flower show."
+
+"I never said anything of the kind. I said Mrs. Fream was going to the
+flower show. Hurry up, Jan."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Well, will I do? Will I satisfy the hedges and ditches, do you think?"
+Jan asked later, as she appeared in the hall clad in the white raiment
+Meg had commanded.
+
+Meg turned her round. "Very nice indeed," she said. "I'm glad you put on
+the expensive one. It's funny why the very plain things cost such a lot.
+I like the black hat with your white hair. Yes, I consent to take you
+out; I don't mind owning you for my missus. Children, come and admire
+Auntie Jan."
+
+Jan dutifully delivered a card at the vicarage, and the nursery party
+left her to walk up the Manor drive alone. Lady Mary was in, and pleased
+to see her, but she only stayed a quarter of an hour, because Meg had
+made her promise to meet them again in the village. They were to have
+tea in the garden with the children and make it a little festival.
+
+What a funny little thing Meg was, she thought as she strolled down the
+drive under the splendid beeches. So determined to have her own way in
+small things, such an incarnation of self-sacrifice in big ones.
+
+A man was standing just outside the great gates in a patch of black
+shade thrown by a holly-tree in the lodge garden. Jan was long-sighted,
+and something in the figure and its pose caused her to stop suddenly. He
+wore the usual grey summer suit and a straw hat. Yet he reminded her of
+somebody, but him she had always seen in a topee, out of doors.
+
+Of course it was only a resemblance--but what was he waiting there for?
+
+He moved out from the patch of shade and looked up the drive through the
+open gates. He took off his hat and waved it, and came quickly towards
+her.
+
+"I couldn't wait any longer," he said. "I won't be the least bit of a
+nuisance. I've come to fish, and I'm staying at 'The Green Hart'.... And
+how are you?"
+
+She could never make it out, when she thought it over afterwards, but
+Jan found herself standing with both her hands in his and her beautiful
+black parasol tumbled unheeded in the dust.
+
+"I happened to meet the children and Miss Morton, and they asked me to
+tell you they've gone home. They also invited me to tea."
+
+"So do I," said Jan.
+
+"I should hardly have known Tony," he continued; "he looks capital. And
+as for little Fay--she's a picture, but she always was."
+
+"Did they know you?"
+
+"_Did_ they know me!"
+
+"Were they awfully pleased?"
+
+"They were ever so jolly; even Tony shouted."
+
+At the lodge they met the Squire. Jan introduced Peter and explained
+that he had just come down for a few days' fishing and was staying at
+"The Green Hart." The Squire proffered advice as to the best flies and a
+warning that he must not hope for much sport. The Amber was a difficult
+river, very; and variable; and it had been a particularly dry June.
+
+Peter bore up under this depressing intelligence and he and Jan walked
+on through warm, scented lanes to Wren's End; and Peter looked at Jan a
+good deal.
+
+Those who happened to be in London during the season of 1914 will
+remember that it was a period of powder and paint and frankest
+touching-up of complexions. The young and pretty were blackened and
+whitened and reddened quite as crudely as the old and ugly. There was no
+attempt at concealment. The faces of many Mayfair ladies filled Peter
+with disrespectful astonishment. He had not been home for four years,
+and then nice girls didn't do that sort of thing--much.
+
+Now one of Jan's best points was her complexion; it was so fair and
+fresh. The touch of sunburn, too, was becoming, for she didn't freckle.
+
+Peter found himself positively thankful to behold a really clean face;
+a face, too, that just then positively beamed with warm welcome and
+frank pleasure.
+
+A clean face; a cool, clean frock; kind, candid eyes and a gentle,
+sincere voice--yes, they were all there just as he remembered them, just
+as he had so often dreamt of them. Moreover, he decided there and then
+that the Georgian ladies knew what they were about when they powdered
+their hair--white hair, he thought, was extraordinarily becoming to a
+woman.
+
+"You are looking better than when I was in Bombay. I think your leave
+must have done you good already," said the kind, friendly voice.
+
+"I need a spell of country air, really to set me up," said Peter.
+
+They had an hilarious tea with the children on the Wren's lawn, and the
+tamest of the robins hopped about on the step just to show that he
+didn't care a fig for any of them.
+
+Meg was just going to take the children to bed when Mr. Withells brought
+Hugo back. It was an awkward moment. Peter knew far too much about Hugo
+to simulate the smallest cordiality; and Hugo was too well aware of some
+of the things Peter knew to feel at all comfortable in his presence. But
+he had no intention of giving way an inch. He took the chair Meg had
+just vacated and sat down. Mr. Withells, too, sat down for a few
+minutes, and no sooner had he done so than William dashed out from
+amongst them, and, returning, was accompanied by Captain Middleton.
+
+"No tea, thank you. Just got down from town, came with a message from
+my uncle--would Miss Ross's friend care for a rod on the Manor water on
+Monday? A brother officer who had been coming had failed at the last
+minute--there was room for four rods, but there wasn't a chance of much
+sport."
+
+Miles was introduced to Peter and sat down by him. The children rushed
+at Miles and, ably impeded by William, swarmed over him in riotous
+welcome, wholly regardless of their nurse's voice which summoned them to
+bed.
+
+Meg stood waiting.
+
+"Miss Morton's father lives in Cheltenham," Jan said to Mr. Withells,
+who seemed rather left out. "She's going to see him on Tuesday--to spend
+the day."
+
+"Then," said Mr. Withells in his clear staccato, "she must take the
+9.15--it's much the best train in the day. And the 4.55 back. No other
+trains are at all suitable. I hope you will be guided by me in this
+matter, Miss Morton. I've made the journey many times."
+
+So had Meg; but Mr. Withells always irritated her to such an extent that
+had it been possible, she would have declared her intention to go and
+return by quite different trains. As it was, she nodded pleasantly and
+said those were the very trains she had selected.
+
+Miles thrust his head out from among the encompassing three and
+respectfully implored Mr. Withells' advice about trains to Cricklade,
+which lay off the Cheltenham route, even going so far as to note the
+hours of departure and arrival carefully in a little book.
+
+Finally Meg came and disencumbered Miles of the children and bore them
+away.
+
+When her voice took on a certain tone it was as useless to cope with Meg
+as with Auntie Jan. They knew this, and like wise children gave in
+gracefully.
+
+Elaborate farewells had to be said to everybody, and with a final warm
+embrace for Miles, little Fay called to him "Tum and see me in my baff."
+
+"Captain Middleton will have gone long before you are ready for that,"
+Meg said inhospitably, and trying to look very tall and dignified she
+walked up the three steps leading to the nursery. But it is almost
+impossible to look imposing with a lagging child dragging at each hand,
+and poor Meg felt that her exit was far from effective.
+
+William settled himself comfortably across his master's knees and in two
+minutes was snoring softly.
+
+Miles manifested so keen an interest in Mr. Withells' exhibits (he had
+got a second prize and a highly commended) that the kindly little man
+was quite attracted; and when Miles inquired about trains to Cheltenham
+he gave him precisely the same advice that he had given Meg.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The station at Amber Guiting is seldom crowded; it's on a shuttle line,
+and except on market-day there is but little passenger traffic.
+
+Therefore a small young lady with rather conspicuously red hair, a neat
+grey coat and skirt, a shady grey straw hat trimmed with white clover
+and green leaves, and a green parasol, was noticeable upon the platform
+out of all proportion to her size.
+
+The train was waiting. The lady entered an empty third-class carriage,
+and sitting in the corner with her back to the engine, shut herself in.
+The train departed punctually, and she took out from her bag a note-book
+which she studied with frowning concentration.
+
+Ten minutes further down the line the train stops again at Guiting
+Green, and here the young lady looked out of the window to see whether
+anyone was travelling that she recognised.
+
+There was. But it was impossible to judge from the young lady's
+expression whether the recognition gave her pleasure or not.
+
+She drew in her head very quickly, but not before she had been seen.
+
+"Hullo, Miss Morton! Where are you going? May I get in here?"
+
+"Aren't you travelling first?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. Sure you don't mind? How jolly to have met you!"
+
+Miles looked so smiling, so big and well turned out, and pleased with
+life, that Meg's severe expression relaxed somewhat.
+
+"I suppose," she said, "you're just going to the junction. But why come
+to Guiting Green?"
+
+"I came to Guiting Green because it's exactly four miles from the Manor
+House. And I've walked those four miles, Miss Morton, walked 'em for
+the good of my health. Wish it wasn't so dusty, though--look at my
+boots! _I'm_ going to Cheltenham. Where are you going?"
+
+"Cheltenham?" Meg repeated suspiciously. "What are you going to do
+there?"
+
+"I'm going to see about a horse--not a dog this time--I hear that
+Smith's have got a horse that may suit me; really up to my weight they
+say it is, so I took the chance of going over while I'm with my
+uncle--it's a lot nearer than town, you know. But where are _you_
+going?"
+
+"I," said Meg, "am going to Cheltenham----"
+
+"To Cheltenham!" Miles exclaimed in rather overdone astonishment. "What
+an extraordinary coincidence! And what are _you_ going to buy in
+Cheltenham?"
+
+"I am going to see my father. I thought I had told you he lives there."
+
+"So you did, of course. How stupid of me to forget! Well, it's very
+jolly we should happen to be going down together, isn't it?"
+
+They looked at one another, and Miles laughed.
+
+"I'm not at all sure that we ought to travel together after we reach the
+junction, and I don't believe you've got a third-class ticket." Meg
+looked very prim.
+
+Miles produced his ticket--it _was_ third-class.
+
+"There!" he said triumphantly.
+
+"You would be much more comfortable in a smoker."
+
+"So would you. We'll take a smoker; I've got the sort of cigarette you
+like."
+
+At the junction they got a smoker, and Miles saw to it that they had it
+to themselves; he also persuaded the guard to give Meg a square wooden
+box to put her feet on, because he thought the seats were too high for
+her.
+
+It seemed a very short journey.
+
+Major Morton was awaiting Meg when they arrived; a little gentleman
+immaculately neat (it was quite clear whence Meg got her love of detail
+and finish)--who looked both washed-out and dried-up. He embraced her
+with considerable solemnity, exclaiming, "God bless you, my dear child!
+You look better than I expected."
+
+"Papa, dear, here is Captain Middleton, a friend from Amber Guiting. We
+happened to travel together."
+
+"Pleased to meet you, sir," said the little Major graciously; and
+somehow Miles contrived in two minutes so to ingratiate himself with
+Meg's "poor little papa" that they all walked out of the station
+together as a matter of course.
+
+Then came the question of plans.
+
+Meg had shopping to do, declared she had a list as long as her arm, but
+was entirely at her father's disposal as to whether she should do it
+before or after lunch.
+
+Miles boldly suggested she should do it now, at once, while it was still
+fairly cool, and then she could have all her parcels sent to the station
+to meet her. He seemed quite eager to get rid of Meg. The little Major
+agreed that this would be the best course. He would stroll round to his
+club while Meg was shopping, and meet her when she thought she would
+have finished. They walked to the promenade and dropped her at Cavendish
+House. Miles, explaining that he had to go to Smith's to look at a
+horse, asked for directions from the Major. Their way was the same, and
+without so much as bidding her farewell, Miles strolled up one of the
+prettiest promenades in England in company with her father. Meg felt
+rather dazed.
+
+She prided herself on having reduced shopping to a fine art, but to-day,
+somehow, she didn't get through as quickly as usual, and there was a
+number of items on her list still unticked when it was time to meet her
+father just outside his club at the top of the promenade.
+
+Major Morton was the essence of punctuality. Meg flew to meet him, and
+found he had waited five minutes. He was not, however, upset, as might
+have been expected. He took her to his rooms in a quiet terrace behind
+the promenade and comfortably near his club. The sun-blinds were down
+outside his sitting-room windows, and the room seemed cool and pleasant.
+
+Then it was that Meg discovered that her father was looking at her in
+quite a new way. Almost, in fact, as though he had never seen her
+before.
+
+Was it her short hair? she wondered.
+
+Yet that was not very noticeable under such a shady hat.
+
+Major Morton had vigorously opposed the nursemaid scheme. To the
+sympathetic ladies who attended the same strictly evangelical church of
+which he was a pillar, he confided that his only daughter did not care
+for "a quiet domestic life." It was a grief to him--but, after all,
+parents are shelved nowadays; every girl wants to "live her own life,"
+and he would be the last man to stand in the way of his child's
+happiness. The ladies felt very sorry for Major Morton and indignant
+with the hard-hearted, unfilial Meg. They did not realise that had Meg
+lived with her father--in rooms--and earned nothing, the Major's
+delicate digestion might occasionally have suffered, and Meg would
+undoubtedly have been half-starved.
+
+To-day, however, he was more hopeful about Meg than he had been for a
+long time. Since the Trent episode he had ceased even to imagine her
+possible marriage. By her own headstrong folly she had ruined all her
+chances. "The weariful rich" who had got her the post did not spare him
+this aspect of her deplorable conduct. To-day, however, there was a rift
+in these dark clouds of consequence.
+
+Captain Middleton--he only knows how--had persuaded Major Morton to go
+with him to see the horse, had asked his quite useless advice, and had
+subtly and insidiously conveyed to the Major, without one single
+incriminating sentence, a very clear idea as to his own feelings for the
+Major's daughter.
+
+Major Morton felt cheered.
+
+He had no idea who Miles really was, but he had remarked the gunner tie,
+and, asking to what part of the Royal Regiment Miles belonged, decided
+that no mere pauper could be a Horse-Gunner.
+
+He regarded his daughter with new eyes.
+
+She was undoubtedly attractive. He discovered certain resemblances to
+himself that he had never noticed before.
+
+Then he informed her that he had promised they would both lunch with her
+agreeable friend at the Queen's Hotel: "He made such a point of it,"
+said Major Morton, "I could hardly refuse; begged us to take pity on his
+loneliness, and so on--and I'm feeling rather better to-day."
+
+Meg decided that the tide of fate was too strong for her, she must just
+drift with it.
+
+It was a most pleasant lunch, save for one incident. Lady Penelope
+Pottinger and her husband, accompanied by Lottie Trent and a man, were
+lunching at another table.
+
+Lady Penelope's party came in late. Miles and his guests had already
+arrived at coffee when they appeared.
+
+They had to pass Miles' table, and Lady Penelope stopped; so did her
+husband. She shook hands with Meg. Miss Trent passed by with her nose in
+the air.
+
+Miles presented his relations to the Major and they passed on.
+
+The Major was quite pleased and rather flattered. He had no idea that
+the tall young woman with Lady Penelope had deliberately cut his host.
+But Meg knew just why she had done it.
+
+After lunch Miles very properly effaced himself, but made a point of
+asking the Major if he might act as Miss Morton's escort on the journey
+back to Amber Guiting.
+
+The Major graciously accompanied Meg while she did the rest of her
+shopping, and in the promenade they met the Pottinger party again.
+
+The 4.55 was crowded. Miles collected Meg's parcels and suggested to the
+Major that it would be less tiring for his daughter if they returned
+first-class. Should he change the tickets?
+
+The Major thought it a sensible proposition, especially with all those
+parcels. Meg would pay Captain Middleton the difference.
+
+Again an amiable porter secured them an empty carriage. The parcels
+spread themselves luxuriously upon the unoccupied seats. The Major
+kissed his daughter and gave her his benediction, shaking hands quite
+warmly with her "pleasant young friend."
+
+The 4.55 runs right up to the junction without a stop. Meg took off her
+best hat and placed it carefully in the rack. She leaned her bewildered
+head against the cushions and closed her eyes. She would drift with the
+tide just a few minutes more, and then----
+
+Miles put a box of groceries for Lady Mary under her feet. She smiled
+faintly, but did not speak.
+
+Presently she opened her eyes to find him regarding her with that
+expression she had surprised once or twice before, and never understood.
+
+"Tired?" he asked.
+
+"Only pleasantly. I think I've only travelled first-class about five
+times in my life before--and then it was with Mr. Ross."
+
+"And now it's with me, and I hope it's the first of many."
+
+"You say very odd things."
+
+"What I mean isn't in the least odd--it's the most natural thing in the
+world."
+
+"What is?"
+
+"To want to go on travelling with you."
+
+"If you're going to talk nonsense, I shall go to sleep again."
+
+"No, I don't think I can allow you to go to sleep. I want you to wake up
+and face facts."
+
+"Facts?"
+
+"A fact."
+
+"Facts are sometimes very unpleasant."
+
+"I hope the fact I want you to face isn't exactly that--if it is ...
+then I'm ... a jolly miserable chap. Miss Morton--Meg--you must see how
+it is with me--you must know that you're dearer to me than anything on
+earth. I think your father tumbled to it--and I don't think he minded
+... that I should want you for my wife."
+
+"My poor little papa would be relieved to think that anyone could...."
+
+"Could what?"
+
+"Care for me ... in that way."
+
+"Nonsense! But I'm exceedingly glad to have met your father."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because I wanted to meet him."
+
+"Again, why?"
+
+"Because he's your father."
+
+"Did you observe that Miss Lotty Trent cut you dead at the Queen's
+to-day?"
+
+"I did notice it, and, like you, I wonder why."
+
+"I can tell you."
+
+"I don't think you'd better bother. Miss Trent's opinion of me really
+doesn't matter----"
+
+"It was because you were with me."
+
+"But what a silly reason--if it is a reason."
+
+"Captain Middleton, will you answer a question quite truthfully?"
+
+"I'll try."
+
+"What have you heard about me in connection with the Trents?"
+
+"Not much, and that I don't believe."
+
+"But you must believe it, some of it. It may not be so bad--as it might
+have been--but I put myself entirely in the wrong. I deceived Mrs. Trent
+and I did a thing no girl in her senses ought to have done."
+
+"Look here, Meg," said Miles, leaning forward. "I don't want to know
+anything you don't choose to tell me; but since you _are_ on the
+subject--what did happen between you and that ... and Walter Brooke?"
+
+Meg, too, leant forward; the express swayed and lurched. Their faces
+were very near; their eyes met and held each other in a long, searching
+gaze on the one side and an answering look of absolute candour on the
+other.
+
+"I promised to go away with him, and I went away a few miles, and
+something came over me that I couldn't go any further, and I broke my
+promise and ran away. Jan knows it's true, for it was to them I went.
+But the Trents would never believe it, though Mr. Ross saw Mrs. Trent
+herself, and told her exactly what had happened. And I daresay ... they
+are quite justified."
+
+"And how many times have you seen him since?"
+
+"Never till the other day, when he nearly ran over William."
+
+"And how long ago is it since all this happened?"
+
+"Nearly six years."
+
+"Don't you think it's about time you put it all out of your mind?"
+
+"I had put it out of my mind ... till ... you came."
+
+"It didn't make any difference to me."
+
+"I shall never forget that," Meg said, so low that the rattle of the
+train wholly drowned her remark, but it couldn't conceal her smile.
+
+Miles lost his head. He kneeled down plump on the floor of that
+compartment and took her in his arms and kissed her.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"All the same, I don't believe I can marry you," she said later.
+
+"Why on earth not?"
+
+"Because I don't think I'm a suitable wife for you."
+
+"Surely I'm the best judge of that."
+
+"No, you're not a judge at all. You think you're in love with me...."
+
+"I'm hanged if I do--I _know_."
+
+"Because you're sorry for me----"
+
+"On the contrary, I'm sorry for myself. I think you're a hard-hearted
+... obstinate ... little...."
+
+Mr. Withells would have been scandalised at the conduct of Miles. He
+would undoubtedly have described it as both "insanitary and improper."
+
+"Oh, please listen!" Meg gasped. "Perhaps a long time hence ... if
+you're still of the same mind...."
+
+"Anyway, may I tell people?"
+
+"Not a soul. I won't have my Jan worried just now. I've undertaken those
+children ... and she's having a bad time with that brother-in-law----"
+
+"I say, Meg, what is it about that chap Tancred? I can't stick him....
+Is he a bad egg, or what?"
+
+"He is...."
+
+"Poor Miss Ross! But why does she have him there?"
+
+"Oh, it's a long story--and here we are at the junction, and I'm not
+going on first to Amber Guiting--so there!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan in the pony-cart was waiting outside when Meg came from the little
+station. Captain Middleton followed in her train, laden with parcels
+like a Father Christmas.
+
+He packed her and the parcels in, covered both the ladies with the
+dust-holland, announced that he had bought a charger, and waited to get
+into the Manor motor till they had driven out of the station.
+
+They neither of them spoke till they had turned into the road. Then Jan
+quoted softly: "When I go to see my poor little papa, I shall go by
+train _by myself_."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+A DEMONSTRATION IN FORCE
+
+
+Hugo was dissatisfied. So far, beyond a miserable ten pounds to buy some
+clothes, he had got no money out of Jan; and he was getting bored.
+
+To be sure, he still had most of the ten pounds, for he had gone and
+ordered everything in the market-town, where the name of Ross was
+considered safe as the Bank of England. So he hadn't paid for anything.
+
+Then there was that fellow Ledgard--what did he want hanging about,
+pretending to fish? He was after Jan and her money, that was his game.
+
+But however clear Peter Ledgard's nefarious intentions might be, Hugo
+confessed his sister-in-law puzzled him. She wasn't nearly as much
+afraid of him as he had expected. She was always gentle and courteous,
+but under the soft exterior he had occasionally felt a rock of
+determination, that was disconcerting.
+
+He had ceased to harp upon the string of his desolation. Somehow Jan
+contrived to show him that she didn't believe in it, and yet she never
+said one word to which he could take exception.
+
+It was awkward that his own people were all of them so unsympathetic
+about the children. His father and mother declared themselves to be too
+old to undertake them unless Hugo could pay liberally for their board
+and for a thoroughly capable nurse. Neither of his sisters would
+entertain the idea at all; and both wrote pointing out that until Hugo
+was able to make a home for them himself, he would be most foolish to
+interfere with the arrangements of a devoted aunt who appeared not only
+willing but anxious to assume their entire maintenance.
+
+He had told his people that his health forced him to relinquish his work
+in India. His brothers-in-law, although they had no idea of the real
+cause, thought there was something fishy about this, and were
+unsympathetic.
+
+Peter got at the doctor, and the doctor declared sea-air to be the one
+thing necessary to insure Hugo's complete restoration to health. Jan
+happened to mention that her brother-in-law's people lived in Guernsey,
+close to the shore. The doctor said he couldn't do better than go and
+stay with them, and that the journey wouldn't hurt him a bit.
+
+Still Hugo appeared reluctant to leave Wren's End.
+
+Peter came one day and demanded a business talk with him. It was a most
+unpleasant conversation. Peter declared on Jan's behalf that she was
+quite ready to help him to some new start in life, but that if it meant
+a partnership in any rubber plantation, fruit-farm, or business of any
+sort whatsoever, the money required must be paid through her lawyer
+directly into the hands of the planter, farmer, or merchant concerned.
+
+Hugo declared such an offer to be an insult. Peter replied that it was
+a great deal better than he deserved or could expect; and that he,
+personally, thought Miss Ross very silly to make it; but she did make
+it, and attached to its acceptance was a clause to the effect that until
+he could show he was in a position to maintain his family in comfort, he
+was to give their aunt an undertaking that he would not interfere with
+her arrangements for the welfare of the children.
+
+"I see no reason," said Hugo, "why you should interfere between my
+sister-in-law and me, but, of course, any fool could see what you're
+after. _You_ want her money, and when you've married her, I suppose my
+poor children are to be thrown out into the street, and me too far off
+to see after them."
+
+"Up to now," Peter retorted, "you have shown no particular desire to
+'see after' your children. Why are you such a fool, Tancred? Why don't
+you thankfully accept Miss Ross's generous offer, and try to make a
+fresh start?"
+
+"It's no business of yours what I do."
+
+"Certainly not, but your sister-in-law's peace and happiness is my
+business, because I have the greatest admiration, respect and liking for
+her."
+
+"_Les beaux yeux de sa cassette_," growled Hugo.
+
+"You _are_ an ass," Peter said wearily. "And you know very little of
+Miss Ross if you haven't seen by this time ..." Peter stopped.
+
+"Well, go on."
+
+"No," said Peter, "I won't go on, for it's running my horses on a rock.
+Think it over, that's all. But remember the offer does not remain open
+indefinitely."
+
+"Well, and if I choose to refuse it and go to law and _take_ my
+children--what then?"
+
+"No court in England would give you their custody."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because you couldn't show means to support them, and we could produce
+witnesses to prove that you are not a fit person to have the custody of
+children."
+
+"We should see about that."
+
+"Well, think it over. It's your affair, you know." And Peter went away,
+leaving Hugo to curse and bite his nails in impotent rage. Peter really
+was far from conciliatory.
+
+Jan needed a fright, Hugo decided; that's what she wanted to bring her
+to heel. And before very long he'd see that she got it. She shouldn't
+shelter herself for ever behind that supercilious beast, Ledgard. Hugo
+was quite ready to have been pleasant to Jan and to have met her more
+than half-way if she was reasonable, but since she had chosen to bring
+Ledgard into it, she should pay. After all, she was only a woman, and
+you can always frighten a woman if you go the right way about it. It was
+damned bad luck that Ledgard should have turned up just now. It was
+Ledgard he'd got to thank that Fay had made that infamously unjust will
+by which she left the remnant of her money to her children and not to
+her husband. Oh yes! he'd a lot to thank Ledgard for. Well, he wouldn't
+like it when Jan got hurt. Ledgard was odd about women. He couldn't
+bear to see them worried; he couldn't bear to see Fay worried,
+interfered then. A blank, blank, blank interfering chap, Ledgard was.
+_What Jan needed was a real good scare._
+
+They suggested Guernsey. Well, he'd go to Guernsey, and he wouldn't go
+alone. Hugo thoroughly enjoyed a plot. The twilight world that had been
+so difficult and perplexing to poor Fay had for him a sort of exciting
+charm. Wren's End had become dreadfully dull. For the first week or two,
+while he felt so ill, it had been restful. Now its regular hours and
+ordered tranquillity were getting on his nerves. All those portraits of
+his wife, too, worried him. He could go into no room where the lovely
+face, with youth's wistful wonder as to what life held, did not confront
+him with a reminder that the wife he had left to die in Bombay did not
+look in the least like that.
+
+There were few things in his life save miscalculation that he regretted.
+But he did feel uncomfortable when he remembered Fay--so trustful
+always, so ready to help him in any difficulty. People liked her; even
+women liked her in spite of her good looks, and Hugo had found the world
+a hard, unfriendly place since her death.
+
+The whole thing was getting on his nerves. It was time to shuffle the
+cards and have a new deal.
+
+He packed his suit-case which had been so empty when he arrived, and
+waited for a day when Peter had taken Jan, Meg and the children for a
+motor run to a neighbouring town. He took care to see that Earley was
+duly busy in the kitchen garden, and the maids safely at the back of the
+house. Then he carried it to the lodge gate himself and waited for a
+passing tradesman's cart. Fortune favoured him; the butcher came up with
+(had Hugo known it) veal cutlets for Hugo's own dinner. Hugo tipped the
+butcher and asked him to leave the suit-case at the station to be sent
+on as carted luggage to its address.
+
+Next morning he learned that Tony was to go with Earley to fetch extra
+cream from Mr. Burgess' farm.
+
+It was unfortunate that he couldn't get any of Tony's clothes without
+causing comment. He had tried the day before, but beyond a jersey and
+two little vests (which happened to be little Fay's), he had been unable
+to find anything. Well, Jan would be glad enough to send Tony's clothes
+when he let her know where they were to be sent. Tony had changed a good
+deal from the silent, solemn child he had disliked in India. He was
+franker and more talkative. Sometimes Hugo felt that the child wasn't
+such a bad little chap, after all. But the very evident understanding
+between Jan and Tony filled Hugo with a dull sort of jealousy. He had
+never tried to win the child, but nevertheless he resented the fact that
+Tony's attitude to Jan and Meg was one of perfect trust and
+friendliness. He never looked at them with the strange judging, weighing
+look that Hugo hated so heartily.
+
+He strolled into the drive and waited. Meg and Jan were busy in the
+day-nursery, making the little garments that were outgrown so fast.
+Little Fay was playing on the Wren's lawn and singing to herself:
+
+    The fox went out one moonlight night,
+    And he played to the moon to give him light,
+    For he had a long way to tlot that night
+    Before he could leach his den-oh.
+
+Hugo listened for a minute. What a clear voice the child had. He would
+like to have taken little Fay, but already he stood in wholesome awe of
+his daughter. She could use her thoroughly sound lungs for other
+purposes than song, and she hadn't the smallest scruple about drawing
+universal attention to any grievance. Now Tony would never make a scene.
+Hugo recognised and admired that quality in his queer little son. He did
+not know that Tony already ruled his little life by a categorical
+imperative of things a sahib must not do.
+
+At the drive gate he met Earley carrying the can of cream, with Tony
+trotting by his side.
+
+"I'm going into the village, Tony, and Auntie Jan says you may as well
+come with me for company. Will you come?"
+
+Tony looked dubious. Still, he remembered that Auntie Jan had said he
+must try and be kind to poor Daddie, who had been so ill and was so sad.
+
+"All right," he said with a little sigh, and took the hand Hugo held
+out.
+
+"He'll be quite safe with me, Earley," Hugo said with a pleasant smile.
+"Miss Ross knows I'm going to take him."
+
+Nevertheless Earley went to the back door and asked Hannah to inform her
+mistress that "Mr. Tancred had taken Mazter Tony along of 'im."
+
+Hannah was busy, and serene in her conception of Hugo as the sorrowing
+widower, did not think the fact that Tony had gone for a walk with his
+own father was worth a journey to the day-nursery.
+
+"How would you like a ride down to the junction?" Hugo said. "I believe
+we could just catch a train if we take the omnibus at 'The Green Hart.'
+I want to make inquiries about something for Auntie Jan."
+
+Tony loved trains; he had only been twice to the junction since he came
+to Wren's End; it was a fascinating place. Daddie seemed in an agreeable
+mood this morning. Auntie Jan would be pleased that he should be nice to
+him.
+
+It all fell out as if the fates had arranged things for Hugo. They saw
+very few people in the village; only one old woman accompanied them in
+the bus; he heard his father ask for a ticket to the junction, and they
+arrived without incident of any kind.
+
+The junction, however, was busy. There were quite a lot of people, and
+when Hugo went to the ticket-office he had to stand in a queue of others
+while Tony waited outside the long row.
+
+Suddenly Tony began to wonder why his father should go to the
+ticket-office at all to inquire for a parcel. Tony was observant, and
+just because everything was so different from things in India small
+incidents were impressed upon his mind. If his father was going on
+anywhere else, he wasn't going; for Peter had promised to take them out
+in his car again that afternoon. When Hugo reached the window of the
+ticket-office Tony heard something about Paddington.
+
+That decided him. Nothing would induce him to go to Paddington.
+
+He pushed his way among the crowd and ran for dear life up the stairs,
+and over the bridge to the other platform where the train for Amber
+Guiting was still waiting, lonely and deserted. He knew that train. It
+went up and down all day, for Amber Guiting was the terminus. No one was
+on the platform as he ran along. With the sure instinct of the hunted he
+passed the carriages with their shut doors. Right at the end was a van
+with empty milk-cans. He had seen a porter putting them in the moment
+the train stopped. Tony darted into the van and crouched down between
+the milk-cans and the wall. He thought of getting into one of them. The
+story of Morgiana and the Forty Thieves was clear in his mind, for Meg
+had told it to them the night before. But the cans were so high and
+narrow he decided that it was impossible. Someone slammed the door of
+the van. There came a bump and a jar, and the train moved out onto a
+siding till it should go back to Amber Guiting when the 1.30 from London
+came in. Tony sat quite still in the dark, stuffy van. His little heart
+was beating with hammer strokes against his ribs, but his face expressed
+nothing but scorn.
+
+Again his father had lied to him. Again he had said he was going to do
+one thing when he fully intended to do another. The pleasantness, the
+kindliness, the apparent desire for Tony's society were a cheat. Tony
+spoke rapidly to himself in Hindustani, and by the time he had finished
+expressing his views Hugo Tancred hadn't a shred of character left.
+
+He didn't know when the train would go back to Amber Guiting. It might
+not be till evening. Tony could wait. Some time it would go back, and
+once in that dear, safe place all would be well.
+
+He disliked the sound of Paddington; it had to do with London, he knew.
+He didn't mind London, but he wasn't going there with his father, and no
+Meg and no Jan and no little Fay and no kind sahibs who were _real_
+sahibs.
+
+He was very hungry, and his eyes grew a bit misty as he thought of
+little Fay consuming scones and milk at the "elevens" Meg was always so
+careful they should have.
+
+A new and troubling thought perturbed him. Did Auntie Jan know he had
+gone at all? Would she be frightened? Would she get that look on her
+dear face that he couldn't bear to see? That Auntie Jan loved them both
+with her whole heart was now one of the fixed stars in Tony's firmament
+of beliefs. He began to think that perhaps it would be better for Auntie
+Jan to give his father some of her twinkly things and let him go away
+and leave them in peace; but he dismissed that thought as cowardly and
+unworthy of a sahib.
+
+Oh, dear! it was very long sitting in the dark, scrunched up behind
+those cans. He must tell himself stories to pass the time; and he
+started to relate the interminable legend of Cocky-locky and Henny-Penny
+who by their superior subtlety evaded the snares set for them by
+Toddy-Loddy the fox. He felt a sort of kinship with those harried fowls.
+Gradually the constant repetition of the various other birds involved,
+"Juckie-Puckie, Goosie-Loosie, Turkey-lurkey and Swannie-Lonnie," had a
+soothing effect, and Tony fell asleep.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Meanwhile Hugo had hunted through every corner of the four platforms; he
+had even gone to look for the Amber Guiting train, but was told it
+always was moved on to a siding directly it had discharged its
+passengers.
+
+It was mysterious, it was profoundly annoying, but it was not, to Hugo,
+alarming. He suspected that Peter Ledgard was in some way mixed up in
+it; that he, himself, had been shadowed and that Peter had stolen Tony
+in the crowd. In his mistrustful wrath he endowed Peter with such
+abnormal foresight and acumen as he certainly did not possess.
+
+It really was an impossible situation. Hugo could not go about asking
+porters and people for a lost child, or the neighbourhood would be
+roused. He couldn't go back to Wren's End without Tony, or there would
+be the devil to pay. He even got a porter to look in every carriage of
+the side-tracked train for a mythical despatch-case, and accompanied him
+in his search. Naturally they didn't seek a despatch-case in the van.
+
+He had lost his train, but there was another, very slow, about
+three-quarters of an hour later, and this he decided to take. He would
+telegraph to Jan from London. Somehow he was not in the least concerned
+about the fate of Tony. Peter and Peter's car had something to do with
+this mysterious disappearance. He was sure of that.
+
+Well, if this particular deal had failed, he must shuffle the cards and
+deal again. In any case Jan should see that where his children were
+concerned he was not to be trifled with.
+
+He was sorry, though, he had bought the half-ticket for Tony, and to ask
+them to take it back might cause comment.
+
+As the slow train steamed out from the junction Hugo felt a very
+ill-used man.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At eleven o'clock Anne Chitt brought in the tray with two cups of milk
+and a plate of Hannah's excellent scones.
+
+"Please go into the kitchen garden and ask Master Tony to come for his
+lunch," Jan said.
+
+Presently Anne returned. "Master Tony ain't in the garden, miss; and
+'Annah says as 'e most likely ain't back yet, miss."
+
+"Back! Back from where?"
+
+"Please, miss, 'Annah says as 'is pa've took him with him down the
+village."
+
+Jan laid her sewing on the table and got up.
+
+"Is Earley in the garden?"
+
+"Yes, miss. I ast Earley an' 'e says the same as 'Annah. Mr. Tancred
+'ave took Master Tony with 'im."
+
+Anne went away, and Jan and Meg, who had stopped her machining to
+listen, stared at each other across the table.
+
+"I suppose they'll be back directly," Jan said uneasily. "I'll go and
+ask Earley when Hugo took Tony."
+
+"He got up to breakfast to-day for the first time," Meg remarked
+irrelevantly.
+
+Jan went out into the Wrens' garden and through Anthony's gate. She
+fumbled at the catch, for her hands trembled.
+
+Earley was picking peas.
+
+"What time did Mr. Tancred take Master Tony?" she asked.
+
+"Just as we got back from fetchin' the cream, miss. I should say as it
+was about 'alf-past nine. He did meet us at the lodge, and took the
+young gentleman with 'im for company--'e said so."
+
+"Thank you, Earley," Jan said quietly.
+
+Earley looked at her and over his broad, good-natured face there passed
+a shade of misgiving. "I did tell Hannah to let you know the minute I
+cum in, miss."
+
+"Thank you," Jan said again; "that's quite right."
+
+"Be you feelin' the 'eat, miss?" Earley asked anxiously. "I don't think
+as you ought to be out without an 'at."
+
+"No, I expect not. I'll go and get one."
+
+By lunch time there was still no sign of Hugo and Tony; and Jan was
+certainly as much scared as even Hugo could have wished.
+
+Meg had been down to the village and discovered that Hugo and Tony had
+gone by bus to the junction in time for the 10.23.
+
+Peter was playing golf with Squire Walcote on a little course he had
+made in some of his fields. It was impossible to go and hunt for Peter
+without giving away the whole situation, and Jan was loth to do that.
+
+She and Meg stared at one another in dismayed impotence.
+
+Jan ordered the pony-carriage; she would drive to the junction, leaving
+a note for Peter at "The Green Hart," but it was only too likely he
+would lunch with the Walcotes.
+
+"You must eat something," said Meg. "There's a train in at a quarter to
+two; you'd better meet that before you go to the junction; the guard
+might be able to tell you something."
+
+At lunch little Fay wept because there was no Tony.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+IN WHICH SEVERAL PEOPLE SPEAK THEIR MINDS
+
+
+"After all, you know," Meg said, with intent to comfort, "no great harm
+can happen to Tony. Hugo will only take the child a little way off, to
+see what he can get out of you."
+
+"It's the moral harm to Tony that I mind," Jan answered sadly. "He was
+getting so happy and trustful, so much more like other children. I know
+his father has got him to go away by some ruse, and he will be miserable
+and embittered because he has been cheated again."
+
+"Shall you drive to the junction if you hear nothing at the station?"
+
+"Yes, I think so, though I've little hope of learning anything there.
+You see, people come there from three directions. They couldn't possibly
+notice everybody as they do at a little station like this."
+
+"Wait," said Meg, "don't go to the junction. Have you forgotten Mr.
+Ledgard was to fetch us all at half-past two? He'll run you over in his
+car in a quarter the time you'd take to go with Placid, and be some use
+as well. You'd better come straight back here if you get no news, and
+I'll keep him till you get back if he turns up first."
+
+By this time the pony-cart was at the door. Meg helped Jan in, kissed
+her, and whispered, "Cheer up; I feel somehow you'll hear something,"
+and Jan drove off. She found a boy to hold the pony when she reached the
+station, and went in. The old porter was waiting for the train, and she
+asked if he happened to notice her little nephew that morning.
+
+"Yes, miss, I did see 'un along with a holder gentleman unbeknownst to
+me."
+
+Jan walked up and down in an agony of doubt and apprehension.
+
+The train came in. There were but few passengers, and among them was
+Miles, come down again for the week-end.
+
+He greeted Jan with effusion. Had she come to meet anyone, or was it a
+parcel?
+
+To his astonishment Miss Ross broke from him and rushed at the guard
+right up at the far end of the train.
+
+The guard evidently disclaimed all knowledge of the parcel, for Miles
+saw him shaking his head vigorously.
+
+"Any other luggage, sir?" asked the old porter, lifting out Miles'
+suit-case.
+
+"Yes, a box of rods in the van."
+
+The old porter went to the end of the train near where Jan had been to
+the guard three minutes before.
+
+He opened the van door and nearly tumbled backward in astonishment, for
+right in the doorway, blinking at the light, stood "Miss Rass' young
+gen'leman."
+
+"Well, I am blessed!" exclaimed the porter, and lifted him out.
+
+Tony was dreadfully dirty. The heat, the dust, the tears he had shed
+when he woke up with the putting in of luggage at the junction and
+couldn't understand what had happened to him, all combined to make him
+about the most miserable-looking and disreputable small boy you could
+imagine. He had left his hat behind the milk-cans.
+
+Jan had gone out of the station. She had passed Miles blindly, and her
+face caused that young man to whistle softly, just once. Then he dashed
+after her.
+
+"Your haunt bin askin' for you," the old porter said to Tony. "'Peared
+to me she was a bit worried-like."
+
+Tony moved stiffly down the little station, the old porter following
+with Miles' luggage on a truck.
+
+The ticket-collector stood in the doorway. Tony, of course, had none.
+"Don't you say nothin'," whispered the old porter. "'Is haunt'll make it
+good; there's some sort of a misteree."
+
+Tony felt queer and giddy. Jan, already in her little pony-trap, had
+started to drive away. Miles, waiting for his baggage beside his uncle's
+car, saw the dejected little figure appear in the station entrance.
+
+He let fly a real barrack-square bellow after Jan, and she pulled up.
+
+She looked back and saw the reason for Captain Middleton's amazing roar.
+
+She swung the indignant Placid round, and in two minutes she was out of
+the pony-trap and had Tony in her strong arms.
+
+Miles tipped the porter and drove off. He, too, realised that there was
+some sort of a "misteree," something painful and unpleasant for Miss
+Ross, and that she would probably prefer that no questions were asked.
+
+Whatever mischief could that young Tony have been after? And dared Miles
+call at Wren's End that evening, in the hope of a glimpse of Meg, or
+would it look inquisitive and ill-bred?
+
+Placid turned a mild, inquiring head to discover the reason for this new
+delay.
+
+When Jan, after paying Tony's fare back from the junction, had driven
+away, the old porter, the ticket-collector, and the station-master sat
+in conclave on the situation. And their unanimous conclusion was summed
+up by the old porter: "Byes be a mishtiful set of young varmints, an' it
+warn't no job for a lone 'ooman to 'ave to bring 'em up."
+
+The lone woman in question held her reins in one hand and her other arm
+very tightly round the dirty little boy on the seat beside her.
+
+As they drove through the village neither of them spoke, but when they
+reached the Wren's End Road, Tony burst into tears.
+
+"I _am_ so hungry," he wailed, "and I feel so nasty in my inside."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As Meg was putting him to bed that night she inquired if he had done
+anything with his green jersey, for she couldn't find it.
+
+"No," Tony answered. "I haven't had it for a long time--it's been too
+warm."
+
+"It's very odd," said Meg. "It has disappeared, and so have two vests
+of little Fay's that I put in the nursery ottoman to mend. Where can
+they be? I hate to lose things; it seems so untidy."
+
+"I 'spect," said Tony, thoughtfully, "my Daddie took them. He'd never
+leave without takin somefin."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There was a dinner-party at the Manor House. Peter had come down from
+town for it, and this time he was staying at Wren's End. Lady Penelope
+and her husband were to dine and sleep at the Manor, likewise Miles, who
+had come down with Peter; and Lady Pen contrived thoroughly to upset her
+aunt before dinner, by relating how she had met Miles with Miss Morton
+and her father in Cheltenham. And poor Lady Mary had been hoping that
+the unfortunate affair would die a natural death. She had asked the
+prettiest girl in the neighbourhood for Miles to take in, and now,
+looking down the table at him, she would have said he was as
+well-pleased with his neighbour as any young man could be. The Freams
+were there and Mr. Withells, the pretty girl's mamma and a bride and
+bridegroom--fourteen in all. A dangerous number to ask, the Squire had
+declared; one might so easily have fallen through. No one did, however,
+and Peter found himself allotted to Lady Penelope, while Jan's fate was
+the bridegroom. "His wife won't be jealous of Miss Ross, you know," Lady
+Mary had said while arranging her couples.
+
+It happened that Peter sat opposite to Jan, and he surveyed her across
+the sweet-peas with considerable satisfaction. He had never seen Jan in
+what her niece bluntly called "a nekked dless" before. To-night she wore
+black, in some soft, filmy stuff from which her fine arms and shoulders
+and beautiful neck stood out in challenging whiteness. Her hair, too,
+had "pretty twinkly things" in it, and she wore a long chain of small
+but well-matched pearls, her father's last gift to her. Yes, Jan was
+undoubtedly distinguished, and oh, thank heaven! she _had_ a clean face.
+
+Beautiful Lady Pen was painted to the eyes, and her maid was not quite
+skilful in blending her complexion rightly with her vivid hair;
+beautiful hair it was, with a large ripple that was most attractive, but
+Mr. Withells, sitting on the other side of Lady Pen, decided that he
+didn't approve of her. She was flamboyant and daring of speech. She made
+him nervous. He felt sincerely sorry for Pottinger.
+
+Peter found Lady Pen very amusing, and perhaps she rather neglected her
+other neighbour.
+
+The dinner was excellent and long; and after it the ladies, when they
+left the men to smoke, strolled about on the terrace, and Jan found
+herself side by side with Lady Penelope.
+
+"How's your little friend?" she asked abruptly. "I suppose you know my
+cousin's playin' round?"
+
+Jan was a little taller than Lady Pen, and turned her head slowly to
+look at her: "I'm afraid I don't quite understand," she said.
+
+"Surely," Lady Pen retorted, "you must have seen."
+
+"If you mean that Captain Middleton admires Miss Morton, I believe he
+does. But you see, to say that anyone is 'playing round' rather reflects
+on me, because she is in my charge."
+
+"I should say you've got a pretty good handful," Lady Pen said
+sympathetically.
+
+"I don't think you quite understand Miss Morton. I've known her, as it
+happens, known her well, for close upon nine years."
+
+"And you think well of her?"
+
+"It would be difficult to express how well."
+
+"You're a good friend, Miss Ross. I had occasion to think so once
+before--now I'm pretty sure of it. What's the sayin'--'Time tryeth
+thingummy'?"
+
+"Troth?" Jan suggested.
+
+"That's it. 'Time tryeth troth.' I never was any good at quotations and
+things. But now, look here, I'd like to ask you somethin' rather
+particular ..." Lady Pen took Jan's arm and propelled her gently down a
+side-walk out of earshot of the others. "Suppose you knew folks--and
+they weren't exactly friends, but pleasant, you know, and all that, and
+you were aware that they went about sayin' things about a third person
+who also wasn't exactly a friend, but ... well, likeable; and you
+believed that what the first lot said gave a wrong impression ... in
+short, was very damaging--none of it any business of yours, mind--would
+you feel called upon to do anything?"
+
+The two tall women stopped and faced one another.
+
+The moon shone full on Lady Pen's beautiful painted face, and Jan saw,
+for the first time, that the eyes under the delicately darkened eyebrows
+were curiously like Miles'.
+
+"It's always tiresome to interfere in other people's business," said
+Jan, "but it's not quite fair, is it, not to stand up for people if you
+believe an accusation to be untrue--whether you like them or not. You
+see, it may be such a serious thing for the person implicated."
+
+"I believe you're right," said Lady Pen, "but oh, lord! what a worry it
+will be."
+
+Lady Mary called to them to come, for the bride was going to sing.
+
+The bride's singing was not particularly pleasing, and she was followed
+by Miles, who performed "Drake's Drum," to his aunt's rather uncertain
+accompaniment, in a voice that shook the walls. Poor Mr. Withells fled
+out by the window, and sat on the step on his carefully-folded
+handkerchief, but even so the cold stones penetrated, and he came in
+again.
+
+And after "Drake's Drum" it was time to go home.
+
+Jan and Peter walked back through the scented night, Peter carrying her
+slippers in a silk bag, for the sternly economical Meg wouldn't hear of
+wasting good suède slippers at 22s. 6d. a pair by walking half a mile in
+them, no matter how dry it was.
+
+When all the guests had gone, Lady Pen seized Miles by the arm and
+implored him to take her outside for a cigarette. "That little Withells
+had given her the hump."
+
+Lady Mary said it was bed-time and the servants wanted to lock up. The
+Squire and Mr. Pottinger melted away imperceptibly to smoke in peace
+elsewhere.
+
+Lady Pen, still holding Miles in an iron grip, pulled him over to the
+door, which she shut, led him back, and stood in front of Lady Mary, who
+was just going to ring for the servants to shut the windows.
+
+"Wait a minute, Aunt Mary. I've got somethin' to say, and I want to say
+it before Miles."
+
+"Oh, don't let us go into all that to-night," Lady Mary implored, "if
+what you have to say has anything to do with what you told me before
+dinner."
+
+"It has and it hasn't. One thing I've decided is that I've got to tell
+the Trents they are liars; and the other thing is that, though I
+disapprove with all my strength of the game Miles is playing, I believe
+that little girl is square...."
+
+"You see," Lady Pen went on, turning to Miles, "I've repeated things to
+Aunt Mary that I heard from the Trents lately--but I heard a different
+story at the time--and though I think you, Miles, are throwing yourself
+away, I won't be a party to spreadin' lies. Somethin' that _poudrée_
+woman with the good skin said to-night made me feel a swab----"
+
+"I'm glad you've spoken up like this, Pen," Miles said slowly, "for if
+you hadn't, we couldn't have been friends any more. I promised Meg I
+wouldn't tell anybody--but I've asked her to marry me ... and though she
+isn't over keen, I believe I'll get her to do it some day."
+
+"Isn't over keen?" Lady Mary repeated indignantly. "Why, she ought to be
+down on her knees with joy!"
+
+Miles laughed. "She's not a kneeling sort, Aunt Mary. It's I who'll have
+to do the kneeling, I can tell you."
+
+Lady Pen was looking straight at her cousin with the beautiful candid
+eyes that were so like his own. "Just for curiosity," she said slowly,
+"I'd dearly like to know if Meg Morton ever said anything to you about
+me--anything rather confidential--I won't be offended, I'd just like to
+know."
+
+"About you?" Miles echoed in a puzzled voice.
+
+"About my appearance, you know--my looks."
+
+"I think she called you good-looking, like everybody else, but I don't
+remember that she was specially enthusiastic. To tell you the honest
+truth, Pen, we've had other things to talk about than you."
+
+"Now listen, you two," said Lady Pen. "That little girl is straight. You
+won't understand, Miles, but Aunt Mary will. Meg Morton knew I was
+against her--about you, Miles--women always know these things. And yet
+she held her tongue when she could have said something true that I'd
+rather not have talked about. You'll hold your tongue, old chap, and so
+will Aunt Mary. I've got her hair; got it on this minute. That's why
+she's such a croppy."
+
+Lady Mary sat down on the nearest chair and sighed deeply.
+
+"It's been a real satisfaction to me, this transformation, because I
+know where it came from."
+
+Miles took his cousin's hand and kissed it. "If somebody had to have it,
+I'm glad it's you," he said.
+
+"Yes, she's straight," Lady Pen repeated. "I don't believe there's many
+girls who would have kept quiet--not when the man they cared about was
+being got at. You may ring now, Aunt Mary. I'm through. Good night."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Do you realise," said Peter as they turned out of the dark Manor drive
+into the moonlit road, "that I've been here on and off over a month, and
+that we are now nearly at the end of July?"
+
+"You've only just come to _us_," said Jan. "You can't count the time you
+stayed at 'The Green Hart' as a visit."
+
+"And now I have come ... I'm not quite sure I've done wisely,
+unless...."
+
+"Unless what?"
+
+"Unless I can put something through that I came back from India to do."
+
+Jan did not answer. They walked on in silence, and Peter looked at the
+moon.
+
+"I think," he said, "you've always had a pretty clear idea why I came
+home from India ... haven't you?"
+
+"It was time for your leave," Jan said nervously. "It isn't good to
+stay out there too long."
+
+"I shouldn't have taken leave this year, though, if it hadn't been for
+you."
+
+"You've always been kind and helpful to me ... I hope it hasn't been
+very ... inconvenient."
+
+Peter laughed, and stopped in the middle of the road.
+
+"I'm fond of fencing," he said lightly, "and free play's all very well
+and pretty; but I've always thought that the real thing, with the
+buttons off the foils, must have been a lot more sport than anything we
+get now."
+
+Again Jan was silent.
+
+"You've fenced with me, Jan," he said slowly, "ever since I turned up
+that day unexpectedly. Now, I want a straight answer. Do you care at
+all, or have you only friendship for me? Look at me; tell me the truth."
+
+"It's all so complicated and difficult," she faltered, and her eyes fell
+beneath Peter's.
+
+"What is?"
+
+"This caring--when you aren't a free agent."
+
+"Free fiddlestick! You either care or you don't--which is it?"
+
+"I care a great deal too much for my own peace of mind," said Jan.
+
+"I am quite satisfied," said Peter. And if Mr. Withells had seen what
+happened to the "sensible" Miss Ross just then, his neatly-brushed hair
+would have stood straight on end.
+
+In the road, too!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+AUGUST, 1914
+
+
+"No," said Jan, "it would be like marrying a widow ... with
+encumbrances."
+
+"But you don't happen to be a widow--besides, if you were, and had a
+dozen encumbrances, if we want to get married it's nobody's business but
+our own."
+
+Peter spoke testily. He wanted Jan to marry him before he went back to
+India in October, and if he got the billet he hoped for, to follow him,
+taking the two children out, early in November.
+
+But Jan saw a thousand lions in the way. She was pulled in this
+direction and that, and though she knew she had got to depend on Peter
+to--as she put it--"a dreadful extent," yet she hesitated to saddle him
+with her decidedly explosive affairs, without a great deal more
+consideration than he seemed disposed to allow her.
+
+Hugo, for the present, was quiet. He was in Guernsey with his people,
+and beyond a letter in which he directly accused Peter Ledgard of
+abducting Tony when his father was taking him to visit his grandparents,
+Jan had heard nothing.
+
+By Peter's advice she did not answer this letter. But they both knew
+that Hugo was only waiting to make some other and more unpleasant
+demonstration than the last.
+
+"You see," Jan began again, "I've got so many people to think of. The
+children and Meg and the house and all the old servants.... You mustn't
+hustle me, dear."
+
+"Yes, I see all that; but I've got _you_ to think of, and if we're
+married and anything happens to me you'll get your pension, and I want
+you to have that."
+
+"And if anything happened to me, you'd be saddled with the care of two
+little children who've got a thoroughly unsatisfactory father, who can
+always make life hateful for them and for you. No, Peter, it wouldn't be
+fair--we must wait and see how things work out."
+
+"At present," Peter said gloomily, "it looks as if things were working
+out to a fair bust-up all round."
+
+This was on the 30th of July.
+
+Peter went up to London, intending to return on the first to stay over
+the Bank Holiday, but he did not come. He wanted to be within easy reach
+of recalling cablegram.
+
+Meg got a wire from Miles on Saturday: "Try to come up for to-morrow and
+Monday I can't leave town must see you."
+
+And half an hour after it, came a note from Squire Walcote, asking her
+to accept his escort, as he and Lady Mary were going up to the
+Grosvenor, and hoped Meg would be their guest.
+
+It was during their stay in London that Lady Mary and the Squire got the
+greatest surprise of their whole lives.
+
+Miles, looking bigger than ever in uniform, rushed in and demanded an
+interview with Meg alone in their private room. He showed her a special
+licence, and ordered, rather than requested, that she should marry him
+at once.
+
+"I can't," she said, "it's no use asking me ... I _can't_."
+
+"Listen; have you any objection to me?"
+
+Meg pulled a little away from him and pretended to look him up and down.
+"No ... in fact ... I love every bit of you--especially your boots."
+
+"Have you thought how likely it is that I may not come back ... if
+there's war?"
+
+"Don't!" said Meg. "Don't put it into words."
+
+"Then why won't you marry me, and let me feel that, whether I'm killed
+or not, I've had the thing I wanted most in this world?"
+
+"Dear, I can't help it, but I feel if I married you now ... you would
+never come back ... but if I wait ... if I don't try to grasp this
+wonderful thing too greedily ... it will come to us both. I _daren't_
+marry you, Miles."
+
+"Suppose I'm all smashed up ... I couldn't ask you then ... suppose I
+come back minus an arm or a leg, or blind or something?"
+
+"If the least little bit of you comes back, I'll marry that; not you or
+anyone else could stop me then."
+
+"You'd make it easier all round if you'd marry me now...."
+
+"That's it ... I don't want it to be easier. If I was your wife, how
+could I go on being nurse to those children?"
+
+"I wouldn't stop you--you could go back to Miss Ross and do just
+exactly what you're doing. I agree with you--the children are
+cheery----"
+
+Meg shook her head. "No; if I was your wife, it wouldn't do. As it is
+... the nursemaid has got her soldier, and that's as it should be."
+
+"Will you marry me the first leave I get, if I live to get any?"
+
+"I'll think about that."
+
+He gave her the ring she had refused before. Such an absurd little ring,
+with its one big sapphire set with diamonds, and "no backing to it,"
+Miles said.
+
+And he gave her a very heavy brass-studded collar for William, and on
+the plate was engraved her name and address.
+
+"You see," he explained, "Miss Ross would never really have him, and I'd
+like to think he was your dog. And here's his licence."
+
+Then Miles took her right up in his arms and hugged her close, and set
+her gently down and left her.
+
+That night he asked his uncle and a brother-officer to witness his will.
+He had left most of his money among his relations, but twenty thousand
+pounds he had left to Meg absolutely, in the event of his being killed
+before they were married.
+
+His uncle pointed out that there was nothing said about her possible
+marriage. "She'll be all the better for a little money of her own if she
+does marry," Miles said simply. "I don't want her to go mourning all her
+days, but I do want the capital tied up on her so that he couldn't
+waste it ... if he was an unfortunate sort of chap over money."
+
+The Squire blew his nose.
+
+"You see," Miles went on, "she's a queer little thing. If I left her too
+much, she'd refuse it altogether. Now I trust to you, Uncle Edward, to
+see that she takes this."
+
+"I'll do my best, my boy, I'll do my best," said the Squire; "but I hope
+with all my soul you'll make settlements on her yourself before long."
+
+"So do I, but you never can tell in war, you know. And we must always
+remember," Miles added with his broad, cheerful smile, "there's a good
+deal of target about me."
+
+Miles wrote to the little Major, a very manly, straightforward letter,
+telling him what he had done, but swearing him to secrecy as regarded
+Meg.
+
+He also wrote to Jan, and at the end, he said, "I am glad she is to be
+with you, because you really apreciate her."
+
+The one "p" in "appreciate" fairly broke Jan down. It was so like Miles.
+
+Meg, white-faced and taciturn, went back to Wren's End on Tuesday night.
+The Squire and Lady Mary remained in town.
+
+In answer to Jan's affectionate inquiries, Meg was brief and
+business-like. Yes; she had seen Miles several times. He was very busy.
+No, she did not expect to see him again before ... he left. Yes; he was
+going with the First Army.
+
+Jan asked no more questions, but was quietly, consistently kind. Meg
+was adorable with her children and surpassed herself in the telling of
+stories.
+
+The First Army left England for Flanders with the silence of a shadow.
+
+But Meg knew when it left.
+
+That night, Jan woke about one o'clock, conscious of a queer sound that
+she could neither define nor locate.
+
+She sat up in bed to listen, and arrived at the conclusion that it came
+from the day-nursery, which was below her room.
+
+Tony was sleeping peacefully. Jan put on her dressing-gown and went
+downstairs. The nursery door was not shut, and a shaft of light shone
+through it into the dark hall. She pushed it open a little way and
+looked in.
+
+Meg was sitting at the table, making muslin curtains as if her life
+depended on it. She wore her nightgown, and over it a queer little
+Japanese kimono of the green she loved. Her bare feet were pillowed upon
+William, who lay snoring peacefully under the table.
+
+Her face was set and absorbed. A grave, almost stern, little face. And
+her rumpled hair, pushed back from her forehead, gave her the look of a
+Botticelli boy angel. It seemed to merge into tongues of flame where the
+lamplight caught it.
+
+The window was wide open and the sudden opening of the door caused a
+draught, though the night was singularly still.
+
+The lamp flickered.
+
+Meg rested her hand on the handle of the sewing-machine, and the
+whirring noise stopped. She saw Jan in the doorway.
+
+"Dear," said Jan gently, standing where she was, half in and half out of
+the door, "are you obliged to do this?"
+
+Meg looked at her, and the dumb pain in that look went to Jan's heart.
+
+Jan came towards her and drew the flaming head against her breast.
+
+"I'm sorry I disturbed you," Meg murmured, "but I was _obliged_ to do
+something."
+
+William stirred at the voices, and turning his head tried to lick the
+little bare feet resting on his back.
+
+"Dearest, I really think you should go back to bed."
+
+"Very well," said Meg meekly. "I'll go now."
+
+"He," Jan continued, "would be very angry if he thought you were making
+curtains in the middle of the night."
+
+"He," Meg retorted, "is absurd--and dear beyond all human belief."
+
+"You see, he left you in my charge ... what will he say if--when he
+comes back--he finds a haggard Meg with a face like a threepenny-bit
+that has seen much service?"
+
+"All right, I'm coming."
+
+When Meg got back to her room, she went and leaned over little Fay
+sleeping in the cot beside her bed. Rosy and beautiful, warm and
+fragrant, the healthy baby brought comfort to Meg's stricken heart.
+
+Perhaps--who knows--the tramp of that silent army sounded in little
+Fay's ears, for she stretched out her dimpled arms and caught Meg round
+the neck.
+
+"Deah Med!" she sighed, and was still.
+
+William stood at attention.
+
+Presently Meg knelt down by her bed, and according to the established
+ritual he thrust his head into her encircling arm.
+
+"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered. "Oh, William, pray for
+your master as you never prayed before."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The strange tense days went on in August weather serene and lovely as
+had not been seen for years. Young men vanished from the country-side
+and older men wistfully wondered what they could do to help.
+
+Peter came down from Saturday to Monday, telling them that every officer
+and every civilian serving in India was recalled, but he had not yet
+learned when he was to sail.
+
+They were sitting in the wrens' garden with the children.
+
+"Earley's going," Tony said importantly.
+
+"Earley!" Jan exclaimed. "Going where?"
+
+"To fight, of course," little Fay chimed in.
+
+"Oh, poor dear Earley!" Jan sighed.
+
+"Happy, fortunate Earley," said Peter. "I wish I stood in his shoes."
+
+Earley joined the Gloucesters because, he said, "he couldn't abear to
+think of them there Germans comin' anigh Mother and them childring and
+the ladies; and he'd better go and see as they didn't."
+
+Mr. Withells called the men on his place together and told them that
+every man who joined would have his wages paid to his wife, and his wife
+or his mother, as the case might be, could stop on in her cottage. And
+Mr. Withells became a special constable, with a badge and a truncheon.
+But he worried every soldier that he knew with inquiries as to whether
+there wasn't a chance for him in _some_ battalion: "I've taken great
+care of my health," he said. "I do exercises every day after my bath;
+I'm young-looking for my age, don't you think? And anyway, a bullet
+might find me instead of a more useful man."
+
+No one laughed then at Mr. Withells and his exercises.
+
+Five days after the declaration of war Jan got a letter from Hugo
+Tancred. He was in London and was already a private in a rather famous
+cavalry regiment.
+
+"They didn't ask many questions," he wrote, "so I hadn't to tell many
+lies. You see, I can ride well and understand horses. If I get knocked
+out, it won't be much loss, and I know you'll look after Fay's kiddies.
+If I come through, perhaps I can make a fresh start somewhere. I've
+always been fond of a gamble, and this is the biggest gamble I've ever
+struck."
+
+Jan showed the letter to Peter, who gave it back to her with something
+like a groan: "Even the wrong 'uns get their chance, and yet I have to
+go back and do a deadly dull job, just because it _is_ my job."
+
+Peter went up to town and two days after came down again to "The Green
+Hart" to say good-bye. He had got his marching orders and was to sail in
+the _Somali_ from Southampton. Some fifteen hundred civilians and
+officers serving in India were sailing by that boat and the _Dongola_.
+
+By every argument he could bring forward he tried to get Jan to marry
+him before he sailed. Yet just because she wanted to do it so much, she
+held back. She, too, she kept telling herself, had her job, and she knew
+that if she was Peter's wife, nothing, not even her dear Fay's children,
+could be of equal importance with Peter.
+
+The children and Meg and the household had by much thinking grown into a
+sort of Frankenstein's monster of duty.
+
+Her attitude was incomprehensible to Peter. It seemed to him to be
+wrong-headed and absurd, and he began to lose patience with her.
+
+On his last morning he sought and found her beside the sun-dial in the
+wrens' garden.
+
+Meg had taken little Fay to see Lady Mary's Persian kittens, but Tony
+preferred to potter about the garden with the aged man who was trying to
+replace Earley. William was not allowed to call upon the kittens, as
+Fatima, their mother, objected to him vehemently, and Tony cared to go
+nowhere if William might not be of the party.
+
+Peter came to Jan and took both her hands and held them.
+
+"It's the last time I shall ask you, my dear. If you care enough, we
+can have these last days together. If you don't I must go, for I can't
+bear any more of this. Either you love me enough to marry me before I
+sail or you don't love me at all. Which is it?"
+
+"I do love you, you know I do."
+
+"Well, which is it to be?"
+
+"Peter, dear, you must give me more time. I haven't really faced it all.
+I can't do anything in such a hurry as that."
+
+Peter looked at her and shook his head.
+
+"You don't know what caring is," he said. "I can't stand any more of
+this. Do you see that motto on the sun-dial: 'I bide my time'--I've read
+it and read it, and I've said it over to myself and waited and hoped to
+move you. Now I can't wait any more."
+
+He kissed her, dropped her hand, and turning from her went out through
+the iron gate and down the drive. For a moment Jan stood by the sun-dial
+as though she, too, were stone.
+
+Then blindly she went up the steps into the empty nursery and sat down
+on an old sofa far back in the room. She leaned face-downward against
+the cushions, and great, tearing sobs broke from her.
+
+Peter was gone. He would never come back. She had driven him from her.
+And having done so she realised that he was the one person in the world
+she could not possibly do without.
+
+Tony's own hen had laid an egg. Carrying it very carefully in a
+cabbage-leaf, he went, accompanied by the faithful William, to show it
+to Auntie Jan, and was just in time to see Peter going down the drive.
+
+He went through the wrens' garden and in by the window. For a moment he
+didn't see his aunt; and was turning to go again when a strange sound
+arrested him, and he saw her all huddled up at the head of the sofa,
+with hidden face and heaving shoulders.
+
+He laid his egg on the table and went and pulled at her arm.
+
+"What is the matter?" he asked anxiously. "And why has Peter gone?"
+
+Jan raised her head; pride and shame and self-consciousness were dead in
+her: "He's gone," she sobbed. "He won't come back, and I shall never be
+happy any more," and down went her head again on her locked arms.
+
+Tony did not attempt to console her. He ran from the room, and Jan felt
+that this was only an added pang of abandonment.
+
+Down the drive ran Tony, with William galumphing beside him. But William
+was not happy, and squealed softly from time to time. He felt it unkind
+to leave a poor lady crying like that, and yet was constrained to go
+with Tony because Meg had left him in William's charge.
+
+Tony turned out of the gate and into the road.
+
+Far away in the distance was a man's figure striding along with
+incredible swiftness. Tony started to run all he knew. Now, seldom as
+William barked, he barked when people ran, and William's bark was so
+deep and sonorous and distinctive that it caused the swiftly striding
+man to turn his head. He turned his body, too, and came back to meet
+Tony and William.
+
+Tony was puffed and almost breathless, but he managed to jerk out: "You
+must go back; she's ... crying dreadful. You _must_ go back. Go quick;
+don't wait for us."
+
+Peter went.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan very rarely cried. When she did it hurt fiercely and absorbed all
+her attention. She was crying now as if she would never stop. If people
+seldom cry it has a devastating effect on their appearance when they do.
+Jan's eyelids were swollen, her nose scarlet and shiny, her features all
+bleared and blurred and almost scarred by tears.
+
+Someone touched her gently on the shoulder, and she looked up.
+
+"My dear," said Peter, "you must not cry like this. I was losing my
+temper--that's why I went off."
+
+Jan sprang to her feet and flung her arms round his neck. She pressed
+her ravaged face against his: "I'll do anything you like," she
+whispered, "if you'll only like it. I can't stand by myself any more."
+
+This was true, for as she spoke her knees gave under her.
+
+Peter held her close. Never had Jan looked less attractive and never had
+Peter loved her more, or realised so clearly how dear and foolish and
+wise and womanly she was.
+
+"You see," she sobbed, "you said yourself everyone _must_ do his job,
+and I thought----"
+
+"But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it, anyway."
+
+Jan sobbed now more quietly, with her head against his shoulder.
+
+Tony and William came and looked in at the window.
+
+His aunt was still crying, crying hard, though Peter was there close
+beside her, very close indeed.
+
+Surely this was most unreasonable.
+
+"She said," Tony remarked accusingly to Peter, "she was crying because
+you had gone, so I ran to fetch you back. And now I _have_ fetched you,
+she's crying worse nor ever."
+
+But William Bloomsbury knew better. William had cause to know the
+solitary bitter tears that hurt. These tears were different.
+
+So William wagged his tail and ran into the room, jumping joyously on
+Peter and Jan.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+
+
+The following corrections were made:
+
+p. 44: Daddy to Daddie, to match all other occurrences (Daddie was very
+daylight.)
+
+p. 113: log to long (long grey dust-cloak)
+
+p. 113: froward to forward (Anthony came forward)
+
+p. 118: bread-an-butter to bread-and-butter (several pieces of
+bread-and-butter)
+
+p. 152: minunte to minute (pondered this for a minute)
+
+p. 284: quit to quick ("I came as quick as I could,")
+
+p. 318: fluttered to flattered (rather flattered)
+
+Inconsistencies in hyphenation (e.g. country-side vs. countryside) have
+not been changed. All dialect and "baby talk" has been left as in the
+original. Two different types of thought breaks were used in the
+original: extra whitespace between paragraphs (represented by 5 spaced
+asterisks in this text) and a line of 8 spaced asterisks (left as in the
+original.) Ellipses match the original, even when inconsistent. The
+exception is when they occur at the end of a paragraph, where they are
+always accompanied by a period.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Jan and Her Job
+
+Author: L. Allen Harker
+
+Release Date: September 9, 2009 [EBook #29945]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JAN AND HER JOB ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Robert Cicconetti, S.D., and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it,
+anyway."]
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+BY
+
+L. ALLEN HARKER
+
+AUTHOR OF "A ROMANCE OF THE NURSERY"; "MISS ESPERANCE AND MR. WYCHERLY";
+"MR. WYCHERLY'S WARDS"; "THE FFOLLIOTS OF REDMARLEY," ETC.
+
+ILLUSTRATED
+
+NEW YORK
+
+CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
+
+1917
+
+
+Copyright, 1917, by
+Charles Scribner's Sons
+
+***
+
+Published March, 1917
+
+
+                       TO
+
+                    F. R. P.
+
+  "_Chary of praise and prodigal of counsel--
+    Who but thou?_"
+                                R. L. S.
+
+
+
+
+_CONTENTS_
+
+
+  CHAPTER                                               PAGE
+
+      I. JAN                                               1
+
+     II. JAN'S MAIL                                       13
+
+    III. BOMBAY                                           19
+
+     IV. THE BEGINNING OF THE JOB                         39
+
+      V. THE CHILDREN                                     52
+
+     VI. THE SHADOW BEFORE                                62
+
+    VII. THE HUMAN TOUCH                                  78
+
+   VIII. THE END OF THE DREAM                             91
+
+     IX. MEG                                              97
+
+      X. PLANS                                           124
+
+     XI. THE STATE OF PETER                              139
+
+    XII. "THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES"                         149
+
+   XIII. THE WHEELS OF CHANCE                            162
+
+    XIV. PERPLEXITIES                                    173
+
+     XV. WREN'S END                                      184
+
+    XVI. "THE BLUDGEONINGS OF CHANCE"                    201
+
+   XVII. "THOUGH AN HOST SHOULD ENCAMP AGAINST
+           ME"                                           212
+
+  XVIII. MEG AND CAPTAIN MIDDLETON                       220
+
+    XIX. THE YOUNG IDEA                                  240
+
+     XX. "ONE WAY OF LOVE"                               252
+
+    XXI. ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE                             261
+
+   XXII. THE ENCAMPMENT                                  276
+
+  XXIII. TACTICS                                         287
+
+   XXIV. "THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID"                  303
+
+    XXV. A DEMONSTRATION IN FORCE                        325
+
+   XXVI. IN WHICH SEVERAL PEOPLE SPEAK THEIR MINDS       339
+
+  XXVII. AUGUST, 1914                                    351
+
+
+
+
+_ILLUSTRATIONS_
+
+
+  "But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it,
+      anyway"                                 _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                      FACING
+                                                       PAGE
+
+  "It would make it easier for both of us if you'd face it,
+      my dear"                                            66
+
+  He washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+      pointing out ... that he "went into all the
+      corners"                                           156
+
+  William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ...
+      nice children                                      188
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+JAN
+
+
+She was something of a puzzle to the other passengers. They couldn't
+quite place her. She came on board the P. and O. at Marseilles. Being
+Christmas week the boat was not crowded, and she had a cabin to herself
+on the spar deck, so there was no "stable-companion" to find out
+anything about her.
+
+The sharp-eyed Australian lady, who sat opposite her at the Purser's
+table, decided that she was not married, or even engaged, as she wore no
+rings of any kind. Besides, her name, "Miss Janet Ross," figured in the
+dinner-list and was plainly painted on her deck-chair. At meals she sat
+beside the Purser, and seemed more or less under his wing. People at her
+table decided that she couldn't be going out as a governess or she would
+hardly be travelling first class, and yet she did not look of the sort
+who globe-trot all by themselves.
+
+Rather tall, slender without being thin, she moved well. Her ringless
+hands were smooth and prettily shaped, so were her slim feet, and always
+singularly well-shod.
+
+Perhaps her chief outward characteristic was that she looked
+delightfully fresh and clean. Her fair skin helped to this effect, and
+the trim suitability of her clothes accentuated it. And yet there was
+nothing challenging or particularly noticeable in her personality.
+
+Her face, fresh-coloured and unlined, was rather round. Her eyes
+well-opened and blue-grey, long-sighted and extremely honest. Her hair,
+thick and naturally wavy, had been what hairdressers call "mid-brown,"
+but was now frankly grey, especially round the temples; and the grey
+hair puzzled people, so that opinions differed widely regarding her age.
+
+The five box-wallahs (gentlemen engaged in commercial pursuits are so
+named in the East to distinguish them from the Heaven-Born in the
+various services that govern India), who, with the Australian lady, sat
+opposite to her at table, decided that she was really young and
+prematurely grey. Between the courses they diligently took stock of her.
+The Australian lady disagreed with them. She declared Miss Ross to be
+middle-aged, to look younger than she was. In this the Australian lady
+was quite sincere. She could not conceive of any _young_ woman
+neglecting the many legitimate means that existed of combating this most
+distressing semblance--if semblance it was--of age.
+
+The Australian lady set her down as a well-preserved forty at least.
+
+Mr. Frewellen, the oldest and crossest and greediest of the five
+box-wallahs, declared that he would lay fifteen rupees to five annas
+that she was under thirty; that her eyes were sad, and it was probably
+trouble that had turned her hair. At his time of life, he could tell a
+young woman when he saw one. No painted old harridan could deceive
+_him_. After all, if Miss Ross _had_ grey hair, she had plenty of it,
+and it was her own. But Mr. Frewellen, who sat directly opposite her,
+was prejudiced in her favour, for she always let him take her roll if it
+was browner than his own. He also took her knife if it happened to be
+sharper than the one he had, and he insisted on her listening to his
+incessant grumbling as to the food, the service, the temperature, and
+the general imbecility and baseness of his fellow-creatures.
+
+Like the Ancient Mariner, he held her with his glittering spectacles.
+Miss Ross trembled before his diatribes. He spoke in a loud and rumbling
+voice, and made derogatory remarks about the other passengers as they
+passed to their respective tables. She would thankfully have changed
+hers, but that it might have seemed ungrateful to the Purser, into whose
+charge she had been given by friends; and the Purser had been most kind
+and attentive.
+
+The Australian lady was sure that the Purser knew more about Miss Ross
+than he would acknowledge--which he did. But when tackled by one
+passenger about another, he was discreet or otherwise in direct ratio to
+what he considered was the discretion of the questioner. And he was a
+pretty shrewd judge of character. He had infinite opportunities of so
+judging. A sea-voyage lays bare many secrets and shows up human nature
+at its starkest.
+
+Janet Ross did not seek to make friends, but kindly people who spoke to
+her found her pleasant and not in the least disposed to be mysterious
+when questioned, though she never volunteered any information about
+herself. She was a good listener, and about the middle of any voyage
+that is a quality supplying a felt want. Mankind in general finds his
+own doings very interesting, and takes great pleasure in recounting the
+same. Even the most energetic young passenger cannot play deck-quoits
+all day, and mixed cricket matches are too heating to last long once
+Aden is left behind. A great many people found it pleasant to drop into
+a chair beside the quiet lady, who was always politely interested in
+their remarks. She looked so cool and restful in her white frock and
+shady hat. She did _not_ buy a solar topee at Port Said, for though this
+was her first voyage she had not, it seemed, started quite unwarned.
+
+In the middle of the Indian Ocean she suddenly found favour in the eyes
+of Sir Langham Sykes, and when that was the case Sir Langham proclaimed
+his preference to the whole ship. No one who attracted his notice could
+remain in obscurity. When he was not eating he was talking, generally
+about himself, though he was also fond of asking questions.
+
+A short, stout man with a red face, little fierce blue eyes, a booming
+voice, noisy laugh and a truculent, domineering manner, Sir Langham
+made his presence felt wherever he was.
+
+It was "her shape," as he called it, that first attracted his attention
+to Miss Ross, as he watched her walking briskly round and round the
+hurricane-deck for her morning constitutional.
+
+"That woman moves well," he remarked to his neighbour; "wonder if she's
+goin' out to be married. Nice-looking woman and pleasant, no frills
+about her--sort that would be kind in illness."
+
+And Sir Langham sighed. He couldn't take any exercise just then, for his
+last attack of gout had been very severe, and his left foot was still
+swathed and slippered.
+
+There was a dance that night on the hurricane-deck, and Sir Langham,
+while watching the dancers, talked at the top of his voice with the more
+important lady passengers. On such occasions he claimed close intimacy
+with the Reigning House, and at all times of day one heard such
+sentences as, "And _I_ said to the Princess Henrietta," with a full
+account of what he did say. And the things he declared he said, and the
+stories he told, certainly suggested a doubt as to whether the ladies of
+our Royal Family are quite as strait-laced as the ordinary public is led
+to believe. But then one had only Sir Langham's word for it. There was
+no possibility of questioning the Princess.
+
+Presently Sir Langham got tired of trying to drown the band--it was such
+a noisy band--and he hobbled down the companion on to the almost
+deserted deck. Right up in the stern he spied Miss Ross, quite alone,
+sitting under an electric light absorbed in a book. Beside her was an
+empty chair with a comfortable leg-rest. Sir Langham never made any
+bones about interrupting people. It would not, to him, have seemed
+possible that a woman could prefer any form of literature to the charm
+of his conversation. So with a series of grunts he lowered himself into
+it, arranged his foot upon the rest, and, without asking permission, lit
+a cigar.
+
+"Don't you care for dancin'?" he asked.
+
+She closed her book. "Oh, yes," she said, "but I don't know many men on
+board, and there are such a lot of young people who do know one another.
+It's pretty to watch them; but the night is pretty, too, don't you
+think? The stars all seem so near compared to what they do at home."
+
+"I've seen too many Eastern nights to take much stock in 'em now," he
+said in a disparaging voice. "I take it this is all new to you--first
+voyage, eh?"
+
+"Yes, I've never been a long voyage before."
+
+"Goin' to India, I suppose. You'd have started sooner if you'd been
+goin' for the winter to Australia. Now what are you goin' to India
+_for_?"
+
+"To stay with my sister."
+
+"Married sister?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Older than you, then, of course."
+
+"No, younger."
+
+"Much younger?"
+
+"Three years."
+
+"Is she like you?"
+
+"Not in the least. She is a beautiful person."
+
+"Been married long?"
+
+"Between five and six years. I'm to take her home at the end of the cold
+weather."
+
+"Any kids?"
+
+"Two."
+
+"And you haven't been out before?"
+
+"No; this is my first visit."
+
+"She's been home, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes, once."
+
+"Is her husband in the Army?"
+
+"No."
+
+Had Sir Langham been an observant person he would have noted that her
+very brief replies did not exactly encourage further questions. But his
+idea of conversation was either a monologue or a means of obtaining
+information, so he instantly demanded, "What does her husband do?"
+
+The impulse of the moment urged her to reply, "What possible business is
+it of yours _what_ he does?" But well-bred people do not yield to these
+impulses, so she answered quietly, "He's in the P.W.D."
+
+"Not a bad service, not a bad service, though not equal to the I.C.S.
+They've had rather a scandal in it lately. Didn't you see about it in
+the papers just before we left?"
+
+At that moment Sir Langham was very carefully flicking the ash from the
+end of his cigar, otherwise he might have observed that as he spoke his
+companion flushed. A wave of warm colour surged over her face and bare
+neck and receded again, leaving her very pale. Her hands closed over the
+book lying in her lap, as if glad to hold on to something, and their
+knuckles were white against the tan.
+
+"Didn't you see it?" he repeated. "Some chap been found to have taken
+bribes over contracts in a native state. Regular rumpus there's been.
+Quite right, too; we sahibs must have clean hands. No dealing with brown
+people if you haven't clean hands--can't have rupees sticking to 'em in
+any Government transactions. Expect you'll hear all about it when you
+get out there--makes a great sensation in any service does that sort of
+thing. I don't remember the name of the chap--perhaps they didn't give
+it--do you?"
+
+"I didn't see anything about it," she said quietly. "I was very busy
+just before I left, and hardly looked at a paper."
+
+"Where is your sister?"
+
+"In Bombay."
+
+"Oh, got a billet there, has he? Expect you'll like Bombay; cheery
+place, in the cold weather, but not a patch on Calcutta, to my mind. I
+hear the Governor and his wife do the thing in style--hospitable, you
+know; got private means, as people in that position always ought to
+have."
+
+"I don't suppose I shall go out at all," she said. "My sister is ill,
+and I've got to look after her. Directly she is strong enough to travel
+I shall bring her home."
+
+"Oh, you _must_ see something of the social life of the place while
+you're there. D'you know what I thought? I thought you were goin' out to
+get married, and"--he continued gallantly--"I thought he was a deuced
+lucky chap."
+
+She smiled and shook her head. She was not looking at Sir Langham, but
+at the long, white, moonlit pathway of foam left in the wake of the
+ship.
+
+"I say," he went on confidentially, "what's your Christian name? I'm
+certain they don't call you Janet. Is it Nettie, now? I bet it's
+Nettie!"
+
+"My _family_," said Miss Ross somewhat coldly, "call me Jan."
+
+"Nice little name," he exclaimed, "but more like a boy's. Now, I never
+got a pet name. I started Langham, and Langham I've stopped, and I
+flatter myself I've made the name known and respected."
+
+He wanted her to look at him, and leaned towards her: "Look here, Miss
+Ross, I'm goin' to ask you a funny question, and it's not one you can
+ask most women--but you're a puzzle. You've got a face like a child, and
+yet you're as grey as a badger. What _is_ your age?"
+
+"I shall be twenty-eight in March."
+
+She looked at him then, and her grey eyes were so full of amusement
+that, incredulous as he usually was as to other people's statements, he
+knew that she was speaking the truth.
+
+"Then why the devil don't you _do_ something _to_ it?" he demanded.
+
+She laughed. "I couldn't be bothered. And it might turn green, or
+something. I don't mind it. It began when I was twenty-three."
+
+"_I_ don't mind it either," Sir Langham declared magnanimously; "but
+it's misleading."
+
+"I'm sorry," she said demurely. "I wouldn't mislead anyone for the
+world."
+
+"Now, what age should you think _I_ am? But I suppose you know--that's
+the worst of being a public character; when one gets nearly a column in
+_Who's Who_, everybody knows all about one. That's the penalty of
+celebrity."
+
+"Do you mind people knowing your age?"
+
+"Not I! Nor anything else about me. _I've_ never done anything to be
+ashamed of. Quite the other way, I can assure you."
+
+"How pleasant that must be," she said quietly.
+
+Sir Langham turned and looked suspiciously at her; but her face was
+guileless and calm, with no trace of raillery, her eyes still fixed on
+the long bright track of foam.
+
+"I suppose you, now," he muttered hoarsely, "always sleep well, go off
+directly you turn in--eh?"
+
+Her quiet eyes met his; little and fierce and truculent, but behind
+their rather bloodshot boldness there lurked something else, and with a
+sudden pang of pity she knew that it was fear, and that Sir Langham
+dreaded the night.
+
+"As a rule I do," she said gently; "but of course I've known what it is
+to be sleepless, and it's horrid."
+
+"It's hell," said Sir Langham, "and I'm in it every night this voyage,
+for I've knocked off morphia and opiates--they were playing the deuce
+with my constitution, and I've strength of mind for anything when I
+fairly take hold. But it's awful. When d'you suppose natural sleep will
+come back?"
+
+She knew that he did not lack physical courage, that he had fearlessly
+faced great dangers in many outposts of the world; but the demon of
+insomnia had got a hold of Sir Langham, and he dreaded the night
+unspeakably. At that moment there was something pathetic about the
+little, boastful, filibustering man.
+
+"I think you will sleep to-night," she said confidently, "especially if
+you go to bed early."
+
+She half rose as she spoke, but he put his hand on her arm and pressed
+her down in her chair again.
+
+"Don't go yet," he cried. "Keep on tellin' me I'll sleep, and then
+perhaps I shall. You look as if you could will people to do things.
+You're that quiet sort. Will me, there's a good girl. Tell me again I'll
+sleep to-night."
+
+It was getting late; the music had stopped and the dancers had
+disappeared. Miss Ross did not feel over comfortable alone with Sir
+Langham so far away from everybody else. Especially as she saw he was
+excited and nervous. Had he been drinking? she wondered. But she
+remembered that he had proclaimed far and wide that, because of his
+gout, he'd made a vow to touch no form of "alcoholic liquor" on the
+voyage, except on Christmas and New Year's Day. It was six days since
+Christmas, and already Aden was left behind. No, it was just sheer
+nervous excitement, and if she could do him any good....
+
+"I feel sure you will sleep to-night," she said soothingly, "if you will
+do as I tell you."
+
+"I'll do any mortal thing. I've got a deck-cabin to myself. Will you
+keep willin' me when you turn in?"
+
+"Go to bed now," she said firmly. "Undress quickly, and then think about
+nothing ... and I'll do the rest."
+
+"You will, you promise?"
+
+"Yes, but you must keep your mind a perfect blank, or I can't do
+anything."
+
+She stood up tall and straight. The moonlight caught her grey hair and
+burnished it to an aureole of silver.
+
+With many grunts Sir Langham pulled himself out of his chair. "No
+smokin'-room, eh?"
+
+"Good night," Miss Ross said firmly, and left him.
+
+"Don't forget to ask your sister's husband about that chap in the
+P.W.D.," he called after her. "He's sure to know all about it. What's
+his name?--your brother-in-law, I mean."
+
+But Miss Ross had disappeared.
+
+"Now how the devil," he muttered, "am I to make my mind, _my_ mind, a
+perfect blank?"
+
+Two hours later Sir Langham's snores grievously disturbed the occupants
+of adjacent cabins.
+
+In hers, Miss Ross sat by the open porthole reading and re-reading the
+mail that had reached her at Aden.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+JAN'S MAIL
+
+
+                                   _Bombay, December 13th._
+
+      My Dear Jan,
+
+      It was a great relief to get your cable saying definitely
+      that you were sailing by the _Carnduff_. Misfortunes seem
+      to have come upon us in such numbers of late that I dreaded
+      lest your departure might be unavoidably delayed or
+      prevented. I will not now enter into the painful question
+      of my shameful treatment by Government, but you can well
+      understand that I shall leave no stone unturned to reverse
+      their most unfair and unjust decision, and to bring my
+      traducers to book. Important business having reference to
+      these matters calls me away at once, as I feel it is most
+      essential not to lose a moment, my reputation and my whole
+      future being at stake. I shall therefore, to my great
+      regret, be unable to meet you on your arrival in Bombay,
+      and, as my movements for the next few months will be rather
+      uncertain, I may find it difficult to let you have regular
+      news of me. I would therefore advise you to take Fay and
+      the children home as soon as all is safely over and she is
+      able to travel, and I will join you in England if and when
+      I find I can get away. I know, dear Jan, that you will not
+      mind financing Fay to this extent at present; as, owing to
+      these wholly unexpected departmental complications, I am
+      uncommonly hard up. I will, of course, repay you at the
+      earliest possible opportunity.
+
+      Poor Fay is not at all well; all these worries have been
+      very bad for her, and I have been distracted by anxiety on
+      her behalf, as well as about my own most distressing
+      position, and a severe attack of fever has left me weak and
+      ailing. I thought it better to bring Fay down to Bombay,
+      where she can get the best medical advice, and her being
+      there will save you the long, tiresome journey to
+      Dariawarpur. It is also most convenient for going home. She
+      is installed in a most comfortable flat, and we brought our
+      own servants, so I hope you will feel that I have done my
+      best for her.
+
+      Fay will explain the whole miserable business to you, and
+      although appearances may be against me, I trust that you
+      will realise how misleading these may be. I cannot thank
+      you enough for responding so promptly to our ardently
+      expressed desire for your presence at this difficult time.
+      It will make all the difference in the world to Fay; and,
+      on her account, to me also.
+
+      Believe me, always yours affectionately,
+
+                                             HUGO TANCRED.
+
+                                          _Bombay, Friday._
+
+      Jan my dear, my dear, are you really on your way? And shall
+      I see your face and hear your kind voice, and be able to
+      cry against your shoulder?
+
+      I can't meet you, my precious, because I don't go out. I'm
+      afraid. Afraid lest I should see anyone who knew us at
+      Dariawarpur. India is so large and so small, and people
+      from everywhere are always in Bombay, and I couldn't bear
+      it.
+
+      Do you know, Jan, that when the very worst has happened,
+      you get kind of numbed. You can't suffer any more. You
+      can't be sorry or angry or shocked or indignant, or
+      anything but just broken, and that's what I am.
+
+      After all, I've one good friend here who knew us at
+      Dariawarpur. He's got a job at the secretariat, and he
+      tries to help me all he can. I don't mind him somehow. He
+      understands. He will meet you and bring you to the
+      bungalow, so look out for him when the boat gets in. He's
+      tall and thin and clean-shaven and yellow, with a grave,
+      stern face and beautiful kind eyes. Peter is an angel, so
+      be nice to him, Jan dear. It has been awful; it will go on
+      being awful; but it will be a little more bearable when you
+      come--for me, I mean--for you it will be horrid. All of us
+      on your hands, and no money, and me such a crock, and
+      presently a new baby. The children are well. It's so queer
+      to think you haven't seen "little Fay." Come soon, Jan,
+      come soon, to your miserable                    FAY.
+
+Jan sat on her bunk under the open porthole. One after the other she
+held the letters open in her hand and stared at them, but she did not
+read. The sentences were burnt into her brain already.
+
+Hugo Tancred's letter was dated. Fay's was not, and neither letter bore
+any address in Bombay. Now, Jan knew that Bombay is a large town; and
+that people like the Tancreds, who, if not actually in hiding, certainly
+did not seek to draw attention to their movements, would be hard to
+find. Fay had wholly omitted to mention the surname of the tall, thin,
+yellow man with the "grave, stern face and beautiful kind eyes." Even in
+the midst of her poignant anxiety Jan found herself smiling at this. It
+was so like Fay--so like her to give no address. And should the tall,
+thin gentleman fail to appear, what was Jan to do? She could hardly go
+about the ship asking if one "Peter" had come to fetch her.
+
+How would she find Fay?
+
+Would they allow her to wait at the landing-place till someone came, or
+were there stringent regulations compelling passengers to leave the
+docks with the utmost speed, as most of them would assuredly desire to
+do?
+
+She knitted her brows and worried a good deal about this; then suddenly
+put the question from her as too trivial when there were such infinitely
+greater problems to solve.
+
+Only one thing was clear. One central fact shone out, a beacon amidst
+the gloom of the "departmental complications" enshrouding the conduct of
+Hugo Tancred, the certainty that he had, for the present anyway, shifted
+the responsibility of his family from his own shoulders to hers. As she
+sat square and upright under the porthole, with the cool air from an
+inserted "wind-sail" ruffling her hair, she looked as though she braced
+herself to the burden.
+
+She wished she knew exactly what had happened, what Hugo Tancred had
+actually done. For some years she had known that he was by no means
+scrupulous in money matters, and that very evening Sir Langham had made
+it clear to her that this crookedness had not stopped short at his
+official work. There had been a scandal, so far-reaching a scandal that
+it had got into the home papers.
+
+This struck Jan as rather extraordinary, for Hugo Tancred was by no
+means a stupid man.
+
+It is one thing to be pleasantly oblivious of private debts, to omit
+cheques in repayment of various necessaries got at the Stores by an
+obliging sister-in-law. One thing to muddle away in wild-cat
+speculations a wife's money that, but for the procrastination of an
+easy-going father, would have been tightly tied up--quite another to
+bring himself so nearly within the clutches of the law as to make it
+possible for the Government of India to dismiss him.
+
+And what was he to do? What did the future hold for him?
+
+Who would give employment to however able a man with such a career
+behind him?
+
+Jan's imagination refused to take such flights. Resolutely she put the
+subject from her and began to consider what her own best course would be
+with Fay, her nephew and niece, and, very shortly, a new baby on her
+hands.
+
+Jan was not a young woman to let things drift. She had kept house for a
+whimsical, happy-go-lucky father since she was fourteen; mothered her
+beautiful young sister; and, at her father's death, two years before,
+had with quiet decision arranged her own life, wholly avoiding the
+discussion and the friction which generally are the lot of an unmarried
+woman of five-and-twenty left without natural guardians and with a large
+circle of friends and relations.
+
+It was nearly two o'clock when she undressed and went to bed, and before
+that she had drafted two cablegrams--one to a house-agent, the other to
+her bankers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+BOMBAY
+
+
+For Jan the next two days passed as in a more or less disagreeable
+dream. She could never afterwards recall very clearly what happened,
+except that Sir Langham Sykes seemed absolutely omnipresent, and made
+her, she felt, ridiculous before the whole ship, by proclaiming far and
+wide that she had bestowed upon him the healing gift of sleep.
+
+He was so effusive, so palpably grateful, that she simply could not
+undeceive him by telling him that after they parted the night before she
+had never given him another thought.
+
+When he was not doing this he was pursuing, with fulminations against
+the whole tribe of missionaries, two kindly, quiet members of the
+Society of Friends.
+
+In an evil moment they had gratified his insatiable curiosity as to the
+object of their voyage to India, which was to visit and report upon the
+missionary work of their community. Once he discovered this he never let
+them alone, and the deck resounded with his denunciations of all
+Protestant missionaries as "self-seeking, oily humbugs."
+
+They bore it with well-mannered resignation, and a common dislike for
+Sir Langham formed quite a bond of union between them and Jan.
+
+There was the usual dance on New Year's Eve, the usual singing of "Auld
+Lang Syne" in two huge circles; and Jan would have enjoyed it all but
+for the heavy foreboding in her heart; for she was a simple person who
+responded easily to the emotions of others. Before she could slip away
+to bed Sir Langham cornered her again, conjuring her to "will" him to
+sleep and "to go on doin' it" after they parted in Bombay. He became
+rather maudlin, and she seized the opportunity of telling him that her
+best efforts would be wholly unavailing if he at all relaxed the
+temperate habits, so necessary for the cure of his gout, that he had
+acquired during the voyage. She was stern with Sir Langham, and her
+admonitions had considerable effect. He sought his cabin chastened and
+thoughtful.
+
+The boat was due early in the morning. Jan finished most of her packing
+before she undressed; then, tired and excited, she could not sleep. A
+large cockroach scuttling about her cabin did not tend to calm her
+nerves. She plentifully besprinkled the floor with powdered borax, kept
+the electric light turned on and the fan whirring, and lay down
+wide-awake to wait for the dawn.
+
+The ship was unusually noisy, but just about four o'clock came a new
+sound right outside her porthole--the rush alongside of the boat bearing
+the pilot and strange loud voices calling directions in an unknown
+tongue. She turned out her light (first peering fearfully under her
+berth to make sure no borax-braving cockroach was in ambush) and knelt
+on her bed to look out and watch the boat with its turbaned occupants:
+big brown men, who shouted to one another in a liquid language full of
+mystery.
+
+For a brief space the little boat was towed alongside the great liner,
+then cast off, and presently--far away on the horizon--Jan saw a streak
+of pearly pinkish light, as though the soft blue curtain of the night
+had been lifted just a little; and against that luminous streak were
+hills.
+
+In spite of her anxiety, in spite of her fears as to the future, Jan's
+heart beat fast with pleasurable excitement. She was young and strong
+and eager, and here at last was the real East. A little soft wind
+caressed her tired forehead and she drank in the blessed coolness of the
+early morning.
+
+Both day and night come quickly in the East. Jan got up, had her bath,
+dressed, and by half-past six she was on deck. The dark-blue curtain was
+rolled up, and the scene set was the harbour of Bombay.
+
+Such a gracious haven of strange multi-coloured craft, with its double
+coast-line of misty hills on one side, and clear-cut, high-piled
+buildings, domes and trees upon the other.
+
+A gay white-and-gold launch, with its attendants in scarlet and white,
+came for certain passengers, who were guests of the Governor. The police
+launch, trim and business-like with its cheerful yellow-hatted sepoys,
+came for others. Jan watched these favoured persons depart in stately
+comfort, and went downstairs to get some breakfast. Then came the rush
+of departure by the tender. So many had friends to meet them, and all
+seemed full of pleasure in arrival. Jan was just beginning to feel
+rather forlorn and anxious when the Purser, fussed and over-driven as he
+always is at such times, came towards her, followed by a tall man
+wearing a pith helmet and an overcoat.
+
+"Mr. Ledgard has come to meet you, Miss Ross, so you'll be all right."
+
+It was amazing how easy everything became. Mr. Ledgard's servants
+collected Jan's cabin baggage and took it with them in the tender and,
+on arrival, in a tikka-gharri--the little pony-carriage which is the
+gondola of Bombay--and almost before she quite realised that the voyage
+was over she found herself seated beside Peter in a comfortable
+motor-car, with a cheerful little Hindu chauffeur at the steering-wheel,
+sliding through wide, well-watered streets, still comparatively empty
+because it was so early.
+
+By mutual consent they turned to look at one another, and Jan noted that
+Peter Ledgard _was_ thin and extremely yellow. That his eyes (hollow and
+tired-looking as are the eyes of so many officials in the East) _were_
+kind, and she thought she had never before beheld a firmer mouth or more
+masterful jaw.
+
+What Peter saw evidently satisfied him as to her common sense, for he
+plunged _in medias res_ at once: "How much do you know of this
+unfortunate affair?" he asked.
+
+"Very little," she answered, "and that little extremely vague. Will you
+tell me has Hugo come to total grief or not?"
+
+"Officially, yes. He is finished, done for--may thank his lucky stars
+he's not in gaol. It's well you should know this at the very beginning,
+for of course he won't allow it, and poor Fay--Mrs. Tancred (I'm afraid
+we're rather free-and-easy about Christian names in India)--doesn't know
+the whole facts by a very long way. From what she tells me, I fear he
+has made away with most of her money, too. Was any of it tied up?"
+
+Jan shook her head. "We both got what money there was absolutely on my
+father's death."
+
+"Then," said Peter, "I fear you've got the whole of them on your hands,
+Miss Ross."
+
+"That's what I've come for," Jan said simply, "to take care of Fay and
+the children."
+
+Peter Ledgard looked straight in front of him.
+
+"It's a lot to put on you," he said slowly, "and I'm afraid you'll find
+it a bit more complicated than you expect. Will you remember that I'd
+like to help you all I can?"
+
+Jan looked at the stern profile beside her and felt vaguely comforted.
+"I shall be most grateful for your advice," she said humbly. "I know I
+shall need it."
+
+The motor stopped, and as she stepped from it in front of the tall block
+of buildings, Jan knew that the old easy, straightforward life was over.
+Unconsciously she stiffened her back and squared her shoulders, and
+looked very tall and straight as she stood beside Peter Ledgard in the
+entrance. The pretty colour he had admired when he met her had faded
+from her cheeks, and the face under the shady hat looked grave and
+older.
+
+Peter said something to the smiling lift-man in an extremely dirty dhoti
+who stood salaaming in the entrance.
+
+"I won't come up now," he said to Jan. "Please tell Mrs. Tancred I'll
+look in about tea-time."
+
+As Jan entered the lift and vanished from his sight, Peter reflected,
+"So that's the much-talked-of Jan! Well, I'm not surprised Fay wanted
+her."
+
+The lift stopped. An elderly white-clad butler stood salaaming at an
+open door, and Jan followed him.
+
+A few steps through a rather narrow passage and she was in a large light
+room opening on to a verandah, and in the centre stood her sister Fay,
+with outstretched arms.
+
+A pathetic, inarticulate, worn and faded Fay: her pretty freshness
+dimmed. A Fay with dark circles round her hollow eyes and all the living
+light gone from her abundant fair hair. It was as though her face was
+covered by an impalpable grey mask.
+
+There was no doubt about it. Fay looked desperately ill. Ill in a way
+not to be accounted for by her condition.
+
+Clinging together they sat down on an immense sofa, exchanging trivial
+question and answer as to the matters ordinary happy folk discuss when
+they first meet after a long absence. Jan asked for the children, who
+had not yet returned from their early morning walk with the ayah. Fay
+asked about the voyage and friends at home, and told Jan she had got
+dreadfully grey; then kissed her and leant against her just as she used
+to do when they were both children and she needed comfort.
+
+Jan said nothing to Fay about _her_ looks, and neither of them so much
+as mentioned Hugo Tancred. But Jan felt a wild desire to get away by
+herself and cry and cry over this sad wraith of the young sister whose
+serene and happy beauty had been the family pride.
+
+And yet she was so essentially the same Fay, tender and loving and
+inconsequent, and full of pretty cares for Jan's comfort.
+
+The dining-room was behind the sitting-room, with only a curtain
+between, and as they sat at breakfast Fay was so eager Jan should
+eat--she ate nothing herself--so anxious lest she should not like the
+Indian food, that poor Jan, with a lump in her throat that choked her at
+every morsel, forced down the carefully thought-out breakfast and meekly
+accepted everything presented by the grey-haired turbaned butler who
+bent over her paternally and offered every dish much as one would tempt
+a shy child with some amusing toy.
+
+Presently Fay took her to see her room, large, bare and airy, with
+little furniture save the bed with its clean white mosquito curtains
+placed under the electric fan in the centre of the ceiling. Outside the
+window was a narrow balcony, and Jan went there at once to look out; and
+though her heart was so heavy she was fain to exclaim joyfully at the
+beauty of the view.
+
+Right opposite, across Back Bay, lay the wooded villa-crowned slopes of
+Malabar Hill, flung like a garland on the bosom of a sea deeply blue and
+smiling, smooth as a lake, while below her lay the pageant of the
+street, with its ever-changing panorama of vivid life. The whole so
+brilliant, so various, so wholly unlike any beautiful place she had ever
+seen before that, artist's daughter she was, she cried eagerly to Fay,
+"Oh, come and look! Did you ever see anything so lovely? How Dad would
+have rejoiced in this!"
+
+Fay followed slowly: "I thought you'd like it," she said, evidently
+pleased by Jan's enthusiasm, "that's why I gave you this room. Look,
+Jan! There are the children coming, those two over by the band-stand.
+They see us. _Do_ wave to them."
+
+The children were still a long way off. Jan could only see an ayah in
+her white draperies pushing a little go-cart with a child in it, and a
+small boy trotting by her side, but she waved as she was bidden.
+
+The room had evidently at one time been used as a nursery, for inside
+the stone balustrade was a high trellis of wood. Jan and Fay were both
+tall women, but even on them the guarding trellis came right up to their
+shoulders. Neither of them could really lean over, though Fay tried, in
+her eagerness to attract the attention of the little group. Jan watched
+her sister's face and again felt that cruel constriction of the throat
+that holds back tears. Fay's tired eyes were so sad, so out of keeping
+with the cheerful movement of her hand, so shadowed by some knowledge
+she could not share.
+
+"You mustn't stand here without a hat," she said, turning to go in. "The
+sun is getting hot. You must get a topee this afternoon. Peter will take
+you and help to choose it."
+
+"Couldn't you come, if we took a little carriage? Does driving tire you
+when it's cool?" Jan asked as she followed her sister back into the
+room.
+
+"I never go out," Fay said decidedly. "I never shall again ... I mean,"
+she added, "till it's all over. I couldn't bear it just now--I might
+meet someone I know."
+
+"But, Fay, it's very bad for you to be always indoors. Surely, in the
+early morning or the evening--you'll come out then?"
+
+Fay shook her head. "Peter has taken me out in the motor once or twice
+at night--but I don't really like it. It makes me so dreadfully tired.
+Don't worry me about that, Jan. I get plenty of air in the verandah.
+It's just as pretty there as in your balcony, and we can have
+comfortable chairs. Let's go there now. _You_ shall go out as much as
+you like. I'll send Lalkhan with you, or Ayah and the children; and
+Peter will take you about all he can--he promised he would. Don't think
+I want to be selfish and keep you here with me all the time."
+
+The flat, weak voice, so nervous, so terrified lest her stronger sister
+should force her to some course of action she dreaded, went to Jan's
+heart.
+
+"My dear," she said gently, "I haven't come here to rush about. I've
+come to be with you. We'll do exactly what you like best."
+
+Fay clung to her again and whispered, "Later on you'll understand
+better--I'll be able to tell you things, and perhaps you'll understand
+... though I'm not sure--you're not weak like me, you'd never go under
+... you'd always fight...."
+
+There was a pattering of small feet in the passage. Little high voices
+called for "Mummy," and the children came in.
+
+Tony, a grave-eyed, pale-faced child of five, came forward instantly,
+with his hand held out far in front of him. Jan, who loved little
+children, knew in a minute that he was afraid she would kiss him; so she
+shook hands with gentlemanly stiffness. Little Fay, on the contrary, ran
+forward, held up her arms "to be taken" and her adorably pretty little
+face to be kissed. She was startlingly like her mother at the same age,
+with bobbing curls of feathery gold, beseeching blue eyes and a
+complexion delicately coloured as the pearly pink lining of certain
+shells. She was, moreover, chubby, sturdy and robust--quite unlike Tony,
+who looked nervous, bleached and delicate.
+
+Tony went and leant against his mother, regarding Jan and his small
+sister with dubious, questioning eyes.
+
+Presently he remarked, "I wish she hadn't come."
+
+"Oh, Tony," Fay exclaimed reproachfully, "you must both love Auntie Jan
+very dearly. She has come such a long way to be good to us all."
+
+"I wish she hadn't," Tony persisted.
+
+"_I_ sall love Auntie Dzan," Fay remarked, virtuously.
+
+It was pleasant to be cuddled by this friendly baby, and Jan laid her
+cheek against the fluffy golden head; but all the time she was watching
+Tony. He reminded her of someone, and she couldn't think who. He
+maintained his aloof and unfriendly attitude till Ayah came to take the
+children to their second breakfast. Little Fay, however, refused to
+budge, and when the meekly salaaming ayah attempted to take her, made
+her strong little body stiff, and screamed vigorously, clinging so
+firmly to her aunt that Jan had herself to carry the obstreperous baby
+to the nursery, where she left her lying on the floor, still yelling
+with all the strength of her evidently healthy lungs.
+
+When Jan returned, rather dishevelled--for her niece had seized a
+handful of her hair in the final struggle not to be put down--Fay said
+almost complacently, "You see, the dear little soul took a fancy to you
+at once. Tony is much more reserved and not nearly so friendly. He's
+very Scotch, is Tony."
+
+"He does what he's told, anyway."
+
+"Oh, not always," Fay said reassuringly, "only when he doesn't mind
+doing it. They've both got very strong wills."
+
+"So have I," said Jan.
+
+Fay sighed. "It was time you came to keep them in order. I can't."
+
+This was evident, for Fay had not attempted to interfere with her
+daughter beyond saying, "I expect she's hungry, that's why she's so
+fretty, poor dear."
+
+That afternoon Peter went to the flat and was shown as usual into the
+sitting-room.
+
+Jan and the children were in the verandah, all with their backs to the
+room, and did not notice his entrance as Jan was singing nursery-rhymes.
+Fay sat on her knee, cuddled close as though there were no such thing as
+tempers in the world. Tony sat on a little chair at her side, not very
+near, but still near enough to manifest a more friendly spirit than in
+the morning. Peter waited in the background while the song went on.
+
+    I saw a ship a-sailing, a-sailing on the sea,
+    And it was full of pretty things for Tony, Fay and me.
+    There was sugar in the cabin and kisses in the hold----
+
+"Whose kisses?" Tony asked suspiciously.
+
+"Mummy's kisses, of course," said Jan.
+
+"Why doesn't it _say_ so, then?" Tony demanded.
+
+"Mummy's kisses in the hold," Jan sang obediently--
+
+    The sails were made of silk and the masts were made of gold.
+    Gold, gold, the masts were made of gold.
+
+"What nelse?" Fay asked before Jan could start the second verse.
+
+    There were four-and-twenty sailors a-skipping on the deck,
+    And they were little white mice with rings about their neck.
+    The captain was a duck, with a jacket on his back,
+    And when the ship began to sail, the captain cried, "Quack! Quack!
+    Quack! Quack!" The captain cried, "Quack! Quack!"
+
+"What nelse?" Fay asked again.
+
+"There isn't any nelse, that's all."
+
+"Adain," said Fay.
+
+"Praps," Tony said thoughtfully, "there was _some_ auntie's kisses in
+that hold ... just a few...."
+
+"I'm sure there were," said a new voice, and Peter appeared on the
+verandah.
+
+The children greeted him with effusion, and when he sat down Tony sat on
+his knee. He was never assailed by fears lest Peter should want to kiss
+him. Peter was not that sort.
+
+"Sing nunner song," little Fay commanded.
+
+"Not now," Jan said; "we've got a visitor and must talk to him."
+
+"Sing nunner song," little Fay repeated firmly, just as though she had
+not heard.
+
+"Not now; some other time," Jan said with equal firmness.
+
+"Mack!" said the baby, and suited the action to the word by dealing her
+aunt a good hard smack on the arm.
+
+"You mustn't do that," said Jan; "it's not kind."
+
+"Mack, mack, mack," in _crescendo_ with accompanying blows.
+
+Jan caught the little hand, while Peter and Tony, interested spectators,
+said nothing. She held it firmly. "Listen, little Fay," she said, very
+gently. "If you do that again I shall take you to Ayah in the nursery.
+Just once again, and you go."
+
+Jan loosed the little hand, and instantly it dealt her a resounding slap
+on the cheek.
+
+It is of no avail to kick and scream and wriggle in the arms of a
+strong, decided young aunt. For the second time that day, a vociferously
+struggling baby was borne back to the nursery.
+
+As the yells died away in the distance, Tony turned right round on
+Peter's knee and faced him: "She does what she says," he remarked in an
+awestruck whisper.
+
+"And a jolly good thing too," answered Peter.
+
+When Jan came back she brought her sister with her. Lalkhan brought tea,
+and Tony went with him quite meekly to the nursery. They heard him
+chattering to Lalkhan in Hindustani as they went along the passage.
+
+Fay looked a thought less haggard than in the morning. She had slept
+after tiffin; the fact that her sister was actually in the bungalow had
+a calming effect upon her. She was quite cheerful and full of plans for
+Jan's amusement; plans in which, of course, she proposed to take no part
+herself. Jan listened in considerable dismay to arrangements which
+appeared to her to make enormous inroads into Peter Ledgard's leisure
+hours. He and his motor seemed to be quite at Fay's disposal, and Jan
+found the situation both bewildering and embarrassing.
+
+"What a nuisance for him," she reflected, "to have a young woman thrust
+upon him in this fashion. It won't do to upset Fay, but I must tell him
+at the first opportunity that none of these projects hold good."
+
+Directly tea was over Fay almost hustled them out to go and buy a topee
+for Jan, and suggested that, having accomplished this, they should look
+in at the Yacht Club for an hour, "because it was band-night," and Jan
+would like the Yacht Club lawn, with the sea and the boats and all the
+cheerful people.
+
+As the car slid into the crowded traffic of the Esplanade Road, Peter
+pointed to a large building on the left, saying, "There's the Army and
+Navy Stores, quite close to you, you see. You can always get anything
+you want there. I'll give you my number ... not that it matters."
+
+"I've belonged for years to the one at home," said Jan, "and I
+understand the same number will do."
+
+She felt she really could not be beholden to this strange young man for
+everything, even a Stores number; and that she had better make the
+situation clear at once that she had come to take care of Fay and not to
+be an additional anxiety to him. At that moment she felt almost jealous
+of Peter. Fay seemed to turn to him for everything.
+
+When they reached the shop where topees were to be got, she heard a
+familiar, booming voice. Had she been alone she would certainly have
+turned and fled, deferring her purchase till Sir Langham Sykes had
+concluded his, but she could hardly explain her rather complicated
+reasons to Peter, who told the Eurasian assistant to bring topees for
+her inspection.
+
+Jan tried vainly to efface herself behind a tailor's dummy, but her back
+was reflected in the very mirror which also reproduced Sir Langham in
+the act of trying on a khaki-coloured topee. He saw her and at once
+hurried in her direction, exclaiming:
+
+"Ah, Miss Ross, run to earth! You slipped off this morning without
+bidding me good-bye, and I've been wonderin' all day where we should
+meet. Now let me advise you about your topee. _I'll_ choose it for you,
+then you can't go wrong. Get a large one, mind, or the back of your nice
+little neck will be burnt the colour of the toast they gave us on the
+_Carnduff_--shockin' toast, wasn't it? No, not that shape, idiot ...
+unless you're goin' to ride, are you? If so, you must have one of
+each--a large one, I said--what the devil's the use of that? You must
+wear it _well_ on your head, mind; you can't show much of that pretty
+grey hair that puzzled us all so--eh, w'at?"
+
+Jan had been white enough as she entered the shop, for she was beginning
+to feel quite amazingly tired; but now the face under the overshadowing
+topee was crimson and she was hopelessly confused and helpless in the
+overpowering of Sir Langham, who, when he could for a moment detach his
+mind from Jan, looked with considerable curiosity at Peter.
+
+Peter stood there silent, aloof, detached; and he appeared quite cool.
+Jan felt the atmosphere to be almost insufferably close, and heaved a
+sigh of gratitude when he suddenly turned on an electric fan above her
+head.
+
+"I think this will do," she said, in a faint voice to the assistant,
+though the crinkly green lining round the crown seemed searing her very
+brain.
+
+Peter intervened, asking: "Is it comfortable? No ..." as she took it
+off. "I can see it isn't. It has marked your forehead already. Don't be
+in a hurry. They'll probably need to alter the lining. Some women have
+it taken out altogether. Pins keep it on all right."
+
+Thus encouraged, she tried on others, and all the time Sir Langham held
+forth at the top of his voice, interrupting his announcement that he was
+dining at Government House that very night to swear at the assistant
+when he brought topees that did not fit, and giving his opinion of her
+appearance with the utmost frankness, till Jan found one that seemed
+rather less uncomfortable than the rest. Then in desperation she
+introduced Sir Langham to Peter.
+
+"Your sister-in-law looks a bit tucked up," he remarked affably. "We'd
+better take her to the Yacht Club and give her a peg--she seems to feel
+the heat."
+
+Jan cast one despairing, imploring glance at Peter, who rose to the
+occasion nobly.
+
+"You're quite right," he said. "This place is infernally stuffy. Come
+on. They know where to send it. Good afternoon sir," and before she
+realised what had happened Peter seized her by the arm and swept her out
+of the shop and into the front seat of the car, stepped over her and
+himself took the steering-wheel.
+
+While Sir Langham's voice bayed forth a mixture of expostulation and
+assignation at the Yacht Club later on.
+
+"Now where shall we go?" asked Peter.
+
+"Not the Yacht Club," Jan besought him. "He's coming there; he said so.
+Isn't he dreadful? Did you mind very much being taken for my
+brother-in-law? He has no idea who he really is, or I wouldn't have let
+it pass ... but I felt I could never explain ... I'm so sorry...."
+
+Her face was white enough now.
+
+"It would have been absurd to explain, and it's I who should apologise
+for the free-and-easy way I carried you off, but it was clearly a case
+for strong measures, or he'd have insisted on coming with us. What an
+awful little man! Did you have him all the voyage? No wonder you look
+tired.... I hope he didn't sit at your table...."
+
+Once out of doors, the delicious breeze from the sea that springs up
+every evening in Bombay revived her. She forgot Sir Langham, for a few
+minutes she even forgot Fay and her anxieties in sheer pleasure in the
+prospect, as the car fell into its place in the crowded traffic of the
+Queen's Road.
+
+Jan never forgot that drive. He ran her out to Chowpatty, where the
+road lies along the shore and the carriages of Mohammedan, Hindu and
+Parsee gentlemen stand in serried rows while their picturesque occupants
+"eat the air" in passive and contented Eastern fashion; then up to Ridge
+Road on Malabar Hill, where he stopped that she might get out and walk
+to the edge of the wooded cliff and look down at the sea and the great
+city lying bathed in that clear golden light only to be found at sunset
+in the East.
+
+Peter enjoyed her evident appreciation of it all. She said very little,
+but she looked fresh and rested again, and he was conscious of a quite
+unusual pleasure in her mere presence as they stood together in the
+green garden, got and kept by such infinite pains and care, that borders
+the road running along the top of Malabar Hill.
+
+Suddenly she turned. "We mustn't wait another minute," she said. "You,
+doubtless, want to go to the club. It has been very good of you to spend
+so much time with me. What makes it all so beautiful is that everywhere
+one sees the sea. I will tell Fay how much I have enjoyed it."
+
+Peter's eyes met hers and held them: "Try to think of me as a friend,
+Miss Ross. I can see you are thoroughly capable and independent; but,
+believe me, India is not like England, and a white woman needs a good
+many things done for her here if she's to be at all comfortable. I don't
+want to butt in and be a nuisance; but just remember I'm there when the
+bell rings----"
+
+"I am not likely to forget," said Jan.
+
+Lights began to twinkle in the city below. The soft monotonous throb of
+tom-toms came beating through the ambient air like a pulse of teeming
+life; and when he left her at her sister's door the purple darkness of
+an Eastern night had curtained off the sea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE BEGINNING OF THE JOB
+
+
+Fay was still lying on her long chair in the verandah when Jan got in.
+She had turned on the electric light above her head and had, seemingly,
+been working at some diminutive garment of nainsook and lace. She looked
+up at Jan's step, asking eagerly, "Well, did you like it? Did you see
+many people? Was the band good?"
+
+Jan sat down beside her and explained that Peter had taken her for a
+drive instead. She made her laugh over her encounter with Sir Langham,
+and was enthusiastic about the view from Malabar Hill. Then Fay sent her
+to say good night to the children, who were just getting ready for bed.
+
+As she went down the long passage towards the nursery, she heard small
+voices chattering in Hindustani, and as she opened the door little Fay
+was in the act of stepping out of all her clothes.
+
+Tony was already clad in pink pyjamas, which made him look paler than
+ever.
+
+Little Fay, naked as any shameless cherub on a Renaissance festoon,
+danced across the tiled floor, and, pausing directly in front of her
+aunt, announced:
+
+"I sall mack Ayah as muts as I like."
+
+The good-natured Goanese ayah salaamed and, beaming upon her charge,
+murmured entire acquiescence.
+
+Jan looked down at the absurd round atom who defied her, and, trying
+hard not to laugh, said:
+
+"Oh, no, you won't."
+
+"I sall!" the baby declared even more emphatically, and, lifting up her
+adorable, obstinate little face to look at Jan, nodded her curly head
+vigorously.
+
+"I think not," Jan remarked rather unsteadily, "because if you do,
+people won't like you. We can none of us go about smacking innocent
+folks just for the fun of it. Everybody would be shocked and horrified."
+
+"Socked and hollified," echoed little Fay, delighted with the new words,
+"socked and hollified!... What nelse?"
+
+"What usually follows is that the disagreeable little girl gets smacked
+herself."
+
+"No," said Fay, but a thought doubtfully. "No," more firmly. Then with a
+smile that was subtly compounded of pathos and confidence, "Nobody would
+mack plitty little Fay ... 'cept ... plapse ... Auntie Dzan."
+
+The stern aunt in question snatched up her niece to cover her with
+kisses. Ayah escaped chastisement that evening, for, arrayed in a white
+nighty, "plitty little Fay" sat good as gold on Jan's knee, absorbed in
+the interest of "This little pig went to market," told on her own toes.
+Even Tony, the aloof and unfriendly, consented to unbend to the extent
+of being interested in the dialogue of "John Smith and Minnie Bowl, can
+you shoe a little foal?" and actually thrust out his own bare feet that
+Jan might make them take part in the drama of the "twa wee doggies who
+went to the market," and came back "louper-scamper, louper-scamper."
+
+At the end of every song or legend came the inevitable "What nelse?"
+from little Fay--and Jan only escaped after the most solemn promises had
+been exacted for a triple bill on the morrow.
+
+When she had changed and went back to the sitting-room, dinner was
+ready. Lalkhan again bent over her with fatherly solicitude as he
+offered each course, and this time Jan, being really hungry, rather
+enjoyed his ministrations. A boy assisted at the sideboard, and another
+minion appeared to bring the dishes from the kitchen, for the butler and
+the boy never left the room for an instant.
+
+Fay looked like a tired ghost, and Jan could see that it was a great
+effort to her to talk cheerfully and seem interested in the home news.
+
+After dinner they went back to the sitting-room. Lalkhan brought coffee
+and Fay lit a cigarette. Jan wandered round, looking at the photographs
+and engravings on the walls.
+
+"How is it," she asked, "that Mr. Ledgard seems to come in so many of
+these groups? Did you rent the flat from a friend of his?"
+
+"I didn't 'rent' the flat from anybody," Fay answered. "It's Peter's own
+flat. He lent it to us."
+
+Jan turned and stared at her sister. "Mr. Ledgard's flat!" she
+repeated. "And what is he doing?"
+
+"He's living at the club just now. He turned out when we came. Don't
+look at me like that, Jan.... There was nothing else to be done."
+
+Jan came back and sat on the edge of the big sofa. "But I understood
+Hugo's letter to say...."
+
+"Whatever Hugo said in his letter was probably lies. If Peter hadn't
+lent us his flat, I should have had nowhere to lay my head. Who do you
+suppose would let us a flat here, after all that has happened, unless we
+paid in advance, and how could we do that without any ready money? Why,
+a flat like this unfurnished costs over three hundred rupees a month. I
+don't know what a furnished flat would be."
+
+"But--isn't it ... taking a great deal from Mr. Ledgard?" Jan asked
+timidly.
+
+Fay stretched out her hand and suddenly switched off the lights, so that
+they were left together on the big sofa in the soft darkness.
+
+"Give me your hand, Jan. I shall be less afraid of you when I just feel
+you and can't see you."
+
+"Why should you be afraid of me?... Dear, dear Fay, you must remember
+how little I really know. How can I understand?"
+
+Fay leant against her sister and held her close. "Sometimes I feel as if
+I couldn't understand it all myself. But you mustn't worry about Peter's
+flat. We'll all go home the minute I can be moved. He doesn't mind,
+really ... and there was nothing else to be done."
+
+"Does Hugo know you are here?"
+
+Fay laughed, a sad, bitter little laugh. "It was Hugo who asked Peter to
+lend his flat."
+
+"Then what about his servants? What has he done with them while you are
+here?"
+
+"These are his servants."
+
+"But Hugo said...."
+
+"Jan, dear, it is no use quoting Hugo to me. I can tell you the sort of
+thing he would say.... Did he mention Peter at all?"
+
+"Certainly not. He said you were 'installed in a most comfortable flat'
+and had brought your own servants."
+
+"I brought Ayah--naturally, Peter hadn't an ayah. But why do you object
+to his servants? They're very good."
+
+"But don't they think it ... a little odd?"
+
+"Oh, you can't bother about what servants think in India. They think us
+all mad anyway."
+
+There was silence for a few minutes while Jan realised the fact that,
+dislike it as she might, she seemed fated to be laid under considerable
+obligation to Mr. Peter Ledgard.
+
+"Where is Hugo?" she asked at last.
+
+"My dear, you appear to have heard from Hugo since I have. As to his
+whereabouts I haven't the remotest idea."
+
+"Do you mean to say, Fay, that he hasn't let you know where he is?"
+
+"He didn't come with us to the flat because he was afraid he'd be seized
+for debts and things. We've only been here a fortnight. He's probably
+on board ship somewhere--there hasn't been much time for him to let me
+know...."
+
+Fay spoke plaintively, as though Jan were rather hard on Hugo in
+expecting him to give his wife any account of his movements.
+
+Jan was glad it was dark. She felt bewildered and oppressed and very,
+very angry with her brother-in-law, who seemed to have left his entire
+household in the care of Peter Ledgard. Was Peter paying for their very
+food, she wondered? She'd put a stop to that, anyhow.
+
+"Jan"--she felt Fay lean a little closer--"don't be down on me. You've
+no idea how hard it has all been. You're such a daylight person
+yourself."
+
+"Hard on you, my precious! I could never feel the least little bit hard.
+Only it's all so puzzling. And what do you mean by a 'daylight person'?"
+
+"You know, Jan, for three months now I've been a lot alone, and I've
+done a deal of thinking--more than ever in all my life before; and it
+seems to me that the world is divided into three kinds of people--the
+daylight people, and the twilight people and the night people."
+
+Fay paused. Jan stroked her hot, thin hand, but did not speak, and the
+tired, whispering voice went on: "_We_ were daylight people--Daddie was
+very daylight. There were never any mysteries; we all of us knew always
+where each of us was, and there were no secrets and no queer people
+coming for interviews, and it wouldn't have mattered very much if
+anyone _had_ opened one of our letters. Oh, it's such an _easy_ life in
+the daylight country...."
+
+"And in the twilight country?" asked Jan.
+
+"Ah, there it's very different. Everything is mysterious. You never know
+where anyone has gone, and if he's away queer people--quite horrid
+people--come and ask for him and won't go away, and sit in the verandah
+and cheek the butler and the boy and insist on seeing the 'memsahib,'
+and when she screws up her courage and goes to them, they ask for money,
+and show dirty bits of paper and threaten, and it's all awful--till
+somebody like Peter comes and kicks them out, and then they simply fly."
+
+In spite of her irritation at being beholden to him, Jan began to feel
+grateful to Peter.
+
+"Sometimes," Fay continued, "I think it would be easier to be a night
+person. They've no appearances to keep up. You see, what makes it so
+difficult for the twilight people is that they _want_ to live in the
+daylight, and it's too strong for them. All the night people whom they
+know--and if you're twilight you know lots of 'em--come and drag them
+back. _They_ don't care. They rather like to go right in among the
+daylight folk and scare and shock them, and make them uncomfortable. You
+_can't_ suffer in the same way when you've gone under altogether."
+
+"But, Fay dear," Jan interposed, "you talk as though the twilight people
+couldn't help it...."
+
+"They can't--they truly can't."
+
+"But surely there's right and wrong, straightness and crookedness, and
+no one _need_ be crooked."
+
+"People like you needn't--but everybody isn't strong like that. Hugo
+says every man has his price, and every woman too--Peter says so, too."
+
+"Then Peter ought to be ashamed of himself. Do you suppose _he_ has his
+price?"
+
+"No, not in that way. He'd think it silly to be pettifogging and
+dishonest about money, or to go in for mad speculations run by shady
+companies; but he wouldn't think it _extraordinary_ like you."
+
+"I'm afraid my education has been neglected. A great many things seem
+extraordinary to me."
+
+"You think it funny I should be living in Peter's flat, waited on by
+Peter's servants--but what else could I do?"
+
+Jan smiled in the darkness. She saw where her niece had got "what
+nelse?"
+
+"Isn't it just a little--unusual?" she asked gently. "Is there no money
+at all, Fay? What has become of all your own?"
+
+"It's not all gone," Fay said eagerly. "I think there's nearly two
+thousand pounds left, but Peter made me write home--that was at
+Dariawarpur, before he came down here--and say no more was to be sent
+out, not even if I wrote myself to ask for it--and _he_ wrote to Mr.
+Davidson too----"
+
+"I know somebody wrote. Mr. Davidson was very worried ... but what _can_
+Hugo have done with eight thousand pounds in two years? Besides his
+pay...."
+
+"Eight thousand pounds doesn't go far when you've dealings with
+money-lenders and mines in Peru--but _I_ don't understand it--don't ask
+me. I believe he left me a little money--I don't know how much--at a
+bank in Elphinstone Circle--but I haven't liked to write and find out,
+lest it should be very little ... or none...."
+
+"Mercy!" exclaimed Jan. "It surely would be better to know for certain."
+
+"When you've lived in the twilight country as long as I have you'll not
+want to know anything for certain. It's only when things are wrapped up
+in a merciful haze of obscurity that life is tolerable at all. Do you
+suppose I _wanted_ to find out that my husband was a rascal? I shut my
+eyes to it as long as I could, and then Truth came with all her cruel
+tools and pried them open. Oh, Jan, it did hurt so!"
+
+If Fay had cried, if her voice had even broken or she had seemed deeply
+moved, it would have been more bearable. It was the poor thing's
+calm--almost indifference--that frightened Jan. For it proved that her
+perceptions were numbed.
+
+Fay had been tortured till she could feel nothing acutely any more. Jan
+had the feeling that in some dreadful, inscrutable way her sister was
+shut away from her in some prison-house of the mind.
+
+And who shall break through those strange, intangible, impenetrable
+walls of unshared experience?
+
+Jan swallowed her tears and said cheerfully: "Well, it's all going to be
+different now. You needn't worry about anything any more. If Hugo has
+left no money we'll manage without. Mr. Davidson will let me have what I
+want ... but we must be careful, because of the children."
+
+"And you'll try not to mind living in Peter's flat?" Fay said, rubbing
+her head against Jan's shoulder. "It's India, you know, and men are very
+kind out here--much friendlier than they are at home."
+
+"So it seems."
+
+"You needn't think there's anything wrong, Jan. Peter isn't in love with
+me now."
+
+"Was he ever in love with you?"
+
+"Oh, yes, a bit, once; when he first came to Dariawarpur ... lots of
+them were then. I really was very pretty, and I had quite a little court
+... but when the bad times came and people began to look shy at
+Hugo--everybody was nice to me always--then Peter seemed different.
+There was no more philandering, he was just ... Oh, Jan, he was just
+such a daylight person, and might have been Daddie. I should have died
+without him."
+
+"Fay, tell me--I'll never ask again--was Hugo unkind to you?"
+
+"No, Jan, truly not unkind. He shut me away from the greater part of his
+life ... and there were other people ... not ladies"--Fay felt the
+shoulder she leant against stiffen--"but I didn't know that for quite a
+long time ... and he wasn't ever surly or cross or grudging. He always
+wanted me to have everything very nice, and I really believe he always
+hoped the mines and things would make lots of money.... You know, Jan,
+I'd _rather_ believe in people. I daresay you think I'm weak and stupid
+... but I can never understand wives who set detectives on their
+husbands."
+
+"It isn't done by the best people," Jan said with a laugh that was half
+a sob. "Let's hope it isn't often necessary...."
+
+Fay drew a little closer: "Oh, you are dear not to be stern and
+scolding...."
+
+"It's not you I feel like scolding."
+
+"If you scolded him, he'd agree with every word, so that you simply
+couldn't go on ... and then he'd go away and do just the same things
+over again, and fondly hope you'd never hear of it. But he _was_ kind in
+lots of ways. He didn't drink----"
+
+"I don't see anything so very creditable in that," Jan interrupted.
+
+"Well, it's one of the things he didn't do--and we had the nicest
+bungalow in the station and by far the best motor--a much smarter motor
+than the Resident. And it was only when I discovered that Hugo had made
+out I was an heiress that I began to feel uncomfortable."
+
+"Was he good to the children?"
+
+"He hardly saw them. Children don't interest him much. He liked little
+Fay because she's so pretty, but I don't think he cared a great deal for
+Tony. Tony is queer and judging. Don't take a dislike to Tony, Jan; he
+needs a long time, but once you've got him he stays for ever--will you
+remember that?"
+
+Again, Jan felt that cold hand laid on her heart, the hand of chill
+foreboding. She had noticed many times already that when Fay was off her
+guard she always talked as though, for her, everything were ended, and
+she was only waiting for something. There seemed no permanence in her
+relations with them all.
+
+A shadowy white figure lifted the curtain between the two rooms and
+stood salaaming.
+
+Jan started violently. She was not yet accustomed to the soundless naked
+feet of the servants whose presence might be betrayed by a rustle, never
+by a step.
+
+It was Ayah waiting to know if Fay would like to go to bed.
+
+"Shall I go, Jan? Are you tired?"
+
+Jan was, desperately tired, for she had had no sleep the night before,
+but Fay's voice had in it a little tremor of fear that showed she
+dreaded the night.
+
+"Send her to bed, poor thing. I'll look after you, brush your hair and
+tuck you up and all.... Fay, oughtn't you to have somebody in your room?
+Couldn't my cot be put in there, just to sleep?"
+
+"Oh, Jan, would you? Don't you mind?"
+
+"Shall I help her to move it?" Jan said, getting up.
+
+Fay pulled her down again. "You funny Jan, you can't do that sort of
+thing here. The servants will do it."
+
+She sat up, gave a rapid, eager order to Ayah, and in a few minutes Jan
+heard her bed being wheeled down the passage. Every room had wide
+double doors--like French rooms--and there was no difficulty.
+
+Fay sank down again among her cushions with a great sigh of relief: "I
+don't mind now how soon I go to bed. I shan't be frightened in the long
+dark night any more. Oh, Jan, you _are_ a dear daylight person!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE CHILDREN
+
+
+Jan made headway with Tony and little Fay. An aunt who carried one
+pick-a-back; who trotted, galloped, or curvetted to command as an
+animated steed; who provided spades and buckets, and herself, getting up
+very early, took them and the children to an adorable sandy beach,
+deserted save for two or three solitary horsemen; an aunt who dug holes
+and built castles and was indirectly the means of thrilling rides upon a
+real horse, when Peter was encountered as one of the mounted few taking
+exercise before breakfast; such an aunt could not be regarded otherwise
+than as an acquisition, even though she did at times exert authority and
+insist upon obedience.
+
+She got it, too; especially from little Fay, who, hitherto, had obeyed
+nobody. Tony, less wilful and not so prone to be destructive, was
+secretly still unwon, though outwardly quite friendly. He waited and
+watched and weighed Jan in the balance of his small judgment. Tony was
+never in any hurry to make up his mind.
+
+One great hold Jan had was a seemingly inexhaustible supply of rhymes,
+songs, and stories, and she was, moreover, of a telling disposition.
+
+Both children had a quite unusual passion for new words. Little Fay
+would stop short in the midst of the angriest yells if anyone called her
+conduct in question by some new term of opprobrium. Ayah's vocabulary
+was limited, even in the vernacular, and nothing would have induced her
+to return railing for railing to the children, however sorely they
+abused her. But Jan occasionally freed her mind, and at such times her
+speech was terse and incisive. Moreover, she quickly perceived her power
+over her niece in this respect, and traded on the baby's quick ear and
+interest.
+
+One day there was a tremendous uproar in the nursery just after tiffin,
+when poor Fay usually tried to get the sleep that would partially atone
+for her restless night. Jan swept down the passage and into the room, to
+find her niece netted in her cot, and bouncing up and down like a
+newly-landed trout, while Ayah wrestled with a struggling Tony, who
+tried to drown his sister's screams with angry cries of "Let me get at
+her to box her," and, failing that, vigorously boxing Ayah.
+
+Jan closed the door behind her and stood where she was, saying in the
+quiet, compelling voice they had both already learned to respect: "It's
+time for Mummy's sleep, and how can Mummy sleep in such a pandemonium?"
+
+Little Fay paused in the very middle of a yell and her face twinkled
+through the restraining net.
+
+"Pandemolium," she echoed, joyously rolling it over on her tongue with
+obvious gusto.
+
+"Pandemolium."
+
+"She kickened and fit with me," Tony cried angrily. "I _must_ box her."
+
+"Pandemolium?" little Fay repeated inquiringly. "What nelse?"
+
+"Yes," said Jan, trying hard not to laugh; "that's exactly what it was
+... disgraceful."
+
+"What nelse?" little Fay persisted. She had heard disgraceful before. It
+lacked novelty.
+
+"All sorts of horrid things," said Jan. "Selfish and odious and
+ill-bred----"
+
+"White bled, blown bled, ill-bled," the person under the net chanted.
+"What nother bled?"
+
+"There's well-bred," said Jan severely, "and that's what neither you nor
+Tony are at the present moment."
+
+"There's toas' too," said the voice from under the net, ignoring the
+personal application. "Sall we have some?"
+
+"Certainly not," Jan answered with great sternness. "People who riot and
+brawl----"
+
+"Don't like zose words," the netted one interrupted distastefully (R's
+always stumped her), "naughty words."
+
+"Not so naughty as the people who do it. Has Ayah had her dinner? No?
+Then poor Ayah must go and have it, and I shall stay here and tell a
+very soft, whispery story to people who are quiet and good, who lie in
+their cots and don't quarrel----"
+
+"Or blawl" came from the net in a small determined voice. She could not
+let the new word pass after all.
+
+"Exactly ... or brawl," Jan repeated in tones nothing like so firm.
+
+"She kickened and fit me, she did," Tony mumbled moodily as he climbed
+into his cot: "Can't I box her nor nothing?"
+
+"Not now," Jan said, soothingly. Ayah salaamed and hurried away. She, at
+all events, had cause to bless Jan, for now she got her meals with fair
+regularity and in peace.
+
+In a few minutes the room was as quiet as an empty church, save for a
+low voice that related an interminable story about "Cockie-Lockie and
+Henny-Penny going to tell the King the lift's fallen," till one, at all
+events, of the "blawlers" was sound asleep.
+
+The voice ceased and Tony's head appeared over the rail of his cot.
+
+"Hush!" Jan whispered. "Sister's asleep. Just wait a few minutes till
+Ayah comes, then I'll take you away with me."
+
+Faithful Ayah didn't dawdle over her food. She returned, sat down on the
+floor beside little Fay's cot and started her endless mending.
+
+Jan carried Tony away with her along the passage and into the
+drawing-room. The verandah was too hot in the early afternoon.
+
+"Now what shall we do?" she asked, with a sigh, as she sat down on the
+big sofa. "_I'd_ like to sleep, but I suppose you won't let me."
+
+Tony got off her knee and looked at her gravely.
+
+"You can," he said, magnanimously, "because you brought me. I hate bed.
+I'll build a temple with my bricks and I won't knock it down. Not
+loud."
+
+And like his aunt he did what he said.
+
+Jan put her feet up and lay very still. For a week now she had risen
+early every morning to take the children out in the freshest part of the
+day. She seldom got any rest in the afternoon, as she saw to it that
+they should be quiet to let Fay sleep, and she went late to bed because
+the cool nights in the verandah were the pleasant time for Fay.
+
+Tony murmured to himself, but he made little noise with his stone
+bricks. And presently Jan was sleeping almost as soundly as her
+obstreperous niece.
+
+Tony did not repeat new words aloud as did his sister. He turned them
+over in his mind and treasured some simply because he liked the sound of
+them.
+
+There were two that he had carried in his memory for nearly half his
+life; two that had for him a mysterious fascination, a vaguely agreeable
+significance that he couldn't at all explain. One was "Piccadilly" and
+the other "Coln St. Aldwyn's." He didn't even know that they were the
+names of places at first, but he thought they had a most beautiful
+sound. Gradually the fact that they were places filtered into his mind,
+and for Tony Piccadilly seemed particularly rural. He connected it in
+some way with the duck-slaying Mrs. Bond of the Baby's Opera, a book he
+and Mummy used to sing from before she grew too tired and sad to sing.
+Before she lay so many hours in her long chair, before the big man he
+called Daddie became so furtive and disturbing. Then Mummy used to tell
+him things about a place called Home, and though she never actually
+mentioned Piccadilly he had heard the word very often in a song that
+somebody sang in the drawing-room at Dariawarpur.
+
+Theatricals had been towards and Mummy was acting, and people came to
+practise their songs with her, for not only did she sing herself
+delightfully, but she played accompaniments well for other people. The
+play was a singing play, and the Assistant Superintendent of Police, a
+small, fair young man with next to no voice and a very clear
+enunciation, continually practised a song that described someone as
+walking "down Piccadilly with a tulip or a lily in his medi�val hand."
+
+Tony rather liked "medi�val" too, but not so much as Piccadilly. A
+flowery way, he was sure, with real grass in it like the Resident's
+garden. Besides, the "dilly" suggested "daffy-down dilly come up to town
+in a yellow petticoat and a green gown."
+
+But not even Piccadilly could compete with Coln St. Aldwyn's in Tony's
+affections. There was something about that suggestive of exquisite peace
+and loveliness, no mosquitoes and many friendly beasts. He had only
+heard the word once by chance in connection with the mysterious place
+called Home, in some casual conversation when no one thought he was
+listening. He seized upon it instantly and it became a priceless
+possession, comforting in times of stress, soothing at all times, a sort
+of refuge from a real world that had lately been very puzzling for a
+little boy.
+
+He was certain that at Coln St. Aldwyn's there was a mighty forest
+peopled by all the nicest animals. Dogs that were ever ready to extend a
+welcoming paw, elephants and mild clumsy buffaloes that gave good milk
+to the thirsty. Little grey squirrels frolicked in the branches of the
+trees, and the tiny birds Mummy told him about that lived in the yew
+hedge at Wren's End. Tony had himself been to Wren's End he was told,
+but he was only one at the time, and beyond a feeling that he liked the
+name and that it was a very green place his ideas about it were hazy.
+
+Sometimes he wished it had been called "Wren St. Endwyn's," but after
+mature reflection he decided it was but a poor imitation of the real
+thing, so he kept the two names separate in his mind.
+
+He had added two more names to his collection since he came to Bombay.
+"Mahaluxmi," the road running beside the sea, where Peter sometimes took
+them and Auntie Jan for a drive after tea when it was high tide; and
+"Taraporevala," who owned a famous book-shop in Medow Street where he
+had once been in a tikka-gharri with Auntie Jan to get some books for
+Mummy. Peter had recommended the shop, and the name instantly seized
+upon Tony's imagination and will remain with it evermore. He never for
+one moment connected it with the urbane gentleman in eyeglasses and a
+funny little round hat who owned the shop. For Tony "Taraporevala" will
+always suggest endless vistas of halls, fitted with books, shelves, and
+tall stacks of books, and counters laden with piles of books. It seemed
+amazing to find anything so vast in such a narrow street. There was
+something magic about it, like the name. Tony was sure that some day
+when he should explore the forest of Coln St. Aldwyn he would come upon
+a little solid door in a great rock. A little solid door studded with
+heavy nails and leading to a magic cave full of unimaginable treasure.
+This door should only open to the incantation of "Taraporevala." None of
+your "abracadabras" for him.
+
+And just as Mummy had talked much of "Wren's End" in happier days, so
+now Auntie Jan told them endless stories about it and what they would
+all do there when they went home. Some day, when he knew her better, he
+would ask her about Coln St. Aldwyn's. He felt he didn't know her
+intimately enough to do so yet, but he was gradually beginning to have
+some faith in her. She was a well-instructed person, too, on the whole,
+and she answered a straight question in a straight way.
+
+It was one of the things Tony could never condone in the big man called
+Daddie, that he could never answer the simplest question. He always
+asked another in return, and there was derision of some sort concealed
+in this circuitous answer. Doubtless he meant to be pleasant and
+amusing--Tony was just enough to admit that--but he was, so Tony felt,
+profoundly mistaken in the means he sought. He took liberties, too;
+punching liberties that knocked the breath out of a small boy's body
+without actually hurting much; and he never, never talked sense. Tony
+resented this. Like the Preacher, he felt there was a time to jest and a
+time to refrain from jesting, and it didn't amuse him a bit to be
+punched and rumpled and told he was a surly little devil if he attempted
+to punch back. In some vague way Tony felt that it wasn't playing the
+game--if it was a game. Often, too, for the past year and more, he
+connected the frequent disappearances of the big man with trouble for
+Mummy. Tony understood Hindustani as well as and better than English.
+His extensive vocabulary in the former would have astonished his
+mother's friends had they been able to translate, and he understood a
+good deal of the servants' talk. He felt no real affection for the big,
+tiresome man, though he admired him, his size, his good looks, and a way
+he had with grown-up people; but he decided quite dispassionately, on
+evidence and without any rancour, that the big man was a "budmash," for
+he, unlike Auntie Jan, never did anything he said he'd do. And when,
+before they left Dariawarpur, the big man entirely disappeared, Tony
+felt no sorrow, only some surprise that having said he was going he
+actually had gone. Auntie Jan never mentioned him, Mummy had reminded
+them both always to include him when they said their prayers, but
+latterly Mummy had been too tired to come to hear prayers. Auntie Jan
+came instead, and Tony, watching her face out of half-shut eyes, tried
+leaving out "bless Daddie" to see if anything happened. Sure enough
+something did; Auntie Jan looked startled. "Say 'Bless Daddie,' Tony,
+'and please help him.'"
+
+"To do what?" Tony asked. "Not to come back here?"
+
+"I don't think he'll come back here just now," Auntie Jan said in a
+frightened sort of whisper, "but he needs help badly."
+
+Tony folded his hands devoutly and said, "Bless Daddie and please help
+him--to stay away just now."
+
+And low down under her breath Jan said, "Amen."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE SHADOW BEFORE
+
+
+Jan had been a week in Bombay, and her grave anxiety about Fay was in no
+way lessened. Rather did it increase and intensify, for not only did her
+bodily strength seem to ebb from her almost visibly day by day, but her
+mind seemed so detached and aloof from both present and future.
+
+It was only when Jan talked about the past, about their happy girlhood
+and their lovable comrade-father, that Fay seemed to take hold and
+understand. All that had happened before his death seemed real and vital
+to her. But when Jan tried to interest her in plans for the future, the
+voyage home, the children, the baby that was due so soon, Fay looked at
+her with tired, lack-lustre eyes and seemed at once to become
+absent-minded and irrelevant.
+
+She was ready enough to discuss the characters of the children, to
+impress upon Jan the fact that Tony was not unloving, only cautious and
+slow before he really gave his affection. That little Fay was exactly
+what she appeared on the surface--affectionate, quick, wilful, and
+already conscious of her own power through her charm.
+
+"I defy anybody to quarrel with Fay when she is willing to make it up,"
+her mother said. "Tony melts like wax before the warmth of her
+advances. She may have behaved atrociously to him five minutes
+before--Ayah lets her, and I am far too weak with her--but if _she_
+wants to be friends Tony forgets and condones everything. Was I very
+naughty to you, Jan, as a baby?"
+
+"Not that I can remember. I think you were very biddable and good."
+
+"And you?"
+
+Jan laughed--"There you have me. I believe I was most naughty and
+obstreperous, and have vivid recollections of being sent to bed for
+various offences. You see, Mother was far too strong and wise to spoil
+me as little Fay is spoilt. Father tried his best, but you remember
+Hannah? Could you imagine Hannah submitting for one moment to the sort
+of treatment that baby metes out to poor, patient Ayah every single
+day?"
+
+"By the way, how is Hannah?"
+
+"Hannah is in her hardy usual. She is going strong, and has developed
+all sorts of latent talent as a cook. She was with me in the furnished
+flat I rented till the day I left (I only took it by the month), and
+she'll be with us again when we all get back to Wren's End."
+
+"But I thought Wren's End was let?"
+
+"Only till March quarter-day, and I've cabled to the agent not to
+entertain any other offer, as we want it ourselves."
+
+"I like to think of the children at Wren's End," Fay said dreamily.
+
+"Don't you like to think of yourself there, too? Would you like any
+other place better?"
+
+Jan's voice sounded constrained and a little hard. People sometimes
+speak crossly when they are frightened, and just then Jan felt the cold,
+skinny hands of some unnameable terror clutching her heart. Why did Fay
+always exclude herself from all plans?
+
+They were, as usual, sitting in the verandah after dinner, and Fay's
+eyes were fixed on the deeply blue expanse of sky. She hardly seemed to
+hear Jan, for she continued: "Do you remember the sketch Daddie did of
+me against the yew hedge? I'd like Tony to have that some day if you'd
+let him."
+
+"Of course that picture is yours," Jan said, hastily. "We never divided
+the pictures when he died. Some were sold and we shared the money, but
+our pictures are at Wren's End."
+
+"I remember that money," Fay interrupted. "Hugo was so pleased about it,
+and gave me a diamond chain."
+
+"Fay, where do you keep your jewellery?"
+
+"There isn't any to keep now. He 'realised' it all long before we left
+Dariawarpur."
+
+"What do you mean, Fay? Has Hugo pawned it? All Mother's things, too?"
+
+"I don't know what he did with it," Fay said, wearily. "He told me it
+wasn't safe in Dariawarpur, as there were so many robbers about that hot
+weather, and he took all the things in their cases to send to the bank.
+And I never saw them again."
+
+Jan said nothing, but she reflected rather ruefully that when Fay
+married she had let her have nearly all their mother's ornaments, partly
+because Fay loved jewels as jewels, and Jan cared little for them
+except as associations. "If I'd kept more," Jan thought, "they'd have
+come in for little Fay. Now there's nothing except what Daddie gave me."
+
+"Are you sorry, Jan?" Fay asked, presently. "I suppose there again you
+think I ought to have stood out, to have made inquiries and insisted on
+getting a receipt from the bank. But I knew very well they were not
+going to the bank. I don't think they fetched much, but Hugo looked a
+little less harassed after he'd got them. I've nothing left now but my
+wedding ring and the little enamel chain like yours, that Daddie gave us
+the year he had that portrait of Meg in the Salon and took us over to
+see it. Where is Meg? Has she come back yet?"
+
+"Meg is still in Bremen with an odious German family, but she leaves at
+the end of the Christmas holidays, as the girl is going to school, and
+Meg will be utilised to bring her over. Then she's to have a rest for a
+month or two, and I daresay she'd come to Wren's End and help us with
+the babies when we get back."
+
+Fay leant forward and said eagerly, "Try to get her, Jan. I'd love to
+think she was there to help you."
+
+"To help us," Jan repeated firmly.
+
+Fay sighed. "I can never think of myself as of much use any more;
+besides ... Oh, Jan, won't you face it? You who are so brave about
+facing things ... I don't believe I shall come through--this time."
+
+Jan got up and walked restlessly about the verandah. She tried to make
+herself say, heard her own voice saying without any conviction, that it
+was nonsense; that Fay was run down and depressed and no wonder; and
+that she would feel quite different in a month or two. And all the time,
+though her voice said these preposterously banal things, her brain
+repeated the doctor's words after his last visit: "I wish there was a
+little more stamina, Miss Ross. I don't like this complete inertia. It's
+not natural. Can't you rouse her at all?"
+
+"My sister has had a very trying time, you know. She seems thoroughly
+worn out."
+
+"I know, I know," the doctor had said. "A bad business and cruelly hard
+on her; but I wish we could get her strength up a bit somehow. I don't
+like it--this lack of interest in everything--I don't like it." And the
+doctor's thin, clever face looked lined and worried as he left.
+
+His words rang in Jan's ears, drowning her own spoken words that seemed
+such a hollow sham.
+
+She went and knelt by Fay's long chair. Fay touched her cheek very
+gently (little Fay had the same adorable tender gestures). "It would
+make it easier for both of us if you'd face it, my dear," she said. "I
+could talk much more sensibly then and make plans, and perhaps really be
+of some use. But I feel a wretched hypocrite to talk of sharing in
+things when I know perfectly well I shan't be there."
+
+"Don't you want to be there?" Jan asked, hoarsely.
+
+[Illustration: "It would make it easier for both of us if you'd face it,
+my dear."]
+
+Fay shook her head. "I know it's mean to shuffle out of it all, but I
+_am_ so tired. Do you think it very horrid of me, Jan?"
+
+In silence Jan held her close; and in that moment she faced it.
+
+The days went on, strange, quiet days of brilliant sunshine. Their daily
+life shrouded from the outside world even as the verandah was shrouded
+from the sun when Lalkhan let down the chicks every day after tiffin.
+
+Peter was their only visitor besides the doctor, and Peter came
+practically every day. He generally took Jan out after tea, sometimes
+with the children, sometimes alone. He even went with her to the bank in
+Elphinstone Circle, so like a bit of Edinburgh, with its solid stone
+houses, and found that Hugo actually had lodged fifty pounds there in
+Fay's name. The clerks looked curiously at Jan, for they thought she was
+Mrs. Tancred. Every one in business or official circles in Bombay knew
+about Hugo Tancred. His conduct had, for a while, even ousted the usual
+topics of conversation--money, food, and woman--from the bazaars; and an
+exhaustive discussion of it was only kept out of the Native Press by the
+combined efforts of the Police and his own Department. Jan gained from
+Peter a fairly clear idea of the _d�b�cle_ that had occurred in Hugo
+Tancred's life. She no longer wondered that Fay refused to leave the
+bungalow. She began to feel branded herself.
+
+For Jan, Peter's visits had come to have something of the relief the
+loosening of a too-tight bandage gives to a wounded man. He generally
+came at tea-time when Fay was at her best, and he brought her news of
+her little world at Dariawarpur. To her sister he seemed the one link
+with reality. Without him the heavy dream would have gone on unbroken.
+Fay was always most eager he should take Jan out, and, though at first
+Jan had been unwilling, she gradually came to look upon such times as a
+blessed break in the monotonous restraint of her day. With him she was
+natural, said what she felt, expressed her fears, and never failed to
+return comforted and more hopeful.
+
+One night he took her to the Yacht Club, and Jan was glad she had gone,
+because it gave her so much to tell Fay when she got back.
+
+It was a very odd experience for Jan, this tea on the crowded lawn of
+the Yacht Club. She turned hot when people looked at her, and Jan had
+always felt so sure of herself before, so proud to be a daughter of
+brilliant, lovable Anthony Ross.
+
+Here, she knew that her sole claim to notice was that she had the
+misfortune to be Hugo Tancred's sister-in-law. Fay, too, had once been
+joyfully proud and confident--and now!
+
+Sometimes in the long, still days Jan wondered whether their father had
+brought them up to expect too much from life, to take their happiness
+too absolutely as a matter of course. Anthony Ross had fully subscribed
+to the R.L.S. doctrine that happiness is a duty. When they were both
+quite little girls he had loved to hear them repeat:
+
+    If I have faltered more or less
+    In my great task of happiness;
+    If I have moved among my race
+    And shown no glorious morning face;
+    If beams from happy human eyes
+    Have moved me not; if morning skies,
+    Books, and my food and summer rain
+    Knocked on my sullen heart in vain;
+    Lord, Thy most pointed pleasure take,
+    And stab my spirit broad awake.
+
+Surely as young girls they had both shown a "glorious morning face." Who
+more so than poor Fay? So gay and beautiful and kind. Why had this come
+upon her, this cruel, numbing disgrace and sorrow? Jan was thoroughly
+rebellious. Again she went over that time in Scotland six years before,
+when, at a big shooting-box up in Sutherland, they met, among other
+guests, handsome Hugo Tancred, home on leave. How he had, almost at
+first sight, fallen violently in love with Fay. How he had singled her
+out for every deferent and delicate attention; how she, young,
+enthusiastic, happy and flattered, had fallen quite equally in love with
+him. Jan recalled her father's rather comical dismay and astonishment.
+His horror when they pressed an immediate marriage, so that Fay might go
+out with Hugo in November. And his final giving-in to everything Fay
+wanted because Fay wanted it.
+
+Did her father really like Hugo Tancred? she wondered. And then came the
+certainty that he wouldn't ever have liked anybody much who wanted to
+marry either of them; but he was far too just and too imaginative to
+stand in the way where, what seemed, the happiness of his daughter was
+concerned.
+
+"What a gamble it all is," thought Jan, and felt inclined to thank
+heaven that she was neither so fascinating nor as susceptible as Fay.
+
+How were they to help to set Hugo Tancred on his legs again, and
+reconstruct something of a future for Fay? And then there always
+sounded, like a knell, Fay's tired, pathetic voice: "Don't bother to
+make plans for me, Jan. For the children, yes, as much as you like. You
+are so clever and constructive--but leave me out, dear, for it's just a
+waste of time."
+
+And the dreadful part of it was that Jan felt a growing conviction that
+Fay was right. And what was more, that Peter felt about it exactly as
+Fay did, in spite of his matter-of-fact optimism at all such times as
+Jan dared to express her dread.
+
+Peter learned a good deal about the Ross family in those talks with Jan.
+She was very frank about her affairs, told him what money she had and
+how it was invested. That the old house in Gloucestershire was hers,
+left directly to her and not to her father, by a curious freak on the
+part of his aunt, one Janet Ross, who disapproved of Anthony's habit of
+living up to whatever he made each year by his pictures, and saving
+nothing that he earned.
+
+"My little girls are safe, anyway," he always said. "Their mother's
+money is tied up on them, though they don't get it except with my
+sanction till my death. I can't touch the capital. Why, then, shouldn't
+we have an occasional flutter when I have a good year, while we are all
+young and can enjoy things?"
+
+They had a great many flutters--for Anthony's pictures sold well among a
+rather eclectic set. His portraits had a certain _cachet_ that gave them
+a vogue. They were delicate, distinguished, and unlike other work. The
+beauties without brains never succeeded in getting Anthony Ross to paint
+them, bribed they never so. But the clever beauties were well satisfied,
+and the clever who were not at all beautiful felt that Anthony Ross
+painted their souls, so they were satisfied, too. Besides, he made their
+sittings so delightful and flirted with them with such absolute
+discretion always. The year that Hugo Tancred met Fay was a particularly
+good year, and Anthony had bought a touring-car, and they all went up to
+Scotland in it. The girls were always well dressed and went out a good
+deal. Young as she was, Jan was already an excellent manager and a
+pleasant hostess. She had been taking care of her father from the time
+she was twelve years old, and knew exactly how to manage him. When there
+was plenty of money she let him launch out; when it was spent she made
+him draw in again, and he was always quite ready to do so. Money as
+money had no charms for Anthony Ross, but the pleasures it could
+provide, the kindnesses it enabled him to do, the easy travel and the
+gracious life were precious to him. He abhorred debt in any form and
+paid his way as he went; lavishly when he had it, justly and exactly
+always.
+
+On hearing all this Peter came to the conclusion that Hugo Tancred was
+not altogether to blame if he had expected a good deal more financial
+assistance from his father-in-law than he got. Anthony made no marriage
+settlement on Fay. He allowed her two hundred a year for her personal
+expenses and considered that Hugo Tancred should manage the running of
+his own house out of his quite comfortable salary. He had, of course, no
+smallest inkling of Hugo's debts or gambling propensities. And all might
+have gone well if only Anthony Ross had made a new will when Fay
+married; a will which tied up her mother's money and anything he might
+leave her, so that she couldn't touch the capital. But nothing of the
+kind was done.
+
+It never occurred to Jan to think of wills.
+
+Anthony Ross was strong and cheerful and so exceedingly young at
+fifty-two that it seemed absurd that he should have grown-up daughters,
+quite ludicrous that he should be a grandfather.
+
+Many charming ladies would greatly like to have occupied the position of
+stepmother to "those nice girls," but Anthony, universal lover as he was
+within strictly platonic limits, showed no desire to give his girls
+anything of the sort. Jan satisfied his craving for a gracious and
+well-ordered comfort in all his surroundings. Fay gratified his �sthetic
+appreciation of beauty and gentleness. What would he do with a third
+woman who might introduce discord into these harmonies?
+
+Fay came home for a short visit when Tony was six months old, as Hugo
+had not got a very good station just then. She was prettier than ever,
+seemed perfectly happy, and both Anthony and Jan rejoiced in her.
+
+After she went out the Tancreds moved to Dariawarpur, which was
+considered one of the best stations in their province, and there little
+Fay was born, and it was arranged that Jan and her father were to visit
+India and Fay during the next cold weather.
+
+But early in the following November Anthony Ross got influenza,
+recovered, went out too soon, got a fresh chill, and in two days
+developed double pneumonia.
+
+His heart gave out, and before his many friends had realised he was at
+all seriously ill, he died.
+
+Jan, stunned, bewildered, and heart-broken, yet contrived to keep her
+head. She got rid of the big house in St. George's Square and most of
+the servants, finally keeping only Hannah, her old Scottish nurse. She
+paid everybody, rendered a full account of her stewardship to Fay and
+Hugo, and then prepared to go out to India as had been arranged. Her
+heart cried out for her only sister.
+
+To her surprise this proposition met with but scant enthusiasm. It
+seemed the Tancreds' plans were uncertain; perhaps it might be better
+for Fay and the children to come home in spring instead of Jan going out
+to them. Hugo's letters were ambiguous and rather cold; Fay's a curious
+mixture of abandonment and restraint; but the prevailing note of both
+was "would she please do nothing in a hurry, but wait."
+
+So, of course, Jan waited.
+
+She waited two years, growing more anxious and puzzled as time went on.
+Her lawyer protested unavailingly at Hugo's perpetual demands (of
+course, backed up by Fay) for more and more capital that he might
+"re-invest" it. Fay's letters grew shorter and balder and more
+constrained. At last, quite suddenly, came the imperative summons to go
+out at once to be with Fay when the new baby should arrive.
+
+And now after three weeks in Bombay Jan felt that she had never known
+any other life, that she never would know any other life than this
+curious dream-like existence, this silent, hopeless waiting for
+something as afflicting as it was inevitable.
+
+There had been a great fire in the cotton green towards Colaba. It had
+blazed all night, and, in spite of the efforts of the Bombay firemen and
+their engines, was still blazing at six o'clock the following evening.
+
+Peter took Jan in his car out to see it. There was an immense crowd, so
+they left the car on its outskirts and plunged into the throng on foot.
+On either side of the road were tall, flimsy houses with a wooden
+staircase outside; those curious tenements so characteristic of the
+poorer parts of Bombay, and in such marked contrast to the "Fort," the
+European quarter of the town. They were occupied chiefly by Eurasians
+and very poor Europeans. That the road was a sea of mud, varied by quite
+deep pools of water, seemed the only possible reason why such houses
+were not also burning.
+
+Jan splashed bravely through the mud, interested and excited by the
+people and the leaping flames so dangerously near. It was growing dusk;
+the air was full of the acrid smell of burnt cotton, and the red glow
+from the sky was reflected on the grave brown faces watching the fire.
+
+Any crowd in Bombay is always extremely varied, and Jan almost forgot
+her anxieties in her enjoyment of the picturesque scene.
+
+"I don't think the people ought to be allowed to throng on the top of
+that staircase," Peter said suddenly. "They aren't built to hold a
+number at once; there'll be an accident," and he left her side for a
+moment to speak to an inspector of police.
+
+Jan looked up at a tall house on her left, where sightseers were
+collecting on the staircase to get a better view. Every window was
+crowded with gazers, all but one. From one, quite at the top, a solitary
+watcher looked out.
+
+There was a sudden shout from the crowd below, a redder glow as more
+piled cotton fell into the general furnace and blazed up, and in that
+moment Jan saw that the solitary watcher was Hugo Tancred, and that he
+recognised her. She gave a little gasp of horror, which Peter heard as
+he joined her again. "What is it?" he said. "What has frightened you?"
+
+Jan pointed upwards. "I've just seen Hugo," she whispered. "There, in
+one of those windows--the empty one. Oh, what can he be doing in those
+dreadful houses, and why is he in Bombay all this time and never a word
+to Fay?"
+
+Jan was trembling. Peter put his hand under her arm and walked on with
+her.
+
+"I knew he was in Bombay," he said, "but I didn't think the poor devil
+was reduced to this."
+
+"What is to be done?" Jan exclaimed. "If he comes and worries Fay for
+money now, it will kill her. She thinks he is safely out of India. What
+_is_ to be done?"
+
+"Nothing," said Peter. "He'll go the very minute he can, and you may be
+sure he'll raise the wind somehow. He's got all sorts of queer irons in
+the fire. He daren't appear at the flat, or some of his creditors would
+cop him for debt--it's watched day and night, I know. Just let it alone.
+I'd no idea he was hiding in this region or I wouldn't have brought you.
+We all want him to get clear. He might file his petition, but it would
+only rake up all the old scandals, and they know pretty well there's
+nothing to be got out of him."
+
+"He looked so dreadful, so savage and miserable," Jan said with a
+half-sob.
+
+"Well--naturally," said Peter. "You'd feel savage and miserable if you
+were in his shoes."
+
+"But oughtn't I to help him? Send him money, I mean."
+
+"Not one single anna. It'll take you all your time to get his family
+home and keep them when you get there. Have you seen enough? Shall we go
+back?"
+
+"You don't think he'll molest Fay?"
+
+"I'm certain of it."
+
+"Please take me home. I shall never feel it safe to leave Fay again for
+a minute."
+
+"That's nonsense, you know," said Peter.
+
+"It's what I feel," said Jan.
+
+It was that night Tony's extempore prayer was echoed so earnestly by his
+aunt.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE HUMAN TOUCH
+
+
+Three days later Jan got a note from Peter telling her that Hugo Tancred
+had left Bombay and was probably leaving India at once from one of the
+smaller ports.
+
+He had not attempted to communicate in person or by letter with either
+Jan or his wife.
+
+Early in the morning, just a week from the time Jan had seen Hugo
+Tancred at the window of that tall house near the cotton green, Fay's
+third child, a girl, was still-born; and Fay, herself, never recovered
+consciousness all day. A most competent nurse had been in the house
+nearly a week, the doctor had done all that human skill could do, but
+Fay continued to sink rapidly.
+
+About midnight the nurse, who had been standing by the bed with her
+finger on Fay's pulse, moved suddenly and gently laid down the weak hand
+she had been holding. She looked warningly across at Jan, who knelt at
+the other side, her eyes fixed on the pale, beautiful face that looked
+so wonderfully young and peaceful.
+
+Suddenly Fay opened her eyes and smiled. She looked right past Jan,
+exclaiming joyfully, "There you are at last, Daddie, and it's broad
+daylight."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For Jan it was still the middle of the Indian night and very dark
+indeed.
+
+The servants were all asleep; the little motherless children safely
+wrapped in happy unconsciousness in their nursery with Ayah.
+
+The last sad offices had been done for Fay, and the nurse, tired out,
+was also sleeping--on Jan's bed.
+
+Jan, alone of all the household, kept watch, standing in the verandah, a
+ghostly figure, still in the tumbled white muslin frock she had had no
+time all day to change.
+
+It was nearly one o'clock. Motors and carriages were beginning to come
+back from Government House, where there was a reception. The motor-horns
+and horses' hoofs sounded loud in the wide silent street, and the head
+lights swept down the Queen's Road like fireflies in flight.
+
+Jan turned on the light in the verandah. Peter would perhaps look up and
+see her standing there, and realise why she kept watch. Perhaps he would
+stop and come up.
+
+She wanted Peter desperately.
+
+Compassed about with many relatives and innumerable friends at home, out
+here Jan was singularly alone. In all that great city she knew no one
+save Peter, the doctor and the nurse. Some few women, knowing all the
+circumstances, had called and were ready to be kind and helpful and
+friendly, as women are all over India, but Fay would admit none but
+Peter--even to see Jan; and always begged her not to return the calls
+"till it was all over."
+
+Well, it was all over now. Fay would never be timid and ashamed any
+more.
+
+Jan had not shed a tear. The longing to cry that had assailed her so
+continuously in her first week had entirely left her. She felt
+clear-headed and cold and bitterly resentful. She would like to have
+made Hugo Tancred go in front of her into that quiet room and forced him
+to look at the girlish figure on the bed--his handiwork. She wanted to
+hurt him, to make him more wretched than he was already.
+
+A car stopped in the street below. Jan went very quietly to the door of
+the flat and listened at the top of the staircase.
+
+Steps were on the stairs, but they stopped at one of the flats below.
+
+Presently another car stopped. Again she went out and listened. The
+steps came up and up and she switched on the light in the passage.
+
+This time it was Peter.
+
+He looked very tired.
+
+"I thought you would come," Jan said. "She died at midnight."
+
+Peter closed the outer door, and taking Jan by the arm led her back into
+the sitting-room, where he put her in a corner of the big sofa and sat
+down beside her.
+
+He could not speak, and Jan saw that the tears she could not shed were
+in his eyes, those large dark eyes that could appear so sombre and then
+again so kind.
+
+Jan watched him enviously. She was acutely conscious of trifling things.
+She even noticed what very black eyebrows he had and how--as always,
+when he was either angry or deeply moved--the veins in his forehead
+stood out in a strongly-marked V.
+
+"It was best, I think," Jan said, and even to herself her voice sounded
+like the voice of a stranger. "She would have been very unhappy if she
+had lived."
+
+Peter started at the cool, hard tones, and looked at her. Then, simply
+and naturally, like a child, he took her hand and held it; and there was
+that in the human contact, in the firm, comfortable clasp, that seemed
+to break something down in Jan, and all at once she felt weak and faint
+and trembling. She leaned her head against the pillows piled high in the
+corner where Fay had always rested. The electric light in the verandah
+seemed suddenly to recede to an immense distance and became a tiny
+luminous pin-head, like a far lone star.
+
+She heard Peter moving about in the dining-room behind and clinking
+things, but she felt quite incapable of going to see what he was doing
+or of trying to be hospitable--besides, it was his house, he knew where
+things were, and she was so tired.
+
+And then he was standing over her, holding a tumbler against her
+chattering teeth.
+
+"Drink it," he said, and, though his voice sounded far away, it was firm
+and authoritative. "Quick; don't pretend you can't swallow, for you
+can."
+
+He tipped the glass, and something wet and cold ran over her chin:
+anything was better than that, and she tried to drink. As she did so
+she realised she was thirsty, drank it all eagerly and gasped.
+
+"Have you had anything to eat all day?" the dominating voice went on; it
+sounded much nearer now.
+
+"I can't remember," she said, feebly. "Oh, why did you give me all that
+brandy, it's made me so muzzy and confused, and there's so much I ought
+to see to."
+
+"You rest a bit first--you'll be all right presently."
+
+Someone lifted her by the knees and put the whole of her on the sofa. It
+was very comfortable; she was not so cold now. She lay quite still and
+closed her eyes. She had not had a real night's sleep since she reached
+Bombay. Fay was always restless and nervous, and Jan had not had her
+clothes off for forty-eight hours. The long strain was over, there was
+nothing to watch and wait for now. She would do as that voice said, rest
+for a few minutes.
+
+There was a white chuddah shawl folded on the end of the sofa. Fay had
+liked it spread over her knees, for she was nearly always chilly.
+
+Peter opened it and laid it very lightly over Jan, who never stirred.
+
+Then he sat down in a comfortable chair some distance off, where she
+would see him if she woke, and reviewed the situation, which was
+unconventional, certainly.
+
+He had sent his car away when he arrived, as it was but a step to the
+Yacht Club where he slept. Now, he felt he couldn't leave, for if Jan
+woke suddenly she would feel confused and probably frightened.
+
+"I never thought so little brandy could have had such an effect," Peter
+reflected half ruefully. "I suppose it's because she'd had nothing to
+eat. It's about the best thing that could have happened, but I never
+meant to hocus her like this."
+
+There she lay, a long white mound under the shawl. She had slipped her
+hand under her cheek and looked pathetically young and helpless.
+
+"I wonder what I'd better do," thought Peter.
+
+Mrs. Grundy commanded him to go at once. Common humanity bade him stay.
+
+Peter was very human, and he stayed.
+
+About half-past five Jan woke. She was certainly confused, but not in
+the least frightened. It was light, not brilliantly light as it would be
+a little later on, but clear and opalescent, as though the sun were
+shining through fold upon fold of grey-blue gauze.
+
+The electric light in the verandah and the one over Peter's head were
+still burning and looked garish and wan, and Jan's first coherent
+thought was, "How dreadfully wasteful to have had them on all
+night--Peter's electric light, too"--and then she saw him.
+
+His body was crumpled up in the big chair; his legs were thrust out
+stiffly in front of him. He looked a heartrending interpretation of
+discomfort in his evening clothes, for he hadn't even loosened the
+collar. He had thought of it, but felt it might be disrespectful to Jan.
+Besides, there was something of the chaperon about that collar.
+
+Jan's tears that had refused to soften sorrow during the anguish of the
+night came now, hot and springing, to blur that absurd, pathetic figure
+looped sideways in the big chair.
+
+It was so plain why he was there.
+
+She sniffed helplessly (of course, she had lost her handkerchief), and
+thrust her knuckles into her eyes like any schoolboy.
+
+When she could see again she noticed how thin was the queer, irregular
+face, with dark hollows round the eyes.
+
+"I wonder if they feed him properly at that Yacht Club," thought Jan.
+"And here are we using his house and his cook and everything."
+
+She swung her feet off the sofa and disentangled them from the shawl,
+folded it neatly and sat looking at Peter, who opened his eyes.
+
+For a full minute they stared at each other in silence, then he
+stretched himself and rose.
+
+"I say, have you slept?" he asked.
+
+"Till a minute ago ... Mr. Ledgard ... why did you stay? It was angelic
+of you, but you must be so dreadfully tired. I feel absolutely rested
+and, oh, so grateful--but so ashamed...."
+
+"Then you must have some tea," said Peter, inconsequently. "I'll go and
+rouse up Lalkhan and the cook. We can't get any ourselves, for he locks
+up the whole show every blessed night."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the East burial follows death with the greatest possible speed. Peter
+and the doctor and the nurse arranged everything. A friend of Peter's
+who had little children sent for Ayah and Tony and little Fay to spend
+the day, and Jan was grateful.
+
+Fay and her baby were laid in the English cemetery, and Jan was left to
+face the children as best she could.
+
+They had been happy, Ayah said, with the kind lady and her children.
+Tony went straight to his mother's room, the room that had been closed
+to him for three whole days.
+
+He came back to Jan and stood in front of her, searching her face with
+his grave, judging gaze.
+
+"What have you done with my Mummy?" he asked. "Have you carried her away
+and put her somewhere like you do Fay when she's naughty? You're strong
+enough."
+
+"Oh, Tony!" Jan whispered piteously. "I would have kept her if I could,
+but I wasn't strong enough for that."
+
+"Who has taken her, then?" Tony persisted. "Where is she? I've been
+everywhere, and she isn't in the bungalow."
+
+"God has taken her, Tony."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"I think," Jan said, timidly, "it was because she was very tired and ill
+and unhappy----"
+
+"But is she happier now and better?"
+
+"I hope so, I believe she is ... quite happy and well."
+
+"You're sure?" And Tony's eyes searched Jan's face. "You're sure _you_
+haven't put her somewhere?"
+
+"Tony, I want Mummy every bit as much as you do. Be a little good to
+me, sonny, for I'm dreadfully sad."
+
+Jan held out her hand and Tony took it doubtfully. She drew him nearer.
+
+"Try to be good to me, Tony, and love me a little ... it's all so hard."
+
+"I'll be good," he said, gravely, "because I promised Mummy ... but I
+can't love you yet--because--" here Tony sighed deeply, "I don't seem to
+feel like it."
+
+"Never mind," said Jan, lifting him on to her knee. "Never mind. I'll
+love you an extra lot to make up."
+
+"And Fay?" he asked.
+
+"And Fay--we must both love Fay more than ever now."
+
+"I do love Fay," Tony said, "because I'm used to her. She's been here a
+long time...."
+
+Suddenly his mouth went down at the corners and he leant against Jan's
+shoulder to hide his face. "I do want Mummy so," he whispered, as the
+slow, difficult tears welled over and fell. "I like so much to look at
+her."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was early afternoon, the hot part of the day. The children were
+asleep and Jan sat on the big sofa, finishing a warm jersey for little
+Fay to wear towards the end of the voyage. Peter, by means of every
+scrap of interest he possessed, had managed to secure her a three-berth
+cabin in a mail boat due to leave within the next fortnight. He insisted
+that she must take Ayah, who was more than eager to go, and that Ayah
+could easily get a passage back almost directly with people he knew who
+were coming out soon after Jan got home. He had written to them, and
+they would write to meet the boat at Aden.
+
+There was nothing Peter did not seem able to arrange.
+
+In the flat below a lady was singing the "Indian Love Lyrics" from the
+"Garden of Khama." She had a powerful voice and sang with considerable
+passion.
+
+    Less than the dust beneath thy chariot wheel,
+    Less than the rust that never stained thy sword.
+
+Jan frowned and fidgeted.
+
+The song went on, finished, and then the lady sang it all over again.
+Jan turned on the electric fan, for it was extremely hot, and the strong
+contralto voice made her feel even hotter. The whirr of the fan in no
+way drowned the voice, which now went on to proclaim with much _brio_
+that the temple bells were ringing and the month of marriages was
+drawing near. And then, very slowly and solemnly, but quite as loudly as
+before, came "When I am dying, lean over me tenderly----"
+
+Jan got up and stamped. Then she went swiftly for her topee and gloves
+and parasol, and fled from the bungalow.
+
+Lalkhan rushed after her to ask if she wanted a "tikka-gharri." He
+strongly disapproved of her walking in the streets alone, but Jan shook
+her head. The lift-man was equally eager to procure one, but again Jan
+defeated his desire and walked out into the hot street. Somehow she
+couldn't bear "The Garden of Khama" just then. It was Hugo Tancred's
+favourite verse, and was among the few books Fay appeared to possess,
+Fay who was lying in the English cemetery, and so glad to be there ...
+at twenty-five.
+
+What was the good of life and love, if that was all it led to? In spite
+of the heat Jan walked feverishly and fast, down the shady side of the
+Mayo Road into Esplanade Road, where the big shops were, and, just then,
+no shade at all.
+
+The hot dust seemed to rise straight out of the pavement and strike her
+in the face, and all the air was full of the fat yellow smell that
+prevails in India when its own inhabitants have taken their mid-day
+meal.
+
+Each bare-legged gharri-man slumbered on the little box of his carriage,
+hanging on in that amazingly precarious fashion in which natives of the
+East seem able to sleep anywhere.
+
+On Jan went, anywhere, anywhere away from the garden of Khama and that
+travesty of love, as she conceived it. She remembered the day when she
+thought them such charming songs and thrilled in sympathy with Fay when
+Hugo sang them. Oh, why did that woman sing them to-day? Would she ever
+get the sound out of her ears?
+
+She had reached Churchgate Street, which was deserted and deep in shade.
+She turned down and presently came to the Cathedral standing in its trim
+garden bright with English flowers. The main door was open and Jan went
+in.
+
+Here the haunting love-lyrics were hushed. It was so still, not even a
+sweeper to break the blessed peace.
+
+Restlessly, Jan walked round the outer aisles, reading the inscriptions
+on marble tablets and brasses, many of them dating back to the later
+eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Men died young out in India
+in those days; hardly any seemed to live beyond forty-two, many died in
+the twenties. On nearly all the tablets the words "zeal" or "zealous"
+regularly appeared. With regard to their performance of their duties
+these dead and gone men who had helped to make the India of to-day had
+evidently had a very definite notion as to their own purpose in life.
+The remarks were guarded and remarkably free from exaggerated tributes
+to the virtues they celebrated. One Major-General Bellasis was described
+as "that very respectable Officer--who departed this life while he was
+in the meritorious discharge of his duty presiding at the Military
+Board." Others died "from exposure to the sun"; nearly all seemed to
+have displayed "unremitting" or "characteristic zeal" in the discharge
+of their duties.
+
+Jan sat down, and gradually it seemed as though the spirits and souls of
+those departed men, those ordinary everyday men--whose descendants might
+probably be met any day in the Yacht Club now--seemed to surround her in
+a great company, all pointing in one direction and with one voice
+declaring, "This is the WAY."
+
+Jan fell on her knees and prayed that her stumbling feet might be
+guided upon it, that she should in no wise turn aside, however steep and
+stony it might prove.
+
+And as she knelt there came upon her the conviction that here was the
+true meaning of life as lived upon the earth; just this, that each
+should do his job.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE END OF THE DREAM
+
+
+She walked back rather slowly. It was a little cooler, but dusty, and
+the hot pavements made her feet ache. She was just wondering whether she
+would take a gharri when a motor stopped at the curb and Peter got out.
+
+"What are you doing?" he asked crossly. "Why are you walking in all this
+heat? You can't play these games in India. Get in."
+
+He held the door open for her.
+
+"Good afternoon, Mr. Ledgard," Jan said, sweetly. "Is it worth while for
+such a little way?"
+
+"Get in," Peter said again, and Jan meekly got in.
+
+"I was just coming to see you, and I could have taken you anywhere you
+wanted to go, if only you'd waited. Why didn't you take a gharri?"
+
+"Since you must know," Jan said, smiling at the angry Peter, "I went out
+because I wanted to go out. And I walked because I wanted to walk."
+
+"You can't do things just because you want to do 'em in this infernal
+country--you must consider whether it's a suitable time."
+
+Jan made no answer, and silence reigned till they reached the bungalow.
+
+Peter followed her in.
+
+"Where did you go?" he asked. "And why?"
+
+"I went to the Cathedral, and my reason was that I simply couldn't stay
+in the bungalow because the lady below was singing 'Less than the
+dust.'"
+
+"I know," Peter said grimly. "Just the sort of thing she would sing."
+
+"She sang very well," Jan owned honestly, "but when Fay was first
+engaged she and Hugo used to sing those songs to each other--it seemed
+all day long--and this afternoon I couldn't bear it. It seemed such a
+sham somehow--so false and unreal, if it only led--to this."
+
+"It's real enough while it lasts, you know," Peter remarked in the
+detached, elderly tone he sometimes adopted. "That sort of thing's all
+right for an episode, but it's a bit too thin for marriage."
+
+"But surely episodes often end in marriage?"
+
+"Not that sort, and if they do it's generally pretty disastrous. A woman
+who felt she was less than the dust and rust and weeds and all that rot
+wouldn't be much good to a man who had to do his job, for she wouldn't
+do hers, you know."
+
+"Then you, too, think that's the main thing--to do your job?"
+
+"It seems to me it's the only thing that justifies one's existence.
+Anyway, to try to do it decently."
+
+"And you don't think one ought to expect to be happy and have things go
+smoothly?"
+
+"Well, they won't always, you know, whether you expect it or not; but
+the job remains, so it's just as well to make up your mind to it."
+
+"I suppose," Jan said thoughtfully, "that's a religion."
+
+"It pans out as well as most," said Peter.
+
+The days that had gone so slowly went quickly enough now. Jan had much
+to arrange and no word came from Hugo. She succeeded in getting the
+monthly bills from the cook, and paid them, and very timidly she asked
+Peter if she might pay the wages for the time his servants had waited
+upon them; but Peter was so huffy and cross she never dared to mention
+it again.
+
+The night before they all sailed Peter dined with her, and, after
+dinner, took her for one last drive over Malabar Hill. The moon was
+full, and when they reached Ridge Road he stopped the car and they got
+out and stood on the cliff, looking over the city just as they had done
+on her first evening in Bombay.
+
+Some scented tree was in bloom and the air was full of its soft
+fragrance.
+
+For some minutes they stood in silence, then Jan broke it by asking:
+"Mr. Ledgard, could Hugo take the children from me?"
+
+"He could, of course, legally--but I don't for a minute imagine he will,
+for he couldn't keep them. What about his people? Will they want to
+interfere?"
+
+"I don't think so; from the little he told us they are not very well
+off. They live in Guernsey. His father was something in salt, I think,
+out here. We've none of us seen them. They didn't come to Fay's
+wedding. I gather they are very strict in their views--both his father
+and mother--and there are two sisters. But Fay said Hugo hardly ever
+wrote--or heard from them."
+
+"There's just one thing you must face, Miss Ross," and Peter felt a
+brute as he looked at Jan pale and startled in the bright moonlight.
+"Hugo Tancred might marry again."
+
+"Oh, surely no one would marry him after all this!"
+
+"Whoever did would probably know nothing of 'all this.' Remember Hugo
+Tancred has a way with women; he's a fascinating chap when he likes,
+he's good-looking and plausible, and always has an excellent reason for
+all his misfortunes. If he does marry again he'll marry money, and
+_then_ he might demand the children."
+
+"Perhaps she wouldn't want them."
+
+"We'll hope not."
+
+"And I can do nothing--nothing to make them safe?"
+
+"I fear--nothing--only your best for them."
+
+"I'll do that," said Jan.
+
+They stood shoulder to shoulder in the scented stillness of the night.
+The shadows were black and sharp in the bright moonlight and the
+tom-toms throbbed in the city below.
+
+"I wonder," Jan said presently, "if I shall ever be able to do anything
+for you, Mr. Ledgard. You have done everything for us out here."
+
+"Would you really like to do something?" Peter asked eagerly. "I
+wouldn't have mentioned it if you hadn't said that just now. Would you
+write pretty often? You see, I've no people of my very own. Aunts and
+uncles and cousins don't keep in touch with one out here. They're kind,
+awfully kind when I go home on leave, but it takes a man's own folk to
+remember to write every mail."
+
+"I'll write every mail," Jan promised eagerly, "and when you take your
+next leave, remember we expect you at Wren's End."
+
+"I'll remember," said Peter, "and it may be sooner than you think."
+
+They sailed next day. Jan had spent six weeks in Bombay, and the whole
+thing seemed a dream.
+
+The voyage back was very different from the voyage out. The boat was
+crowded, and nearly all were Service people going home on leave. Jan
+found them very kind and friendly, and the children, with plenty of
+others to play with, were for the most part happy and good.
+
+The journey across France was rather horrid. Little Fay was as
+obstreperous as Tony was disagreeably silent and aloof. Jan thanked
+heaven when the crowded train steamed into Charing Cross.
+
+There, at the very door of their compartment, a girl was waiting. A girl
+so small, she might have been a child except for a certain decision and
+capability about everything she did. She seized Jan, kissed her
+hurriedly and announced that she had got a nice little furnished flat
+for them till they should go to the country, and that Hannah had tea
+ready; this young person, herself, helped to carry their smaller
+baggage to a taxi, packed them in, demanded Jan's keys and announced
+that she would bring the luggage in another taxi. She gave the address
+to the man, and a written slip to Jan, and vanished to collect their
+cabin baggage.
+
+It was all done so briskly and efficiently that it left Ayah and the
+children quite breathless, accustomed as they were to the leisurely
+methods of the East.
+
+"Who is vat mem?" asked little Fay, as the taxi door was slammed by this
+energetic young person.
+
+"Is she quite a mem?" suggested the accurate Tony. "Is she old enough or
+big enough?"
+
+"Who is vat mem?" little Fay repeated.
+
+"That," said Jan with considerable satisfaction in her voice, "is Meg."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+MEG
+
+
+It was inevitable as the refrain of a _rondeau_ that when Jan said
+"that's Meg" little Fay should demand "What nelse?"
+
+Now there was a good deal of "nelse" about Meg, and she requires some
+explanation, going back several years.
+
+Like most Scots, Anthony Ross had been faithful to his relations whether
+he felt affection for them or not; sometimes even when they had not a
+thought in common with him and he rather disliked them than otherwise.
+
+And this was so in the case of one Amelia Ross, his first cousin, who
+was head-mistress of a flourishing and well-established school for
+"young ladies," in the Regent's Park district.
+
+She had been a head-mistress for many years, and was well over fifty
+when she married a meek, small, nothingly man who had what Thackeray
+calls "a little patent place." And it appeared that she added the
+husband to the school in much the same spirit as she would have
+increased the number of chairs in her dining-room, and with no more
+appreciable result in her life. On her marriage she became Mrs.
+Ross-Morton, and Mr. Morton went in and out of the front door,
+breakfasted and dined at Ribston Hall, caught his bus at the North Gate
+and went daily to his meek little work. It is presumed that he lived on
+terms of affectionate intimacy with his wife, but no one who saw them
+together could have gathered this.
+
+Now Anthony Ross disliked his cousin Amelia. He detested her school,
+which he considered was one of the worst examples of a bad old period.
+He suspected her of being hard and grasping, he knew she was dull, and
+her husband bored him--not to tears, but to profanity. Yet since she was
+his cousin and a hard-working, upright woman, and since they had played
+together as children in Scotland and her father and mother had been kind
+to him then, he could never bring himself to drop Amelia. Not for worlds
+would he have allowed Jan or Fay to go to her school, but he did allow
+them, or rather he humbly entreated them, to visit it occasionally when
+invited to some function or other. Jan's education after her mother's
+death had been the thinnest scrape sandwiched between many household
+cares and much attendance upon her father's whims. Fay was allowed
+classes and visiting governesses, but their father could never bring
+himself to spare either of them to the regular discipline of school, and
+Cousin Amelia bewailed the desultory training of Anthony's children.
+
+In 1905, Jan and Fay had been to a party at Ribston Hall: tea in the
+garden followed by a pastoral play. Anthony was sitting in the balcony,
+smoking, when the girls came back. He saw their hansom and ran
+downstairs to meet them, as he always did. They were a family who went
+in for affectionate greetings.
+
+"Daddie," cried Fay, seizing her father by the arm, "one of the seven
+wonders of the world has happened. We have found an interesting person
+at Ribston Hall."
+
+Jan took the other arm. "We can't possibly tell you all about it under
+an hour, so we'd better go and sit in the balcony." And they gently
+propelled him towards the staircase.
+
+"Not if you're going to discuss Cousin Amelia," Anthony protested. "You
+have carrying voices, both of you."
+
+"Cousin Amelia is only incidental," Jan said, when they were all three
+seated in the balcony. "The main theme is concerned with a queer little
+pixie creature called Meg Morton. She's a pupil-governess, and she's
+sixteen and a half--just the same age as Fay."
+
+"She doesn't reach up to Jan's elbow," Fay added, "and she chaperons the
+girls for music and singing, and sits in the drawing-class because the
+master can't be quite seventy yet."
+
+"She's the wee-est thing you ever saw, and they dress her in Cousin
+Amelia's discarded Sunday frocks."
+
+"That's impossible," Anthony interrupted. "Amelia is so massive and
+square; if the girl's so small she'd look like 'the Marchioness.'"
+
+"She does, she does!" Jan cried delightedly. "Of course the garments are
+'made down,' but in the most elderly way possible. Daddie, can you
+picture a Botticelli angel of sixteen, with masses of Titian-red hair,
+clad in a queer plush garment once worn by Cousin Amelia, that retains
+all its ancient frumpiness of line. And it's not only her appearance
+that's so quaint, _she_ is quaint inside."
+
+"We were attracted by her hair," Fay went on "(You'll go down like a
+ninepin before that hair), and we got her in a corner and hemmed her in
+and declared it was her duty to attend to us because we were strangers
+and shy, and in three minutes we were friends. Sixteen, Daddie! And a
+governess-pupil in Cousin Amelia's school. She's a niece of the little
+husband, and Cousin Amelia is preening herself like anything because she
+takes her for nothing and makes her work like ten people."
+
+"Did the little girl say so?"
+
+"Of course not," Jan answered indignantly, "but Cousin Amelia did. Oh,
+how thankful I am she is _your_ cousin, dear, and once-removed from us!"
+
+"How many generations will it take to remove her altogether?" Fay asked.
+"However," she added, "if we can have the pixie out and give her a good
+time I shan't mind the relationship so much. We _must_ do something,
+Daddie. What shall it be?"
+
+Anthony Ross smoked thoughtfully and said very little. Perhaps he did
+not even listen with marked attention, because he was enjoying his
+girls. Just to see them healthy and happy; to know that they were
+naturally kind and gay; to hear them frank and eager and
+loquacious--sometimes gave him a sensation of almost physical pleasure.
+He was like an idler basking in the sun, conscious of nothing but just
+the warmth and comfort of it.
+
+Whatever those girls wanted they always got. Anthony's diplomacy was
+requisitioned and was, as usual, successful; for, in spite of her
+disapproval, Mrs. Ross-Morton could never resist her cousin's charm.
+This time the result was that one Saturday afternoon in the middle of
+June little Meg Morton, bearing a battered leather portmanteau and clad
+in the most-recently-converted plush abomination, appeared at the tall
+house in St. George's Square to stay over the week-end.
+
+It was the mid-term holiday, and from the first moment to the last the
+visit was one almost delirious orgy of pleasure to the little
+pupil-governess.
+
+It was also a revelation.
+
+It would be hard to conceive of anything odder than the appearance of
+Meg Morton at this time. She just touched five feet in height, and was
+very slenderly and delicately made, with absurd, tiny hands and feet.
+Yet there was a finish about the thin little body that proclaimed her
+fully grown. Her eyes, with their thick, dark lashes, looked overlarge
+in the pale little pointed face; strange eyes and sombre, with big,
+bright pupil, and curious dark-blue iris flecked with brown. Her
+features were regular, and her mouth would have been pretty had the lips
+not lacked colour. As it was, all the colour about Meg seemed
+concentrated in her hair; red as a flame and rippled as a river under a
+fresh breeze. There was so much of it, too, the little head seemed bowed
+in apology beneath its weight.
+
+Yet for the time being Meg forgot to be apologetic about her hair, for
+Anthony and his girls frankly admired it.
+
+These adorable, kind, amusing people actually admired it, and said so.
+Hitherto Meg's experience had been that it was a thing to be slurred
+over, like a deformity. If mentioned, it was to be deprecated. In the
+strictly Evangelical circles where hitherto her lot had been cast, they
+even tried vainly to explain it away.
+
+She had, of course, heard of artists, but she never expected to meet
+any. That sort of thing lay outside the lives of those who had to make
+their living as quickly as possible in beaten tracks; tracks so
+well-beaten, in fact, that all the flowers had been trodden underfoot
+and exterminated.
+
+Meg, at sixteen, had received so little from life that her expectations
+were of the humblest. And as she stood before the glass in a pretty
+bedroom, fastening her one evening dress (of shiny black silk that
+crackled, made with the narrow V in front affected by Mrs. Ross-Morton),
+preparatory to going to the play for the first time in her life, she
+could have exclaimed, like the little old woman of the story, "This be
+never I!"
+
+Anthony Ross was wholly surprising to Meg.
+
+This handsome, merry gentleman with thick, brown hair as crinkly as her
+own; who was domineered over and palpably adored by these two, to her,
+equally amazing girls--seemed so very, very young to be anybody's
+father.
+
+He frankly owned to enjoying things.
+
+Now, according to Meg's experience, grown-up people--elderly
+people--seldom enjoyed anything; above all, never alluded to their
+enjoyment.
+
+Life was a thing to be endured with fortitude, its sorrows borne with
+Christian resignation; its joys, if there were any joys, discreetly
+slurred over. Joys were insidious, dangerous things that might lead to
+the leaving undone of obvious duties. To seek joy and insure its being
+shared by others, bravely and honestly believing it to be an excellent
+thing, was to Meg an entirely unknown frame of mind.
+
+After the play, in Meg's room the three girls were brushing their hair
+together; to be accurate, Jan was brushing Fay's and Meg admiring the
+process.
+
+"Have you any sisters?" Jan asked. She was always interested in people's
+relations.
+
+"No," said Meg. "There are, mercifully, only three of us, my two
+brothers and me. If there had been any more I don't know what my poor
+little Papa would have done."
+
+"Why do you call him your 'poor little papa'?" Fay asked curiously.
+
+"Because he is poor--dreadfully--and little, and very melancholy. He
+suffers so from depression."
+
+"Why?" asked the downright Jan.
+
+"Partly because he has indigestion, _constant_ indigestion, and then
+there's us, and boys are so expensive, they will grow so. It upsets him
+dreadfully."
+
+"But they can't help growing," Fay objected.
+
+"It wouldn't matter so much if they didn't both do it at once. But you
+see, there's only a year between them, and they're just about the same
+size. If only one had been smaller, he could have worn the outgrown
+things. As it is, it's always new clothes for both of them. Papa's are
+no sort of use, and even the cheapest suits cost a lot, and boots are
+perfectly awful."
+
+Meg looked so serious that Fay and Jan, who were like the lilies of the
+field, and expected new and pretty frocks at reasonable intervals as a
+matter of course, looked serious too; for the first time confronted by a
+problem whose possibility they had never even considered before.
+
+"He must be pleased with you," Jan said, encouragingly. "_You're_ not
+too big."
+
+"Yes, but then I'm not a boy. Papa's clothes would have made down for me
+beautifully if I'd been a boy; as it is, they're no use." Meg sighed,
+then added more cheerfully. "But I cost less in other ways, and several
+relations send old clothes to me. They are never too small."
+
+"Do you like the relations' clothes?" Fay asked.
+
+"Of course not," said Meg, simply. "They are generally hideous; but,
+after all, they cover me and save expense."
+
+The spoiled daughters of Anthony Ross gazed at Meg with horror-stricken
+eyes. To them this seemed a most tragic state of things.
+
+"Do they all," Fay asked timidly, "wear such ... rich materials--like
+Cousin Amelia?"
+
+"They're fond of plush, as a rule, but there's velveteen as well, and
+sometimes a cloth dress. One was mustard-coloured, and embittered my
+life for a whole year."
+
+Jan suddenly ceased to brush Fay's hair and went and sat on the bed
+beside Meg and put her arm round her. Fay's pretty face, framed in
+fluffy masses of fair hair, was solemn in excess of sympathy.
+
+"I shouldn't care a bit if only the boys were through Sandhurst and
+safely into the Indian Army--but I do hate them having to go without
+nearly everything. Trevor's a King's Cadet, but they wouldn't give us
+two cadetships ... Still," she added, more cheerfully, "it's cheaper
+than anything else for a soldier's son."
+
+"Is your father a soldier?" asked Jan.
+
+"Oh, yes, a major in the Westshires; but he had to leave the Army
+because of his health, and his pension is very small, and mother had so
+little money. I sometimes think it killed her trying to do everything on
+nothing."
+
+"Were you quite small when she died?" Fay asked in a sympathetic
+whisper.
+
+"Oh, no; I was nearly twelve, and quite as big as I am now. Then I kept
+house while the boys were at Bedford, but when they went to Sandhurst
+poor little Papa thought I'd better get some education, too, and Uncle
+John's wife offered to take me for nothing, so here I am. HERE, it's too
+wonderful. Who could have dreamed that Ribston Hall would lead to this?"
+And Meg snuggled down in Jan's kind embrace, her red hair spread around
+her like a veil.
+
+"Are some of the richly-dressed relations nice?" Jan asked hopefully.
+
+"I don't know if you'd think them nice--you seem to expect such a lot
+from people--but they're quite kind--only it's a different sort of
+kindness from yours here. They don't laugh and expect you to enjoy
+yourself, like _your_ father. My brothers say they are dull ... they
+call them--I'm afraid it's very ungrateful--the weariful rich. But I
+expect we're weariful to them too. I suppose poor relations _are_ boring
+if you're well-off yourself. But we get pretty tired, too, when they
+talk us over."
+
+"But do you mean to say they talk you over _to_ you?"
+
+"Always," Meg said firmly. "How badly we manage, how improvident we are,
+how Papa ought to rouse himself and I ought to manage better, and how
+foolish it is to let the boys go into the Army instead of banks and
+things ... And yet, you know, it hasn't cost much for Trevor, and once
+he's in he'll be able to manage, and Jo said he'd enlist if there was
+any more talk of banks, and poor little Papa had to give in--so there it
+is."
+
+"How much older are they than you?" Jan asked.
+
+"Trevor's nineteen and Jo's eighteen, and they are the greatest darlings
+in the world. They always lifted the heavy saucepans for me at Bedford,
+and filled the buckets and did the outsides of the windows, and carried
+up the coals to Papa's sitting-room before they went to school in the
+morning, and they very seldom grumbled at my cooking...."
+
+"But where were the servants?" Fay asked innocently.
+
+Meg laughed. "Oh, we couldn't have any servants. A woman came in the
+morning. Papa dined at his club, and I managed for the boys and me. But,
+oh dear, they do eat a lot, and joints are so dear. Sheep's heads and
+things pall if you have them more than once a week. They're such a mixty
+sort of meat, so gummy."
+
+"_I_ can cook," Jan announced, then added humbly, "at least, I've been
+to classes, but I don't get much practice. Cook isn't at all fond of
+having me messing in her kitchen."
+
+"It isn't the cooking that's so difficult," said Meg; "it's getting
+things to cook. It's all very well for the books to say 'Take' this and
+that. My experience is that you can never 'take' anything. You have to
+buy every single ingredient, and there's never anything like enough. We
+tried being fruitarians and living on dates and figs and nuts all
+squashed together, but it didn't seem to come a bit cheaper, for the
+boys were hungry again directly and said it was hog-wash."
+
+"Was your papa a fruitarian too?" Fay asked.
+
+"Oh, no, he can't play those tricks; he has to be most careful. He never
+had his meals with us. Our meals would have been too rough for him. I
+got him breakfast and afternoon tea. He generally went out for the
+others."
+
+Jan and Fay looked thoughtful.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Amelia Ross-Morton was a fair judge of character. When she consented to
+take her husband's niece as a governess-pupil she had been dubious as to
+the result. She very soon discovered, however, that the small red-haired
+girl was absolutely trustworthy, that she had a power of keeping order
+quite disproportionate to her size, that she got through a perfectly
+amazing amount of work, and did whatever she was asked as a matter of
+course. Thus she became a valuable factor in the school, receiving
+nothing in return save her food and such clothes as Mrs. Ross-Morton
+considered too shabby for her own wear.
+
+At the end of the first year Meg ceased to receive any lessons. Her day
+was fully occupied in teaching the younger and chaperoning the elder
+girls. Only one stipulation did she make at the beginning of each
+term--that she should be allowed to accept, on all reasonable occasions,
+the invitations of Anthony Ross and his daughters, and she made this
+condition with so much firmness that Anthony's cousin knew better than
+to be unreasonably domineering, as was her usual habit. Moreover, though
+it was against her principles to do anything to further the enjoyment
+of persons in a subordinate position, she was, in a way, flattered that
+Anthony and his girls should thus single out her "niece by marriage" and
+appear to enjoy her society.
+
+Thus it came about that Meg went a good deal to St. George's Square and
+nearly always spent part of each holiday with Fay and Jan wherever they
+happened to be.
+
+The queer clothes were kept for wear at Ribston Hall, and by
+degrees--although she never had any money--she became possessed of
+garments more suitable to her age and colouring.
+
+Again and again Anthony painted her. She sat for him with untiring
+patience and devotion. She was always entirely at her ease with him, and
+prattled away quite simply of the life that seemed to him so
+inexpressibly hard and dreary.
+
+Only once had he interfered on her behalf at Ribston Hall, and then
+sorely against Meg's will. She was sitting for him one day, with her
+veil of flaming hair spread round her, when she said, suddenly, "I
+wonder why it is incorrect to send invitations by post to people living
+in the same town?"
+
+"But it isn't," Anthony objected. "Everybody does it."
+
+"Not in schools," Meg said firmly. "Mrs. Ross-Morton will never send
+invitations to people living in London through the post--she says it
+isn't polite. They must go by hand."
+
+"I never heard such nonsense," Anthony exclaimed crossly. "If she
+doesn't send 'em by post, how _does_ she send them?"
+
+"I take them generally, in the evening, after school, and deliver them
+at all the houses. Some are fairly near, of course--a lot of her friends
+live in Regent's Park--but sometimes I have to go quite a long way by
+bus. I don't mind that in summer, when it's light, but in winter it's
+horrid going about the lonely roads ... People speak to one...."
+
+Anthony Ross stepped from behind his easel.
+
+"And what do you do?" he asked.
+
+"I run," Meg said simply, "and I can generally run much faster than they
+do ... but it's a little bit frightening."
+
+"It's infernal," Anthony said furiously. "I shall speak to Amelia at
+once. You are never to do it again."
+
+In vain did Meg plead, almost with tears, that he would do nothing of
+the kind. He was roused and firm.
+
+He did "speak to Amelia." He astonished that good lady as much as he
+annoyed her. Nevertheless Mrs. Ross-Morton used the penny post for her
+invitations as long as Meg remained at Ribston Hall.
+
+At the end of two years Major Morton, who had removed from Bedford to
+Cheltenham, wrote a long, querulous letter to his sister-in-law to the
+effect that if--like the majority of girls nowadays--his daughter chose
+to spend her life far from his sheltering care, it was time she earned
+something.
+
+Mrs. Ross-Morton replied that only now was Meg beginning to repay all
+the expense incurred on her behalf in the way of board, clothing and
+tuition; and it was most unreasonable to expect any salary for quite
+another year.
+
+Major Morton decided to remove Meg from Ribston Hall.
+
+Many acrimonious letters passed between her aunt and her father before
+this was finally accomplished, and Meg left "under a cloud."
+
+To her great astonishment, her meek little uncle appeared at Paddington
+to see her off. Just as the train was starting he thrust an envelope
+into her hand.
+
+"It hasn't been fair," he almost shouted--for the train was already
+beginning to move. "You worked hard, you deserved some pay ... a little
+present ... but please don't mention it to your aunt ... She is so
+decided in her views...."
+
+When Meg opened the envelope she found three ten-pound notes. She had
+never seen so much money before, and burst into tears; but it was not
+because of the magnitude of the gift. She felt she had never properly
+appreciated her poor little uncle, and her conscience smote her.
+
+This was at Christmas.
+
+The weariful rich sat in conclave over Meg, and it was decided that she
+should in March go as companion and secretary to a certain Mrs. Trent
+slightly known to one of them.
+
+Mrs. Trent was kindly, careless, and quite generous as regards money.
+She had grown-up daughters, and they lived in one of the Home Counties
+where there are many country-houses and plenty of sport. Meg proved to
+be exceedingly useful, did whatever she was asked to do, and a great
+many things no one had ever done before. She shared in the fun, and for
+the first time since her mother died was not overworked.
+
+Her employer was as keen on every form of pleasure as her own daughters.
+She exercised the very smallest supervision over them and none at all
+over the "quite useful" little companion.
+
+Many men came to the easy-going, lavish house, and Meg, with pretty
+frocks, abundant leisure and deliriously prim Ribston-Hallish manners,
+came in for her full share of admiration.
+
+It happened that at the end of July Anthony Ross came up to London in
+the afternoon to attend and speak at a dinner in aid of some artists'
+charity. He and Jan were staying with friends at Teddington; Fay, an
+aunt and the servants were already at Wren's End--all but Hannah, the
+severe Scottish housemaid, who remained in charge. She was grim and
+gaunt and plain, with a thick, black moustache, and Anthony liked her
+less than he could have wished. But she had been Jan's nurse, and was
+faithful and trustworthy beyond words. He would never let Jan go to the
+country ahead of him, for without her he always left behind everything
+most vital to his happiness, so she was to join him next day and see
+that his painting-tackle was all packed.
+
+The house in St. George's Square was nominally shut up and shrouded in
+dust-sheets, but Hannah had "opened up" the dining-room on Anthony's
+behalf, and there he sat and slumbered till she should choose to bring
+him some tea.
+
+He was awakened by an opening door and Hannah's voice announcing, not
+tea, but:
+
+"Miss Morton to see you, sir."
+
+There seemed a thousand "r's" in both the Morton and the sir, and
+Anthony, who felt that there was something ominous and arresting in
+Hannah's voice, was wide-awake before she could shut the door again.
+
+Sure enough it was Meg, clad in a long grey dust-cloak and motor bonnet,
+the grey veil flung back from a very pale face.
+
+Meg, looking a wispy little shadow of woe.
+
+Anthony came forward with outstretched hands.
+
+"Meg, my child, what good wind has blown you here this afternoon? I
+thought you were having ever such a gay time down in the country."
+
+But Meg made no effort to grasp the greeting hands. On the contrary, she
+moved so that the whole width of the dining-room table was between them.
+
+"Wait," she said, "you mustn't shake hands with me till I tell you what
+I've done ... perhaps you won't want to then."
+
+And Anthony saw that she was trembling.
+
+"Come and sit down," he said. "Something's wrong, I can see. What is
+it?"
+
+But she stood where she was, looking at him with large, tragic eyes;
+laid down a leather despatch-case she was carrying, and seized the edge
+of the table as if for support.
+
+"I'd rather not sit down yet," she said. "Perhaps when you've heard what
+I've got to tell you, you'll never want me to sit down in your house
+again ... and yet ... I did pray so you'd be here ... I knew it was most
+unlikely ... but I did pray so ... And you _are_ here."
+
+Anthony was puzzled. Meg was not given to making scenes or going into
+heroics.
+
+It was evident that something had happened to shake her out of her usual
+almost cynical calm.
+
+"You'd be much better to sit down," he said, soothingly. "You see, if
+you stand, so must I, and it's such an uncomfortable way of talking."
+
+She pulled out a chair and sat down at the table, took off her gloves,
+and two absurd small thumbs appeared above its edge, the knuckles white
+and tense with the strength of her grip.
+
+Anthony seated himself in a deep chair beside the fireplace. He was in
+shadow. Meg faced the light, and he was shocked at the appearance of the
+little smitten face.
+
+"Now tell me," he said gently, "just as little or as much as you like."
+
+"This morning," she said hoarsely, "I ran away with a man ... in a
+motor-car."
+
+Anthony was certainly startled, but all he said was, "That being the
+case, why are you here, my dear, and what have you done with him?"
+
+"He was married...."
+
+"Have you only just found that out?"
+
+"No, I knew it all along. His wife is hard and disagreeable and older
+than he is ... and he's thirty-five ... and they can't live together,
+and she won't divorce him and he can't divorce her ... and I loved him
+so much and thought how beautiful it would be to give up everything and
+make it up to him."
+
+"Yes?" said Anthony, for Meg paused as though unable to go on.
+
+"And it seemed very wonderful and noble to do this, and I forgot my poor
+little Papa and those boys in India, and you and Jan and Fay and ... I
+was very mad and very happy ... till this morning, when we actually went
+off in his car."
+
+"But where," Anthony asked in a voice studiously even and quiet, "_are_
+he and his car?"
+
+"I don't know," Meg said hopelessly, "unless they're still at the place
+where we had lunch ... and I don't suppose he'd stay there all this
+time...."
+
+Anthony felt a great desire to laugh, but Meg looked so woebegone and
+desperately serious that he restrained the impulse and said very kindly:
+"I don't yet understand how, having embarked upon such an enterprise,
+you happen to be here ... alone. Did you quarrel at lunch, or what?"
+
+"We didn't _have_ lunch," Meg exclaimed with a sob. "At least, I didn't
+... it was the lunch that did it."
+
+"Did what?"
+
+"Made me realise what I had done, and go away."
+
+"Meg dear," said Anthony, striving desperately to keep his voice steady,
+"was it a very bad lunch?"
+
+"I don't know," she answered with the utmost seriousness. "We hadn't
+begun; we were just going to, when I noticed his hands, and his nails
+were dirty, and they looked horrid, and suddenly it came over me that if
+I stayed ... those hands...."
+
+She let go of the table, put her elbows upon it and hid her face in her
+hands.
+
+Anthony made no sound, and presently, still with hidden face, she went
+on again:
+
+"And in that minute I saw what I was doing, and that I could never be
+the same again, and I remembered my poor little dyspeptic Papa, and my
+dear, dear brothers so far away in India ... and you and Jan and
+Fay--_all_ the special people I pray for every single night and
+morning--and I felt that if I didn't get away that minute I should
+die...."
+
+"And how did you get away?"
+
+"It was quite simple. There was something wrong with the car (that's how
+he got his hands so dirty), and he'd sent for a mechanic, and just as we
+were sitting down to lunch, the waiter said the motor-man had come ...
+and he went out to the garage to speak to him...."
+
+"Yes?" Anthony remarked, for again Meg paused.
+
+"So I just walked out of the front door. No one saw me, and the station
+was across the road, and I went right in and asked when there was a
+train to London, and there _was_ one going in five minutes; so I took a
+ticket and came straight here, for I knew somehow, even if you were all
+away, Hannah would let me stay ... just to-night. I knew she would ..."
+and Meg began to sob feebly.
+
+And, as if in response to the mention of her name, Hannah appeared,
+bearing a tray with tea upon it. Hannah was short and square; she
+stumped as she walked, and she carried a tray very high and stately, as
+though it were a sacrifice. As she came in Meg rose and hastily moved to
+the window, standing there with her back to the room.
+
+"I thocht," said Hannah, as though challenging somebody to contradict
+her, "that Miss Morton would be the better for an egg to her tea. She
+looks just like a bit soap after a hard day's washing."
+
+"I had no lunch," said a muffled, apologetic voice from the window.
+
+"Come away, then, and take yer tea," Hannah said sharply. "Young leddies
+should have more sense than go fasting so many hours."
+
+As it was evident that Hannah had no intention of leaving the room till
+she saw Meg sitting at the table, the girl came back and sat down.
+
+"See that she gets her tea, sir," she said in a low, admonitory voice to
+Anthony. "She's pretty far through."
+
+The tray was set at the end of the table. Anthony came and sat down
+behind it.
+
+"I'll pour out," he said, "and until you've drunk one cup of tea, eaten
+one piece of bread-and-butter and one egg, you're not to speak one word.
+_I_ will talk."
+
+He tried to, disjointedly and for the most part nonsense. Meg drank her
+tea, and to her own amazement ate up her egg and several pieces of
+bread-and-butter with the utmost relish.
+
+As the meal proceeded, Anthony noted that she grew less haggard. The
+tears still hung on her eyelashes, but the eyes themselves were a
+thought less tragic.
+
+When Hannah came for the tray she gave a grunt of satisfaction at the
+sight of the egg-shell and the empty plates.
+
+"Now," said Anthony, "we must thresh this subject out and settle what's
+to be done. I suppose you left a message for the Trents. What did you
+tell them?"
+
+"Lies," said Meg. "He said we must have a good start. His yacht was at
+Southampton. And I left a note that I'd been suddenly summoned to Papa,
+and would write from there. They'd all gone for a picnic, you know--and
+it was arranged I was to have a headache that morning ... I've got it
+now with a vengeance ... It seemed rather fun when we were planning it.
+Now it all looks so mean and horrid ... Besides, lots of people saw us
+in his motor ... and people always know me again because of my hair.
+Everyone knew him ... the whole county made a fuss of him, and it seemed
+so wonderful ... that he should care like that for me...."
+
+"Doubtless it did," said Anthony drily. "But we must consider what is to
+be done now. If you said you were going to your father, perhaps the best
+thing you can do is to go to him, and write to the Trents from there. I
+hope you didn't inform _him_ of your intention?"
+
+"No," she faltered. "I was to write to him just before we sailed ... But
+you may be perfectly sure the Trents will find out ... He will probably
+go back there to look for me ... I expect he is awfully puzzled."
+
+"I expect he is, and I hope," Anthony added vindictively, "the fellow is
+terrified out of his life as well. He ought to be horsewhipped, and I'd
+like to do it. A babe like you!"
+
+"No," said Meg, firmly; "there you're wrong. I'm not a babe ... I knew
+what I was doing; but up to to-day it seemed worth it ... I never seemed
+to see till to-day how it would hurt other people. Even if he grew tired
+of me--and I had faced that--there would have been some awfully happy
+months ... and so long as it was only me, it didn't seem to matter. And
+when you've had rather a mouldy life...."
+
+"It can never be a case of 'only me.' As society is constituted, other
+people are always involved."
+
+"Yet there was Marian Evans ... he told me about her ... she did it, and
+everyone came round to think it was very fine of her really. She wrote,
+or something, didn't she?"
+
+"She did," said Anthony, "and in several other respects her case was
+not at all analogous to yours. She was a middle-aged woman--you are a
+child...."
+
+"Perhaps, but I'm not an ignorant child...."
+
+"Oh, Meg!" Anthony protested.
+
+"I daresay about books and things I am, but I mean I haven't been
+wrapped in cotton-wool, and taken care of all my life, like Jan and Fay
+... I know about things. Oh dear, oh dear, will you forbid Jan ever to
+speak to me again?"
+
+"Jan!" Anthony repeated. "Jan! Why, she's the person of all others we
+want. We'll do nothing till she's here. Let's get her." And he pushed
+back his chair and rushed to the bell.
+
+Meg rushed after him: "You'll let her see me? You'll let her talk to me?
+Oh, are you sure?"
+
+The little hands clutched his arm, her ravaged, wistful face was raised
+imploringly to his.
+
+Anthony stooped and kissed the little face.
+
+"It's just people like Jan who are put into the world to straighten
+things out for the rest of us. We've wasted three-quarters of an hour
+already. Now we'll get her."
+
+"Is she on the telephone?" asked the practical Meg. "Not far off?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan was quite used to being summoned to her father in a tremendous
+hurry. She was back in St. George's Square before he started for the
+dinner. Meg was lying down in one of the dismantled bedrooms, and when
+Jan arrived she went straight to her father in his dressing-room.
+
+She found him on his knees, pursuing a refractory collar-stud under the
+wash-stand.
+
+"It's well you've come," he said as he got up. "I can't fasten my collar
+or my tie. I've had a devil of a time. My fingers are all thumbs and I'm
+most detestably sticky."
+
+He told Jan about Meg. She fastened his collar and arranged his tie in
+the neatest of bows. Then she kissed him on both cheeks and told him not
+to worry.
+
+"How can one refrain from worrying when the works of the devil and the
+selfishness of man are made manifest as they have been to-day? But for
+the infinite mercy of God, where would that poor silly child have been?"
+
+"It's just because the infinite mercy of God is so much stronger than
+the works of the devil or the selfishness of man, that you needn't
+worry," said Jan.
+
+Anthony put his hands on Jan's shoulders and held her away from him.
+
+"Do you know," he said, "I shall always like Hannah better after this.
+In spite of her moustache and her grimness, that child was sure Hannah
+would take her in, whether any of us were here or not. Now, how did she
+know?"
+
+"Because," said Jan, "things are revealed to babes like Meg that are
+hidden from men of the world like you. Hannah is all right--you don't
+appreciate Hannah, and you are rather jealous of her moustache."
+
+Anthony leant forward and kissed his tall young daughter: "You are a
+great comfort, Jan," he said. "How do you do it?"
+
+Jan nodded at him. "It will all straighten out--don't you worry," she
+said.
+
+All the same, there was plenty of worry for everybody. The man, after
+his fashion, was very much in love with Meg. He was horribly alarmed by
+her sudden and mysterious disappearance. No one had seen her go, no one
+had noticed her.
+
+He got into a panic, and motored back to the Trents', arriving there
+just before dinner. Mrs. Trent, tired and cross after a wet picnic, had,
+of course, read Meg's note, thought it very casual of the girl and was
+justly incensed.
+
+On finding they knew no more of Meg's movements than he did himself, the
+man--one Walter Brooke--lost his head and confessed the truth to Mrs.
+Trent, who was much shocked and not a little frightened.
+
+Later in the evening she received a telegram from Jan announcing Meg's
+whereabouts.
+
+Jan had insisted on this, lest the Trents should suspect anything and
+wire to Major Morton.
+
+Mrs. Trent, quite naturally, refused to have anything further to do with
+Meg. She talked of serpents, and was very much upset. She wrote a
+dignified letter to Major Morton, explaining her reasons for Meg's
+dismissal. She also wrote to their relative among the weariful rich,
+through whom she had heard of Meg.
+
+Meg was more under a cloud than when she left Ribston Hall.
+
+But for Jan and Anthony she might have gone under altogether; but they
+took her down to Wren's End and kept guard over her. Anthony Ross dealt
+faithfully with the man, who went yachting at once.
+
+Meg recovered her poise, searched the advertisements of the scholastic
+papers industriously, and secured a post in a school for little boys, as
+Anthony forced his cousin Amelia to give her a testimonial.
+
+Here she worked hard and was a great success, for she could keep order,
+and that quality, where small boys are concerned, is much more valuable
+than learning. She stayed there for some years, and then her frail
+little ill-nourished body gave out, and she was gravely ill.
+
+When she recovered, she went as English governess to a rich German
+family in Bremen. The arrangement was only for one year, and at its
+termination she was free to offer to meet Jan and her charges.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+PLANS
+
+
+"Now, chicks, this is London, the friendly town," Jan announced, as the
+taxi drove away from Charing Cross station.
+
+"Flendly little London, dirty little London," her niece rejoined, as she
+bounced up and down on Jan's knee. She had slept during the very good
+crossing and was full of conversation and ready to be pleased with all
+she saw.
+
+Tony was very quiet. He had suffered far more in the swift journey
+across France than during the whole of the voyage, and it was difficult
+to decide whether he or Ayah were the more extraordinary colour.
+Greenish-white and miserable he sat beside his aunt, silent and
+observing.
+
+"Here's dear old Piccadilly," Jan exclaimed, as the taxi turned out of
+St. James's Street. "Doesn't it look jolly in the sunshine?"
+
+Tony turned even greener than before, and gasped:
+
+"This! Piccadilly!"
+
+This not very wide street with shops and great houses towering above
+them, the endless streams of traffic in the road and on the crowded
+pavements!
+
+"Did Mrs. Bond live in one of those houses?" he wondered, "and if so,
+where did she keep her ducks? And where, oh, where, were the tulips and
+the lilies of his dream?"
+
+He uttered no sound, but his mind kept exclaiming, "This! Piccadilly?"
+
+"See," said Jan, oblivious of Tony and intent on keeping her lively
+niece upon her knee. "There's the Green Park."
+
+Tony breathed more freely.
+
+After all, there _were_ trees and grass; good grass, and more of it than
+in the Resident's garden. He took heart a little and summoned up courage
+to inquire: "But where are the tulips?"
+
+"It's too early for tulips yet," Jan answered. "By and by there will be
+quantities. How did you know about them? Did dear Mummy tell you? But
+they're in Hyde Park, not here."
+
+Tony made no answer. He was, as usual, weighing and considering and
+making up his mind.
+
+Presently he spoke. "It's different," he said, slowly, "but I rather
+like to look at it."
+
+Tony never said whether he thought things were pretty or ugly. All he
+knew was that certain people and places, pictures and words, sometimes
+filled him with an exquisite sense of pleasure, while others merely
+bored or exasperated or were positively painful.
+
+His highest praise was "I like to look at it." When he didn't like to
+look at it, he had found it wiser to express no opinion at all, except
+in moments of confidential expansion, and these were rare with Tony.
+
+Meg had found them a nice little furnished flat on the fifth floor in
+one of the blocks behind Kensington High Street, and Hannah must surely
+have been waiting behind the door, so instantaneously was it opened,
+when Jan and her party left the lift.
+
+There were tears in Hannah's eyes and her nose was red as she welcomed
+"Miss Fay's motherless bairns." She was rather shocked that there was no
+sign of mourning about any of them except Jan, who wore--mainly as a
+concession to Hannah's prejudices--a thin black coat and skirt she had
+got just before she left Bombay.
+
+Tony stared stonily at Hannah and decided he did not like to look at
+her. She was as surprising as the newly-found Piccadilly, but she
+gratified no sensuous perception whatsoever.
+
+Ayah might not be exactly beautiful, but she was harmonious. Her body
+was well proportioned, her sari fell in gracious flowing lines, and she
+moved with dignity. Without knowing why, Tony felt that there was
+something pleasing to the eye in Ayah. Hannah, on the contrary, was the
+reverse of graceful; stumpy and heavy-footed, she gave an impression of
+abrupt terminations. Everything about her seemed too short except her
+caps, which were unusually tall and white and starchy. Her afternoon
+aprons, too, were stiffer and whiter and more voluminous than those of
+other folk. She did not regard these things as vain adornings of her
+person, rather were they the outward and visible sign of her office as
+housekeeper to Miss Ross. They were a partial expression of the dignity
+of that office, just as a minister's gown is the badge of his.
+
+By the time everyone was washed and brushed Meg returned with the
+luggage and Hannah brought in tea.
+
+"I thought you'd like to give the bairns their tea yourself the first
+day, Miss Jan. Will that Hindu body have hers in the nursery?"
+
+"That would be best," Jan said hastily. "And Hannah, you mustn't be
+surprised if she sits on the floor. Indian servants always do."
+
+"_Nothing_ she can do will surprise me," Hannah announced loftily. "I've
+not forgotten the body that came back with Mrs. Tancred, with a ring
+through her nose and a red wafer on her forehead."
+
+Jan, herself, went with Ayah to the nursery, where she found that in
+spite of her disparaging sniffs, Hannah had put out everything poor Ayah
+could possibly want.
+
+The children were hungry and tea was a lengthy meal. It was not until
+they had departed with Ayah for more washings that Jan found time to
+say: "Why don't you take off your hat, Meg dear? I can't see you
+properly in that extinguisher. Is it the latest fashion?"
+
+"The very latest."
+
+Meg looked queerly at Jan as she slowly took off her hat.
+
+"There!" she said.
+
+Her hair was cropped as short as a boy's, except for the soft, tawny
+rings that framed her face.
+
+"Meg!" Jan cried. "Why on earth have you cut off your hair?"
+
+"Chill penury's the cause. I've turned it into good hard cash. It
+happens to be the fashionable colour just now."
+
+"Did you really need to? I thought you were getting quite a good salary
+with those Hoffmeyers."
+
+"No English governess gets a _good_ salary in Bremen, and mine was but a
+modest remuneration, so I wanted more. Do you remember Lady Penelope
+Pottinger?"
+
+"Hazily. She was pretty, wasn't she ... and very smart?"
+
+"She was and is ... smarter than ever now--mind, I put you on your
+honour never to mention it--_she's_ got my hair."
+
+"Do you mean she asked you to sell it?"
+
+"No, my child. I offered it for sale and she was all over me with
+eagerness to purchase. Hair's the defective wire in her lighting
+apparatus. Her own, at the best, is skimpy and straight, though very
+much my colour, and what with permanent waving and instantaneous hair
+colouring it was positively dwindling away."
+
+"I wish you had let it dwindle."
+
+"No, I rather like her--so I suggested she should give her own poor
+locks a rest and have an artistic _postiche_ made with mine; it made
+two, one to come and one to go--to the hairdresser. She looks perfectly
+charming. I'd no idea my hair was so decent till I saw it on her head."
+
+"I hope _I_ never shall," Jan said gloomily. "I think it was silly of
+you, for it makes you look younger and more irresponsible than ever; and
+what about posts?"
+
+"I've got a post in view where it won't matter if only I can run things
+my own way."
+
+"Will you have to go at once? I thought, perhaps----"
+
+"I wish to take this post at once," Meg interposed quickly, "but it
+depends on you whether I get it."
+
+"On me?"
+
+"On no one else. Look here, Jan, will you take me on as nurse to Fay's
+children? A real nurse, mind, none of your fine lady arrangements; only
+you must pay me forty pounds a year. I can't manage with less if I'm to
+give my poor little Papa any chirps ... I suppose that's a frightful lot
+for a nurse?"
+
+"Not for a good nurse ... But, Meg, you got eighty when you taught the
+little boys, and I know they'd jump at you again in that school, hair or
+no hair."
+
+"Listen, Jan." Meg put her elbows on the table and leaned her sharp
+little chin on her two hands while she held Jan's eyes with hers. "For
+nine long years, except that time with the Trents, I've been teaching,
+teaching, teaching, and I'm sick of teaching. I'd rather sweep a
+crossing."
+
+"Yet you teach so well; you know the little boys adored you."
+
+"I love children and they usually like me. If you take me to look after
+Tony and little Fay, I'll do it thoroughly, I can promise you. I won't
+teach them, mind, not a thing--I'll make them happy and well-mannered;
+and, Jan, listen, do you suppose there's anybody, even the most
+superior of elderly nurses, who would take the trouble for Fay's
+children that I should? If you let me come you won't regret it, I
+promise you."
+
+Meg's eyes, those curious eyes with the large pupil and blue iris
+flecked with brown, were very bright, her voice was earnest, and when it
+ceased it left a sense of tension in the very air.
+
+Jan put out her hand across the table, and Meg, releasing her sharp
+little chin, clasped it with hers.
+
+"So that's settled," Meg announced triumphantly.
+
+"No." Jan's voice was husky but firm. "It's not settled. I don't think
+you're strong enough; but, even so, if I could pay you the salary you
+ought to have, I'd jump at you ... but, my dear, I can't at present. I
+haven't the least idea what it will all cost, but the fares and things
+have made such a hole in this year's money I'll need to be awfully
+careful."
+
+"That's exactly why I want to come; you've no idea of being careful and
+doing things in a small way. I've done it all my life. You'll be far
+more economical with me than without me."
+
+"Don't tempt me," Jan besought her. "I see all that, but why should I be
+comfortable at your expense? I want you more than I can say. Fay wanted
+it too--she said so."
+
+"Did Fay actually say so? Did she?"
+
+"Yes, she did--not that you should be their nurse, we neither of us ever
+thought of that; but she did want you to be there to help me with the
+children. We used to talk about it."
+
+"Then I'm coming. I must. Don't you see how it is, Jan? Don't you
+realise that nearly all the happiness in my life--_all_ the happiness
+since the boys left--has come to me through Mr. Ross and Fay and you?
+And now when there's a chance for me to do perhaps a little something in
+return ... If you don't let me, it's you who are mean and grudging. I
+shall be perfectly strong, if I haven't got to teach--mind, I won't do
+that, not so much as A.B.C."
+
+"I know it's wrong," Jan sighed, "just because it would be so heavenly
+to have you."
+
+Meg loosed the hand she held and stood up. She lifted her thin arms
+above her head, as though invoking some invisible power, stretched
+herself, and ran round the table to kiss Jan.
+
+"And do you never think, you dear, slow-witted thing, that it will be
+rather lovely for _me_ to be with you? To be with somebody who is kind
+without being patronising, who treats one as a human being and not a
+machine, who sees the funny side of things and isn't condescending or
+improving if she doesn't happen to be cross?"
+
+"I'm often cross," Jan said.
+
+"Well, and what if you are? Can't I be cross back? I'm not afraid of
+your crossness. You never hit below the belt. Now, promise me you'll
+give me a trial. Promise!"
+
+Meg's arms were round her neck, Meg's absurd cropped head was rubbing
+against hers. Jan was very lonely and hungry for affection just then,
+timid and anxious about the future. Even in that moment of time it
+flashed upon her what a tower of strength this small, determined
+creature would be, and how infinitely hard it was to turn Meg from any
+course she had determined on.
+
+"For a little while, then," so Jan salved her conscience. "Just till we
+all shake down ... and your hair begins to grow."
+
+Meg stood up very straight and shook her finger at Jan. "Remember, I'm
+to be a real, proper nurse with authority, and a clinical thermometer
+... and a uniform."
+
+"If you like, and it's a pretty uniform."
+
+Meg danced gleefully round the table.
+
+"It will be lovely, it is lovely. I've got it all ready; green linen
+frocks, big _well_-fitting aprons, and such beautiful caps."
+
+"Not caps, Meg!" Jan expostulated. "Please not caps."
+
+"Certainly caps. How otherwise am I to cover up my head? I can't wear
+hats all the time. And how could I ever inspire those children with
+respect with a head like this? When I get into my uniform you'll see
+what a very superior nurse I look."
+
+"You'll look much more like musical comedy than sober service."
+
+"You mistake the situation altogether," Meg said loftily. "I take my
+position very seriously."
+
+"But you can't go about Wren's End in caps. Everybody knows you down
+there."
+
+"They'll find out they don't know me as well as they thought, that's
+all."
+
+"Meg, tell me, what did Hannah say when she saw your poor shorn head?"
+
+"Hannah, as usual, referred to my Maker, and said that had He intended
+me to have short hair He would either have caused it not to grow or
+afflicted me with some disease which necessitated shearing; and she
+added that such havers are just flying in the face of Providence."
+
+"So they are."
+
+"All the more reason to cover them up, and I wish to impress the
+children."
+
+"Those children will be sadly browbeaten, I can see, and as for their
+poor aunt, she won't be able to call her soul her own."
+
+"That," Meg said, triumphantly, "is precisely why I'm so eager to come.
+When you've been an underling all your life you can't imagine what a joy
+it is to be top dog occasionally."
+
+"In that respect," Jan said firmly, "it must be turn and turn about. I
+won't let you come unless you promise--swear, here and now--that when I
+consider you are looking fagged--'a wispy wraith,' as Daddie used to
+say--if I command you to take a day in bed, in bed you will stay till I
+give you leave to get up. Unless you promise me this, the contract is
+off."
+
+"I'll promise anything you like. The idea of being _pressed_ to remain
+in bed strikes me as merely comic. You have evidently no notion how
+persons in a subordinate position ought to be treated. Bed, indeed!"
+
+"I think you might have waited till I got back before you parted with
+your hair." Jan's tone was decidedly huffy.
+
+"Now don't nag. That subject is closed. What about _your_ hair. Do you
+know it is almost white?"
+
+"And what more suitable for a maiden aunt? As that is to be my _r�le_
+for the future I may as well look the part."
+
+"But you don't--that's what I complain of. The whiter your hair grows
+the younger your face gets. You're a contradiction, a paradox, you
+provoke conjecture, you're indecently noticeable. Mr. Ross would have
+loved to paint you."
+
+Jan shook her head. "No, Daddie never wanted to paint anything about me
+except my arms."
+
+"He'd want to paint you now," Meg insisted obstinately. "_I_ know the
+sort of person he liked to paint."
+
+"He never would paint people unless he _did_ like them," Jan said,
+smiling as at some recollection. "Do you remember how he utterly refused
+to paint that rich Mr. Withells down at Amber Guiting?"
+
+"I remember," and Meg laughed. "He said Mr. Withells was puffy and
+stippled."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tony had been cold ever since he reached the Gulf of Lyons, and he
+wondered what could be the matter with him, for he never remembered to
+have felt like this before. He wondered miserably what could be the
+reason why he felt so torpid and shivery, disinclined to move, and yet
+so uncomfortable when he sat still.
+
+After his bath, on that first night in London, tucked into a little bed
+with a nice warm eiderdown over him, he still felt that horrid little
+trickle of ice-cold water down his spine and could not sleep.
+
+His cot was in Auntie Jan's room with a tall screen round it. The rooms
+in the flat were small, tiny they seemed to Tony, after the lofty
+spaciousness of the bungalow in Bombay, but that didn't seem to make it
+any warmer, because Auntie Jan's window was wide open as it would
+go--top and bottom--and chilly gusts seemed to blow round his head in
+spite of the screen. Ayah and little Fay were in the nursery across the
+passage, where there was a fire. There was no fire in this wind-swept
+chamber of Auntie Jan's.
+
+Tony dozed and woke and woke and dozed, getting colder and more forlorn
+and miserable with each change of position. The sheets seemed made of
+ice, so slippery were they, so unkind and unyielding and unembracing.
+
+Presently he saw a dim light. Auntie Jan had come to bed, carrying a
+candle. He heard her say good night to the little mem who had met them
+at the station, and the door was shut.
+
+In spite of her passion for fresh air, Jan shivered herself as she
+undressed. She made a somewhat hasty toilet, said her prayers, peeped
+round the screen to see that Tony was all right, and hopped into bed,
+where a hot-water bottle put in by the thoughtful Hannah was most
+comforting.
+
+Presently she heard a faint, attenuated sniff. Again it came, this time
+accompanied by the ghost of something like a groan.
+
+Jan sat up in bed and listened. Immediately all was perfectly still.
+
+She lay down again, and again came that sad little sniff, and
+undoubtedly it was from behind the screen that it came.
+
+Had Tony got cold?
+
+Jan leapt out of bed, switched on the light and tore away the screen
+from around his bed.
+
+Yes; his doleful little face was tear-stained.
+
+"Tony, Tony darling, what is the matter?"
+
+"I don't know," he sobbed. "I feel so funny."
+
+Jan put her hand on his forehead--far from being hot, the little face
+was stone-cold. In a moment she had him out of bed and in her warm arms.
+As she took him she felt the chill of the stiff, unyielding small body.
+
+"My precious boy, you're cold as charity! Why didn't you call me long
+ago? Why didn't you tell Auntie Jan?"
+
+"I didn't ... know ... what it was," he sobbed.
+
+In no time Tony was put into the big bed, the bed so warm from Auntie
+Jan's body, with a lovely podgy magic something at his feet that
+radiated heat. Auntie Jan slammed down the window at the bottom, and
+then more fairness! She struck a match, there was a curious sort of
+"plop," and a little fire started in the grate, an amazing little fire
+that grew redder and redder every minute. Auntie Jan put on a blue
+dressing-gown over the long white garment that she wore, and bustled
+about. Tony decided that he "liked to look at her" in this blue robe,
+with her hair in a great rope hanging down. She was very quick; she
+fetched a little saucepan and he heard talking in the passage outside,
+but no one else came in, only Auntie Jan.
+
+Presently she gave him milk, warm and sweet, in a blue cup. He drank it
+and began to feel much happier, drowsy too, and contented. Presently
+there was no light save the red glow of the fairy fire, and Auntie Jan
+got into bed beside him.
+
+She put her arm about him and drew him so that his head rested against
+her warm shoulder. He did not repulse her, he did not speak, but lay
+stiff and straight with his feet glued against that genial podgy
+something that was so infinitely comforting.
+
+"You are kind," Tony said suddenly. "I believe you."
+
+The stiff little body relaxed and lay against hers in confiding
+abandonment, and soon he was sound asleep.
+
+What a curious thing to say! Jan lay awake puzzling. Tragedy lay behind
+it. Only five years old, and yet, to Tony, belief was a more important
+thing than love. She thought of Fay, hectic and haggard, and again she
+seemed to hear her say in her tired voice, trying to explain Tony: "He's
+not a cuddly child; he's queer and reserved and silent, but if he once
+trusts you it's for always; he'll love you then and never change."
+
+Jan could just see, in the red glow from the fire, the little head that
+lay so confidingly against her shoulder, the wide forehead, the
+peacefully closed eyes. And suddenly she realised that the elusive
+resemblance to somebody that had always evaded her was a likeness to
+that face she saw in the glass every time she did her hair. She kissed
+him very softly, praying the while that she might never fail him; that
+he might always have reason to trust her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE STATE OF PETER
+
+
+Meanwhile Peter was making discoveries about himself. He went back to
+his flat on the evening of the day Jan and the children sailed. Swept
+and garnished and exceedingly tidy, it appeared to have grown larger
+during his absence and seemed rather empty. There was a sense of
+unfilled spaces that caused him to feel lonely.
+
+That very evening he decided he must get a friend to chum with him. The
+bungalow was much too big for one person.
+
+This had never struck him before.
+
+In spite of their excessive neatness there remained traces of Jan and
+the children in the rooms. The flowers on the dinner-table proclaimed
+that they had been arranged by another hand than Lalkhan's. He was
+certain of that without Lalkhan's assurance that the Miss-Sahib had done
+them herself before she sailed that very morning.
+
+When he went to his desk after dinner--never before or after did Peter
+possess such an orderly bureau--he found a letter lying on the
+blotting-pad, and on each side of the heavy brass inkstand were placed a
+leaden member of a camel-corps and an India-rubber ball with a face
+painted upon it, which, when squeezed, expressed every variety of
+emotion. These, Lalkhan explained, were parting gifts from the young
+sahib and little Fay respectively, and had been so arranged by them just
+before they sailed.
+
+The day before Jan had told the children that all this time they had
+been living in Peter's house and that she was sure Mummy would want them
+to be very grateful (she was careful to talk a great deal about Mummy to
+the children lest they should forget her); that he had been very kind to
+them all, and she asked if there was anything of their very own they
+would like to leave for Peter as a remembrance.
+
+Tony instantly fetched the camel-corps soldier that kept guard on a
+chair by his cot every night; that Ayah had not been permitted to pack
+because it must accompany him on the voyage. It was, Jan knew, his most
+precious possession, and she assured him that Peter would be
+particularly gratified by such a gift.
+
+Not to be outdone by her brother, little Fay demanded her beloved ball,
+which was already packed for the voyage in Jan's suit-case.
+
+Peter sat at his desk staring at the absurd little toys with very kind
+eyes. He understood. Then he opened Jan's letter and read it through
+quite a number of times.
+
+"Dear Mr. Ledgard," it ran.
+
+"Whatever Mr. Kipling may say of the Celt, the lowland Scot finds it
+very difficult to express strong feeling in words. If I had tried to
+tell you, face to face, how sensible I am of your kindness and
+consideration for us during the last sad weeks--I should have cried. You
+would have been desperately uncomfortable and I--miserably ashamed of
+myself. So I can only try to write something of my gratitude.
+
+"We have been your guests so long and your hospitality has been so
+untiring in circumstances sad and strange enough to try the patience of
+the kindest host, that I simply cannot express my sense of obligation;
+an obligation in no wise burdensome because you have always contrived to
+make me feel that you took pleasure in doing all you have done.
+
+"I wish there had been something belonging to my sister that I could
+have begged you to accept as a remembrance of her; but everything she
+had of the smallest value has disappeared--even her books. When I get
+home I hope to give you one of my father's many portraits of her, but I
+will not send it till I know whether you are coming home this summer.
+Please remember, should you do so, as I sincerely hope you will, that
+nowhere can there be a warmer welcome for you than at Wren's End. It
+would be the greatest possible pleasure for the children and me to see
+you there, and it is a good place to slack in and get strong. And there
+I hope to challenge you to the round of golf we never managed during my
+time in India.
+
+"Please try to realise, dear Mr. Ledgard, that my sense of your kindness
+is deep and abiding, and, believe me, yours, in most true gratitude,
+
+                                             "JANET ROSS."
+
+For a long time Peter sat very still, staring at the cheerful,
+highly-coloured face painted on Fay's ball. Cigarette after cigarette
+did he smoke as he reviewed the experience of the last six weeks.
+
+For the first time since he became a man he had been constantly in the
+society of a woman younger than himself who appeared too busy and too
+absorbed in other things to remember that she was a woman and he a man.
+
+Peter was ordinarily susceptible, and he was rather a favourite with
+women because of his good manners; and his real good-nature made him
+ready to help either in any social project that happened to be towards
+or in times of domestic stress. Yet never until lately had he seen so
+much of any woman not frankly middle-aged without being conscious that
+he _was_ a man and she a woman, and this added, at all events, a certain
+piquancy to the situation.
+
+Yet he had never felt this with Jan.
+
+Quite a number of times in the course of his thirty years he had fallen
+in love in an agreeably surface sort of way without ever being deeply
+stirred. Love-making was the pleasantest game in the world, but he had
+not yet felt the smallest desire to marry. He was a shrewd young man,
+and knew that marriage, even in the twentieth century, at all events
+starts with the idea of permanence; and, like many others who show no
+inclination to judge the matrimonial complications of their
+acquaintance, he would greatly have disliked any sort of scandal that
+involved himself or his belongings.
+
+He was quite as sensitive to criticism as other men in his service, and
+he knew that he challenged it in lending his flat to Mrs. Tancred. But
+here he felt that the necessities of the case far outweighed the
+possibilities of misconception, and after Jan came he thought no more
+about it.
+
+Yet in a young man with his somewhat cynical knowledge of the world, it
+was surprising that the thought of his name being coupled with Jan's
+never crossed his mind. He forgot that none of his friends knew Jan at
+all, but that almost every evening they did see her with him in the
+car--sometimes, it is true, accompanied by the children, but quite as
+often alone--and that during her visit his spare time was so much
+occupied in looking after the Tancred household that his friends saw
+comparatively little of him, and Peter was, as a rule, a very sociable
+person.
+
+Therefore it came upon him as a real shock when people began to ask him
+point-blank whether he was engaged to Jan, and if so, what they were
+going to do about Tancred's children. Rightly or wrongly, he discerned
+in the question some veiled reflection upon Jan, some implied slur upon
+her conduct. He was consequently very short and huffy with these
+inquisitive ones, and when he was no longer present they would shake
+their heads and declare that "poor old Peter had got it in the neck."
+
+If so, poor old Peter was, as yet, quite unconscious of anything of the
+kind.
+
+Nevertheless he found himself constantly thinking about her. Everything,
+even the familiar streets and roads, served to remind him of her, and
+when he went to bed he nearly always dreamed about her. Absurd,
+inconsequent, unsatisfactory dreams they were; for in them she was
+always too busy to pay any attention to him at all; she was wholly
+absorbed by what it is to be feared Peter sometimes called "those
+confounded children." Though even in his dream world he was careful to
+keep his opinion to himself.
+
+Why on earth should he always dream of Jan during the first part of the
+night?
+
+Lalkhan could have thrown some light upon the subject. But naturally
+Peter did not confide his obsession to Lalkhan.
+
+Just before she left Jan asked Lalkhan where the sahib's linen was kept,
+and on being shown the cupboard which contained the rather untidy little
+piles of sheets, pillow-cases, and towels that formed Peter's modest
+store of house linen, she rearranged it and brought sundry flat, square
+muslin bags filled with dried lavender. Lace-edged bags with
+lavender-coloured ribbon run through insertion and tied in bows at the
+two corners. These bags she placed among the sheets, much to the wonder
+of Lalkhan, who, however, decided that it was kindly meant and therefore
+did not interfere.
+
+The odour was not one that commended itself to him. It was far too faint
+and elusive. He could understand a liking for attar of roses, of
+jessamine, of musk, or of any of the strong scents beloved by the native
+of India. Yet had she proposed to sprinkle the sheets with any of these
+essences he would have felt obliged to interfere, as the sahib swore
+violently and became exceedingly hot and angry did any member of his
+household venture into his presence thus perfumed. Even as it was he
+fully expected that his master would irritably demand the cause of the
+infernal smell that pervaded his bed; so keen are the noses of the
+sahibs. Whereupon Lalkhan, strong in rectitude, would relate exactly
+what had happened, produce one of the Jan-incriminating muslin bags,
+escape further censure, and doubtless be commanded to burn it and its
+fellows in the kitchen stove. But nothing of the kind occurred, and, as
+it is always easier to leave a thing where it has been placed than to
+remove it, the lavender remained among the sheets in humble obscurity.
+
+The old garden at Wren's End abounded in great lavender bushes, and
+every year since it became her property Jan made lavender sachets which
+she kept in every possible place. Her own clothes always held a faint
+savour of lavender, and she had packed these bags as much as a matter of
+course as she packed her stockings. It seemed a shame, though, to take
+them home again when she could get plenty more next summer, so she left
+them in the bungalow linen cupboard. They reproduced her atmosphere;
+therefore did Peter dream of Jan.
+
+A fortnight passed, and on their way to catch the homeward mail came
+Thomas Crosbie and his wife from Dariawarpur to stay the night. Next
+morning at breakfast Mrs. Crosbie, young, pretty and enthusiastic,
+expatiated on the comfort of her room, finally exclaiming: "And how,
+Mr. Ledgard, do you manage to have your sheets so deliciously scented
+with lavender--d'you get it sent out from home every year?"
+
+"Lavender?" Peter repeated. "I've got no lavender. My people never sent
+me any, and I've certainly never come across any in India."
+
+"But I'm convinced everything smelt of lavender. It made me think of
+home so. If I hadn't been just going I'd have been too homesick for
+words. I'm certain of it. Think! You must have got some from somewhere
+and forgotten it."
+
+Peter shook his head. "I've never noticed it myself--you really must be
+mistaken. What would I be doing with lavender?"
+
+"It was there all the same," Mrs. Crosbie continued. "I'm certain of it.
+You must have got some from somewhere. Do find out--I'm sure I'm not
+wrong. Ask your boy."
+
+Peter said something to Lalkhan, who explained volubly. Tom Crosbie
+grinned; he understood even fluent Hindustani. His wife did not. Peter
+looked a little uncomfortable. Lalkhan salaamed and left the room.
+
+"Well?" Mrs. Crosbie asked.
+
+"It seems," Peter said slowly, "there _is_ something among the sheets.
+I've sent Lalkhan to get it."
+
+Lalkhan returned, bearing a salver, and laid on the salver was one of
+Jan's lavender bags. He presented it solemnly to his master, who with
+almost equal solemnity handed it to Mrs. Crosbie.
+
+"There!" she said. "Of course I knew I couldn't be mistaken. Now where
+did you get it?"
+
+"It was, I suppose, put among the things when poor Mrs. Tancred had the
+flat. I never noticed, of course--it's such an unobtrusive sort of
+smell...."
+
+"Hadn't she a sister?" Mrs. Crosbie asked, curiously, holding the little
+sachet against her soft cheek and looking very hard at Peter.
+
+"She had. It was she who took the children home, you know."
+
+"Older or younger than Mrs. Tancred?"
+
+"Older."
+
+"How much older?"
+
+"I really don't know," said the mendacious Peter.
+
+"Was she awfully pretty, too?"
+
+"Again, I really don't know. I never thought about her looks ... she had
+grey hair...."
+
+"Oh!" Mrs. Crosbie exclaimed--a deeply disappointed "Oh." "Probably much
+older, then. That explains the lavender bags."
+
+Silent Thomas Crosbie looked from his wife to Peter with considerable
+amusement. He realised, if she didn't, that Peter was most successfully
+putting her off the scent of more than lavender; but men are generally
+loyal to each other in these matters, and he suddenly took his part in
+the conversation and changed the subject.
+
+Among Peter's orders to his butler that morning was one to the effect
+that nothing the Miss-Sahib had arranged in the bungalow was to be
+disturbed, and the lavender bag was returned to rejoin its fellows in
+the cupboard.
+
+It was four years since Peter had had any leave, and it appeared that
+the lavender had the same effect upon him as upon Mrs. Crosbie. He felt
+homesick--and applied for leave in May.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES"
+
+
+Peter had been as good as his word, and had found a family returning to
+India who were glad to take Ayah back to Bombay. And she, though sorry
+to leave Jan and the children, acquiesced in all arrangements made for
+her with the philosophic patience of the East. March was a cold month,
+and she was often rather miserable, in spite of her pride in her shoes
+and stockings and the warm clothes Jan had provided for her.
+
+Before she left Jan interviewed her new mistress and found her kind and
+sensible, and an old campaigner who had made the voyage innumerable
+times.
+
+It certainly occurred to Jan that Peter had been extraordinarily quick
+in making this arrangement, but she concluded that he had written on the
+subject before they left India. She had no idea that he had sent a long
+and costly cable on the subject. His friend thought him very solicitous
+for her comfort, but set it down entirely to her own merits and Peter's
+discriminating good sense.
+
+When the day came Jan took Ayah to her new quarters in a taxi. Of course
+Ayah wept, and Jan felt like weeping herself, as she would like to have
+kept her on for the summer months. But she knew it wouldn't do; that
+apart from the question of expense, Hannah could never overcome her
+prejudices against "that heathen buddy," and that to have explained that
+poor Ayah was a Roman Catholic would only have made matters worse.
+Hannah was too valuable in every way to upset her with impunity, and the
+chance of sending Ayah back to India in such kind custody was too good
+to lose.
+
+Meg had deferred the adoption of the musical-comedy costume until such
+time as she took over Ayah's duties. She in no way interfered, but was
+helpful in so many unobtrusive ways that Jan, while she still felt
+guilty in allowing her to stay at all, acknowledged she could never have
+got through this time without her.
+
+Fortunately the day of Ayah's departure was fine, so that while Jan took
+her to her destination Meg took the children to spend the afternoon at
+the Zoo. To escort little Fay about London was always rather an ordeal
+to anyone of a retiring disposition. She was so fearless, so interested
+in her fellow-creatures, and so ready at all times and in all places to
+enter into conversation with absolute strangers, preferably men, that
+embarrassing situations were almost inevitable; and her speech, high and
+clear and carrying--in spite of the missing "r"--rendered it rarely
+possible to hope people did not understand what she said.
+
+They went by the Metropolitan to Baker Street and sat on one of the
+small seats at right angles to the windows, and a gentleman wearing a
+very shiny top-hat sat down opposite to them.
+
+He looked at little Fay; little Fay looked at him and, smiling her
+adorable, confident smile, leant forward, remarking: "Sahib, you wear a
+very high hat."
+
+Instantly the eyes of all the neighbouring passengers were fixed upon
+the hat and its owner. His, however, were only for the very small lady
+that faced him; the small lady in a close white bonnet and bewitching
+curls that bobbed and fluttered in the swaying of the train.
+
+He took off the immaculate topper and held it out towards her. "There,"
+he said, "would you like to look at it?"
+
+Fay carefully rubbed it the wrong way with a tentative woolly-gloved
+finger. "Plitty, high hat," she cooed. "Can plitty little Fay have it to
+keep?"
+
+But the gentleman's admiration did not carry him as far as this.
+Somewhat hastily he withdrew his hat, smoothed it (it had just been
+ironed) and placed it on his head again. Then he became aware of the
+smiling faces and concentrated gaze of his neighbours; also, that the
+attractive round face that had given him so much pleasure had exchanged
+its captivating smile for a pathetic melancholy that even promised
+tears. He turned extremely red and escaped at the next station.
+Whereupon ungrateful little Fay, who had never had the slightest
+intention of crying, remarked loftily: "Tahsome man dawn."
+
+When at last they reached the Zoo Meg took it upon herself to
+remonstrate with her younger charge.
+
+"You mustn't ask strangers for things, dear; you really mustn't--not in
+the street or in the train."
+
+"What for?" asked Fay. She nearly always said, "What for" when she meant
+"Why"; and it was as hard-worked a phrase as "What nelse?"
+
+"Because people don't do it, you know."
+
+"They do--I've heard 'em."
+
+"Well, beggars perhaps, but not nice little girls."
+
+"Do nasty little girls?"
+
+"_Only_ nasty little girls would do it, I think."
+
+Fay pondered this for a minute, then in a regretfully reflective voice
+she said sadly: "Vat was a nasty, gleedy sahib in a tlain."
+
+"Not at all," Meg argued, struggling with her mirth. "How would you have
+liked it if he'd asked you to give him your bonnet 'to keep'?"
+
+Little Fay hastily put up her hands to her head to be sure her bonnet
+was in its place, then she inquired with great interest: "What's 'is
+place, deah Med?"
+
+"Deah Med" soon found herself followed round by a small crowd of other
+sight-seers who waited for and greeted little Fay's unceasing comments
+with joyful appreciation. Such popular publicity was not at all to Meg's
+taste, and although the afternoon was extremely cold her cheeks never
+ceased to burn till she got the children safely back to the flat again.
+Tony was gloomy and taciturn. Nobody took the slightest notice of him.
+Weather that seemed to brace his sister to the most energetic gaiety
+only made him feel torpid and miserable. He was not naughty, merely
+apathetic, uninterested, and consequently uninteresting. Meg thought he
+might be homesick and sad about Ayah, and was very kind and gentle, but
+her advances met with no response.
+
+By this time Tony was sure of his aunt, but he had by no means made up
+his mind about Meg.
+
+When they got back to Kensington Meg joyously handed over the children
+to Jan while she retired to her room to array herself in her uniform.
+She was to "take over" from that moment, and approached her new sphere
+with high seriousness and an intense desire to be, as she put it, "a
+wild success."
+
+For weeks she had been reading the publications of the P. N. E. U. and
+the "Child-Study Society," to say nothing of Manuals upon "Infant
+Hygiene," "The Montessori Method" and "The Formation of Character."
+Sympathy and Insight, Duty and Discipline, Self-Control and Obedience,
+Regularity and Concentration of Effort--all with the largest
+capitals--were to be her watchwords. And she buttoned on her
+well-fitting white linen apron (newest and most approved hospital
+pattern, which she had been obliged to make herself, for she could buy
+nothing small enough) in a spirit of dedication as sincere as that
+imbuing any candidate for Holy Orders. Then, almost breathlessly, she
+put her cap upon her flaming head and surveyed the general effect in the
+long glass.
+
+Yes, it was all very satisfactory. Well-hung, short, green linen
+frock--was it a trifle short? Yet the little feet in the low-heeled
+shoes were neat as the ankles above them were slim, and one needed a
+short skirt for "working about."
+
+Perhaps there _was_ a touch of musical comedy about her appearance, but
+that was merely because she was so small and the cap, a muslin cap of a
+Quakerish shape, distinctly becoming. Well, there was no reason why she
+should want to look hideous. She would not be less capable because she
+was pleasing to the eye.
+
+She seized her flannel apron from the bed where she had placed it ready
+before she went out, and with one last lingering look at herself went
+swiftly to her new duties.
+
+Tea passed peacefully enough, though Fay asked embarrassing questions,
+such as "Why you wear suts a funny hat?"
+
+"Because I'm an ayah," Meg answered quickly.
+
+"Ayahs don't wear zose kind of hats."
+
+"English ayahs do, and I'm going to be your ayah, you know."
+
+Fay considered Meg for a minute. "No," she said, shaking her head.
+"_No._"
+
+"Have another sponge-finger," Jan suggested diplomatically, handing the
+dish to her niece, and the danger was averted.
+
+They played games with the children after tea and all went well till
+bed-time. Meg had begged Jan to leave them entirely to her, and with
+considerable misgiving she had seen Meg marshal the children to the
+bathroom and shut the door. Tony was asked as a favour to go too this
+first evening without Ayah, lest little Fay should feel lonely. It was
+queer, Jan reflected when left alone in the drawing-room, how she seemed
+to turn to the taciturn Tony for help where her obstreperous niece was
+concerned. Over and over again Tony had intervened and successfully
+prevented a storm.
+
+Meg turned on the bath and began to undress little Fay. She bore this
+with comparative meekness, but when all her garments had been removed
+she slipped from Meg's knees and, standing squarely on the floor,
+announced:
+
+"I want my own Ayah. Engliss Ayah not wass me. Own Ayah muss come bat."
+
+"She can't, my darling; she's gone to other little girls, you know--we
+told you many days ago."
+
+"She muss come bat--'_jaldi_,'" shouted Fay--"jaldi" being Hindustani
+for "quickly."
+
+Meg sighed. "I'm afraid she can't do that. Come, my precious, and let me
+bathe you; you'll get cold standing there."
+
+With a quick movement Meg seized the plump, round body. She was muscular
+though so small, and in spite of little Fay's opposition she lifted her
+into the bath. She felt Tony pull at her skirts and say something, but
+was too busy to pay attention.
+
+Little Fay was in the bath sure enough, but to wash her was quite
+another matter. You may lead a sturdy infant of three to the water in a
+fixed bath, but no power on earth can wash that infant if it doesn't
+choose. Fay screamed and struggled and wriggled and kicked, finally
+slipping right under the water, which frightened her dreadfully; she
+lost her breath for one second, only to give forth ear-splitting yells
+the next. She was slippery as a trout and strong as a leaping salmon.
+
+Jan could bear it no longer and came in. Meg had succeeded in lifting
+the terrified baby out of the bath, and she stood on the square of cork
+defying the "Engliss Ayah," wet from her topmost curl to her pink toes,
+but wholly unwashed.
+
+Tony ran to Jan and under all the din contrived to say: "It's the big
+bath; she's frightened. Ayah never put her in the big bath."
+
+Meg had forgotten this. The little tin bath they had brought from India
+for the voyage stood in a corner.
+
+It was filled, while Fay, wrapped in a Turkish towel, sobbed more
+quietly, ejaculating between the gurgles: "Nasty hat, nasty Engliss
+Ayah. I want my own deah Ayah!"
+
+When the bath was ready poor Meg again approached little Fay, but Fay
+would have none of her.
+
+"No," she wailed, "Engliss Ayah in nasty hat _not_ wass me. Tony wass
+me, _deah_ Tony."
+
+She held out her arms to her brother, who promptly received her in his.
+
+"You'd better let me," he said to the anxious young women. "We'll never
+get her finished else."
+
+So it ended in Tony's being arrayed in the flannel apron which, tied
+under his arm-pits, was not so greatly too long. With his sleeves
+turned up he washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+pointing out somewhat proudly that he "went into all the corners."
+
+[Illustration: He washed his small sister with thoroughness and
+despatch, pointing out ... that he "went into all the corners."]
+
+The washing-glove was very large on Tony's little hand, and he used a
+tremendous lot of soap--but Fay became all smiles and amiability during
+the process. Meg and Jan had tears in their eyes as they watched the
+quaint spectacle. There was something poignantly pathetic in the
+clinging together of these two small wayfarers in a strange country, so
+far from all they had known and shared in their short experience.
+
+Meg's "nasty hat" was rakishly askew upon her red curls, for Fay had
+frequently grabbed at it in her rage, and the beautiful green linen gown
+was sopping wet.
+
+"Engliss Ayah clying!" Fay remarked surprisedly. "What for?"
+
+"Because you wouldn't let me bathe you," said Meg dismally. Her voice
+broke. She really was most upset. As it happened, she did the only thing
+that would have appealed to little Fay.
+
+"Don't cly, deah Med," she said sweetly. "You sall dly me."
+
+And Meg, student of so many manuals, humbly and gratefully accepted the
+task.
+
+It had taken exactly an hour and a quarter to get Fay ready for bed.
+Indian Ayah used to do it in fifteen minutes.
+
+Consistently and cheerfully gracious, Fay permitted Meg to carry her to
+her cot and tuck her in.
+
+Meg lit the night-light and switched off the light, when a melancholy
+voice began to chant:
+
+"_My_ Ayah always dave me a choccly."
+
+Now there was no infant in London less deserving of a choccly at that
+moment than troublesome little Fay. "Nursery Hygiene" proclaimed the
+undeniable fact that sweetmeats last thing at night are most injurious.
+Duty and Discipline and Self-Control should all have pointed out the
+evil of any indulgence of the sort. Yet Meg, with all her theories quite
+fresh and new, and with this excellent opportunity of putting them into
+practice, extracted a choccly from a box on the chest of drawers; and
+when the voice, "like broken music," announced for the third time, "_My_
+Ayah always dave me a choccly," "So will this Ayah," said Meg, and
+popped it into the mouth whence the voice issued.
+
+There was a satisfied smacking and munching for a space, when the voice
+took up the tale:
+
+"Once Tony had thlee----"
+
+But what it was Tony once had "thlee" of Meg was not to know that night,
+for naughty little Fay fell fast asleep.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a week Tony bathed his sister every night. Neither Jan nor Meg felt
+equal to facing and going through again the terrors of that first night
+without Ayah. Little Fay was quite good--she permitted Meg to undress
+her and even to put her in the little bath, but once there she always
+said firmly, "Tony wass me," and Tony did.
+
+Then he burned his hand.
+
+He was never openly and obstreperously disobedient like little Fay. On
+the whole he preferred a quiet life free from contention. But very early
+in their acquaintance Jan had discovered that what Tony determined upon
+that he did, and in this he resembled her so strongly that she felt a
+secret sympathy with him, even when such tenacity of purpose was most
+inconvenient.
+
+He liked to find things out for himself, and no amount of warning or
+prohibition could prevent his investigations. Thus it came about that,
+carefully guarded as the children were from any contact with the fires,
+Tony simply didn't believe what was told him of their dangers.
+
+Fires were new to him. They were so pretty, with their dancing flames,
+it seemed a pity to shut them in behind those latticed guards Auntie Jan
+was so fond of. Never did Tony see the fires without those tiresome
+guards and he wanted to very much.
+
+One afternoon just before tea, while Meg was changing little Fay's
+frock, he slipped across to the drawing-room where Auntie Jan was busy
+writing a letter. Joy! the guard was off the fire; he could sit on the
+rug and watch it undisturbed. He made no noise, but knelt down softly in
+front of it and stretched out his hands to the pleasant warmth. It was
+the sort of fire Tony liked to watch, red at the heart, with little
+curling flames that were mirrored in the tiled hearth.
+
+Jan looked up from her writing and saw him there, saw also that there
+was no guard, but, as little Fay had not yet come, thought Tony far too
+sensible to interfere with the fire in any way. She went on with her
+writing; then when she looked again something in the intentness of his
+attitude caused her to say: "Be sure you don't get too near the fire,
+Tony; it hurts badly to be burned."
+
+"Yes, Auntie Jan," Tony said meekly.
+
+She wrote a few lines more, looked up, and held her breath. It would
+have been an easy matter even then to dash across and put on the guard;
+but in a flash Jan realised that to let Tony burn himself a little at
+that moment might save a very bad accident later on. There was nothing
+in his clothes to catch alight. His woollen jersey fitted closely.
+
+Exactly as though he were going to pick a flower, with curved hand
+outstretched Tony tried to capture and hold one of the dancing flames.
+He drew his hand back very quickly, and Jan expected a loud outcry, but
+none came. He sat back on the hearth-rug and rocked his body to and fro,
+holding the burnt right hand with his left, but he did not utter a
+sound.
+
+"It does hurt, doesn't it?" said Jan.
+
+He started at the quiet voice and turned a little puckered face towards
+her. "Yes," he said, with a big sigh; "but I know now."
+
+"Come with me and I'll put something on it to make it hurt less," said
+Jan, and crossed to the door.
+
+"Hadn't we better," he said, rather breathlessly, "put that thing on for
+fear of Fay?"
+
+Jan carefully replaced the "thing" and took him to her room, where she
+bandaged the poor little hand with carron-oil and cotton-wool. The outer
+edge was scorched from little finger to wrist. She made no remark while
+she did it, and Tony leaned confidingly against her the while.
+
+"Is that better?" she asked, when she had fastened the final safety-pin
+in the bandage. There was one big tear on Tony's cheek.
+
+"It's nice and cool, that stuff. _Why_ does it hurt so, Auntie Jan? It
+looks so kind and pretty."
+
+"It is kind and pretty, only we mustn't go too near. Will you be sure
+and tell Fay how it can hurt?"
+
+"I'll _tell_ her," he promised, but he didn't seem to have much hope of
+the news acting as a deterrent.
+
+When at bed-time Jan announced that Tony could not possibly bathe Fay
+because he mustn't get his hand wet or disturb the dressing, she and Meg
+tremblingly awaited the awful fuss that seemed bound to follow.
+
+But Fay was always unexpected. "Then Med muss wass me," she remarked
+calmly. The good custom was established and Meg began to perk up again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE WHEELS OF CHANCE
+
+
+Meg was out walking with the children in Kensington Gardens, and Hannah
+was paying the tradesmen's books. It was the only way to make Hannah
+take the air, to send her, as she put it, "to do the messages." She
+liked paying the books herself, for she always suspected Jan of not
+counting the change.
+
+Jan was alone in the flat and was laying tea for the children in the
+dining-room when "ting" went the electric bell. She opened the door to
+find upon the threshold an exceedingly tall young man; a well-set-up,
+smart young man with square shoulders, who held out his hand to her,
+saying in a friendly voice: "You may just happen to remember me, Miss
+Ross, but probably not. Colonel Walcote's my uncle, and he's living in
+your house, you know. My name's Middleton ... I _hope_ you remember me,
+for I've come to ask a favour."
+
+As he spoke he gave Jan his card, and on it was "Captain Miles
+Middleton, R. H. A.," and the addresses of two clubs.
+
+She led him to the little drawing-room, bracing herself the while to be
+firm in her refusal if the Walcotes wanted the house any longer, good
+tenants though they were.
+
+She was hopelessly vague about her guest, but felt she had met him
+somewhere. She didn't like to confess how slight her recollection was,
+for he looked so big and brown and friendly it seemed unkind.
+
+He sat down, smoothed his hat, and then with an engaging smile that
+showed his excellent teeth, began: "I've come--it sounds rather
+farcical, doesn't it--about a dog?"
+
+"A dog?" Jan repeated vaguely. "What dog?"
+
+"Well, he's my dog at present, but I want him to be your dog--if you'll
+have him."
+
+"You want to give me a dog--but why? Or do you only want me to keep him
+a bit for you?"
+
+"Well, it's like this, Miss Ross; it would be cheek to ask you to keep a
+young dog, and when you'd had all the trouble of him and got fond of
+him--and you'll get awfully fond of him, if you have him--to take him
+away again. It wouldn't be fair, it really wouldn't ... so...."
+
+"Wait a bit," said the cautious Jan. "What sort of a dog is he ... if it
+is a he...."
+
+"He's a bull-terrier...."
+
+"Oh, but I don't think I'm very fond of bull-terriers ... aren't they
+fierce and doesn't one always associate them with public-houses? I
+couldn't have a fierce dog, you know, because of the two children."
+
+"They're always nice with children," Captain Middleton said firmly. "And
+as for the pothouse idea--that's quite played out. I suppose it was that
+picture with the mug and the clay pipe. He'd _love_ the children; he's
+only a child himself, you know."
+
+"A puppy! Oh, Captain Middleton, wouldn't he eat all our shoes and
+things and tear up all the rugs?"
+
+"I think he's past that, I do really--he'll be a year old on Monday.
+He'll be a splendid watchdog, and he's not a bit deaf--lots of 'em are,
+you know--and he's frightfully well-bred. Just you look at the
+pedigree ..." and Captain Middleton produced from his breast-pocket a
+folded foolscap document which he handed to Jan.
+
+She gazed at it with polite interest, though it conveyed but little to
+her mind. The name "Bloomsbury" seemed to come over and over again.
+There were many dates and other names, but "Bloomsbury" certainly
+prevailed, and it was evident that Captain Middleton's dog had a long
+pedigree; it was all quite clearly set down, and, to Jan, very
+bewildering.
+
+"His points are on the back page," Captain Middleton said proudly, "and
+there isn't a single one a perfect bull-terrier ought to have that
+William Bloomsbury hasn't got."
+
+"Is that his name?"
+
+"Yes, but I call him William, only he is of the famous Bloomsbury
+strain, you know, and one can't help being a bit proud of it."
+
+"But," Jan objected, "if he's so well-bred and perfect, he must be
+valuable--so why should you want to give him to me?"
+
+"I'll explain," said Captain Middleton. "You see, ever since they've
+been down at Wren's End, my aunt kept him for me. He's been so happy
+there, Miss Ross, and grown like anything. We're stationed in St. John's
+Wood just now, you know, and he'd be certain to be stolen if I took him
+back there. And now my aunt's coming to London to a flat in Buckingham
+Gate. Now London's no life for a dog--a young dog, anyway--he'd be
+miserable. I've been down to Wren's End very often for a few days'
+hunting, and I can see he's happy as a king there, and we may be ordered
+anywhere any day ... and I don't want to sell him ... You see, I know if
+you take him you'll be good to him ... and he _is_ such a nice beast."
+
+"How do you know I'd be good to him? You know nothing about me."
+
+"Don't I just! Besides, I've seen you, I'm seeing you now this
+minute ... I don't want to force him on you, only ... a lady living
+alone in the country ought to have a dog, and if you take William you
+won't be sorry--I can promise you that. He's got the biggest heart, and
+he's the nicest beast ... and the most faithful...."
+
+"Are you sure he'll be quite gentle with the children?"
+
+"He's gentle with everybody, and they're well known to be particularly
+good with children ... you ask anyone who knows about dogs. He was given
+me when he was three weeks old, and I could put him in my pocket."
+
+Captain Middleton was rather appealing just then, so earnest and big and
+boyish. His face was broad though lean, the features rather blunt, the
+eyes set wide apart; clear, trustworthy, light-blue eyes. He looked just
+what he was--a healthy, happy, prosperous young Englishman without a
+real care in the world. After all, Jan reflected, there was plenty of
+room at Wren's End, and it was good for the children to grow up with
+animals.
+
+"I had thought of an Airedale," she said thoughtfully, "but----"
+
+"They're good dogs, but quarrelsome--fight all the other dogs round
+about. Now William isn't a fighter unless he's unbearably provoked,
+then, of course, he fights to kill."
+
+"Oh dear!" sighed Jan, "that's an awful prospect. Think of the trouble
+with one's neighbours----"
+
+"But I assure you, it doesn't happen once in a blue moon. I've never
+known him fight yet."
+
+"I'll tell you what, Captain Middleton; let me keep him for the present,
+till you know where you're going to be stationed, and then, if you find
+you can have him, he's there for you to take. I'll do my best for him,
+but I want you to feel he's still your dog...."
+
+"It's simply no end good of you, Miss Ross. I'd like you to have him
+though ... May I put it this way? If you don't like him, find him a
+nuisance or want to get rid of him, you send for me and I'll fetch him
+away directly. But if you like him, he's your dog. There--may I leave it
+at that?"
+
+"We'll try to make him happy, but I expect he'll miss you dreadfully....
+I know nothing about bull-terriers; do they need any special
+treatment?"
+
+"Oh dear, no. William's as strong as a young calf. Just a bone
+occasionally and any scraps there are. There's tons of his biscuits down
+there ... only two meals a day and no snacks between, and as much
+exercise as is convenient--though, mind you, they're easy dogs in that
+way--they don't need you to be racing about all day like some."
+
+The present fate of William Bloomsbury with the lengthy and exalted
+pedigree being settled, Jan asked politely for her tenants, Colonel and
+Mrs. Walcote, heard that it had been an excellent and open season, and
+enjoyed her guest's real enthusiasm about Wren's End.
+
+After a few minutes of general conversation he got up to go. She saw him
+out and rang up the lift, but no lift came. She rang again and again.
+Nothing happened. Evidently something had gone wrong, and she saw people
+walking upstairs to the flats below. Just as she was explaining the
+mishap to her guest, the telephone bell sounded loudly and persistently.
+
+"Oh dear!" she cried. "Would you mind very much stopping a young lady
+with two little children, if you meet them at the bottom of the stairs,
+and tell her she is on no account to carry up little Fay. It's my
+friend, Miss Morton; she's out with them, and she's not at all strong;
+tell her to wait for me. I'll come the minute I've answered this
+wretched 'phone."
+
+"Don't you worry, Miss Ross, I'll stop 'em and carry up the kiddies
+myself," Captain Middleton called as he started to run down, and Jan
+went back to answer the telephone.
+
+He ran fast, for Jan's voice had been anxious and distressed. Five long
+flights did he descend, and at the bottom he met Meg and the children
+just arrived to hear the melancholy news from the hall porter.
+
+Meg always wheeled little Fay to and from the gardens in the funny
+little folding "pram" they had brought from India. The plump baby was a
+tight fit, but the queer little carriage was light and easily managed.
+The big policeman outside the gate often held up the traffic to let Meg
+and her charges get across the road safely, and she would sail serenely
+through the avenue of fiercely panting monsters with Tony holding on to
+her coat, while little Fay waved delightedly to the drivers. That
+afternoon she was very tired, for it had started to rain, cold, gusty
+March rain. She had hurried home in dread lest Tony should take cold. It
+seemed the last straw, somehow, that the lift should have gone wrong.
+She left the pram with the porter and was just bracing herself to carry
+heavy little Fay when this very tall young man came dashing down the
+staircase, saw them and raised his hat. "Miss Morton? Miss Ross has just
+entrusted me with a message ... that I'm to carry her niece upstairs,"
+and he took little Fay out of Meg's arms.
+
+Meg looked up at him. She had to look up a long way--and he looked down
+into a very small white face.
+
+The buffeting wind that had given little Fay the loveliest colour, and
+Tony a very pink nose, only left Meg pallid with fatigue; but she smiled
+at Captain Middleton, and it was a smile of such radiant happiness as
+wholly transfigured her face. It came from the exquisite knowledge that
+Jan had thought of her, had known she would be tired.
+
+To be loved, to be remembered, to be taken care of was to Meg the most
+wonderful thing in the world. It went to her head like wine.
+
+Therefore did she smile at Captain Middleton in this distracting
+fashion. It started tremblingly at the corners of her mouth, and
+then--quite suddenly--her wan little face became dimpled and beseeching
+and triumphant all at once.
+
+It had no connection whatsoever with Captain Middleton, but how was he
+to know that?
+
+It fairly bowled him, middle stump, first ball.
+
+No one had ever smiled at him like that before. It turned him hot and
+cold, and gave him a lump in his throat with the sheer heartrending
+pathos of it. And he felt an insane desire to lie down and ask this
+tiny, tired girl to walk upon him if it would give her the smallest
+satisfaction.
+
+The whole thing passed in a flash, but for him it was one of those
+illuminating beams that discovers a hitherto undreamed-of panorama.
+
+He caught up little Fay, who made no objection, and ran up all five
+flights about as fast as he had run down. Jan was just coming out of the
+flat.
+
+"Here's one!" he cried breathlessly, depositing little Fay. "And now
+I'll go down and give the little chap a ride as well."
+
+He met them half-way up. "Now it's your turn," he said to Tony. "Would
+you like to come on my back?"
+
+Tony, though taciturn, was not unobservant. "I think," he said solemnly,
+"Meg's more tired nor me. P'raps you'd better take her."
+
+Meg laughed, and what the rain and wind could not do, Tony managed. Her
+cheeks grew rosy.
+
+"I'm afraid I should be rather heavy, Tony dear, but it's kind of you to
+think of it."
+
+She looked up at Captain Middleton and smiled again. What a kind world
+it was! And really that tall young man was rather a pleasant person. So
+it fell out that Tony was carried the rest of the way, and he had a
+longer ride than little Fay; for his steed mounted the staircase
+soberly, keeping pace with Meg; they even paused to take breath on the
+landings. And it came about that Captain Middleton went back into the
+flat with the children, showing no disposition to go away, and Jan could
+hardly do less than ask him to share the tea she had laid in the
+dining-room.
+
+There he got a shock, for Meg came to tea in her cap and apron.
+
+Out of doors she wore a long, warm coat that entirely covered the green
+linen frock, and a little round fur hat. This last was a concession to
+Jan, who hated the extinguisher. So Meg looked very much like any other
+girl. A little younger, perhaps, than any young woman of twenty-five
+has any business to look, but pretty in her queer, compelling way.
+
+That she looked even prettier in her uniform Captain Middleton would
+have been the first to allow; but he hated it nevertheless. There seemed
+to him something incongruous and wrong for a girl with a smile like that
+to be anybody's nursemaid.
+
+To be sure, Miss Ross was a brick, and this queer little servant of hers
+called her by her Christian name and contradicted her flatly twice in
+the course of tea. Miss Morton certainly did not seem to be downtrodden
+... but she wore a cap and an apron--a very becoming Quakerish cap ...
+without any strings ... and--"it's a d----d shame," was the outcome of
+all Captain Middleton's reflections.
+
+"Would the man never go?" Jan wondered, when after a prolonged and
+hilarious tea he followed the enraptured children back to the
+drawing-room and did tricks with the fire-irons.
+
+Meg had departed in order to get things ready for the night, and he hung
+on in the hope that she would return. Vain hope; there was no sign of
+her.
+
+He told the children all about William Bloomsbury and exacted promises
+that they would love him very much. He discussed, with many
+interruptions from Fay, who wanted all his attention, the entire
+countryside round about Wren's End; and, at last, as there seemed really
+no chance of that extraordinary girl's return, he heaved his great
+length out of his chair and bade his hostess a reluctant farewell
+several times over.
+
+In the passage he caught sight of Meg going from one room to another
+with her arms full of little garments.
+
+"Ah," he cried, striding towards her. "Good night, Miss Morton. I hope
+we shall meet again soon," and he held out his hand.
+
+Meg ignored the hand, her own arms were so full of clothes: "I'm afraid
+that's not likely," she said, with unfeeling cheerfulness. "We all go
+down to the country on Monday."
+
+"Yes, yes, I know. Jolly part of the world it is, too. I expect I shall
+be thereabouts a good deal this summer, my relations positively swarm in
+that county."
+
+"Good-bye," said Meg, and turned to go. Jan stood at the end of the
+passage, holding the door open.
+
+"I say, Miss Morton, you'll try and like my William, won't you?"
+
+"I like all sensible animals," was Meg's response, and she vanished into
+a bedroom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+PERPLEXITIES
+
+
+"Don't you think it is very extraordinary that I have never had one line
+from Hugo since the letter I got at Aden?" asked Jan.
+
+It was Friday evening, the Indian mail was in, and there was a letter
+from Peter--the fourth since her return.
+
+"But you've heard of him from Mr. Ledgard," Meg pointed out.
+
+"Only that he had gone to Karachi from Bombay just before Fay
+died--surely he would see papers there. It seems so heartless never to
+have written me a line--I can't believe it, somehow, even of Hugo--he
+must be ill or something."
+
+"Perhaps he was ashamed to write. Perhaps he felt you would simply
+loathe him for being the cause of it all."
+
+"I did, I do," Jan exclaimed; "but all the same he is the children's
+father, and he was her husband--I don't want anything very bad to happen
+to him."
+
+"It would simplify things very much," Meg said dreamily.
+
+Jan held up her hand as if to ward off a blow.
+
+"Don't, Meg; sometimes I find myself wishing something of the kind, and
+I know it's wrong and horrible. I want as far as I can to keep in the
+right with regard to Hugo, to give him no grievance against me. I've
+written to that bank where he left the money, and asked them to forward
+the letters if he has left any address. I've told him exactly where we
+are and what we propose to do. Beyond the bare facts of Fay's death--I
+told him all about her illness as dispassionately as I could--I've never
+reproached him or said anything cruel. You see, the man is down and out;
+though Mr. Ledgard always declared he had any amount of mysterious wires
+to pull. Yet, I can't help wondering whether he is ill somewhere, with
+no money and no friends, in some dreadful native quarter."
+
+"What about the money in the bank, then? Did you use it?"
+
+Jan blushed. "No, I couldn't bear to touch his money ... Mr. Ledgard
+said it was idiotic...."
+
+"So it was; it was Fay's money, not his. For all your good sense, Jan,
+sometimes you're sentimental as a schoolgirl."
+
+"I daresay it was stupid, and I didn't dare to tell Mr. Ledgard I'd left
+it," Jan said humbly; "but I felt that perhaps that money might help him
+if things got very desperate; I left it in his name and a letter telling
+him I had done so ... I didn't _give_ him any money...."
+
+"It was precisely the same thing."
+
+"And he may never have got the letter."
+
+"I hope he hasn't."
+
+"Oh, Meg, I do so hate uncertainty. I'd rather know the worst. I always
+have the foreboding that he will suddenly turn up at Wren's End and
+threaten to take the children away ... and get money out of me that way
+... and there's none to spare...."
+
+"Jan, you've got into a thoroughly nervous, pessimistic state about
+Hugo. Why in the world should he _want_ the children? They'd be terribly
+in his way, and wherever he put them he'd have to pay _something_. You
+know very well his people wouldn't keep them for nothing, even if he
+were fool enough (for the sake of blackmailing you) to threaten to place
+them there. His sisters wouldn't--not for nothing. What did Fay say
+about his sisters? I remember one came to the wedding, but she has left
+no impression on my mind. He has two, hasn't he?"
+
+"Yes, but only one came, the Blackpool one. But Fay met both of them,
+for she spent a week-end with each, with Hugo, after she was married."
+
+"Well, and what did she say?"
+
+Jan laughed and sighed: "She said--you remember how Fay could say the
+severest things in the softest, gentlest voice--that 'for social
+purposes they were impossible, but they were doubtless excellent and
+worthy of all esteem and that they were exactly suited to the _milieu_
+in which they lived.'"
+
+"And where do they live?"
+
+"One lives at Blackpool--she's married to ... I forget exactly what he
+is--but it's something to do with letting houses. They're quite well off
+and all her towels had crochet lace at the ends. Fay was much impressed
+by this, as it scratched her nose. They also gave you 'doylies' at
+afternoon tea and no servant ever came into the room without knocking."
+
+"Any children?"
+
+"Yes, three."
+
+"And the other sister?"
+
+"She lives at Poulton-le-Fylde, and her husband had to do with a
+newspaper syndicate. Quite amusing he was, Fay says, but very shaky as
+to the letter 'H.'"
+
+"Would they like the children?"
+
+"They might, for they've none of their own, but they certainly wouldn't
+take them unless they were paid for, as they were not well off. They
+were rather down on the Blackpool sister, Fay said, for extravagance and
+general swank."
+
+"What about the grandparents?"
+
+"In Guernsey? They're quite nice old people, I believe, but
+curiously--of course I'm quoting Fay--comatose and uninterested in
+things, 'behindhand with the world,' she said. They thought Hugo very
+wonderful, and seemed rather afraid of him. What he has told them lately
+I don't know. He wrote very seldom, they said; but _I've_ written to
+them, saying I've got the children and where we shall be. If they
+express a wish to see the children I'll ask them to Wren's End. If, as
+would be quite reasonable, they say it's too far to come--they're old
+people, you know--I suppose one of us would need to take them over to
+Guernsey for a visit. I do so want to do the right thing all round, and
+then they can't say I've kept the children away from their father's
+relations."
+
+"Scotch people always think such a lot about relations," Meg grumbled.
+"I should leave them to stew in their own juice. Why should you bother
+about them if he doesn't?"
+
+"They're all quite respectable, decent folk, you know, though they
+mayn't be our kind. The father, I fancy, failed in business after he
+came back from India. Fay said he was very meek and depressed always. I
+think she was glad none of them came to the wedding except the Blackpool
+sister, for she didn't want Daddie to see them. He thought the Blackpool
+sister dreadful (he told me afterwards that she 'exacerbated his mind
+and offended his eye'), but he was charming to her and never said a word
+to Fay."
+
+"I don't see much sign of Hugo and his people in the children."
+
+"We can't tell, they're so little. One thing does comfort me, they show
+no disposition to tell lies; but that, I think, is because they have
+never been frightened. You see, everyone bowed down before them; and
+whatever Indian servants may be in other respects, they seem to me
+extraordinarily kind and patient with children."
+
+"Jan, what are your views about the bringing up of children?... You've
+never said ... and I should like to know. You see, we're both"--here Meg
+sighed deeply and looked portentously grave--"in a position of awful
+responsibility."
+
+They were sitting on each side of the hearth, with their toes on the
+fender. Meg had been sewing at an overall for little Fay, but at that
+moment she laid it on her knee and ran her hands through her cropped
+hair, then about two inches long all over her head, so that it stood on
+end in broken spirals and feathery curls above her bright eyes. In the
+evening the uniform was discarded "by request."
+
+Jan looked across at her and laughed.
+
+So funny and so earnest; so small, and yet so great with purpose.
+
+"I don't think I've any views. R. L. S. summed up the whole duty of
+children ages ago, and it's our business to see that they do it--that's
+all. Don't you remember:
+
+    A child should always say what's true,
+    And speak when he is spoken to,
+    And behave mannerly at table:
+    At least as far as he is able.
+
+It's no use to expect too much, is it?"
+
+"If you expect to get the second injunction carried out in the case of
+your niece you're a most optimistic person. For three weeks now I've
+been perambulating Kensington Gardens with those children, and I have
+never in the whole course of my life entered into conversation with so
+many strangers, and it's always she who begins it. Then complications
+arise and I have to intervene. I don't mind policemen and park-keepers
+and roadmen, but I rather draw the line at idly benevolent old gentlemen
+who join our party and seem to spend the whole morning with us...."
+
+"But, Meg, that never happens when I'm with you. I confess I've left
+you to it this last week...."
+
+"And what am I here for except to be left to it--I don't mean that
+anyone's rude or pushing--but Miss Tancred _is_ so friendly, and I'm not
+dignified and awe-inspiring like you, you great big Jan; and the poor
+men are encouraged, directly and deliberately encouraged, by your niece.
+I never knew a child with such a continual flow of conversation."
+
+"Poor Meg," said Jan, "you won't have much more of it. Little Fay _is_ a
+handful, I confess; but I always feel it must be a bit hard to be hushed
+continually--and just when one feels particularly bright and sparkling,
+to have all one's remarks cut short...."
+
+"You needn't pity that child. No amount of hushing has any effect; you
+might just as well hush a blackbird or a thrush. Don't look so worried,
+Jan. Did Mr. Ledgard say anything about Hugo in that letter to-night?"
+
+"Only that he was known to have left Karachi in a small steamer going
+round the coast, but after that nothing more. Mr. Ledgard has a friend
+in the Police, and even there they've heard nothing lately. I think
+myself the Indian Government _wants_ to lose sight of Hugo. He's
+inconvenient and disgraceful, and they'd like him blotted out as soon as
+possible."
+
+"What else does Mr. Ledgard say? He seems to write good long letters."
+
+"He is coming home at the end of April for six months."
+
+"Oh ... then we shall see him, I suppose?"
+
+"I hope so."
+
+Meg looked keenly at Jan, who was staring into the fire, her eyes soft
+and dreamy; and almost as if she was unconsciously thinking aloud, she
+said: "I do hope, if Hugo chooses to turn up, he'll wait till Mr.
+Ledgard is back in England."
+
+"You think he could manage him?"
+
+"I know he could."
+
+"Then let us pray for his return," said Meg.
+
+The clock on the mantelpiece struck eleven.
+
+"Bed-time," said Meg, "but I must have just one cigarette first. That's
+what's so lovely about being with you, Jan--you don't mind. Of course
+I'd never do it before the children."
+
+"You wouldn't shock them if you did. Fay smoked constantly."
+
+Meg lit her cigarette and clearly showed her real enjoyment. She had
+taken to it first when she was about fifteen, as she found it helped her
+to feel less hungry. Now it had become as much a necessity to her as to
+many men, and the long abstinence of term-time had always been a
+penance.
+
+She made some good rings, and, leaning forward to look through them at
+Jan, said: "By the way, I must just tell you that for the last three
+afternoons we've met that Captain Middleton in the Gardens."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"And he talks everlastingly about his dog--that William Bloomsbury
+creature. I know _all_ the points of a bull-terrier now--'Well-set head
+gradually tapering to muzzle, which is very powerful and well-filled up
+in front of the eyes. Nose large and black. Teeth dead-level and big'
+... oh! and reams more, every bit of him accurately described."
+
+"I'm a little afraid of those teeth so 'dead-level and big'--I foresee
+trouble."
+
+"Oh, no," said Meg easily. "He's evidently a most affectionate brute.
+That young man puzzles me. He's manifestly devoted to the dog, but he's
+so sure he'd be stolen he'd rather have him away from him down at Wren's
+End than here with him, to run that risk."
+
+"Surely," said Jan, "Kensington Gardens are some distance from St.
+John's Wood."
+
+"So one would think, but the rich and idle take taxis, and he seems to
+think he can in some way insure the welfare of his dog through the
+children and me."
+
+"And what about the old gentlemen? Do they join the party as well?"
+
+"Oh, dear no; no old gentlemen would dare to come within miles of us
+with that young man in charge of little Fay. He's like your Mr.
+Ledgard--very protective."
+
+"I like him for being anxious about his dog, but I'm not quite so sure
+that I approve of the means he takes to insure its happiness."
+
+"I didn't encourage him in the least, I assure you. I pointed out that
+he most certainly ought not to be walking about with a nurse and two
+children. That the children without the nurse would be all right, but
+that my being there made the whole thing highly inexpedient, and _infra
+dig_."
+
+"Meg!... you didn't!"
+
+"I did, indeed. There was no use mincing matters."
+
+"And what did he say?"
+
+"He said, 'Oh, that's all bindles'--whatever that may mean."
+
+"You mustn't go to the Gardens alone any more. I'll come with you
+to-morrow, or, better still, we'll all go to Kew if it's fine."
+
+"I _should_ be glad, though I grudge the fares; but you needn't come. I
+know how busy you are, with Hannah away and so much to see to--and what
+earthly use am I if I can't look after the children without you?"
+
+"You do look after the children without me for hours and hours on end. I
+could never trust anyone else as I do you."
+
+"I _am_ getting to manage them," Meg said proudly; "but just to-day I
+must tell you--it was rather horrid--we came face to face with the
+Trents in the Baby's Walk. Mrs. Trent and Lotty, the second girl, the
+big, handsome one--and he evidently knows them...."
+
+"Who evidently knows them?"
+
+"Captain Middleton, silly! (I told you he was with us, talking about his
+everlasting dog)--and they greeted him with effusion, so he had to stop.
+But you can imagine how they glared at me. Of course I walked on with
+Tony, but little Fay had his hand--I was wheeling the go-cart thing and
+she stuck firmly to him, and I heard her interrupting the conversation
+all the time. He followed us directly, I'll say that for him, but it was
+a bad moment ... You see, they had a right to glare...."
+
+"They had nothing of the kind. I wish I got the chance of glaring at
+them. Daddie _saw_ Mrs. Trent; he explained everything, and she said she
+quite understood."
+
+"She would, to him, he was so nice always; but you see, Jan, I know what
+she believes and what she has said, and what she will probably say to
+Captain Middleton if she gets the chance."
+
+Meg's voice broke. "Of course I don't care----"
+
+She held her tousled head very high and stuck out her sharp little chin.
+
+"My dear," said Jan, "what with my gregarious niece and my
+too-attractive nurse, I think it's a good thing we're all going down to
+Wren's End, where the garden-walls are high and the garden fairly large.
+Besides all that, there will be that dog with the teeth 'dead-level and
+big.'"
+
+"Remember," said Meg. "He treated me like a princess always."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+WREN'S END
+
+
+It stands just beyond the village of Amber Guiting, on the side furthest
+from the station, which is a mile from the village.
+
+"C. C. S. 1819" is carved above the front door, but the house was built
+a good fifty years previous to that date.
+
+One Charles Considine Smith, who had been a shipper of sherry in
+Billiter Street, in the City of London, bought it in that year from a
+Quaker called Solomon Page, who planted the yew hedge that surrounds the
+smooth green lawn seen from the windows of the morning-room. There was a
+curious clause attached to the title-deeds, which stipulated that no
+cats should be kept by the owner of Wren's End, lest they should
+interfere with the golden-crested wrens that built in the said yew
+hedge, or the brown wrens building at the foot of the hedges in the
+orchard. Appended to this injunction were the following verses:
+
+    If aught disturb the wrens that build,
+    If ever little wren be killed
+    By dweller in Wren's End--
+
+    Misfortunes--whence he shall not know--
+    Shall fall on him like noiseless snow,
+    And all his steps attend.
+
+    Peace be upon this house; and all
+    That dwell therein good luck befall,
+    That do the wrens befriend.
+
+Charles Considine Smith faithfully kept to his agreement regarding the
+protection of the wrens, and much later wrote a series of articles upon
+their habits, which appeared in the _North Cotswold Herald_. He seems to
+have been on friendly terms with Solomon Page, who, having inherited a
+larger property in the next county, removed thence when he sold Wren's
+End.
+
+In 1824 Smith married Tranquil Page, daughter of Solomon. She was then
+thirty-seven years old, and, according to one of her husband's diaries,
+"a staid person like myself." She was twenty years younger than her
+husband and bore him one child, a daughter also named Tranquil.
+
+She, however, appears to have been less staid than her parents, for she
+ran away before she was twenty with a Scottish advocate called James
+Ross.
+
+The Smiths evidently forgave the wilful Tranquil, for, on the death of
+Charles, she and her husband left Scotland and settled with her mother
+at Wren's End. She had two children, Janet, the great-aunt who left Jan
+Wren's End, and James, Jan's grandfather, who was sent to Edinburgh for
+his education, and afterwards became a Writer to the Signet. He married
+and settled in Edinburgh, preferring Scotland to England, and it was
+with his knowledge and consent that Wren's End was left to his sister
+Janet.
+
+Janet never married. She was energetic, prudent, and masterful, having
+an excellent head for business. She was kind to her nephews and nieces
+in a domineering sort of way, and had always a soft place in her heart
+for Anthony, though she regarded him as more or less of a scatter-brain.
+When she was nearly eighty she commanded his little girls to visit her.
+Jan was then fourteen and Fay eleven. She liked them because they had
+good manners and were neither of them in the least afraid of her. And at
+her death, six years later, she left Wren's End to Jan absolutely--as it
+stood; but she left her money to Anthony's elder brother, who had a
+large family and was not particularly well off.
+
+That year was a good artistic year for Anthony, and he spent over five
+hundred pounds in--as he put it--"making Jan's house habitable."
+
+This proved not a bad investment, for they had let it every winter since
+to Colonel Walcote for the hunting season, as three packs of hounds met
+within easy reach of it; and although the stabling accommodation at
+Wren's End was but small, plenty of loose boxes were always obtainable
+from Farmer Burgess quite near.
+
+Amber Guiting is a big village, almost a little town. It possesses an
+imposing main street wherein are several shops, among them a stationer's
+with a lending library in connection with Mudie's; a really beautiful
+old inn with a courtyard; and grave-looking, dignified houses occupied
+by the doctor, a solicitor, and several other persons of acknowledged
+gentility.
+
+There were many "nice places" round about, and altogether the
+inhabitants of Amber Guiting prided themselves, with some reason, on the
+social and �sthetic advantages of their neighbourhood. Moreover, it is
+not quite three hours from Paddington. You catch the express from the
+junction.
+
+Notwithstanding all these agreeable circumstances, William Bloomsbury
+was very lonely and miserable.
+
+All the friends he knew and loved had gone, leaving him in the somewhat
+stepmotherly charge of a caretaker from the village, who was supposed to
+be getting the house ready for its owner. To join her came
+Hannah--having left her young ladies with an "orra-buddy" in the flat.
+And after Hannah came the caretaker-lady did not stop long, for their
+ideas on the subject of cleanliness were diametrically opposed. Hannah
+was faithful and punctual as regarded William's meals; but though his
+body was more comfortable than during the caretaker's reign, his heart
+was empty and hungry, and he longed ardently for social intercourse and
+an occasional friendly pat.
+
+Presently in Hannah's train came Anne Chitt, a meek young assistant from
+the village, who did occasionally gratify William's longing for a little
+attention; but so soon as she began to pat him and say he was a good
+dog, she was called away by Hannah to sweep or dust or wash something.
+In William's opinion the whole house was a howling wilderness where
+pails of water easily upset, and brooms that fell upon the unsuspecting
+with resounding blows lay ambushed in unexpected places.
+
+Men and dogs alike abhor "spring-cleaning," and William's heart died
+within him.
+
+There came a day, however, when things were calmer. The echoing,
+draughty house grew still and warm, and a fire was lit in the hall.
+William lay in front of it unmolested; but he felt dejected and lonely,
+and laid his head down on his crossed paws in patient melancholy.
+
+Late in the afternoon, there came a sound of wheels in the drive. Hannah
+and Anne Chitt, decorous in black dresses and clean aprons, came into
+the hall and opened the front door, and in three minutes William knew
+that happier times were in store for him. The "station-fly" stopped at
+the door, and regardless of Hannah's reproving voice he rushed out to
+welcome the strangers. Two children, nice children, who appeared as glad
+to see him as he was to see them, who wished him many happy returns of
+his birthday--William had forgotten it was his birthday--and were as
+lavish with pats and what little Fay called "stlokes" as Hannah had been
+niggardly. There were also two young ladies, who addressed him kindly
+and seemed pleasantly aware of his existence, and William liked young
+ladies, for the three Miss Walcotes had thoroughly spoiled him. But he
+decided to attach himself most firmly to the children and the very small
+young lady. Perhaps they would stay. In his short experience grown
+people had a cruel way of disappearing. There was that tall young man
+... William hardly dared let himself think about that tall young man who
+had allowed him to lie upon his bed and was so kind and jolly. "Master"
+William had called him. Ah, where was he? Perhaps he would come back
+some day. In the meantime here were plenty of people to love. William
+cheered up.
+
+[Illustration: William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ... nice
+children.]
+
+He wished to ingratiate himself, and proceeded to show off his one
+accomplishment. With infinite difficulty and patience the Miss Walcotes
+had taught him to "give a paw"; so now, on this first evening, William
+followed the children about solemnly offering one paw and then the
+other; a performance which was greeted with acclamation.
+
+When the children went to the bathroom he somehow got shut outside. So
+he lay down and breathed heavily through the bottom of the door and
+varied this by thin, high-pitched yelps--which were really squeals, and
+very extraordinary as proceeding from such a large and heavy dog.
+
+"William wants to come in," Tony said. He still always accompanied his
+sister to the bath.
+
+Meg was seized with an inspiration. "I know why," she exclaimed. "He
+expects to see little Fay in the big bath."
+
+Fay looked from Meg to her brother and from her brother to Meg.
+
+Another dismal squeal from under the door.
+
+"Does he tluly espect it?" she asked anxiously.
+
+"I think so," Meg said gravely, "and we can't let him in if you're going
+to be washed in the little bath; he'd be so disappointed."
+
+The little bath stood ready on its stand. Fay turned her back upon it
+and went and looked over the edge of the big bath. It was a very big
+bath, white and beautiful, with innumerable silvered handles that
+produced sprays and showers and waves and all sorts of wonders. An
+extravagance of Anthony's.
+
+"Will William come in, too?" she asked.
+
+"No; he'd make such a mess; but he'd love to see you. We'll all bathe
+William some other time."
+
+More squeals from outside, varied by dolorous snores.
+
+"Let him in," said little Fay. "I'll show him me."
+
+Quick as thought Meg lifted her in, opened the door to the delighted
+William, who promptly stood on his hind legs, with his front paws on the
+bath, and looked over the edge at little Fay.
+
+"See me swim," she exclaimed proudly, sitting down in the water, while
+William, with his tongue hanging out and a fond smile of admiration on
+his foolish countenance, tried to lick the plump pink shoulders
+presented to his view. "This is a muts nicer baff than the nasty little
+one. I can't think what you bringed it for, deah Med."
+
+"Deah Med" and Tony nodded gaily to one another.
+
+Hannah had made William sleep in the scullery, which he detested. She
+put his basket there and his blanket, and he was warm enough, but
+creature comforts matter little to the right kind of dog. It's human
+fellowship he craves. That night she came to fetch him at bed-time, and
+he refused point-blank to go. He put his head on Meg's knee and gazed at
+her with beseeching eyes that said as plainly as possible: "Don't banish
+me--where you go I go--don't break my heart and send me away into the
+cold."
+
+Perhaps the cigarette smoke that hung about Meg gave him confidence. His
+master smelt like that. And William went to bed with his master.
+
+"D'you think he might sleep in the dressing-room?" Meg asked. "I know
+how young dogs hate to be alone at night. Put his basket there,
+Hannah--I'll let him out and see to him, and you could get him first
+thing in the morning."
+
+Hannah gave a sniff of disapproval, but she was always very careful to
+do whatever Meg asked her at once and ungrudgingly. It was partly an
+expression of her extreme disapproval of the uniform. But Meg thought it
+was prompted entirely by Hannah's fine feeling, and loved her dearly in
+consequence.
+
+Nearly all the bedrooms at Wren's End had dressing-rooms. Tony slept in
+Jan's, with the door between left open. Fay's little cot was drawn up
+close to Meg's bed. William and his basket occupied the dressing-room,
+and here, also, the door was left open.
+
+While Meg undressed, William was quite still and quiet, but when she
+knelt down to say her prayers he was overcome with curiosity, and,
+getting out of his basket, lurched over to her to see what she was
+about. Could she be crying that she covered her face? William couldn't
+bear people to cry.
+
+He thrust his head under her elbow. She put her arm round his neck and
+he sat perfectly still.
+
+"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"I like to look at it," said Tony.
+
+"Oh, London may be very gay, but it's nothing to the countryside," sang
+Meg.
+
+"What nelse?" inquired little Fay, who could never be content with a
+mere snatch of song.
+
+"Oh, there's heaps and heaps of nelse," Jan answered. "Come along,
+chicks, we'll go and see everything. This is home, you know, where dear
+Mummy wanted you to be."
+
+It was their first day at Wren's End, and the weather was kind. They
+were all four in the drive, looking back at the comfortable
+stone-fronted Georgian house. The sun was shining, a cheerful April sun
+that had little warmth in it but much tender light; and this showed how
+all around the hedges were getting green; that buds were bursting from
+brown twigs, as if the kind spring had covered the bare trees with a
+thin green veil; and that all sorts of green spears were thrusting up in
+the garden beds.
+
+Down the drive they all four ran, accompanied by a joyfully galumphing
+William, who was in such good spirits that he occasionally gave vent to
+a solemn deep-chested bark.
+
+When they came to the squat grey lodge, there was Mrs. Earley standing
+in her doorway to welcome them. Mrs. Earley was Earley's mother, and
+Earley was gardener and general factotum at Wren's End. Mrs. Earley
+looked after the chickens, and when she had exchanged the news with Jan,
+and rather tearfully admired "poor Mrs. Tancred's little 'uns," she
+escorted them all to the orchard to see the cocks and hens and chickens.
+Then they visited the stable, where Placid, the pony, was sole occupant.
+In former years Placid had been kept for the girls to drive in the
+governess-cart and to pull the heavy lawn-mower over the lawns. And
+Hannah had been wont to drive him into Amesberrow every Sunday, that she
+might attend the Presbyterian church there. She put him up at a
+livery-stable near her church and always paid for him herself. Anthony
+Ross usually had hired a motor for the summer months. Now they would
+depend entirely on Placid and a couple of bicycles for getting about.
+All round the walled garden did they go, and Meg played horses with the
+children up and down the broad paths while Jan discussed vegetables with
+Earley. And last of all they went to the back door to ask Hannah for
+milk and scones, for the keen, fresh air had made them all hungry.
+
+Refreshed and very crumby, they were starting out again when Hannah laid
+a detaining hand on Jan's arm: "Could you speak a minute, Miss Jan?"
+
+The children and Meg gone, Hannah led the way into the kitchen with an
+air of great mystery; but she did not shut the doors, as Anne Chitt was
+busy upstairs.
+
+"What is it, Hannah?" Jan asked nervously, for she saw that this
+summons portended something serious.
+
+"It's about Miss Morton I want to speak, Miss Jan. I was in hopes she'd
+never wear they play-acting claes down here ..." (when Hannah was deeply
+earnest she always became very Scotch), "but it seems I hoped in vain.
+And what am I to say to ither folk when they ask me about her?"
+
+"What is there to say, Hannah, except that she is my dear friend, and by
+her own wish is acting as nurse to my sister's children?"
+
+"I ken that; I'm no sayin' a word against that; but first of all she
+goes and crops her hair--fine hair she had too, though an awfu-like
+colour--and not content with flying in the face of Providence that way,
+she must needs dress like a servant. And no a weiss-like servant,
+either, but one o' they besoms ye see on the hoardings in London wha act
+in plays. Haven't I seen the pictures mysel'? 'The Quaker Gerrl,' or
+some such buddy."
+
+"Oh, I assure you, Hannah, Miss Morton in no way resembles those ladies,
+and I can't see that it's any business of ours what she wears. You know
+that she certainly does what she has undertaken to do in the best way
+possible."
+
+"I'm no saying a word against her wi' the children, and there never was
+a young lady who gave less trouble, save in the way o' tobacco ash, and
+was more ready to help--but yon haverals is very difficult to explain.
+_You_ may understand, Miss Jan. I may _say_ I understand--though I
+don't--but who's to make the like o' that Anne Chitt understand? Only
+this morning she keeps on at me wi' her questions like the clapper o' a
+bell. 'Is she a servant? If she's no, why does she wear servants' claes?
+Why does she have hair like a boy? Has she had a fever or something
+wrong wi' her heid? Is she one of they suffragette buddies and been in
+prison?'--till I was fair deeved and bade the lassie hold her tongue.
+But so it will be wherever Miss Morton goes in they fantastic claes.
+Now, Miss Jan, tell me the honest truth--did you ever see a
+self-respecting, respectable servant in the like o' yon? Does she _look_
+like any servant you've ever heard tell of out of a stage-play?"
+
+"Not a bit, Hannah; she looks exactly like herself, and therefore not in
+the least like any other person. Don't you worry. Miss Morton requires
+no explanation. All we must do is to see that she doesn't overwork
+herself."
+
+"Then ye'll no speak to her, Miss Jan?"
+
+"Not I, Hannah. Why should I dictate to her as to what she wears? She
+doesn't dictate to me."
+
+This was not strictly true, for Meg was most interfering in the matter
+of Jan's clothes. Hannah shook her head. "I thocht it my duty to speak,
+Miss Jan, and I'll say no more. But it's sheer defiance o' her Maker to
+crop her heid and to clothe herself in whim-whams, when she could be
+dressed like a lady; and I'm real vexed she should make such an object
+of herself when she might just be quite unnoticeable, sae wee and
+shelpit as she is."
+
+"I'm afraid," said Jan, "that Miss Morton will never be quite
+unnoticeable, whatever she may wear. But don't let us talk about it any
+more. You understand, don't you, Hannah?"
+
+When Jan's voice took that tone Hannah knew that further argument was
+unavailing.
+
+Jan turned to go, and saw Tony waiting for her in the open doorway.
+Neither of them had either heard or seen him come.
+
+Quite silently he took her hand and did not speak till they were well
+away from the house. Meg and little Fay were nowhere in sight. Jan
+wondered how much he had heard.
+
+"She's a very proud cook, isn't she?" he said presently.
+
+"She's a very old servant," Jan explained, "who has known me all my
+life."
+
+"If," said Tony, as though after deep thought, "she gets very
+chubbelsome, you send for me. Then I will go to her and say '_Jao!_'"
+Tony followed this up by some fluent Hindustani which, had Jan but known
+it, seriously reflected on the character of Hannah's female ancestry.
+"I'll say '_Jao!_'," he went on. "I'll say it several times very loud,
+and point to the door. Then she'll roll up her bedding, and you'll give
+her money and her chits, and she will depart."
+
+They had reached a seat. On this Jan sank, for the vision of Tony
+pointing majestically down the drive while little Hannah staggered into
+the distance under a rolled-up mattress, was too much for her.
+
+"But I don't want her to go," she gasped. "I love her dearly."
+
+"She should not speak to you like that; she scolded you," he said
+firmly. "She is a servant ... She _is_ a servant?" he added doubtfully.
+
+"How much did you hear of what she said? Did you understand?"
+
+"I came back directly to fetch you, I thought she _sounded_ cross. Mummy
+was afraid when people were cross; she liked me to be with her. I
+thought you would like me to be with you. If she was very rude I could
+beat her. I beat the boy--not Peter's boy, our boy--he was rude to
+Mummy. He did not dare to touch me because I am a sahib ... I will beat
+Hannah if you like."
+
+Tony stood in front of Jan, very earnest, with an exceedingly pink nose,
+for the wind was keen. He had never before said so much at one time.
+
+"Shall I go back and beat her?" he asked again.
+
+"Certainly not," Jan cried, clutching Tony lest he should fly off there
+and then. "We don't _do_ such things here at home. Nobody is beaten,
+ever. I'm sure Peter never beats his servants."
+
+"No," Tony allowed. "A big sahib must not strike a servant, but I can,
+and I do if they are rude. She was rude about Meg."
+
+"She didn't mean to be rude."
+
+"She found fault with her clothes and her hair. She is a very proud and
+impudent cook."
+
+"Tony dear, you really don't understand. She wasn't a bit rude. She was
+afraid other people might mistake Meg for a servant. She was all _for_
+Meg--truly she was."
+
+"She scolded you," he rejoined obstinately.
+
+"Not really, Tony; she didn't mean to scold."
+
+Tony looked very hard at Jan.
+
+In silence they stared at one another for quite a minute. Jan got up off
+the seat.
+
+"Let's go and find the others," she said.
+
+"She is a very proud cook," Tony remarked once more.
+
+Jan sighed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+That night while she was getting ready for bed Tony woke up. His cot was
+placed so that he could see into Jan's room, and the door between was
+always left open. She was standing before the dressing-table, taking
+down her hair.
+
+Unlike the bedrooms at the flat, the room was not cold though both the
+windows were open. Wren's End was never cold, though always fresh, for
+one of Anthony's earliest improvements had been a boiler-house and
+central heating, with radiators set under the windows, so that they
+could always stand open.
+
+Jan had not put on her dressing-gown, and her night-dress had rather
+short, loose sleeves that fell back from her arms as she raised them.
+
+He watched the white arm wielding the brush with great pleasure; he
+decided he liked to look at it.
+
+"Auntie Jan!"
+
+She turned and flung her hair back from her face in a great silver
+cloud.
+
+"You awake, sonny! Did I make a noise?"
+
+"No, I just woke. Auntie Jan, will Daddie ever come here?"
+
+"I expect so."
+
+"Well, listen. If he does, he shan't take your things, your pretty
+twinkly things. I won't let him."
+
+Jan stood as if turned to stone.
+
+"He took Mummy's. I saw him; I couldn't stop him, I was so little. But
+she _said_--she said it twice before she went away from that last
+bungalow--she said: 'Take care of Auntie Jan, Tony; don't let Daddie
+take her things.' So I won't."
+
+Tony was sitting up. His room was all in darkness; two candles were lit
+on Jan's dressing-table. He could see her, but she couldn't see him.
+
+She came to him, stooped over him, and laid her cheek against his so
+that they were both veiled with her hair. "Darling, I don't think poor
+Daddie would want to take my things. You must try not to think hardly of
+Daddie."
+
+Tony parted the veil of hair with a gentle hand so that they could both
+see the candles.
+
+"You don't know my Daddie ... much," he said, "do you?"
+
+Jan shuddered.
+
+"I saw him," he went on in his queer little unemotional voice. "I saw
+him take all her pretty twinkly things; and her silver boxes. I'm glad I
+sleep here."
+
+"Did she mind much?" Jan whispered.
+
+"I don't know. She didn't see him take them, only me. She hadn't come to
+bed. She never said nothing to me--only about you."
+
+"I don't expect," Jan made a great effort to speak naturally, "that
+Daddie would care about my things ... It's different, you see."
+
+"I'm glad I sleep here," Tony repeated, "and there's William only just
+across the passage."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+"THE BLUDGEONINGS OF CHANCE"
+
+
+They had been at Wren's End nearly three weeks, and sometimes Jan
+wondered if she appeared to Tony as unlike her own conception of herself
+as Tony's of his father was unlike what she had pictured him.
+
+She knew Hugo Tancred to be dishonest, shifty, and wholly devoid of a
+sense of honour, but she had up till quite lately always thought of him
+as possessing a lazy sort of good-nature.
+
+Tony was changing this view.
+
+He was not yet at all talkative, but every now and then when he was
+alone with her he became frank and communicative, as reserved people
+often will when suddenly they let themselves go. And his very simplicity
+gave force to his revelations.
+
+During their last year together in India it was evident that downright
+antagonism had existed between Hugo Tancred and his little son. Tony had
+weighed his father and found him wanting; and it was clear that he had
+tried to insert his small personality as a buffer between his father and
+mother.
+
+Jan talked constantly to the children of their mother. Her portraits,
+Anthony's paintings and sketches, were all over the house, in every
+variety of happy pose. One of the best was hung at the foot of Tony's
+cot. The gentle blue eyes seemed to follow him in wistful benediction,
+and alone in bed at night he often thought of her, and of his home in
+India. It was, then, quite natural that he should talk of them to this
+Auntie Jan who had evidently loved his mother well; and from Tony Jan
+learned a good deal more about her brother-in-law than she had ever
+heard from his wife.
+
+Tony loved to potter about with his aunt in the garden. She worked
+really hard, for there was much to do, and he tried his best to assist,
+often being a very great hindrance; but she never sent him away, for she
+desired above all things to gain his confidence.
+
+One day after a hard half-hour's weeding, when Tony had wasted much time
+by pulling up several sorts of the wrong thing, Jan felt her temper
+getting edgy, so they sat down to rest upon one of the many convenient
+seats to be found at Wren's End. Anthony hated a garden where you
+couldn't sit comfortably and smoke, wheresoever the prospect was
+pleasing.
+
+Tony sat down too, looking almost rosy after his labours.
+
+He didn't sit close and cuddly, as little Fay would have done, but right
+at the other end of the seat, where he could stare at her. Every day was
+bringing Tony more surely to the conclusion that "he liked to look at"
+his aunt.
+
+"You like Meg, don't you?" he said.
+
+"No," Jan shook her head. "I don't like her. I love her; which is quite
+a different thing."
+
+"Do you like people and love them?"
+
+"I like some people--a great many people--then there are others, not so
+many, that I love--you're one of them."
+
+"Is Fay?"
+
+"Certainly, dear little Fay."
+
+"And Peter?"
+
+For a moment Jan hesitated. With heightened colour she met Tony's grave,
+searching eyes. Above everything she desired to be always true and
+sincere with him, that he might, as on that first night in England, feel
+that he "believed" her. "I have every reason to love Mr. Ledgard," she
+said slowly: "he was so wonderfully kind to all of us." She was
+determined to be loyal to Peter with poor Fay's children. Jan hated
+ingratitude. To have said she only liked Peter must have given Tony the
+impression that she was both forgetful and ungrateful. She would not
+risk that even though she might risk misunderstanding of another kind if
+he ever repeated her words to anybody else.
+
+Her heart beat rather faster than was comfortable, and she was thankful
+that she and Tony were alone.
+
+"Who _do_ you like?" he asked.
+
+"Nearly everybody; the people in the village, our good neighbours ...
+Can't you see the difference yourself? Now, you love your dear Mummy and
+you like ... say, William----"
+
+"No," Tony said firmly, "I love William. I don't think," he went on, "I
+like people ... much. Either I love them like you said, or I don't care
+about them at all ... or I hate them."
+
+"That," said Jan, "is a mistake. It's no use to hate people."
+
+"But if you feel like it ... I hate people if they cheat me."
+
+"But who on earth would cheat you? What do you mean?"
+
+"Once," said Tony, and by the monotonous, detached tone of his voice Jan
+knew he was going to talk about his father, "my Daddie asked me if I'd
+like to see smoke come out of his ears ... an' he said: 'Put your hand
+here on me and watch very careful.'" Tony pointed to Jan's chest. "I put
+my hand there and I watched and watched an' he hurt me with the end of
+his cigar. There's the mark!" He held out a grubby little hand, back
+uppermost, for Jan's inspection, and there, sure enough, was the little
+round white scar.
+
+"And what did you do?" she asked.
+
+"I bit him."
+
+"Oh, Tony, how dreadful!"
+
+"I shouldn't of minded so much if he'd really done it--the smoke out of
+his ears, I mean; but not one teeniest little puff came. I watched so
+careful ... He cheated me."
+
+Jan said nothing. What could she say? Hot anger burned in her heart
+against Hugo. She could have bitten him herself.
+
+"Peter was there," Tony went on, "and Peter said it served him right."
+
+"Yes," said Jan, grasping at this straw, "but what did Peter say to
+you?"
+
+"He said, 'Sahibs don't cry and sahibs don't bite,' and if I was a sahib
+I mustn't do it, so I don't. I don't bite people often."
+
+"I should hope not; besides, you know, sometimes quite good-natured
+people will do things in fun, never thinking it will hurt."
+
+Tony gazed gloomily at Jan. "He cheated me," he repeated. "He said he
+would make it come out of his ears, and it didn't. He didn't like
+me--that's why."
+
+"I don't think you ought to say that, and be so unforgiving. I expect
+Daddie forgot all about your biting him directly, and yet you remember
+what he did after this long time."
+
+Poor Jan did try so hard to be fair.
+
+"I wasn't afraid of him," Tony went on, as though he hadn't heard, "not
+really. Mummy was. She was drefully afraid. He said he'd whip me because
+I was so surly, and she was afraid he would ... I _knew_ he wouldn't,
+not unless he could do it some cheaty way, and you can't whip people
+that way. But it frightened Mummy. She used to send me away when he
+came...."
+
+Tony paused and knitted his brows, then suddenly he smiled. "But I
+always came back very quick, because I knew she wanted me, and I liked
+to look at him. He liked Fay, I suppose he liked to look at her, so do
+I. Nobody wants to look at me ... much ... except Mummy."
+
+"I do," Jan said hastily. "I like to look at you just every bit as much
+as I like to look at Fay. I think you care rather too much what people
+look like, Tony."
+
+"It does matter a lot," Tony said obstinately.
+
+"Other things matter much more. Courage and kindness and truth and
+honesty. Look at Mr. Ledgard--he's not what you'd call a beautiful
+person, and yet I'm sure we all like to look at him."
+
+"Sometimes you say Peter, and sometimes Mr. Ledgard. Why?"
+
+Again Jan's heart gave that queer, uncomfortable jump. She certainly
+always _thought_ of him as Peter. Quite unconsciously she occasionally
+spoke of him as Peter. Meg had observed this, but, unlike Tony, made no
+remark.
+
+"Why?" Tony repeated.
+
+"I suppose," Jan mumbled feebly, "it's because I hear the rest of you do
+it. I've no sort of right to."
+
+"Auntie Jan," Tony said earnestly. "What is a devil?"
+
+"I haven't the remotest idea, Tony," Jan replied, with the utmost
+sincerity.
+
+"It isn't anything very nice, is it, or nice to look at?"
+
+"It might be," said Jan, with Scottish caution.
+
+"Daddie used to call me a surly little devil--when I used to come back
+because Mummy was frightened ... she was always frightened when he
+talked about money, and he did it a lot ... When he saw me, he would
+say: 'Wot you doing here, you surly little devil--listening, eh?'"
+Tony's youthful voice took on such a snarl that Jan positively jumped,
+and put out her hand to stop him. "'I'll give you somefin to listen
+to....'"
+
+"Tony, Tony, couldn't you try to forget all that?"
+
+Tony shook his head. "No! I shall never forget it, because, you see,
+it's all mixed up with Mummy so, and you said"--here Tony held up an
+accusing small finger at Jan--"you said I was never to forget her, not
+the least little bit."
+
+"I know I did," Jan owned, and fell to pondering what was best to be
+done about these memories. Absently she dug her hoe into the ground,
+making ruts in the gravel, while Tony watched her solemnly.
+
+"Then why," he went on, "do you not want me to remember Daddie?"
+
+"Because," said Jan, "everything you seem to remember sounds so unkind."
+
+"Well, I can't help that," Tony answered.
+
+Jan arose from the seat. "If we sit idling here all afternoon," she
+remarked severely, "we shall never get that border weeded for Earley."
+
+The afternoon post came in at four, and when Jan went in there were
+several letters for her on the hall-table, spread out by Hannah in a
+neat row, one above the other. It was Saturday, and the Indian mail was
+in. There was one from Peter, but it was another letter that Jan seized
+first, turning it over and looking at the post-mark, which was
+remarkably clear. She knew the excellent handwriting well, though she
+had seen it comparatively seldom.
+
+It was Hugo Tancred's; and the post-mark was Port Said. She opened it
+with hands that trembled, and it said:
+
+      "MY DEAR JAN,
+
+      "In case other letters have miscarried, which is quite
+      possible while I was up country, let me assure you how
+      grateful I am for all you did for my poor wife and the
+      children--and for me in letting me know so faithfully what
+      your movements have been. I sent to the bank for your
+      letters while passing through Bombay recently, and but for
+      your kindness in allowing the money I had left for my
+      wife's use to remain to my credit, I should have been
+      unable to leave India, for things have gone sadly against
+      me, and the world is only too ready to turn its back upon a
+      broken man.
+
+      "When I saw by the notice in the papers that my beloved
+      wife was no more, I realised that for me the lamp is
+      shattered and the light of my life extinguished. All that
+      remains to me is to make the best of my poor remnant of
+      existence for the sake of my children.
+
+      "We will talk over plans when we meet. I hope to be in
+      England in about another month, perhaps sooner, and we will
+      consult together as to what is best to be done.
+
+      "I have no doubt it will be possible to find a good and
+      cheap preparatory school where Tony can be safely bestowed
+      for the present, and one of my sisters would probably take
+      my precious little Fay, if you find it inconvenient to have
+      her with you. A boy is always better at school as soon as
+      possible, and I have strong views as to the best methods of
+      education. I never for a moment forget my responsibilities
+      towards my children and the necessity for a father's
+      supreme authority.
+
+      "You may be sure that, in so far as you make it possible
+      for me to do so, I will fall in with your wishes regarding
+      them in every way.
+
+      "It will not be worth your while writing to me here, as my
+      plans are uncertain. I will try to give you notice of my
+      arrival, but may reach you before my next letter.
+
+                           "Yours affectionately,
+
+                                           "HUGO TANCRED."
+
+Still as a statue sat Jan. From the garden came the cheerful chirruping
+of birds and constant, eager questioning of Earley by the children.
+Earley's slow Gloucestershire speech rumbled on in muffled _obbligato_
+to the higher, carrying, little voices.
+
+The whirr of a sewing-machine came from the morning-room, now the
+day-nursery, where Meg was busy with frocks for little Fay.
+
+In a distant pantry somebody was clinking teacups. Jan shivered, though
+the air from the open window was only fresh, not cold. At that moment
+she knew exactly how an animal feels when caught in a trap. Hugo
+Tancred's letter was the trap, and she was in it. With the exception of
+the lie about other letters--Jan was perfectly sure he had written no
+other letters--and the stereotyped phrases about shattered lamps and the
+wife who was "no more," the letter was one long menace--scarcely veiled.
+That sentence, "in so far as you make it possible for me to do so, I
+will fall in with your wishes regarding them in every way," simply meant
+that if Jan was to keep the children she must let Hugo make ducks and
+drakes of her money; and if he took her money, how could she do what she
+ought for the children?
+
+And he was at Port Said; only a week's journey.
+
+Why had she left that money in Bombay? Why had she not listened to
+Peter? Sometimes she had thought that Peter held rather a cynically low
+view of his fellow-creatures--some of his fellow-creatures. Surely no
+one could be all bad? Jan had hoped great things of adversity for Hugo
+Tancred. Peter indulged in no such pleasant illusions, and said so.
+"Schoolgirl sentimentality" Meg had called it, and so it was. "No doubt
+it will be possible to find some cheap preparatory school for Tony."
+
+Would he try to steal Tony?
+
+From the charitable mood that hopeth all things Jan suddenly veered to a
+belief in all things evil of her brother-in-law. At that moment she felt
+him capable of murdering the child and throwing his little body down a
+well, as they do in India.
+
+Again she shivered.
+
+What was she to do?
+
+So helpless, so unprotected; so absolutely at his mercy because she
+loved the children. "Never let him blackmail you," Peter had said.
+"Stand up to him always, and he'll probably crumple up."
+
+Suddenly, as though someone had opened shutters in a pitch-dark room,
+letting in the blessed light, Jan remembered there was also a letter
+from Peter.
+
+She crossed the hall to get it, though her legs shook under her and her
+knees were as water.
+
+She felt she couldn't get back to the window-seat, so she sat on the
+edge of the gate-table and opened the letter.
+
+A very short letter, only one side of a page.
+
+      "DEAR MISS ROSS,
+
+      "This is the last mail for a bit, for I come myself by the
+      next, the _Macedonia_. You may catch me at Aden, but
+      certainly a note will get me at Marseilles, if you are kind
+      enough to write. Tancred has been back in Bombay and gone
+      again in one of the smaller home-going boats. Where he got
+      the money to go I can't think, for from many sources lately
+      I've heard that his various ventures have been far from
+      prosperous, and no one will trust him with a rupee.
+
+      "So look out for blackmail, and be firm, mind.
+
+      "I go to my aunt in Artillery Mansions on arrival. When may
+      I run down to see you all?
+
+                         "Yours always sincerely,
+
+                                          "PETER LEDGARD."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+"THOUGH AN HOST SHOULD ENCAMP AGAINST ME"
+
+
+The flap of the gate-leg table creaked under Jan's weight, but she dug
+her heels into the rug and balanced, for she felt incapable of moving.
+
+Peter was coming home; if the worst came to the worst he would deal with
+Hugo, and a respite would be gained. But Peter would go out to India
+again and Hugo would not. The whole miserable business would be
+repeated--and how could she continue to worry Peter with her affairs?
+What claim had she upon him? As though she were some stranger seeing it
+for the first time, Jan looked round the square, comfortable hall. She
+saw it with new eyes sharpened by apprehension; yet everything was
+solidly the same.
+
+The floor with its draught-board pattern of large, square, black and
+white stones; the old dark chairs; the high bookcases at each side of
+the hearth; the wide staircase with its spacious, windowed turning and
+shallow steps, so easily traversed by little feet; the whole steeped in
+that atmosphere of friendly comfort that kind old houses get and keep.
+
+Such a good place to be young in.
+
+Such a happy place, so safe and sheltered and pleasant.
+
+Outside the window a wren was calling to his mate with a note that
+sounded just like a faint kiss; such a tender little song.
+
+The swing door was opened noisily and Anne Chitt appeared bearing the
+nursery tea-tray, deposited it in the nursery, opened the front door,
+thumped on the gong and vanished again. Meg came out from the nursery
+with two pairs of small slippers in her hand: "Where are my children? I
+left little Fay with Earley while I finished the overalls; he's a most
+efficient under-nurse--I suppose you left Tony with him too. Such a lot
+of letters for you. Did you get your mail? I heard from both the boys.
+Ah, sensible Earley's taking them round to the back door. Where's
+William's duster? Hannah does make such a fuss about paw-marks." And
+Meg, too, vanished through the swing door.
+
+Slowly Jan dragged herself off the table, gathered up her unread
+letters, and went into the nursery. She felt as though she were
+dreadfully asleep and couldn't awake to realise the wholesome everyday
+world around her.
+
+Vaguely she stared round the room, the most charming room in Wren's End.
+Panelled in wood long since painted white, with two delightful rounded
+corner cupboards, it gave straight on to the wrens' sunk lawn from a big
+French window with steps, an anachronism added by Miss Janet Ross. Five
+years ago Anthony had brought a beautiful iron gate from Venice that
+fitted into the archway, cut through the yew hedge and leading to the
+drive. Jan had given this room to the children because in summer they
+could spend the whole day in its green-walled garden, quite safe and
+shut in from every possibility of mischief. A sun-dial was in the
+centre, and in one corner a fat stone cherub upheld a bath for the
+birds. Daffodils were in bloom on the banks, and one small single tulip
+of brilliant red. Jan went out and stood on the top step.
+
+Long immunity from menace of any kind had made all sorts of little birds
+extraordinarily bold and friendly. Even the usually shy and furtive
+golden-crested wrens fussed in and out under the yew hedge quite
+regardless of Jan.
+
+Through an open window overhead came the sound of cheerful high voices,
+and little Fay started to sing at the top of her strong treble:
+
+    Thlee mice went into a hole to spin,
+    Puss came by, and puss peeped in;
+    What are you doing, my littoo old men?
+    We're weaving coats for gentoomen.
+
+"Is that what I've been doing?" thought Jan. "Weaving coats of many
+colours out of happy dreams?" Were she and the children the mice, she
+wondered.
+
+Marauding cats had been kept away from Wren's End for over a hundred
+years. "The little wrens that build" had been safe enough. But what of
+these poor human nestlings?
+
+"Shall I come and help loo to wind up loo thleds?" sang little Fay. "Oh,
+no, Missis Pussy, you'd bite off our heads!" And Tony joined in with a
+shout: "Oh, no, Missis Pussy, you'd bite off our heads."
+
+The voices died away, the children were coming downstairs.
+
+Jan drank three cups of tea and crumbled one piece of bread and butter
+on her plate. The rest of the party were hungry and full of adventures.
+Before she joined Earley little Fay had been to the village with Meg to
+buy tape, and she had a great deal to say about this expedition. Meg saw
+that something was troubling Jan, and wondered if Mr. Ledgard had given
+her fresh news of Hugo. But Meg never asked questions or worried people.
+She chattered to the children, and immediately after tea carried them
+off for the usual washing of hands.
+
+Jan went out into the hall; the door was open and the sunny spring
+evening called to her. When she was miserable she always wanted to walk,
+and she walked now; swiftly down the drive she went and out along the
+road till she came to the church, which stood at the end of the village
+nearest to Wren's End.
+
+She turned into the churchyard, and up the broad pathway between the
+graves to the west door.
+
+Near the door was a square headstone marking the grave of Charles
+Considine Smith; and she paused beside it to read once more the somewhat
+strange inscription.
+
+Under his name and age, cut deep in the moss-grown stone, were the
+words: "_Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not
+fear._"
+
+Often before Jan had wondered what could have caused Tranquil, his wife,
+to choose so strenuous an epitaph. Tranquil, who had never stirred
+twenty miles from the place where she was born; whose very name, so far
+as they could gather, exemplified her life.
+
+What secret menace had threatened this "staid person," this prosperous
+shipper of sherry who, apparently, had spent the evening of his life in
+observing the habits of wrens.
+
+Why should his gentle wife have thus commemorated his fighting spirit?
+
+Be the reason what it might, Jan felt vaguely comforted. There was
+triumph as well as trust in the words. Whatever it was that had
+threatened him, he had stood up to it. His wife knew this and was proud.
+
+Jan tried the heavy oak door and it yielded, and from the soft mildness
+of the spring evening, so full of happy sounds of innocent life, she
+passed into the grey and sacred silence of the church.
+
+It was cold in the beautiful old fourteenth-century church, with that
+pervading smell of badly-burning wood that is so often found in country
+churches till all attempt at heating ceases for the summer. But nothing
+could mar the nobility of its austerely lovely architecture; the
+indefinable, exquisite grace that soothes and penetrates.
+
+She went and knelt in the Wren's End pew where Charles Considine Smith's
+vast prayer-book still stood on the book-board. And even as in the
+Bombay Cathedral she had prayed that strength might be given to her to
+walk in the Way, so now she prayed for courage and a quiet, steadfast
+mind.
+
+Her head was bowed and buried in her hands: "_My heart shall not
+fear_," she whispered; but she knew that it did fear, and fear
+grievously.
+
+The tense silence was broken by an odd, fitful, pattering sound; but
+Jan, absorbed in her petition for the courage she could not feel, heard
+nothing.
+
+Something clumsy, warm, and panting pushed against her, and she
+uncovered her face and looked down upon William trying to thrust his
+head under her arm and join in her devotions.
+
+And William became a misty blur, for her eyes filled with tears; he
+looked so anxious and foolish and kind with his tongue hanging out and
+his absurd, puzzled expression.
+
+He was puzzled. Part of the usual ritual had been omitted.
+
+She ought, by all known precedents, to have put her arm round his neck
+and have admonished him to "pray for his Master." But she did nothing of
+the kind, only patted him, with no sort of invitation to join in her
+orisons.
+
+William was sure something was wrong somewhere.
+
+Then Jan saw Tony sitting at the far end of the seat, hatless, coatless,
+in his indoor strap shoes; and he was regarding her with grave,
+understanding eyes.
+
+In a moment she was back in the present and vividly alive to the fact
+that here was chilly, delicate Tony out after tea, without a coat and
+sitting in an ice-cold church.
+
+She rose from her knees, much to William's satisfaction, who did not
+care for religious services in which he might not take an active part.
+He trotted out of the pew and Jan followed him, stooping to kiss Tony as
+she passed.
+
+"It's too cold for you here, dear," she whispered; "let us come out."
+
+She held out her hand and Tony took it, and together they passed down
+the aisle and into the warmer air outside.
+
+"How did you know I was here?" she asked, as they hurried into the road.
+
+"I saw you going down the drive from the bathroom window, and so I
+runned after you, and William came too."
+
+"But what made you come after me?"
+
+"Because I thought you looked frightened, and I didn't like it; you
+looked like Mummy did sometimes."
+
+No one who has seen fear stamped upon a woman's face ever forgets it.
+Tony had watched his aunt all tea-time, and this quite new expression
+troubled him. Mummy had always seemed to want him when she looked like
+that; perhaps Auntie Jan would want him too. The moment his hands were
+dried he had rushed past Meg and down the stairs with William in his
+wake. Meg had not tried to stop him, for she, too, realised that
+something worried Jan, and she knew that already there had arisen an
+almost unconscious _entente_ between these two. But she had no idea that
+he had gone out of doors. She dressed little Fay and took her out to the
+garden, thinking that Tony and Jan were probably in the nursery, and she
+was careful not to disturb them.
+
+"Are you cold, Tony?" Jan asked anxiously, walking so fast that Tony
+had almost to run to keep up with her.
+
+"No, not very; it's a nice coldness rather, don't you think?"
+
+"Tony, will you tell me--when Daddie was angry with you, were you never
+frightened?"
+
+Tony pulled at her hand to make her go more slowly. "Yes," he said, "I
+used to feel frightened inside, but I wouldn't let him know it, and
+then--it was funny--but quite sunn'ly I wasn't frightened any more. You
+try it."
+
+"You mean," Jan asked earnestly, "that if you don't let anyone else know
+you are frightened, you cease to be frightened?"
+
+"Something like that," Tony said; "it just happens."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+MEG AND CAPTAIN MIDDLETON
+
+
+Meg had worked hard and faithfully ever since Ayah left. Very soon after
+she took over the children entirely she discovered that, however naughty
+and tiresome they were in many respects, they were quick-witted and
+easily interested. And she decided there and then that to keep them good
+she must keep them well amused, and it acted like a charm.
+
+She had the somewhat rare power of surrounding quite ordinary everyday
+proceedings with a halo of romance, so that the children's day developed
+into a series of entrancing adventures.
+
+With Meg, enthusiastic make-believe had never wholly given place to
+common sense. Throughout the long, hard days of her childhood and early
+apprenticeship to a rather unkindly world she had pretended joyously,
+and invented for herself all sorts of imaginary pleasures to take the
+place of those tangible ones denied to her. She had kept the width and
+wistfulness of the child's horizon with a good deal of the child's
+finality and love of detail; so that she was as responsive to the drama
+of common things as the children themselves.
+
+Thus it came about that the daily donning of the uniform was in very
+truth symbolic and inspiring; and once the muslin cap was adjusted, she
+felt herself magically surrounded by the atmosphere most conducive to
+the production of the Perfect Nurse.
+
+For Tony and little Fay getting up and going to bed resolved themselves
+into feats of delicious dexterity that custom could not stale. The
+underneaths of tables were caves and dungeons, chairs became chariots at
+will, and every night little Fay waved a diminutive pocket-handkerchief
+to Tony from the deck of an ocean-going P. and O.
+
+The daily walks, especially since they came to Wren's End, were filled
+with hopeful possibilities. And to hunt for eggs with Mrs. Earley, or
+gather vegetables with her son, partook of the nature of a high and
+solemn quest. It was here Meg showed real genius. She drew all the
+household into her net of interest. The children poked their busy
+fingers into everybody's pies, and even stern Hannah was compelled,
+quite unconsciously, to contribute her share in the opulent happiness of
+their little world.
+
+But it took it out of Meg.
+
+For weeks she had been on the alert to prevent storms and tempests. Now
+that the children's barometer seemed at "set fair" she suddenly felt
+very tired.
+
+Jan had been watching her, and on that particular Sunday, had she been
+able to catch Meg before she got up, Jan would have dressed the children
+and kept her in bed. But Meg was too nimble for her, washed and dressed
+her charges, and appeared at breakfast looking a "wispy wraith."
+
+She had slept badly; a habit formed in her under-nourished youth which
+she found hard to break; and she had, in consequence, been sitting up in
+bed at five in the morning to make buttonholes in garden smocks for
+Tony.
+
+This would have enraged Jan had she but known it. But Meg, frank and
+honest as the day in most things, was, at times, curiously secretive;
+and so far had entirely eluded Jan's vigilance. By the time Anne Chitt
+came with the awakening tea there wasn't a vestige of smock, needles, or
+cotton to be seen, and so far lynx-eyed little Fay had never awoke in
+time to catch her at it.
+
+This morning, however, Jan exerted her authority. She slung the hammock
+between two trees in the sunniest part of the garden; she wrapped Meg in
+her own fur coat, which was far too big for Meg; covered her with a
+particularly soft, warm rug, gave her a book, a sun-umbrella, and her
+cigarette case; and forbade her to move till lunch-time unless it
+rained.
+
+Then she took the two children and William into Squire Walcote's woods
+for the morning and Meg fell fast asleep.
+
+Warm with the double glow that came from being wrapped in Jan's coat
+because Jan loved her; lulled by the songs of birds and a soft, shy wind
+that ruffled the short hair about her forehead, little Meg was supremely
+happy. To be tired, to be made to rest, to be kissed and tucked in and
+sternly commanded to stay where she was till she was fetched--all this,
+so commonplace to cherished, cared-for folk, seemed quite wonderful to
+Meg, and she snuggled down among the cushions in blissful content.
+
+Meanwhile, on that same Sunday morning, Captain Middleton, at Amber
+Guiting Manor, was trying to screw his courage up to the announcement
+that he did not intend to accompany his aunt and uncle to church. Lady
+Mary Walcote was his mother's only sister, and Mrs. Walcote, wife of
+Jan's tenant, was one of his father's, so that he spoke quite truly when
+he told Meg he had "stacks of relations down at Amber Guiting."
+
+Colonel Walcote was much better off than his elder brother, the squire
+of Amber Guiting, for he benefited by the Middleton money.
+
+Miles Middleton's father was the originator of "Middleton's Made
+Starch," which was used everywhere and was supposed to be superior to
+all other starches. Why "Made" scoffers could never understand, for it
+required precisely the same treatment as other starches. But the British
+Public believed in it, the British Public also bought it in large
+quantities, and George Middleton, son of Mutton-Pie Middleton, a
+well-to-do confectioner in Doncaster, became an exceedingly rich man. He
+did not marry till he was forty, and then he married "family," for Lady
+Agnes Keills, younger daughter of Lord Glencarse, had a long pedigree
+and no dower at all. She was a good wife to him, gentle, upright, and
+always affectionate. She adored their only child, Miles, and died quite
+suddenly from heart failure, just after that cheerful youth had joined
+at Woolwich. George Middleton died some three years later, leaving his
+money absolutely to his son, who came of age at twenty-five. And, so
+far, Miles had justified his father's faith in him, for he had never
+done anything very foolish, and a certain strain of Yorkshire shrewdness
+prevented him from committing any wild extravagance.
+
+He was generous, kindly, and keen on his profession, and he had reached
+the age of thirty-two without ever having felt any overwhelming desire
+to marry; though it was pretty well known that considerable efforts to
+marry him suitably had been made by both mothers and daughters.
+
+The beautiful and level-headed young ladies of musical comedy had failed
+to land this considerable fish, angled they never so skilfully; though
+he frankly enjoyed their amusing society and was quite liberal, though
+not lavish, in the way of presents.
+
+Young women of his own rank were pleasant to him, their mothers cordial,
+and no difficulty was ever put in the way of his enjoying their society.
+But he was not very susceptible. Deep in his heart, in some dim,
+unacknowledged corner, there lay a humble, homely desire that he might
+_feel_ a great deal more strongly than he had felt yet, when the time
+and the woman came to him.
+
+Never, until Meg smiled at him when he offered to carry little Fay up
+that long staircase, had the thought of a girl thoroughly obsessed him;
+and it is possible that even after their meetings in Kensington Gardens
+her image might gradually have faded from his mind, had it not occurred
+to Mrs. Trent to interfere.
+
+He had seen a good deal of the Trents while hunting with the Pytchley
+two winters ago. Lotty was a fearless rider and what men called "a real
+good sort." At one time it had sometimes crossed Captain Middleton's
+mind that Lotty wouldn't make half a bad wife for a Horse Gunner, but
+somehow it had always stopped at the idea, and when he didn't see Lotty
+he never thought about her at all.
+
+Now that he no longer saw Meg he thought about her all day and far into
+the night. His sensations were so new, so disturbing and unpleasant, his
+life was so disorganised and upset, that he asked himself in varying
+degrees of ever-accumulating irritation: "What the deuce was the
+matter?"
+
+Then Mrs. Trent asked him to luncheon.
+
+She was staying with her daughters at the Kensington Palace Hotel, and
+they had a suite of rooms. Lotty and her sister flew away before coffee
+was served, as they were going to a _matin�e_, and Miles was left
+_t�te-�-t�te_ with Mrs. Trent.
+
+She was most motherly and kind.
+
+Just as he was wondering whether he might now decently take leave of
+her, she said: "Captain Middleton, I'm going to take a great liberty and
+venture to say something to you that perhaps you will resent ... but I
+feel I must do it because your mother was such a dear friend of mine."
+
+This was a piece of information for Miles, who knew perfectly well that
+Lady Agnes Middleton's acquaintance with Mrs. Trent had been of the
+slightest. However, he bowed and looked expectant.
+
+"I saw you the other day walking with Miss Morton in Kensington Gardens;
+apparently she is now in charge of somebody's children. May I ask if you
+have known her long?"
+
+Mrs. Trent looked searchingly at Miles, and there was an inflection on
+the "long" that he felt was in some way insulting to Meg, and he
+stiffened all over.
+
+"Before I answer that question, Mrs. Trent, may I ask why you should
+want to know?"
+
+"My dear boy, I see perfectly well that it must seem impertinent
+curiosity on my part. But I assure you my motive for asking is quite
+justifiable. Will you try not to feel irritated and believe that what I
+am doing, I am doing for the best?"
+
+"I have not known Miss Morton very long; why?"
+
+"Do you know the people she is living with at present?"
+
+Again that curious inflection on the "present."
+
+"Oh, yes, and so do my people; they think all the world of her."
+
+"Of Miss Morton?" Shocked astonishment was in Mrs. Trent's voice.
+
+"I was not speaking of Miss Morton just then, but of the lady she is
+with. I've no doubt, though," said Miles stoutly, "they'd think just
+the same of Miss Morton if they knew her. They may know her, too; it's
+just a chance we've never discussed her."
+
+"It is very difficult and painful for me to say what I have got to say
+... but if Miss Morton is in charge of the children of a friend of your
+family, I think you ought to know she is not a suitable person to be
+anything of the kind."
+
+"I say!" Miles exclaimed, "that's a pretty stiff thing to say about any
+girl; a dangerous thing to say; especially about one who seems to need
+to earn her own living."
+
+"I know it is; I hate to say it ... but it seemed to me the other day--I
+hope I was mistaken--that you were rather ... attracted, and knowing
+what I do I felt I must speak, must warn you."
+
+Miles got up. He seemed to tower above the table and dwarf the whole
+room. "I'd rather not hear any more, Mrs. Trent, please. It seems too
+beastly mean somehow for me to sit here and listen to scandal about a
+poor little unprotected girl who works hard and faithfully--mind you,
+I've seen her with those children, and she's perfectly wonderful. Don't
+you see yourself how I can't _do_ it?"
+
+Mrs. Trent sat on where she was and smiled at Miles, slowly shaking her
+head. "Sit down, my dear boy. Your feelings do you credit; but we
+mustn't be sentimental, and facts are facts. I have every reason to know
+what I'm talking about, for some years ago Miss Morton was in my
+service."
+
+Miles did not sit down. He stood where he was, glowering down at Mrs.
+Trent.
+
+"That doesn't brand her, does it?" he asked.
+
+Still smiling maternally at him, Mrs. Trent continued: "She left my
+service when she ran away with Mr. Walter Brooke--you know him, I think?
+Disgraceful though it was, I must say this of him, that he never made
+any concealment of the fact that he was a married man. She did it with
+her eyes open."
+
+"If," Miles growled, "all this happened 'some years ago' she must have
+been about twelve at the time, and Brooke ought to have been hounded out
+of society long ago."
+
+"I needn't say that _we_ have cut him ever since. She was, I believe,
+about nineteen at the time. She did not remain with him, but you can
+understand that, naturally, I don't want _you_ to get entangled with a
+girl of that sort."
+
+Miles picked up his hat and stick. "I wish you hadn't told me," he
+groaned. "I don't think a bit less highly of her, but you've made _me_
+feel such a low-down brute, I can't bear it. Good-bye--I've no doubt you
+did it for the best ... but----" And Miles fairly ran from the room.
+
+Mrs. Trent drummed with her fingers on the table and looked thoughtful.
+"It was quite time somebody interfered," she reflected. And then she
+remembered with annoyance that she had not found out the name of Meg's
+employer.
+
+Miles strode through Kensington Gore and past Knightsbridge, when he
+turned down Sloane Street till he came to a fencing school he
+frequented. Here he went in and had a strenuous half-hour with the
+instructor, but nothing served to restore his peace of mind. He was
+angry and hurt and horribly worried. If it was true, if the whole
+miserable story was true, then he knew that something had been taken
+from him. Something he had cherished in that dim, secret corner of his
+heart. Its truth or untruth did not affect his feeling for Meg. But if
+it were true, then he had irretrievably lost something intangible, yet
+precious. Young men like Miles never mention ideals, but that's not to
+say that in some very hidden place they don't exist, like buried
+treasure.
+
+All the shrewd Yorkshire strain in him shouted that he must set this
+doubt at rest. That whatever was to be his action in the future he must
+know and face the truth. All the delicacy, the fine feeling, the
+sensitiveness he got from his mother, made him loathe any investigation
+of the kind, and his racial instincts battled together and made him very
+miserable indeed.
+
+When he left the fencing school, he turned into Hyde Park. The Row was
+beginning to fill, and suddenly he came upon his second cousin, Lady
+Penelope Pottinger, sitting all alone on a green chair with another
+empty one beside it. Miles dropped into the empty chair. He liked Lady
+Pen. She was always downright and sometimes very amusing. Moreover she
+took an intelligent interest in dogs, and knew Amber Guiting and its
+inhabitants. So Miles dexterously led the conversation round to Jan and
+Wren's End.
+
+Lady Pen was looking very beautiful that afternoon. She wore a
+broad-leaved hat which did not wholly conceal her glorious hair. Hair
+the same colour as certain short feathery rings that framed a pale,
+pathetic little face that haunted him.
+
+"Talking of Amber Guiting," he said, "did you ever come across a Miss
+Morton down there? A friend of Miss Ross."
+
+Lady Pen turned and looked hard at him. "Oh dear, yes; she's rather a
+pal of mine. I knew her long before I met her at the Ross's. Why, I knew
+her when she was companion at the Trents, poor little devil."
+
+"Did she have a bad time there? Weren't they nice to her?"
+
+"At first they were nice enough, but afterwards it was rotten. Clever
+little thing she is, but poor as a rat. What do you know about her?"
+
+Again Lady Pen looked hard at Miles. She was wondering whether Meg had
+ever given away the reason for that short hair of hers.
+
+"Oh, I've met her just casually, you know, with Miss Ross. She strikes
+me as a ... rather unusual sort of girl."
+
+"Ever mention me?"
+
+"No, never that I can remember. I haven't seen much of her, you know."
+
+"Well, my son, the less you see of her the better, for her, I should
+say. She's a clever, industrious, good little thing, but she's not in
+your row. After all, these workin' girls have their feelin's."
+
+"I don't fancy Miss Morton is at all the susceptible idiot you appear
+to think her. It's other people's feelings I should be afraid of, not
+hers."
+
+"Oh, I grant you she's attractive enough to some folks. Artists, for
+instance, rave over her. At least, Anthony Ross did. Queer chap, that;
+would never paint me. Now can you understand any man in his senses
+refusin' to paint me?"
+
+"It seems odd, certainly."
+
+"He painted her, for nothin' of course, over an' over again ... just
+because he liked doin' it. Odd chap he was, but very takin'. You
+couldn't dislike him, even when he refused to paint you. Awful swank
+though, wasn't it?"
+
+"Were his pictures of Miss Morton--sold?"
+
+"Some were, I believe; but Janet Ross has got a lot of 'em down at
+Wren's End. She always puts away most of her father's paintin's when she
+lets the house. But you take my advice, Miley, my son: you keep clear of
+that little girl."
+
+This was on Thursday, and, of course, after two warnings in one
+afternoon, Miles went down to Amber Guiting on Saturday night.
+
+"Aunt Mary, it's such a lovely morning, should you mind very much if I
+go for a stroll in the woods--or slack about in the fresh air, instead
+of going to church?"
+
+At the word "stroll" he had seen an interested expression lighten up
+Squire Walcote's face, and the last thing he wanted was his uncle's
+society for the whole morning.
+
+"I don't feel up to much exercise," Miles went on, trying to look
+exhausted and failing egregiously. "I've had rather a hard week in town.
+I'll give the vicar a turn in the evening, I will truly."
+
+Lady Mary smiled indulgently on this large young man, who certainly
+looked far from delicate. But only a hard-hearted woman could have
+pointed this out at such a moment, and where her nephew was concerned
+Lady Mary's heart was all kindly affection. So she let him off church.
+
+Miles carried out a pile of books to a seat in the garden and appeared
+to be settled down to a studious morning. He waved a languid hand to his
+aunt and uncle as they started for church, and the moment they were out
+of sight laid down his book and clasped his hands behind his head.
+
+The vicar of Amber Guiting was a family man and merciful. The school
+children all creaked and pattered out of church after morning prayer,
+and any other small people in the congregation were encouraged to do
+likewise, the well-filled vicarage pew setting the example. Therefore,
+Miles reckoned, that even supposing Miss Morton took the little boy to
+church (he couldn't conceive of anyone having the temerity to escort
+little Fay thither), they would come out in about three-quarters of an
+hour after the bell stopped. But he had no intention of waiting for
+that. The moment the bell ceased he--unaccompanied by any of the dogs
+grouped about him at that moment--was going to investigate the Wren's
+End garden. He knew every corner of it, and he intended to unearth Meg
+and the children if they were to be found.
+
+Besides, he ardently desired to see William.
+
+William was a lawful pretext. No one could see anything odd in his
+calling at Wren's End to see William. It was a perfectly natural thing
+to do.
+
+Confound Mrs. Trent.
+
+Confound Pen, what did she want to interfere for?
+
+Confound that bell. Would it never stop?
+
+Yes it had. No it hadn't. Yes ... it had.
+
+Give a few more minutes for laggards, and then----
+
+Three melancholy and disappointed dogs were left in the Manor Garden,
+while Miles swung down the drive, past the church, and into the road
+that led to Wren's End.
+
+What a morning it was!
+
+The whole world seemed to have put on its Sunday frock. There had been
+rain in the night, and the air was full of the delicious fresh-washed
+smell of spring herbage. Wren's End seemed wonderfully quiet and
+deserted as Miles turned into the drive. As he neared the house he
+paused and listened, but there was no sound of high little voices
+anywhere.
+
+Were they at church, then?
+
+They couldn't be indoors on such a beautiful day.
+
+Miles whistled softly, knowing that if William were anywhere within
+hearing, that would bring him at the double.
+
+But no joyfully galumphing William appeared to welcome him.
+
+He had no intention of ringing to inquire. No, he'd take a good look
+round first, before he went back to hang about outside the church.
+
+It was pleasant in the Wren's End garden.
+
+Presently he went down the broad central path of the walled garden, with
+borders of flowers and beds of vegetables. Half-way down, in the
+sunniest, warmest place, he came upon a hammock slung between an
+apple-tree not quite out and a pear-tree that was nearly over, and a
+voice from the hammock called sleepily: "Is that you, Earley? I wish
+you'd pick up my cigarette case for me; it's fallen into the lavender
+bush just below."
+
+"Yes, Miss," a voice answered that was certainly not Earley's.
+
+Meg leaned out of the hammock to look behind her.
+
+"Hullo!" she said. "Why are you not in church? I can't get up because
+I'm a prisoner on _parole_. Short of a thunderstorm nothing is to move
+me from this hammock till Miss Ross comes back."
+
+Miles stood in the pathway looking down at the muffled figure in the
+hammock. There was little to be seen of Meg save her rumpled, hatless
+head. She was much too economical of her precious caps to waste one in a
+hammock. She had slept for nearly two hours, then Hannah roused her with
+a cup of soup. She was drowsy and warm and comfortable, and her usually
+pale cheeks were almost as pink as the apple-blossom buds above her
+head.
+
+"Do you want to sleep? Or may I stop and talk to you a bit?" Miles
+asked, when he had found the somewhat battered cigarette case and
+restored it to her.
+
+"As I'm very plainly off duty, I suppose you may stay and talk--if I
+fall asleep in the middle you must not be offended. You'll find plenty
+of chairs in the tool house."
+
+When Miles returned Meg had lit her cigarette, and he begged a light
+from her.
+
+What little hands she had! How fine-grained and delicate her skin!
+
+Again he felt that queer lump in his throat at the absurd, sweet pathos
+of her.
+
+He placed his chair where he had her full in view, not too near, yet
+comfortably so for conversation. Jan had swung the hammock very high,
+and Meg looked down at Miles over the edge.
+
+"It is unusual," she said, "to find a competent nurse spending her
+morning in this fashion, but if you know Miss Ross at all, you will
+already have realised that under her placid exterior she has a will of
+iron."
+
+"I shouldn't say _you_ were lacking in determination."
+
+"Oh, I'm nothing to Jan. _She_ exerts physical force. Look at me perched
+up here! How can I get down without a bad fall, swathed like a mummy in
+wraps; while my employer does my work?"
+
+"But you don't want to get down. You look awfully comfortable."
+
+"I am awfully comfortable--but it's most ... unprofessional--please
+don't tell anybody else."
+
+Meg closed her eyes, looking rather like a sleepy kitten, and Miles
+watched her in silence with a pain at his heart. Something kept saying
+over and over again: "Six years ago that girl there ran off with Walter
+Brooke. Six years ago that apparently level-headed, sensible little
+person was dazzled by the pinchbeck graces of that epicure in
+sensations." Miles fully granted his charm, his gentle melancholy, his
+caressing manner; but with it all Miles felt that he was so plainly "a
+wrong-'un," so clearly second-rate and untrustworthy--and a nice girl
+ought to recognise these things intuitively.
+
+Miles looked very sad and grave, and Meg, suddenly opening her eyes,
+found him regarding her with this incomprehensible expression.
+
+"You are not exactly talkative," she said.
+
+"I thought, perhaps, you wanted to rest, and would rather not talk.
+Maybe I'm a bit of a bore, and you'd rather I went away?"
+
+"You have not yet asked after William."
+
+"I hoped to find William, but he's nowhere to be seen."
+
+"He's with Jan and the children. I think"--here Meg lifted her curly
+head over the edge of the hammock--"he is the very darlingest animal in
+the world. I love William."
+
+"You do! I knew you would."
+
+"I do. He's so faithful and kind and understanding."
+
+"Has he been quite good?"
+
+"Well ... once or twice he may have been a little--destructive--but you
+expect that with children."
+
+"I hope you punish him."
+
+"Jan does. Jan has a most effectual slap, but there's always a dreadful
+disturbance with the children on these occasions. Little Fay roars the
+house down when William has to be chastised."
+
+"What has he done?"
+
+"I'm not going to tell tales of William."
+
+Miles and Meg smiled at one another, and Walter Brooke faded from his
+mind.
+
+"Perhaps," he said, and paused, "you will by and by allow to William's
+late master a small portion of that regard?"
+
+"If William's master on further acquaintance proves half as loyal and
+trustworthy as William--I couldn't help it."
+
+"I wonder what you mean exactly by loyal and trustworthy?"
+
+"They're not very elastic terms, are they?"
+
+"Don't you think they mean rather the same thing?"
+
+"Not a bit," Meg cried eagerly; "a person might be ever so trustworthy
+and yet not loyal. I take it that trustworthy and honest in tangible
+things are much the same. Loyalty is something intangible, and often
+means belief in people when everything seems against them. It's a much
+rarer quality than to be trustworthy. William would stick to one if one
+hadn't a crust, just because he liked to be there to make things a bit
+less wretched."
+
+Miles smoked in silence for a minute, and again Meg closed her eyes.
+
+"By the way," he said presently, "I didn't know you and my cousin Pen
+were friends. I met her in the Park the day before yesterday. Her hair's
+rather the same colour as yours--handsome woman, isn't she?"
+
+Meg opened her eyes and turned crimson. Had the outspoken Lady Pen said
+anything about her hair, she wondered.
+
+Miles, noting the sudden blush, put it down to Lady Pen's knowledge of
+what had happened at the Trents, and the miserable feelings of doubt and
+apprehension came surging back.
+
+"She's quite lovely," said Meg.
+
+"A bit too much on the big side, don't you think?"
+
+"I admire big women."
+
+Silence fell again. Meg pulled the rug up under her chin.
+
+Surely it was not quite so warm as a few minutes ago.
+
+Miles stood up. "I have a guilty feeling that Miss Ross will strongly
+disapprove of my disturbing you like this. If you will tell me which way
+they have gone I will go and meet them."
+
+"They've gone to your uncle's woods, and I think they must be on their
+way home by now. If you call William he'll answer."
+
+"I won't say good-bye," said Miles, "because I shall come back with
+them."
+
+"I shall be on duty then," said Meg. "Good-bye."
+
+She turned her face from him and nestled down among her cushions. For a
+full minute he stood staring at the back of her head, with its crushed
+and tumbled tangle of short curls.
+
+Then quite silently he took his way out of the Wren's End garden.
+
+Meg shut her eyes very tight. Was it the light that made them smart so?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE YOUNG IDEA
+
+
+Squire Walcote had given the Wren's End family the run of his woods,
+and, what was even more precious, permission to use the river-path
+through his grounds. Lady Mary, who had no children of her own, was
+immensely interested in Tony and little Fay, and would give Jan more
+advice as to their management in an hour than the vicar's wife ever
+offered during the whole of their acquaintance. But then _she_ had a
+family of eight.
+
+But the first time Tony went to the river Jan took him alone; and not to
+the near water in Squire Walcote's grounds, but to the old bridge that
+crossed the Amber some way out of the village. It was the typical
+Cotswold bridge, with low parapets that make such a comfortable seat for
+meditative villagers. Just before they reached it she loosed Tony's
+hand, and held her breath to see what he would do. Would he run straight
+across to get to the other side, or would he look over?
+
+Yes. He went straight to the low wall; stopped, looked over, leaned
+over, and stared and stared.
+
+Jan gave a sigh of relief.
+
+The water of the Amber just there is deep and clear, an infinite thing
+for a child to look down into; but it was not of that Jan was thinking.
+
+Hugo was no fisherman. Water had no attraction for him, save as a
+pleasant means of taking exercise. He was a fair oar; but for a stream
+that wouldn't float a boat he cared nothing at all.
+
+Charles Considine Smith had angled diligently. In fact, he wrote almost
+as much about the habits of trout as about wrens. James Ross, the
+gallant who carried off the second Tranquil, had been fishing at Amber
+Guiting when he first saw her. Anthony's father fished and so did
+Anthony; and Jan, herself, could throw a fly quite prettily. Yet, your
+true fisherman is born, not made; it is not a question of environment,
+but it is, very often, one of heredity; for the tendency comes out when,
+apparently, every adverse circumstance has combined to crush it.
+
+And no mortal who cares for or is going to care for fishing can ever
+cross a bridge without stopping to look down into the water.
+
+"There's a fish swimming down there," Tony whispered (was it instinct
+made him whisper? Jan wondered), "brown and speckledy, rather like the
+thrushes in the garden."
+
+Jan clutched nervously at the little coat while Tony hung over so far
+that only his toes were on the ground. She had brought a bit of bread in
+her pocket, and let him throw bits to the greedy, wily old trout who had
+defied a hundred skilful rods. On that first day old Amber whispered her
+secret to Tony and secured another slave.
+
+For Jan it was only another proof that Tony possessed a sterling
+character. Since her sister's disastrous marriage she had come to look
+upon a taste for fishing as more or less of a moral safeguard. She had
+often reflected that if only Fay had not been so lukewarm with regard to
+the gentle craft--and so bored in a heavenly place where, if it did rain
+for twenty-three of the twenty-four hours, even a second-rate rod might
+land fourteen or fifteen pounds of good sea-trout in an afternoon--she
+could never have fallen in love with Hugo Tancred, who was equally
+without enthusiasm and equally bored till he met Fay. Jan was ready
+enough now to blame herself for her absorption at this time, and would
+remember guiltily the relief with which she and her father greeted Fay's
+sudden willingness to remain a week longer in a place she previously had
+declared to be absolutely unendurable.
+
+The first time Tony's sister went to Amber Bridge Meg took them both.
+Little Fay descended from her pram just before they reached it,
+declaring it was a "nice dly place to walk." She ran on a little ahead,
+and before Meg realised what she was doing, she had scrambled up on to
+the top of the low wall and run briskly along it till her progress was
+stopped by a man who was leaning over immersed in thought. He nearly
+fell in himself, when a clear little voice inquired, "Do loo mind if I
+climb over loo?"
+
+It was Farmer Burgess, and he clasped the tripping lady of the white
+woolly gaiters in a pair of strong arms, and lifted her down just as the
+terrified Meg reached them.
+
+"Law, Missie!" gasped Mr. Burgess, "you mustn't do the like o' that
+there. It's downright fool'ardy."
+
+"Downlight foolardy," echoed little Fay. "And what nelse?"
+
+According to Mr. Burgess it was dangerous and a great many other things
+as well, but he lost his heart to her in that moment, and she could
+twist him round her little finger ever after.
+
+To be told that a thing was dangerous was to add to its attractions. She
+was absolutely without fear, and could climb like a kitten. She hadn't
+been at Wren's End a week before she was discovered half-way up the
+staircase on the outside of the banisters. And when she had been caught
+and lifted over by a white-faced aunt, explained that it was "muts the
+most instasting way of going up tairs."
+
+When asked how she expected to get to the other side at the top, she
+giggled derisively and said "ovel."
+
+Jan seriously considered a barbed-wire entanglement for the outside edge
+of her staircase after that.
+
+While Meg rested in the hammock Jan spent a strenuous morning in Guiting
+Woods with the children and William. Late windflowers were still in
+bloom, and early bluebells made lovely atmospheric patches under the
+trees, just as though a bit of the sky had fallen, as in the oft-told
+tale of "Cockie Lockie." There were primroses, too, and white violets,
+so that there were many little bunches with exceedingly short stalks to
+be arranged and tied up with the worsted provident Auntie Jan had
+brought with her; finally they all sat down on a rug lined with
+mackintosh, and little Fay demanded "Clipture."
+
+"Clipture" was her form of "Scripture," which Auntie Jan "told" every
+morning after breakfast to the children. Jan was a satisfactory
+narrator, for the form of her stories never varied. The Bible stories
+she told in the actual Bible words, and all children appreciate their
+dramatic simplicity and directness.
+
+That morning Joseph and his early adventures and the baby Moses were the
+favourites, and when these had been followed by "The Three Bears" and
+"Cock Robin," it was time to collect the bouquets and go home. And on
+the way home they met Captain Middleton. William spied him afar off, and
+dashed towards him with joyful, deep-toned barks. He was delighted to
+see William, said he had grown and was in the pink of condition; and
+then announced that he had already been to Wren's End and had seen Miss
+Morton. There was something in the tone of this avowal that made Jan
+think. It was shy, it was proud, it seemed to challenge Jan to find any
+fault in his having done so, and it was supremely self-conscious. He
+walked back with them to the Wren's End gate, and then came a moment of
+trial for William.
+
+He wanted to go with his master.
+
+He wanted to stay with the children.
+
+Captain Middleton settled it by shaking each offered paw and saying very
+seriously: "You must stay and take care of the ladies, William. I trust
+you." William looked wistfully after the tall figure that went down the
+road with the queer, light, jumpetty tread of all men who ride much.
+
+Then he trotted after Jan and the children and was exuberantly glad to
+see Meg again.
+
+She declared herself quite rested; heard that they had seen Captain
+Middleton, and met unmoved the statement that he was coming to tea.
+
+But she didn't look nearly so well rested as Jan had hoped she would.
+
+After the children's dinner Meg went on duty, and Jan saw no more of the
+nursery party till later in the afternoon. The creaking wheels of two
+small wheelbarrows made Jan look up from the letters she was writing at
+the knee-hole table that stood in the nursery window, and she beheld
+little Fay and Tony, followed by Meg knitting busily, as they came
+through the yew archway on to the lawn.
+
+Meg subsided into one of the white seats, but the children processed
+solemnly round, pausing under Jan's window.
+
+"I know lots an' lots of Clipture," her niece's voice proclaimed proudly
+as she sat down heavily in her wheelbarrow on the top of some garden
+produce she had collected.
+
+"How much do you know?" Tony asked sceptically.
+
+"Oh, lots an' lots, all about poor little Jophez in the bullushes, and
+his instasting dleams."
+
+"Twasn't Jophez," Tony corrected. "It was Mophez in the bulrushes, and
+he didn't have no dreams. That was Jophez."
+
+"How d'you know," Fay persisted, "that poor little Mophez had no dleams?
+Why _shouldn't_ he have dleams same as Jophez?"
+
+"It doesn't say so."
+
+"It doesn't say he _didn't_ have dleams. He _had_ dleams, I tell you; I
+know he had. Muts nicer dleams van Jophez."
+
+"Let's ask Meg; she'll know."
+
+Jan gave a sigh of relief. The children had not noticed her, and Meg had
+a fertile mind.
+
+The wheelbarrows were trundled across the lawn and paused in front of
+Meg, while a lively duet demanded simultaneously:
+
+  {"_Did_ little Mophez have dleams?"
+  {"_Didn't_ deah littoo Mophez have dleams?"
+
+When Meg had disentangled the questions and each child sat down in a
+wheelbarrow at her feet, she remarked judicially: "Well, there's nothing
+said about little Moses' dreams, certainly; but I should think it's
+quite likely the poor baby did have dreams."
+
+"What sort of dleams? Nicer van sheaves and sings, wasn't they?"
+
+"I should think," Meg said thoughtfully, "that he dreamed he must cry
+very quietly lest the Egyptians should hear him."
+
+"Deah littoo Mophez ... and what nelse?"
+
+Meg was tempted and fell. It was very easy for her to invent "dleams"
+for "deah littoo Mophez" lying in his bulrush ark among the flags at the
+river's edge. And, wholly regardless of geography, she transported him
+to the Amber, where the flags were almost in bloom at that moment, such
+local colour adding much to the realism of her stories.
+
+Presently William grew restless. He ran to Anthony's Venetian gate in
+the yew hedge and squealed (William never whined) to get out. Tony let
+him out, and he fled down the drive to meet his master, who had come a
+good half-hour too soon for tea.
+
+Jan continued to try and finish her letters while Captain Middleton,
+coatless, on all-fours, enacted an elephant which the children rode in
+turn. When he had completely ruined the knees of his trousers he arose
+and declared it was time to play "Here we go round the mulberry-bush,"
+and it so happened that once or twice he played it hand-in-hand with
+Meg.
+
+Jan left her letters and went out.
+
+The situation puzzled her. She feared for Meg's peace of mind, for
+Captain Middleton was undoubtedly attractive; and then she found herself
+fearing for his.
+
+After tea and more games with the children Captain Middleton escorted
+his hostess to church, where he joined his aunt in the Manor seat.
+
+During church Jan found herself wondering uneasily:
+
+"Was everybody going to fall in love with Meg?"
+
+"Would Peter?"
+
+"What a disagreeable idea!"
+
+And yet, why should it be?
+
+Resolutely she told herself that Peter was at perfect liberty to fall
+in love with Meg if he liked, and set herself to listen intelligently to
+the Vicar's sermon.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Meg started to put her children to bed, only to find that her fertility
+of imagination in the afternoon was to prove her undoing in the evening;
+for her memory was by no means as reliable as her powers of invention.
+
+Little Fay urgently demanded the whole cycle of little Mophez' dleams
+over again. And for the life of her Meg couldn't remember them either in
+their proper substance or sequence--and this in spite of the most
+persistent prompting, and she failed utterly to reproduce the
+entertainment of the afternoon. Both children were disappointed, but
+little Fay, accustomed as she was to Auntie Jan's undeviating method of
+narrating "Clipture," was angry as well. She fell into a passion of rage
+and nearly screamed the house down. Since the night of Ayah's departure
+there had not been such a scene.
+
+Poor Meg vowed (though she knew she would break her vow the very first
+time she was tempted) that never again would she tamper with Holy Writ,
+and for some weeks she coldly avoided both Jophez and Mophez as topics
+of conversation.
+
+Meg could never resist playing at things, and what "Clipture" the
+children learned from Jan in the morning they insisted on enacting with
+Meg later in the day.
+
+Sometimes she was seized with misgiving as to the propriety of these
+representations, but dismissed her doubts as cowardly.
+
+"After all," she explained to Jan, "we only play the very human bits. I
+never let them pretend to be anybody divine ... and you know the
+people--in the Old Testament, anyway--were most of them extremely human,
+not to say disreputable at times."
+
+It is possible that "Clipture's" supreme attraction for the children was
+that it conveyed the atmosphere of the familiar East. The New Testament
+was more difficult to play at, but, being equally dramatic, the children
+couldn't see it.
+
+"Can't we do one teeny miracle?" Tony would beseech, but Meg was firm;
+she would have nothing to do with either miracles nor yet with angels.
+Little Fay ardently desired to be an angel, but Meg wouldn't have it at
+any price.
+
+"You're not in the least _like_ an angel, you know," she said severely.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"Because angels are _perfectly_ good."
+
+"I could _pletend_ to be puffectly good."
+
+"Let's play Johnny Baptist," suggested the ever-helpful Tony, "and we
+could pittend to bring in his head on a charger."
+
+"Certainly not," Meg said hastily. "That would be a horrid game."
+
+"Let me be the daughter!" little Fay implored, "and dance in flont of
+Helod."
+
+This was permitted, and Tony, decorated with William's chain, sat
+gloomily scowling at the gyrations of "the daughter," who, assisted by
+William, danced all over the nursery: and Meg, watching the
+representation, decided that if the original "daughter" was half as
+bewitching as this one, there really might have been some faint excuse
+for Herod.
+
+Hannah had no idea of these goings-on, or she would have expected the
+roof to fall in and crush them. Yet she, too, was included among the
+children's prophets, owing to her exact and thorough knowledge of
+"Clipture." Hannah's favourite part of the Bible was the Book of Daniel,
+which she knew practically by heart; and her rendering of certain
+chapters was--though she would have hotly resented the phrase--extremely
+dramatic.
+
+It is so safe and satisfying to know that your favourite story will run
+smoothly, clause for clause, and word for word, just as you like it
+best, and the children were always sure of this with Hannah.
+
+Anne Chitt would listen open-mouthed in astonishment, exclaiming
+afterwards, "Why, 'Annah, wot a tremenjous lot of Bible verses you 'ave
+learned to be sure."
+
+The children once tried Anne Chitt as a storyteller, but she was a
+failure.
+
+As she had been present at several of Hannah's recitals of the Three
+Children and the burning fiery furnace, they thought it but a modest
+demand upon her powers. But when--instead of beginning with the sonorous
+"_Then an herald cried aloud, To you it is commanded, O people, nations
+and languages_"--when she wholly omitted any reference to "_the sound of
+cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer_, and all kinds of
+musick"--and essayed to tell the story in broad Gloucestershire and her
+own bald words, the disappointed children fell upon her and thumped her
+rudely upon the back; declaring her story to be "_kutcha_" and she,
+herself, a _budmash_. Which, being interpreted, meant that her story was
+most badly made and that she, herself, was a rascal.
+
+Anne Chitt was much offended, and complained tearfully to Jan that she
+"wouldn't 'ave said nothin' if they'd called 'er or'nery names, but them
+there Injian words was more than she could abear."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+"ONE WAY OF LOVE"
+
+
+Among the neighbours there was none more assiduous in the matter of
+calls and other friendly manifestations than Mr. Huntly
+Withells--emphasis on the "ells"--who lived at Guiting Grange, about a
+couple of miles from Wren's End. Mr. Withells was settled at the Grange
+some years before Miss Janet Ross left her house to Jan, and he was
+already a person of importance and influence in that part of the county
+when Anthony Ross and his daughters first spent a whole summer there.
+
+Mr. Withells proved most neighbourly. He had artistic leanings himself,
+and possessed some good pictures; among them, one of Anthony's, which
+naturally proved a bond of union. He did not even so much as sketch,
+himself--which Anthony considered another point in his favour--but he
+was a really skilled photographer, possessed the most elaborate cameras,
+and obtained quite beautiful results.
+
+Since Jan's return from India he had completely won her heart by taking
+a great many photographs of the children, pictures delightfully natural,
+and finished as few amateurs contrive to present them.
+
+It was rumoured in Amber Guiting that Mr. Withells' views on the
+subject of matrimony were "peculiar"; but all the ladies, especially the
+elderly ladies, were unanimous in declaring that he had a "beautiful
+mind."
+
+Mrs. Fream, the vicar's wife, timidly confided to Jan that Mr. Withells
+had told her husband that he cared only for "spiritual marriage"--
+whatever that might be; and that, as yet, he had met no woman whom he
+felt would see eye to eye with him on this question. "He doesn't approve
+of caresses," she added.
+
+"Well, who wants to caress him?" Jan asked bluntly.
+
+Meg declared there was one thing she could not bear about Mr. Withells,
+and that was the way he shook hands, "exactly as if he had no thumbs. If
+he's so afraid of touching one as all that comes to, why doesn't he let
+it alone?"
+
+Yet the apparently thumbless hands were constantly occupied in bearing
+gifts of all kinds to his friends.
+
+In appearance he was dapper, smallish, without being undersized, always
+immaculately neat in his attire, with a clean-shaven, serious, rather
+sallow face, which was inclined to be chubby as to the cheeks. He wore
+double-sighted pince-nez, and no mortal had ever seen him without them.
+His favourite writer was Miss Jane Austen, and he deplored the
+licentious tendency of so much modern literature; frequently, and with
+flushed countenance, denouncing certain books as an "outrage." He was
+considered a very well-read man. He disliked anything that was "not
+quite nice," and detested a strong light, whether it were thrown upon
+life or landscape; in bright sunshine he always carried a white umbrella
+lined with green. The game he played best was croquet, and here he was
+really first class; but he was also skilled in every known form of
+Patience, and played each evening unless he happened to be dining out.
+
+As regards food he was something of a faddist, and on the subject of
+fresh air almost a monomaniac. He declared that he could not exist for
+ten minutes in a room with closed windows, and that the smell of apples
+made him feel positively faint; moreover, he would mention his somewhat
+numerous antipathies as though there were something peculiarly
+meritorious in possessing so many. This made his entertainment at any
+meal a matter of agitated consideration among the ladies of Amber
+Guiting.
+
+Nevertheless, he kept an excellent and hospitable table himself, and in
+no way forced his own taste upon others. He disliked the smell of
+tobacco and hardly ever drank wine, yet he kept a stock of excellent
+cigars and his cellar was beyond reproach.
+
+He had been observing Jan for several years, and was rapidly coming to
+the conclusion that she was an "eminently sensible woman." Her grey hair
+and the way she had managed everything for her father led him to believe
+that she was many years older than her real age. Recently he had taken
+to come to Wren's End on one pretext and another almost every day. He
+was kind and pleasant to the children, who amused and pleased
+him--especially little Fay; but he was much puzzled by Meg, whom he had
+known in pre-cap-and-apron days while she was staying at Wren's End.
+
+He couldn't quite place Meg, and there was an occasional glint in her
+queer eyes that he found disconcerting. He was never comfortable in her
+society, for he objected to red hair almost as strongly as to a smell of
+apples.
+
+He really liked the children, and since he knew he couldn't get Jan
+without them he was beginning to think that in such a big house as the
+Grange they would not necessarily be much in the way. He knew nothing
+whatever about Hugo Tancred.
+
+Jan satisfied his fastidious requirements. She was dignified, graceful,
+and, he considered, of admirable parts. He felt that in a very little
+while he could imbue Jan with his own views as to the limitations and
+delicate demarcations of such a marriage as he contemplated.
+
+She was so sensible.
+
+Meanwhile the object of these kind intentions was wholly unaware of
+them. She was just then very much absorbed in her own affairs and
+considerably worried about Meg's. For Captain Middleton's week-end was
+repeated on the following Saturday and extended far into the next week.
+He came constantly to Wren's End, where the children positively adored
+him, and he seemed to possess an infallible instinct which led him to
+the village whensoever Meg and her charges had business there.
+
+On such occasions Meg was often quite rude to Captain Middleton, but the
+children and William more than atoned for her coldness by the warmth of
+their welcome, and he attached himself to them.
+
+In fact, as regards the nursery party at Wren's End, Miles strongly
+resembled William before a fire--you might drive him away ninety and
+nine times, he always came thrusting back with the same expression of
+deprecating astonishment that you could be other than delighted to see
+him.
+
+Whither was it all tending? Jan wondered.
+
+No further news had come from Hugo; Peter, she supposed, had sailed and
+was due in London at the end of the week.
+
+Then Mr. Huntly Withells asked her one afternoon to bicycle over to see
+his spring irises--he called them "_irides_," and invariably spoke of
+"_croci_," and "_delphinia_"--and as Meg was taking the children to tea
+at the vicarage, Jan went.
+
+To her surprise, she found herself the sole guest, but supposed she was
+rather early and that his other friends hadn't come yet.
+
+They strolled about the gardens, so lovely in their spring blossoming,
+and it happened that from one particular place they got a specially good
+view of the house.
+
+"How much larger it is than you would think, looking at the front," Jan
+remarked. "You don't see that wing at all from the drive."
+
+"There's plenty of room for nephews and nieces," Mr. Withells said
+jocularly.
+
+"Have you many nephews and nieces?" she asked, turning to look at him,
+for there was something in the tone of his voice that she could not
+understand.
+
+"Not of my own," he replied, still in that queer, unnatural voice, "but
+you see my wife might have ... if I was married."
+
+"Are you thinking of getting married?" she asked, with the real interest
+such a subject always rouses in woman.
+
+"That depends," Mr. Withells said consciously, "on whether the lady I
+have in mind ... er ... shall we sit down, Miss Ross? It's rather hot in
+the walks."
+
+"Oh, not yet," Jan exclaimed. She couldn't think why, but she began to
+feel uncomfortable. "I must see those Darwin tulips over there."
+
+"It's very sunny over there," he objected. "Come down the nut-walk and
+see the _myosotis arvensis_; it is already in bloom, the weather has
+been so warm.
+
+"Miss Ross," Mr. Withells continued seriously, as they turned into the
+nut-walk which led back towards the house, "we have known each other for
+a considerable time...."
+
+"We have," said Jan, as he had paused, evidently expecting a reply.
+
+"And I have come to have a great regard for you...."
+
+Again he paused, and Jan found herself silently whispering, "Curtsy
+while you're thinking--it saves time," but she preserved an outward
+silence.
+
+"You are, if I may say so, the most sensible woman of my acquaintance."
+
+"Thank you," said Jan, but without enthusiasm.
+
+"We are neither of us quite young"--(Mr. Withells was forty-nine, but it
+was a little hard on Jan)--"and I feel sure that you, for instance,
+would not expect or desire from a husband those constant outward
+demonstrations of affection such as handclaspings and kisses, which are
+so foolish and insanitary."
+
+Jan turned extremely red and walked rather faster.
+
+"Do not misunderstand me, Miss Ross," Mr. Withells continued, looking
+with real admiration at her downcast, rosy face--she must be quite
+healthy he thought, to look so clean and fresh always--"I lay down no
+hard-and-fast rules. I do not say should my wife desire to kiss me
+sometimes, that I should ... repulse her."
+
+Jan gasped.
+
+"But I have the greatest objection, both on sanitary and moral grounds
+to----"
+
+"I can't imagine anyone _wanting_ to kiss you," Jan interrupted
+furiously; "you're far too puffy and stippled."
+
+And she ran from him as though an angry bull were after her.
+
+Mr. Withells stood stock-still where he was, in pained astonishment.
+
+He saw the fleeing fair one disappear into the distance and in the
+shortest time on record he heard the clanging of her bicycle bell as she
+scorched down his drive.
+
+"Puffy and stippled"--"Puffy and stippled"!
+
+Mr. Withells repeated to himself this rudely personal remark as he
+walked slowly towards the house.
+
+What could she mean?
+
+And what in the world had he said to make her so angry?
+
+Women were really most unaccountable.
+
+He ascended his handsome staircase and went into his dressing-room, and
+there he sought his looking-glass, which stood in the window, and
+surveyed himself critically. Yes, his cheeks _were_ a bit puffy near the
+nostrils, and, as is generally the case in later life, the pores of the
+skin were a bit enlarged, but for all that he was quite a personable
+man.
+
+He sighed. Miss Ross, he feared, was not nearly so sensible as he had
+thought.
+
+It was distinctly disappointing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For the first mile and a quarter Jan scorched all she knew. The angry
+blood was thumping in her ears and she exclaimed indignantly at
+intervals, "How dared he! How dared he!"
+
+Then she punctured a tyre.
+
+There was no hope of getting it mended till she reached Wren's End, when
+Earley would do it for her. As she pushed her bicycle along the lane she
+recovered her sense of humour and she laughed. And presently she became
+aware of a faint, sweet, elusive perfume from some flowering shrub on
+the other side of somebody's garden wall.
+
+It strongly resembled the smell of a blossoming tree that grew on Ridge
+Road, Malabar Hill. And in one second Jan was in Bombay, and was
+standing in the moonlight, looking up into a face that was neither puffy
+nor stippled nor prim; but young and thin and worn and very kind. And
+the exquisite understanding of that moment came back to her, and her
+eyes filled with tears.
+
+Yet in another moment she was again demanding indignantly, "How dared
+he!"
+
+She went straight to her room when she got in, and, like Mr. Withells,
+she went and looked at herself in the glass.
+
+Unlike Mr. Withells, she saw nothing there to give her any satisfaction.
+She shook her head at the person in the glass and said aloud:
+
+"If that's all you get by trying to be sensible, the sooner you become a
+drivelling idiot the better for your peace of mind--and your vanity."
+
+The person in the glass shook her head back at Jan, and Jan turned away
+thoroughly disgusted with such a futile sort of _tu quoque_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE
+
+
+Meg and the children, returning from their tea-party at the vicarage,
+were stopped continually in their journey through the main street by
+friendly folk who wanted to greet the children. It was quite a triumphal
+progress, and Meg was feeling particularly proud that afternoon, for her
+charges, including William, had all behaved beautifully. Little Fay had
+refrained from snatching other children's belongings with the cool
+remark, "Plitty little Fay would like 'at"; Tony had been quite merry
+and approachable; and William had offered paws and submitted to
+continual pullings, pushings and draggings with exemplary patience.
+
+Once through the friendly, dignified old street, they reached the main
+road, which was bordered by rough grass sloping to a ditch surmounted by
+a thick thorn hedge. They were rather late, and Meg was wheeling little
+Fay as fast as she could, Tony trotting beside her to keep up, when a
+motor horn was sounded behind them and a large car came along at a good
+speed. They were all well to the side of the road, but William--with the
+perverse stupidity of the young dog--above all, of the young
+bull-terrier--chose that precise moment to gambol aimlessly right into
+the path of the swiftly-coming motor, just as it seemed right upon him;
+and this, regardless of terrified shouts from Meg and the children,
+frantic sounding of the horn and violent language from the driver of the
+car.
+
+It seemed that destruction must inevitably overtake William when the car
+swerved violently as the man ran it down the sloping bank, where it
+stuck, leaving William, unscathed and rather alarmed by all the clamour,
+to run back to his family.
+
+Meg promptly whacked him as hard as she could, whereupon, much
+surprised, he turned over on his back, waving four paws feebly in the
+air.
+
+"Why don't you keep your dog at the side?" the man shouted with very
+natural irritation as he descended from his seat.
+
+"He's a naughty--stupid--puppy," Meg ejaculated between the whacks. "It
+wasn't your fault in the least, and it was awfully good of you to avoid
+him."--Whack--whack.
+
+The man started a little as she spoke and came across the road towards
+them.
+
+Meg raised a flushed face from her castigation of William, but the
+pretty colour faded quickly when she saw who the stranger was.
+
+"Meg!" he exclaimed. "_You!_"
+
+For a tense moment they stared at one another, while the children stared
+at the stranger. He was certainly a handsome man; melancholy,
+"interesting." Pale, with regular features and sleepy, smallish eyes set
+very near together.
+
+"If you knew how I have searched for you," he said.
+
+His voice was his great charm, and would have made his fortune on the
+stage. It could convey so much, could be so tender and beseeching, so
+charged with deepest sadness, so musical always.
+
+"Your search cannot have been very arduous," Meg answered drily. "There
+has never been any mystery about my movements." And she looked him
+straight in the face.
+
+"At first, I was afraid ... I did not try to find you."
+
+"You were well-advised."
+
+"Who is 'at sahib?" little Fay interrupted impatiently. "Let us go
+home." She had no use for any sahib who ignored her presence.
+
+"Yes, we'd better be getting on," Meg said hurriedly, and seized the
+handle of the pram.
+
+But he stood right in their path.
+
+"You were very cruel," the musical voice went on. "You never seemed to
+give a thought to all _I_ was suffering."
+
+Meg met the sleepy eyes, that used to thrill her very soul, with a look
+of scornful amusement in hers that was certainly the very last
+expression he had ever expected to see in them.
+
+She had always dreaded this moment.
+
+Realising the power this man had exercised over her, she always feared
+that should she meet him again the old glamour would surround him; the
+old domination be reasserted. She forgot that in five years one's
+standards change.
+
+Now that she did meet him she discovered that he held no bonds with
+which to bind her. That what she had dreaded was a chimera. The real
+Walter Brooke, the moment he appeared in the flesh, destroyed the image
+memory had set up; and Meg straightened her slender shoulders as though
+a heavy burden had dropped from them.
+
+The whole thing passed like a flash.
+
+"You were very cruel," he repeated.
+
+"There is no use going into all that," Meg answered in a cheerful,
+matter-of-fact tone. "Good-bye, Mr. Brooke. We are most grateful to you
+for not running over William, who is," here she raised her voice for the
+benefit of the culprit, "a naughty--tiresome dog."
+
+"But you can't leave me like this. When can I see you again--there is so
+much I want to explain...."
+
+"But I don't want any explanations, thank you. Come children, we _must_
+go."
+
+"Meg, listen ... surely you have some little feeling of kindness towards
+me ... after all that happened...."
+
+He put his hand on Meg's arm to detain her, and William, who had never
+been known to show enmity to human creature, gave a deep growl and
+bristled. A growl so ominous and threatening that Meg hastily loosed the
+pram and caught him by the collar with both hands.
+
+Tony saw that Meg was flustered and uncomfortable. "Why does he not go?"
+he asked. "I thought he was a sahib, but I suppose he is the
+gharri-wallah. We have thanked him--does he want backsheesh? Give him a
+rupee."
+
+"He _does_ want backsheesh," the deep, musical voice went on--"a little
+pity, a little common kindness."
+
+It was an embarrassing situation. William was straining at his collar
+and growling like an incipient thunderstorm.
+
+"We have thanked you," Tony said again with dignity. "We have no money,
+or we would reward you. If you like to call at the house, Auntie Jan
+always has money."
+
+The man smiled pleasantly at Tony.
+
+"Thank you, young man. You have told me exactly what I wanted to know.
+So you are with your friends?"
+
+"I can't hold this dog much longer," Meg gasped. "If you don't
+go--you'll get bitten."
+
+William ceased to growl, for far down the road he had heard a footstep
+that he knew. He still strained at his collar, but it was in a direction
+that led away from Mr. Walter Brooke. Meg let go and William swung off
+down the road.
+
+"Shall we all have a lide in loo ghalli?" little Fay asked--it seemed to
+her sheer waste of time to stand arguing in the road when a good car was
+waiting empty. The children called every form of conveyance a "gharri."
+
+"We shall meet again," said this persistent man. "You can't put me off
+like this."
+
+He raised his voice, for he was angry, and its clear tones carried far
+down the quiet road.
+
+"There's Captain Middleton with William," Tony said suddenly. "Perhaps
+_he_ has some money."
+
+Meg paled and crimsoned, and with hands that trembled started to push
+the pram at a great pace.
+
+The man went back to his car, and Tony, regardless of Meg's call to him,
+ran to meet William and Miles.
+
+The back wheels of the car had sunk deeply into the soft wet turf. It
+refused to budge. Miles came up. He was long-sighted, and he had seen
+very well who it was that was talking to Meg in the road. He had also
+heard Mr. Brooke's last remark.
+
+Till lately he had only known Walter Brooke enough to dislike him
+vaguely. Since his interview with Mrs. Trent this feeling had
+intensified to such an extent as surprised himself. At the present
+moment he was seething with rage, but all the same he went and helped to
+get the car up the bank, jacking it up, and setting his great shoulders
+against it to start it again.
+
+All this Tony watched with deepest interest, and Meg waited, fuming, a
+little way down the road, for she knew it was hopeless to get Tony to
+come till the car had once started. Once on the hard road again, it
+bowled swiftly away and to her immense relief passed her without
+stopping.
+
+She saw that Miles was bringing Tony, and started on again with little
+Fay.
+
+Fury was in her heart at Tony's disobedience, and behind it all a dull
+ache that Miles should have heard, and doubtless misunderstood, Walter
+Brooke's last remark.
+
+Tony was talking eagerly as he followed, but she was too upset to listen
+till suddenly she heard Miles say in a tone of the deepest satisfaction,
+"Good old William."
+
+This was too much.
+
+She stopped and called over her shoulder: "He isn't good at all; he's a
+thoroughly tiresome, disobedient, badly-trained dog."
+
+They came up with her at that, and William rolled over on his back, for
+he knew those tones portended further punishment.
+
+"He's an ass in lots of ways," Miles allowed, "but he is an excellent
+judge of character."
+
+And as if in proof of this William righted himself and came cringing to
+Meg to try and lick the hand that a few minutes ago had thumped him so
+vigorously.
+
+Meg looked up at Miles and he looked down at her, and his gaze was
+pained, kind and grave. _His_ eyes were large and well-opened and set
+wide apart in his broad face. Honest, trustworthy eyes they were.
+
+Very gently he took the little pram from her, for he saw that her hands
+were trembling: "You've had a fright," he said. "I know what it is. I
+had a favourite dog run over once. It's horrible, it takes months to get
+over it. I can't think why dogs are so stupid about motors ... must have
+been a near shave that ... very decent of Brooke--he's taken pounds off
+his car with that wrench."
+
+While Miles talked he didn't look at Meg.
+
+"I say, little Fay," he suddenly suggested, "wouldn't you like to walk a
+bit?" and he lifted her out. "There, that's better. Now, Miss Morton,
+you sit down a minute; you've had a shake, you know. I'll go on with the
+kiddies."
+
+Meg was feeling a horrible, humiliating desire to cry. Her eyes were
+bright with unshed tears, her knees refused to bear her. Thankfully she
+sat down on the foot-board of Fay's little pram. The tall figure between
+the two little ones suddenly grew blurred and dim. Furtively she blew
+her nose and wiped her eyes. They were not a stone's throw from the
+lodge at Wren's End.
+
+How absurd to be sitting there!
+
+And yet she didn't feel inclined to move just yet.
+
+"'Ere, my dear, you take a sip o' water; the gentleman's told me all
+about it. Them sort o' shocks fair turns one over."
+
+And kind Mrs. Earley was beside her, holding out a thick tumbler. Meg
+drank the deliciously cold water and arose refreshed.
+
+And somehow the homely comfort of Mrs. Earley's presence made her
+realise wherein lay the essential difference between these two men.
+
+"He still treats me like a princess," she thought, "even though he
+thinks ... Oh, what _can_ he think?" and Meg gave a little sob.
+
+"There, there!" said Mrs. Earley, "don't you take on no more, Miss. The
+dear dog bain't 'urted not a 'air of him. 'E cum frolicking in that
+friendly--I sometimes wonders if there do be anyone as William 'ud ever
+bite. 'E ain't much of a watchdog, I fear."
+
+"He nearly bit someone this afternoon," Meg said.
+
+"Well, I'm not sorry to yer it. It don't do for man nor beast to be too
+trustful--not in this world it don't."
+
+At the drive gate Miles was standing.
+
+Mrs. Earley took the pram with her for Earley to clean, and Meg and
+Miles walked on together.
+
+"I'm sorry you've had this upset," he said. "I've talked to William like
+a father."
+
+"It wasn't only William," Meg murmured.
+
+They were close to the house, and she stopped.
+
+"Good night, Captain Middleton. I must go and put my children to bed;
+we're late."
+
+"I don't want to seem interfering, Miss Morton, but don't you let anyone
+bully you into picking up an acquaintance you'd rather drop."
+
+"I suppose," said Meg, "one always has to pay for the things one has
+done."
+
+"Well, yes, sooner or later; but it's silly to pay Jew prices."
+
+"Ah," said Meg, "you've never been poor enough to go to the Jews, so you
+can't tell."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Miles walked slowly back to Amber Guiting that warm May evening. He had
+a good deal to think over, for he had come to a momentous decision. When
+he thought of Meg as he had just seen her--small and tremulous and
+tearful--he clenched his big hands and made a sound in his throat not
+unlike William's growl. When he pictured her angry onslaught upon
+William, he laughed. But the outcome of his reflections was this--that
+whether in the past she had really done anything that put her in Walter
+Brooke's power, or whether he was right to trust to that intangible
+quality in her that seemed to give the direct lie to the worst of Mrs.
+Trent's story, Meg appeared to him to stand in need of some hefty chap
+as a buffer between her and the hard world, and he was very desirous of
+being that same for Meg.
+
+His grandfather, "Mutton-Pie Middleton," had married one of his own
+waitresses for no other reason than that he found she was "the lass for
+him"--and he might, so the Doncaster folk thought, have looked a good
+deal higher for a wife, for he was a "warm" man at the time. Miles
+strongly resembled his grandfather. He was somewhat ruefully aware that
+in appearance there was but little of the Keills about him. He could
+just remember the colossal old man who must have weighed over twenty
+stone in his old age, and Miles, hitherto, had refused to buy a motor
+for his own use because he knew that if he was to keep his figure he
+must walk, and walk a lot.
+
+Like his grandfather, he was now perfectly sure of himself; Meg "was the
+lass for him"; but he was by no means equally sure of her. By some
+infallible delicacy of instinct--and this he certainly did not get from
+the Middletons--he knew that what the world would regard as a
+magnificent match for Meg, might be the very circumstance that would
+destroy his chance with her. The Middletons were all keenly alive to the
+purchasing powers of money, and saw to it that they got their money's
+worth.
+
+All the same, a man's a man, whether he be rich or poor, and Miles still
+remembered the way Meg had smiled upon him the first time they ever met.
+Surely she could never have smiled at him like that unless she had
+rather liked him.
+
+It was the pathos of Meg herself--not the fact that she had to
+work--that appealed to Miles. That she should cheerfully earn her own
+living instead of grousing in idleness in a meagre home seemed to him
+merely a matter of common sense. He knew that if he had to do it he
+could earn his, and the one thing he could neither tolerate nor
+understand about a good many of his Keills relations was their
+preference for any form of assistance to honest work. He helped them
+generously enough, but in his heart of hearts he despised them, though
+he did not confess this even to himself.
+
+As he drew near the Manor House he saw Lady Mary walking up and down
+outside, evidently waiting for him.
+
+"Where have you been, Miles?" she asked, impatiently. "Pen has been
+here, and wanted specially to see you, but she couldn't stay any longer,
+as it's such a long run back. She motored over from Malmesbury."
+
+"What did she want?" Miles asked. "She's always in a stew about
+something. One of her Pekinese got pip, or what?"
+
+Lady Mary took his arm and turned to walk along the terrace. "I think,"
+she said, and stopped. "Where _were_ you, Miles?"
+
+"I strolled down the village to get some tobacco, and then I saw a chap
+who'd got his motor stuck, and helped him, and then ..." Here Miles
+looked down at his aunt, who looked up at him apprehensively. "I caught
+up with Miss Morton and the children, and walked back to Wren's End with
+them. There, Aunt Mary, that's a categorical history of my time since
+tea."
+
+Lady Mary pressed his arm. "Miles, dear, do you think it's quite wise to
+be seen about so much with little Miss Morton ... wise for her I mean?"
+
+"I hope I'm not the sort of chap it's bad to be seen about with...."
+
+"Of course not, dear Miles, but, you see, her position...."
+
+"What's the matter with her position?"
+
+"Of course I know it's most creditable of her and all that ... but ...
+when a girl has to go out as a sort of nursery governess, it is
+different, isn't it, dear? I mean...."
+
+"Yes, Aunt Mary, I'm awfully interested--different from what?"
+
+"From girls who lead the sheltered life, girls who don't work ... girls
+of our own class."
+
+"I don't know," Miles said thoughtfully, "that I should say Pen, for
+instance, lives exactly a _sheltered_ life, should you?"
+
+"Pen is married."
+
+"Yes, but before she was married ... eh, Aunt Mary? Be truthful, now."
+
+Miles held his aunt's arm tightly within his, and he stooped and looked
+into her face.
+
+"And does the fact that Pen is married explain or excuse her deplorable
+taste in men? Which does it do, Aunt Mary? Speak up, now."
+
+Lady Mary laughed. "I'm not here to defend Pen; I'm here to get your
+answer as to whether you think it's ... quite fair to make that little
+Miss Morton conspicuous by running after her and making her the talk of
+the entire county, for that's what you're doing."
+
+"What good old Pen has been telling you I'm doing, I suppose."
+
+"I had my own doubts about it without any help from Pen ... but she said
+Alec Pottinger had been talking...."
+
+"Pottinger's an ass."
+
+"He doesn't talk _much_, anyhow, Miles, and she felt if _he_ said
+anything...."
+
+"Look here, Aunt Mary, how's a chap to go courting seriously if he
+doesn't run after a girl?... he can't work it from a distance ... not
+unless he's one of those poet chaps, and puts letters in hollow trees
+and so on. And you don't seem to have provided any hollow trees about
+here."
+
+"Courting ... seriously!" Lady Mary repeated with real horror in her
+tones. "Oh, Miles, you can't mean that!"
+
+"Surely you'd not prefer I meant the other thing?"
+
+"But, Miles dear, think!"
+
+"I have thought, and I've thought it out."
+
+"You mean you want to _marry_ her?"
+
+Lady Mary spoke in an awed whisper.
+
+"Just exactly that, and I don't care who knows it; but I'm not at all
+sure she wants to marry me ... that's why I don't want to rush my fences
+and get turned down. I'm a heavy chap to risk a fall, Aunt Mary."
+
+"Oh, Miles! this is worse than anything Pen even dreamt of."
+
+"What is? If you mean that she probably won't have me--I'm with you."
+
+"Of course she'd jump at you--any girl would.... But a little
+nursemaid!"
+
+"Come now, Aunt Mary, you know very well she's just as good as I am;
+better, probably, for she's got no pies nor starch in her pedigree. Her
+father's a Major and her mother was of quite good family--and she's got
+lots of rich, stingy relations ... and she doesn't sponge on 'em. What's
+the matter with her?"
+
+"Please don't do anything in a hurry, dear Miles."
+
+"I shan't, if you and Pen and the blessed 'county,' with its criticism
+and gossip, don't drive me into it ... but the very first word you
+either say or repeat to me against Miss Morton, off I go to her and to
+the old Major.... So now we understand each other, Aunt Mary--eh?"
+
+"There are things you ought to know, Miles."
+
+"You may depend," said Miles grimly, "that anything I ought to know I
+shall be told ... over and over again ... confound it.... And remember,
+Aunt Mary, that what I've told you is not in the least private. Tell
+Pen, tell Mrs. Fream, tell Withells, but just leave me to tell Miss
+Ross, that's all I beg."
+
+"Miles, I shall tell nobody, for I hope ... I hope----"
+
+"'Hope told a flattering tale,'" said Miles, and kissed his aunt ... but
+to himself he said: "I've shut their mouths for a day or two anyway."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE ENCAMPMENT
+
+
+It was the morning of the first Monday in June, and Tony had wandered
+out into the garden all by himself. Monday mornings were very busy, and
+once Clipture was over Jan and Meg became socially useless to any
+self-respecting boy.
+
+There was all the washing to sort and divide into two large heaps: what
+might be sent to Mrs. Chitt in the village, and what might be kept for
+the ministrations of one Mrs. Mumford, who came every Monday to Wren's
+End. And this division was never arrived at without a good deal of
+argument between Jan and Meg.
+
+If Jan had had her way, Mrs. Mumford's heap would have been very small
+indeed, and would have consisted chiefly of socks and handkerchiefs. If
+Meg had had hers, nothing at all would have gone to Mrs. Chitt. Usually,
+too, Hannah was called in as final arbitrator, and she generally sided
+with Meg. Little Fay took the greatest interest in the whole ceremony,
+chattered continually, and industriously mixed up the heaps when no one
+was looking.
+
+At such times Tony was of the opinion that there were far too many women
+in the world. On this particular morning, too, he felt injured because
+of something that had happened at breakfast.
+
+It was always a joy to Meg and Jan that whatever poor Fay might have
+left undone in the matter of disciplining her children, she had at least
+taught them to eat nicely. Little Fay's management of a spoon was a joy
+to watch. The dimpled baby hand was so deft, the turn of the plump wrist
+so sure and purposeful. She never spilled or slopped her food about. Its
+journey from bowl to little red mouth was calculated and assured. Both
+children had a horror of anything sticky, and would refuse jam unless it
+was "well covelled in a sangwidge."
+
+That very morning Jan and Meg exchanged congratulatory glances over
+their well-behaved charges, sitting side by side.
+
+Then, all at once, with a swift, sure movement, little Fay stretched up
+and deposited a spoonful of exceedingly hot porridge exactly on the top
+of her brother's head, with a smart tap.
+
+Tony's hair was always short, and had been cut on Saturday, and the hot
+mixture ran down into his eyes, which filled him with rage.
+
+He tried to get out of his high chair, exclaiming angrily, "Let me get
+at her to box her!"
+
+Jan held him down with one hand while she wiped away the offending mess
+with the other, and all the time Tony cried in _crescendo_, "Let me get
+at her!"
+
+Little Fay, quite unmoved, continued to eat her porridge with studied
+elegance, and in gently reproachful tones remarked, "Tony velly closs
+littoo boy."
+
+Jan and Meg, who wanted desperately to laugh, tried hard to look
+shocked, and Meg asked, "What on earth possessed you to do such a
+thing?"
+
+"Tony's head so shiny and smoove."
+
+Tony rubbed the shiny head ruefully.
+
+"Can't I do nuffin to her?" he demanded.
+
+"No," his sister answered firmly, "loo can't, 'cos I'm plitty littoo
+Fay."
+
+"Can't I plop some on _her_ head?" he persisted.
+
+"It certainly seems unfair," Jan said thoughtfully, "but I think you'd
+better not."
+
+"It _is_ unfair," Tony grumbled.
+
+Jan loosed his hands. "Now," she said, "you can do what you like."
+
+Little Fay leaned towards her brother, smiling her irresistible,
+dimpled, twinkling smile, and held out a spoonful of her porridge.
+
+"Deah littoo Tony," she cooed, "taste it."
+
+And Tony meekly accepted the peace-offering.
+
+"You haven't smacked her," Jan remarked.
+
+Tony sighed. "It's too late now--I don't feel like it any more."
+
+All the same he felt aggrieved as he set out to seek Earley in the
+kitchen garden.
+
+Earley was not to be found. He saw Mrs. Mumford already hanging kitchen
+cloths on a line in the orchard, but he felt no desire for Mrs.
+Mumford's society.
+
+Tony's tormented soul sought for something soothing.
+
+The garden was pleasant, but it wasn't enough.
+
+Ah! he'd got it!
+
+He'd go to the river; all by himself he'd go, and not tell anybody. He'd
+look over the bridge into that cool deep pool and perhaps that big fat
+trout would be swimming about. What was it he had heard Captain
+Middleton say last time he was down at Amber Guiting? "The Mayfly was
+up."
+
+He had seemed quite delighted about it, therefore it must mean something
+pleasant.
+
+After all, on a soft, not too sunny morning in early June, with a west
+wind rustling the leaves in the hedges, the world was not such a bad
+place; for even if there were rather too many women in it, there were
+dogs and rivers and country roads where adventurous boys could see life
+for themselves.
+
+William agreed with Tony in his dislike of Monday mornings. He went and
+lay on the front door mat so that he was more than ready to accompany
+anyone who happened to be going out.
+
+By the time they reached the bridge all sense of injury had vanished,
+and buoyant expectation had taken its place.
+
+Three men were fishing. One was far in the distance, one about three
+hundred yards up stream, and one Tony recognised as Mr. Dauncey,
+landlord of "The Full Basket," the square white house standing in its
+neat garden just on the other side of the bridge. The fourth gentleman,
+who had forgotten his hat, and was clad in a holland smock, sandals,
+and no stockings, leaned over luxuriously, with his elbows on the low
+wall and his bare legs thrust out. He was very still, even trying not to
+twitch when William licked his bare legs, as he did at intervals just to
+show he was there on guard.
+
+There had been heavy rain in the night and the water was discoloured.
+Nobody noticed Tony, and for about an hour nothing happened. Then Mr.
+Dauncey got a rise. The rigid little figure on the bridge leaned further
+over as Mr. Dauncey's reel screamed and he followed his cast down
+stream.
+
+Presently, with a sense of irritation, Tony was aware of footsteps
+coming over the bridge. He felt that he simply could not bear it just
+then if anyone leaned over beside him and talked. The footsteps came up
+behind him and passed; and William, who was lying between Tony's legs
+and the wall, squeezed as close to him as possible, gave a low growl.
+
+"Hush, William, naughty dog!" Tony whispered crossly.
+
+William hushed, and drooped as he always did when rebuked.
+
+It occurred to Tony to look after this amazing person who could cross a
+bridge without stopping to look over when a reel was joyfully
+proclaiming that some fisherman was having luck.
+
+It was a man, and he walked as though he were footsore and tired. There
+was something dejected and shabby in his appearance, and his clothes
+looked odd somehow in Amber Guiting. Tony stared after the stranger,
+and gradually he realised that there was something familiar in the back
+of the tall figure that walked so slowly and yet seemed trying to walk
+fast.
+
+The man had a stick and evidently leant upon it as he went. He wore an
+overcoat and carried nothing in his hand.
+
+Mr. Dauncey's reel chuckled and one of the other anglers ran towards him
+with a landing-net.
+
+But Tony still stared after the man. Presently, with a deep sigh, he
+started to follow him.
+
+Just once he turned, in time to see that Mr. Dauncey had landed his
+trout.
+
+The sun came out from behind the clouds. "The Full Basket," the river,
+brown and rippled, the bridge, the two men talking eagerly on the bank
+below, the muddy road growing cream-coloured in patches as it dried,
+were all photographed upon Tony's mind. When he started to follow the
+stranger he was out of sight, but now Tony trotted steadily forward and
+did not look round again.
+
+William was glad. He had been lying in a puddle, and, like little Fay,
+he preferred "a dly place."
+
+Meanwhile, at Wren's End the washing had taken a long time to count and
+to divide. There seemed a positively endless number of little smocks and
+frocks and petticoats and pinafores, and Meg wanted to keep them all for
+Mrs. Mumford to wash, declaring that she (Meg) could starch and iron
+them beautifully. This was quite true. She could iron very well, as she
+did everything she undertook to do. But Jan knew that it tired her
+dreadfully, that the heat and the wielding of the heavy iron were very
+bad for her, and after much argument and many insulting remarks from Meg
+as to Jan's obstinacy and extravagance generally, the things were
+divided. Meg put on little Fay's hat and swept her out into the garden;
+whereupon Jan plunged into Mrs. Mumford's heap, removed all the things
+to be ironed that could not be tackled by Anne Chitt, stuffed them into
+Mrs. Chitt's basket, fastened it firmly and rang for Anne and Hannah to
+carry the things away.
+
+She washed her hands and put on her gardening gloves preparatory to
+going out, humming a gay little snatch of song; and as she ran down the
+wide staircase she heard the bell ring, and saw the figure of a man
+standing in the open doorway.
+
+The maids were carrying the linen down the back stairs, and she went
+across the hall to see what he wanted.
+
+"Well, Jan," he said, and his voice sounded weak and tired. "Here I am
+at last."
+
+He held out his hand, and as she took it she felt how hot and dry it
+was.
+
+"Come in, Hugo," she said quietly. "Why didn't you let me know you were
+coming, and I'd have met you."
+
+The man followed her as she led the way into the cool, fragrant
+drawing-room. He paused in the doorway and passed his hand across his
+eyes. "It does bring it all back," he said.
+
+He sat down in a deep chair and leaned his head against the back,
+closing his eyes. Jan saw that he was thin to emaciation, and that he
+looked very ill; shabby, too, and broken.
+
+The instinct of the nurse that exists in any woman worth her salt was
+roused in Jan. All the passionate indignation she had felt against her
+brother-in-law was merged at the moment in pity and anxiety.
+
+"Hugo," she said gently, "I fear you are ill. Have you had any
+breakfast?"
+
+"I came by the early train to avoid ordering breakfast; I couldn't have
+paid for it. I'd only enough for my fare. Jan, I haven't a single rupee
+left."
+
+He sat forward in the chair with his hands on the arms and closed his
+eyes again.
+
+Jan looked keenly at the handsome, haggard face. There was no pretence
+here. The man was gravely ill. His lips (Jan had always mistrusted his
+well-shaped mouth because it would never really shut) were dry and
+cracked and discoloured, the cheekbones sharp, and there was that deep
+hollow at the back of the neck that always betrays the man in
+ill-health.
+
+She went to him and pressed him back in the chair.
+
+"What do you generally do when you have fever?" she asked.
+
+"Go to bed--if there is a bed; and take quinine and drink hot tea."
+
+"That's what you'd better do now. Where are your things?"
+
+"There's a small bag at the station. They promised to send it up. I
+couldn't carry it and I had no money to pay a boy. I came the long way
+round, Jan, not through the village. No one recognised me."
+
+"I'll get you some tea at once, and I have quinine in the house. Will
+you take some now?"
+
+Hugo laughed. "Your quinine would be of no earthly use to me, but I've
+already taken it this morning. I've got some here in my pocket. The
+minute my bag comes I'll go to bed--if you don't mind."
+
+Someone fumbled at the handle of the door, and Tony, followed by
+William, appeared on the threshold.
+
+Hugo Tancred opened his eyes. "Hullo!" he said. "Do you remember me,
+young shaver?"
+
+Tony came into the room holding out his hand. "How do you do?" he said
+solemnly.
+
+Hugo took it and stared at his son with strange glazed eyes. "You look
+fit enough, anyhow," he said, and dropped the little hand.
+
+"I came as quick as I could," Tony said eagerly to Jan. "But Mr. Dauncey
+caught a trout, and I _had_ to wait a minute."
+
+"Good heavens!" Hugo exclaimed irritably. "Do you all _still_ think and
+talk about nothing but fishing?"
+
+"Come," said Jan, holding out her hand to Tony, "and we'll go and see
+about some breakfast for Daddie."
+
+William, who had been sniffing dubiously at the man in the chair, dashed
+after them.
+
+As they crossed the hall Tony remarked philosophically: "Daddie's got
+fever. He'll be very cross, then he'll be very sad, and then he'll want
+you to give him something, and if you do--p'raps he'll go away."
+
+Jan made no answer.
+
+Tony followed her through the swing door and down the passage to speak
+to Hannah, who was much moved and excited when she heard Mr. Tancred had
+arrived. Hannah was full of sympathy for the "poor young widower," and
+though she could have wished that he had given them notice of his
+coming, still, she supposed him to be so distracted with grief that he
+forgot to do anything of the kind. She and Anne Chitt went there and
+then to make up his bed, while Jan boiled the kettle and got him some
+breakfast.
+
+While she was doing this Meg and little Fay came round to the back to
+look for Tony, whom they found making toast.
+
+"Who's tum?" asked little Fay, while Jan rapidly explained the situation
+to Meg.
+
+"Your Daddie's come."
+
+Little Fay looked rather vague. "What sort of a Daddie?" she asked.
+
+"You take her to see him, Tony, and I'll finish the toast," said Jan,
+taking the fork out of his hand.
+
+When the children had gone Meg said slowly: "And Mr. Ledgard comes
+to-morrow?"
+
+"He can't. I must telegraph and put him off for a day or two. Hugo is
+really ill."
+
+"I shouldn't put him off long, if I were you."
+
+Jan seized the tray: "I'll send a wire now, if you and the children will
+take it down to the post-office for me."
+
+"Why send it at all?" said Meg. "Let him come."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+TACTICS
+
+
+It was a fortnight since Hugo Tancred arrived at Wren's End, and Jan had
+twice put off Peter's visit.
+
+During the first few days Hugo's temperature remained so high that she
+grew thoroughly alarmed; and in spite of his protestations that he was
+"quite used to it," she sent for the doctor. Happily the doctor in his
+youth had been in the East and was able to reassure her. His opinion,
+too, had more weight with Hugo on this account, and though he grumbled
+he consented to do what the doctor advised. And at the end of a week
+Hugo was able to come downstairs, looking very white and shaky. He lay
+out in the garden in a deck-chair for most of the day and managed to eat
+a good many of the nourishing dishes Hannah prepared for him.
+
+It had been a hard time for Jan, as Hugo was not an invalid who excited
+compassion in those who had to wait upon him. He took everything for
+granted, was somewhat morose and exacting, and made no attempt to
+control the extreme irritability that so often accompanies fever.
+
+When the fever left him, however, his tone changed, and the second
+stage, indicated by Tony as "sad," set in with severity.
+
+His depression was positively overwhelming, and he seemed to think that
+its public manifestation should arouse in all beholders the most
+poignant and respectful sympathy.
+
+Poor Jan found it very difficult to behave in a manner at all calculated
+to satisfy her brother-in-law. She had not, so far, uttered one word of
+reproach to him, but she _would_ shrink visibly when he tried to discuss
+his wife, and she could not even pretend to believe in the deep
+sincerity of a grief that seemed to find such facile solace in
+expression. The mode of expression, too, in hackneyed, commonplace
+phrases, set her teeth on edge.
+
+She knew that poor Hugo--she called him "poor Hugo" just then--thought
+her cold and unsympathetic because she rather discouraged his
+outpourings; but Fay's death was too lately-lived a tragedy to make it
+possible for her to talk of it--above all, with him; and after several
+abortive attempts Hugo gave up all direct endeavour to make her.
+
+"You are terribly Scotch, Jan," he said one day. "I sometimes wonder
+whether anything could make you _really_ feel."
+
+Jan looked at him with a sort of contemptuous wonder that caused him to
+redden angrily, but she made no reply.
+
+He was her guest, he was a broken man, and she knew well that they had
+not yet even approached their real difference.
+
+Two people, however, took Hugo's attitude of profound dejection in the
+way he expected and liked it to be taken. These were Mr. Withells and
+Hannah.
+
+Mr. Withells did not bear Jan a grudge because of her momentary lapse
+from good manners. In less than a week from the unfortunate interview in
+the nut-walk he had decided that she could not properly have understood
+him; and that he had, perhaps, sprung upon her too suddenly the high
+honour he held in store for her.
+
+So back he came in his neat little two-seater car to call at Wren's End
+as if nothing had happened, and Jan, guiltily conscious that she _had_
+been very rude, was only too thankful to accept the olive-branch in the
+spirit in which it was offered.
+
+He took to coming almost as often as before, and was thoroughly
+interested and commiserating when he heard that poor Mrs. Tancred's
+husband had come home from India and been taken ill almost immediately
+on arrival. He sent some early strawberries grown in barrels in the
+houses, and with them a note conjuring Jan "on no account to leave them
+in the sickroom overnight, as the smell of fruit was so deleterious."
+
+Hannah considered Hugo's impenetrable gloom a most proper and husbandly
+tribute to the departed. She felt that had there been a Mr. Hannah she
+could not have wished him to show more proper feeling had Providence
+thought fit to snatch her from his side. So she expressed her admiration
+in the strongest of soups, the smoothest of custards, and the most
+succulent of mutton-chops. Gladly would she have commanded Mrs. Earley
+to slay her fattest cockerels for the nourishment of "yon poor
+heartbroken young man," but that she remembered (from her experience of
+Fay's only visit) that no one just home from India will give a thank-you
+for chickens.
+
+Jan had cause to bless kind Mr. Withells, for directly Hugo was able for
+it, he came with his largest and most comfortable car, driven by his
+trustworthy chauffeur, to take the invalid for a run right into
+Wiltshire. He pressed Jan to go too, but she pleaded "things to see to"
+at home.
+
+Hugo had seen practically nothing of Meg. She was fully occupied in
+keeping the children out of their father's way. Little Fay "pooah
+daddied" him when they happened to meet, and Tony stared at him in the
+weighing, measuring way Hugo found so trying, but Meg neither looked at
+him nor did she address any remark whatever to him unless she positively
+could not help it.
+
+Meg was thoroughly provoked that he should have chosen to turn up just
+then. She had been most anxious that Peter should come. Firstly,
+because, being sharply observant, she had come to the conclusion that
+his visit would be a real pleasure to Jan, and secondly, because she
+ardently desired to see him herself that she might judge whether he was
+"at all good enough."
+
+And now her well-loved Jan, instead of looking her best, was growing
+thin and haggard, losing her colour, and her sweet serenity, and in
+their place a patient, tired expression in her eyes that went to Meg's
+heart.
+
+She had hardly seen Jan alone for over a week; for since Hugo came
+downstairs Meg had taken all her meals with the children in the nursery,
+while Jan and Hugo had theirs in the rarely-used dining-room. The girls
+breakfasted together, as Hugo had his in his room, but as the children
+were always present there was small chance of any confidential
+conversation.
+
+The first afternoon Mr. Withells took Hugo for a drive, Meg left her
+children in Earley's care the minute she heard the car depart, and went
+to look for Jan in the house.
+
+She found her opening all the windows in the dining-room. Meg shut the
+door and sat on the polished table, lit a cigarette and regarded her own
+pretty swinging feet with interest.
+
+"How long does Mr. Tancred propose to stay?" she asked.
+
+"How can I tell," Jan answered wearily, as she sat down in one of the
+deep window-seats. "He has nowhere to go and no money to go with; and,
+so far, except for a vague allusion to some tea-plantation in Ceylon, he
+has suggested no plans. Oh, yes! I forgot, there was something about
+fruit-farming or vine-growing in California, but I fancy considerable
+capital would be needed for that."
+
+"And how much longer do you intend to keep Mr. Ledgard waiting for _his_
+visit?"
+
+"It would be small pleasure for Mr. Ledgard to come here with Hugo, and
+horrid for Hugo, for he knows perfectly well what Peter ... Mr. Ledgard
+thinks of him."
+
+"But if friend Hugo knew Mr. Ledgard was coming, might it not have an
+accelerating effect upon his movements? You could give him his
+fare--single, mind--to Guernsey. Let him go and stay with his people for
+a bit."
+
+Jan shook her head. "I can't turn him out, Meg; and I'm not going to let
+Mr. Ledgard waste his precious leave on an unpleasant visit. If I could
+give him a good time it would be different; but after all he did for us
+while we were in Bombay, it would be rank ingratitude to let him in for
+more worries at home."
+
+"Perhaps he wouldn't consider them worries. Perhaps he'd _like_ to
+come."
+
+Jan's strained expression relaxed a little and she smiled with her eyes
+fixed on Meg's neat swinging feet. "He _says_ he would."
+
+"Well, then, take him at his word. We can turn the excellent Withells on
+to Hugo. Let him instruct Hugo in the importance of daily free
+gymnastics after one's bath and the necessity for windows being left
+open at the top 'day and night, but _especially_ at night.' Let's tell
+that Peter man to come."
+
+Jan shook her head.
+
+"No, I've explained the situation to him and begged him not to consider
+us any more for the present. We must think of the maids too. You see,
+Hugo makes a good deal of extra work, and I'm afraid Hannah might turn
+grumpy if there was yet another man to do for."
+
+Meg thoughtfully blew beautiful rings of smoke, carefully poked a small
+finger exactly into the centre of each and continued to swing her feet
+in silence.
+
+Jan leaned her head against the casement and closed her eyes.
+
+Without so much as a rustle Meg descended from the table. She went over
+to Jan and dropped a light kiss on the top of the thick wavy hair that
+was so nearly white. Jan opened her tired eyes and smiled.
+
+This quaint person in the green linen frock and big white apron always
+looked so restfully neat and clean, so capable and strong with that
+inward shining strength that burns with a steady light. Jan put her arms
+round Meg and leaned her head against the admirable apron's cool, smooth
+bib.
+
+"You're here, anyway," she said. "You don't know how I thank God for
+that."
+
+Meg held her close. "Listen to me," she said. "You're going on quite a
+wrong tack with that brother-in-law. You are, Jan--I grieve to say
+it--standing between him and his children--you don't allow him to see
+his children, especially his adored daughter, nearly enough. Now that he
+is well enough to take the air with Mr. Withells I propose that we allow
+him to _study_ his children--and how can he study them if they are never
+left with him? Let him realise what it would be if he had them with him
+constantly, and no interfering aunt to keep them in order--do you
+understand, Jan? Have you tumbled to it? You are losing a perfectly
+magnificent opportunity."
+
+Jan pushed Meg a little away from her and looked up: "I believe there's
+a good deal in what you say."
+
+"There's everything in what I say. As long as the man was ill one
+couldn't, of course, but now we can and will--eh, Jan?"
+
+"Not Tony," Jan said nervously. "Hugo doesn't care much for Tony, and
+I'm always afraid what he may say or do to the child."
+
+"If you let him have them both occasionally he may discover that Tony
+has his points."
+
+"They're _both_ perfect darlings," Jan said resentfully. Meg laughed and
+danced a two-step to the door.
+
+"They're darlings that need a good deal of diplomatic managing, and if
+they don't get it they'll raise Cain. I'm going to take them down to the
+post-office directly with my Indian letters. Why not come with us for
+the walk?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hugo quite enjoyed his run with Mr. Withells and Mr. Withells enjoyed
+being consulted about Hugo's plans. He felt real sympathy for a young
+man whose health, ruined by one bad station after another, had forced
+him to give up his career in India. He suggested various ameliorating
+treatments to Hugo, who received his advice with respectful gratitude,
+and they arranged to drive again together on Saturday, which was next
+day but one.
+
+Hugo sought the sofa in the drawing-room for a quiet hour before dinner
+and lit a cigar. He had hardly realised his pleasantly tired and rather
+somnolent condition when his daughter entered carrying a large
+Teddy-bear, two dolls, a toy trumpet and a box containing a wooden
+tea-set. She dropped several of these articles just inside the door.
+"Come and help me pick up my sings," she commanded. "I've come to play
+wis loo, Daddie."
+
+Hugo did not move. He was fond of little Fay; he admired her good looks
+and her splendid health, but he didn't in the least desire her society
+just then.
+
+"Poor Daddie's tired," he said in his "saddest" tone. "I think you'd
+better go and play in the nursery with Tony."
+
+"No," said little Fay, "Tony's not zere; _loo_ mus' play wis me.
+Or"--she added as a happy alternative--"loo can tell me sumfin
+instastin."
+
+"Surely," said Hugo, "it's your bed-time?"
+
+"No," little Fay answered, and the letters were never formed that could
+express the finality of that "no," "Med will fesh me when it's time.
+I've come to play wis _loo_. Det up, Daddie; loo can't play p'oply lying
+zere."
+
+"Oh, yes, I can," Hugo protested eagerly. "You bring all your nice toys
+one by one and show them to me."
+
+"'At," she remarked with great scorn, "would be a velly stupid game. Det
+up!"
+
+"Why can't Meg play with you?" Hugo asked irritably. "What's she doing?"
+
+Little Fay stared at her father. She was unaccustomed to be addressed
+in that tone, and she resented it. Earley and Mr. Burgess were her
+humble slaves. Captain Middleton did as he was told and became an
+elephant, a camel, or a polar bear on the shortest notice, moreover he
+threw himself into the part with real goodwill and enjoyment. The lazy
+man lying there on the sofa, who showed no flattering pleasure in her
+society, must be roused to a sense of his shortcomings. She seized the
+Teddy-bear, swung it round her head and brought it down with a
+resounding thump on Hugo's chest. "Det up," she said more loudly. "Loo
+don't seem to know any stolies, so you _mus'_ play wis me."
+
+Hugo swung his legs off the sofa and sat up to recover his breath, which
+had been knocked out of him by the Teddy-bear.
+
+"You're a very rude little girl," he said crossly. "You'll have to be
+punished if you do that sort of thing."
+
+"What sort of sing?"
+
+"What you did just now; it's very naughty indeed."
+
+"What nelse?"
+
+Little Fay stood with her head on one side like an inquisitive sparrow.
+One of the things she had not dropped was the tin trumpet. She raised it
+to her lips now, and blew a blast that went through Hugo's head like a
+knife.
+
+He snatched it from her. "You're not to do that," he said. "I can't
+stand it. Go and pick up those other things and show them to me."
+
+"Loo can see zem from here."
+
+"Not what's in the box," he suggested diplomatically.
+
+"I'm tah'ed too," she said, suddenly sitting down on the floor. "You
+fesh 'em."
+
+"Will you play with them if I do?"
+
+She shook her head. "Not if loo're closs, and lude and naughty and ...
+stupid."
+
+Hugo groaned and stalked over to collect the two dolls and the
+tea-things. He brought them back and put them down on one end of the
+sofa while he sat down at the other.
+
+"Now," he said, "show me how you play with them."
+
+His cigar had gone out and he struck a match to light it again. Little
+Fay scrambled to her feet and blew it out before he had touched his
+cigar with it.
+
+"Adain," she said joyously. "Make anozer light."
+
+He struck another match, but sheltered it with his hand till he'd got
+his cigar going, his daughter blowing vigorously all the time.
+
+"Now," she said, "you can be a nengine and I'll be the tlain."
+
+Round that drawing-room the unfortunate Hugo ran, encouraged in his
+efforts by blasts upon the trumpet. The chairs were arranged as
+carriages, the dolls as passengers, and the box of tea-things was
+luggage. None of these transformations were suggested by Hugo, but
+little Fay had played the game so often under Meg's brilliant
+supervision that she knew all the properties by heart.
+
+At the end of fifteen minutes Hugo was thoroughly exhausted and audibly
+thanked God when Meg appeared to fetch her charge. But he hadn't
+finished even then, for little Fay, aided and abetted by Meg, insisted
+that every single thing should be tidily put back exactly where it was
+before.
+
+At the door, just as they were on the point of departure, Meg paused.
+"You must enjoy having her all to yourself for a little while," she said
+in honeyed, sympathetic tones such as Hugo, certainly, had never heard
+from her before. "I fear we've been rather selfish about it, but for the
+future we must not forget that you have the first right to her.... Did
+you kiss your dear Daddie, my darling?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Through the shut door Hugo heard his daughter's voice proclaiming in
+lofty, pitying tones, "Pooah Daddie velly stupid man, he was a velly bad
+nengine, he did it all long."
+
+"Damn!" said Hugo Tancred.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+During dinner that night Jan talked continually about the children. She
+consulted Hugo as to things in which he took not the smallest interest,
+such as what primers he considered the best for earliest instruction in
+reading, and whether he thought the Montessori method advantageous or
+not.
+
+As they sat over dessert he volunteered the remark that little Fay was
+rather an exhausting child.
+
+"All children are," Jan answered, "and I've just been thinking that
+while you are here to help me, it would be such a good chance to give
+Meg a little holiday. She has not had a day off since I came back from
+India, and it would be so nice for her to go to Cheltenham for a few
+days to see Major Morton."
+
+"But surely," Hugo said uneasily, "that's what she's here for, to look
+after the children. She's very highly paid; you could get a good nurse
+for half what you pay her."
+
+"I doubt it, and you must remember that, because she loved Fay, she is
+accepting less than half of what she could earn elsewhere to help me
+with Fay's children."
+
+"Of course, if you import sentiment into the matter you must pay for
+it."
+
+"But I fear that's just what I don't do."
+
+"My dear Jan, you must forgive me if I venture to think that both you
+and your father, and even Fay, were quite absurd about Meg Morton. She's
+a nice enough little girl, but nothing so very wonderful, and as for her
+needing a holiday after a couple of months of the very soft job she has
+with you ... that's sheer nonsense."
+
+There was silence for a minute. Hugo took another chocolate and said,
+"You know I don't believe in having children all over the place. The
+nursery is the proper place for them when they're little, and school is
+the proper place--most certainly the proper place, anyway, for a boy--as
+soon as ever any school can be found to take him."
+
+"I quite agree with you as to the benefit of a good school," Jan said
+sweetly. "I am painfully conscious myself of how much I lost in never
+having had any regular education. Have you thought yet what preparatory
+school you'd prefer for Tony?"
+
+"Hardly yet. I've not been home long enough, and, as you know, at
+present, I've no money at all...."
+
+"I shall be most pleased to help with Tony's education, but in that case
+I should expect to have some voice in the school selected."
+
+"Certainly, certainly," Hugo agreed. "But what I really want to know is
+what you propose to do to help me to attain a position in which I _can_
+educate my children as we both should wish."
+
+"I don't quite see where I come in."
+
+"My dear Jan, that's absurd. You have money--and a few hundreds now will
+start me again...."
+
+"Start you again in what direction?"
+
+"That's what we've got to thresh out. I've several propositions to lay
+before you."
+
+"All propositions will have to be submitted to Mr. Davidson."
+
+"That's nonsense. You must remember that I could contest Fay's will if I
+liked--it was grossly unfair to leave that two thousand pounds away from
+me."
+
+"She left it to her children, Hugo, and _you_ must remember you spent
+eight thousand pounds of her money."
+
+"_I_ didn't spend it. Do you think _I_ benefited? The investments were
+unfortunate, I grant you, but that's not to say I had it."
+
+"Anyway that money is gone."
+
+"And the sooner I set about making some more to replace it the better,
+but I must have help."
+
+"It takes every penny of my income to run things here."
+
+"Well, you know, Jan, to be quite candid, I think it's rather ridiculous
+of you to live here. You could let this place easily and for a good
+rent. In a smaller house you'd be equally comfortable and in easier
+circumstances. I'm not at all sure I approve of my children being
+brought up with the false ideas they will inevitably acquire if they
+continue to live in a big place like this."
+
+"You see, Hugo, it happens to be my house, and I'm fond of it."
+
+"No doubt, but if you make a fetish of the house, if the house stands in
+the way of your helping your own flesh and blood...."
+
+"I don't think I've ever refused to help my _own_ relations."
+
+"Which means, I suppose, that your sister's husband is nothing to you."
+
+Jan rose. "You are rather unjust, I think," she said quietly. "I must
+put the children first."
+
+"And suppose you marry----"
+
+"I certainly wouldn't marry any man who would object to my doing all I
+could for my sister's children."
+
+"You think so now, but wait till a man comes along. You're just getting
+to the age, Jan, when a woman is most apt to make a fool of herself over
+a man. And, remember this, I'd much rather my children were brought up
+simply with my people in Guernsey than that they should grow up with all
+sorts of false ideas with nothing to back them."
+
+Jan clenched her teeth, and though outwardly she was silent, her soul
+was repeating, "I _will_ not fear," over and over again.
+
+"Perhaps you are right, Hugo," she said quietly. "You must arrange as
+you think best; only please remember that you can hardly expect me to
+contribute to the keeping of the children if I am allowed no voice in
+their upbringing. Have you consulted your parents as to their living
+with them in Guernsey? Shall we go out? It's such a beautiful evening."
+
+Hugo followed her into the hall and out into the garden. Involuntarily
+he looked after her with considerable admiration. She held herself well,
+that quiet woman. She waited for him in the drive, and as she did so
+Tony's words came back to her: "I used to feel frightened inside, but I
+wouldn't let him know it, and then--it was funny--but quite sunnly I
+wasn't frightened any more. You try it."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan had tried it, and, again to quote Tony, "it just happened."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+"THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID"
+
+
+Peter began to feel annoyed. More and more clearly did he realise that
+his chief object in coming home was to see Jan again; and here was he,
+still in London in the third week of June, and never so much as a
+glimpse of her.
+
+Her last letter, too, had postponed his visit indefinitely, and he
+almost thought she was not treating him quite fairly. It was, of course,
+a confounded bore that Hugo Tancred should have turned up just now, but
+Peter saw no reason for staying away for ever on that account. He knew
+Wren's End was a good-sized house, and though he appreciated Jan's
+understanding of the fact that he wouldn't exactly choose to be a
+fellow-guest with such a thoroughly bad hat as Hugo Tancred, still he
+considered it was laying too much stress upon the finer shades of
+feeling to keep him away so long.
+
+His aunt was delighted to have him; London was very pleasant; he had
+dined out quite a number of times, attended some big parties, seen all
+the best plays, and bought or ordered all the new clothes he needed, and
+a good deal that he didn't need at all. He had also bought a motor to
+take out with him. It was more than time to get within range of the main
+objective of his leave.
+
+Suggestions that Jan _must_ have shopping to do and might as well come
+up for a day or two to do it only elicited the reply that she had no
+money for shopping and that it was most unlikely that she would be in
+London again for ages.
+
+She hadn't answered his last letter, either, which was another
+grievance.
+
+Then came a letter with the Amber Guiting post-mark, and in a
+handwriting he did not know--a funny little, clear, square handwriting
+with character in every stroke.
+
+He opened it and read:
+
+      "DEAR MR. LEDGARD,
+
+      "It is just possible you may have heard of me from Mrs.
+      Tancred or Miss Ross, but in case you haven't I will
+      explain that I am nurse to the little Tancreds and that
+      Miss Ross is my dearest friend. I think it would be a very
+      good thing if you came down to see her, for her
+      brother-in-law is here, and I am never quite sure what he
+      might persuade her to do if he put the screw on about the
+      children. There is a comfortable inn called 'The Green
+      Hart,' and there's another called 'The Full Basket,' but I
+      fear you'd not get a room there as it's very small and
+      always chock-full at this time of year with fishing people.
+
+      "You see, if you came down to 'The Green Hart,' Jan
+      couldn't say anything, for you've a perfect right to stay
+      there if you choose, and I know it would help her and
+      strengthen her hands to talk things over with you. She has
+      spoken much of your kindness to them all in India.
+
+      "Do you fish, I wonder? I'm sure Squire Walcote would be
+      amiable to any friend of Jan's.
+
+                        "Believe me, yours truly,
+
+                                        "MARGARET MORTON."
+
+Peter put the letter in his pocket and left the rest of his
+correspondence till after breakfast, and his aunt decided that he really
+was a most amusing and agreeable companion, and that she must have been
+mistaken last night in thinking he seemed rather depressed and worried.
+
+After breakfast he went out to send a reply-paid telegram, and then to
+the garage, where he kept his car. Among other places he drove to "Hardy
+Brothers" in Pall Mall, where he stayed over an hour.
+
+By the time he got back to Artillery Mansions it was lunch time. More
+letters awaited him, also a telegram.
+
+During lunch he mentioned casually that he was going down into the
+country for the week-end to fish. He was going to motor down.
+
+"Yes," in answer to his aunt's inquiry, "I do know people down there,
+but I'm not going to stay with them. I'm going to the inn--one's freer,
+you know, and if the sport's good I may stay on a few days."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Withells came again for Hugo on Saturday morning and proposed a run
+right over to Cheltenham for a rose show. Hugo declined the rose show,
+but gratefully accepted the drive. He would potter about the town while
+Mr. Withells inspected the flowers. The Grange head-gardener had
+several exhibits, and was to be taken on the front seat.
+
+They started soon after breakfast and would be gone the whole day, for
+it was an hour and three-quarters run by road and two by train.
+
+"I wish he had offered to take you," Jan said to Meg when the big motor
+had vanished out of the drive. "It would have been so nice for you to
+see Major Morton."
+
+"And sit bodkin between Hugo and Mr. Withells or on one of those horrid
+little folding-seats--no, thank you! When I go to see my poor little
+papa I shall go by train by myself. I'll choose a day when their dear
+father can help you with the children."
+
+After lunch Meg began to find fault with Jan's appearance. "I simply
+won't see you in that old grey skirt a minute longer--go and put on a
+white frock--a nice white frock. You've got plenty."
+
+"Who is always grumbling about the washing? Besides, I want to garden."
+
+"You can't garden this afternoon. On such a lovely day it's your duty to
+dress in accordance with it. I'm going to clean up my children, and then
+we'll all go down to the post-office to buy stamps and show ourselves.
+_You_ ought to call on Lady Mary--you know you ought. Go and change, and
+then come and see if I approve of you. You might leave a card at the
+vicarage, too. I know they're going to the rose show, so you'd be quite
+safe."
+
+"You're a nuisance, Meg," Jan complained. "Let you and little Fay go
+swanking down the village if you like, but why can't you leave Tony and
+me to potter comfortably in our old clothes?"
+
+"I'm tired of your old clothes; I want you to look decent for once. You
+haven't done anything I asked you for ages. You might as well do this."
+
+Jan sighed. "It seems rather absurd when you yourself say every soul we
+know will be at the flower show."
+
+"I never said anything of the kind. I said Mrs. Fream was going to the
+flower show. Hurry up, Jan."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Well, will I do? Will I satisfy the hedges and ditches, do you think?"
+Jan asked later, as she appeared in the hall clad in the white raiment
+Meg had commanded.
+
+Meg turned her round. "Very nice indeed," she said. "I'm glad you put on
+the expensive one. It's funny why the very plain things cost such a lot.
+I like the black hat with your white hair. Yes, I consent to take you
+out; I don't mind owning you for my missus. Children, come and admire
+Auntie Jan."
+
+Jan dutifully delivered a card at the vicarage, and the nursery party
+left her to walk up the Manor drive alone. Lady Mary was in, and pleased
+to see her, but she only stayed a quarter of an hour, because Meg had
+made her promise to meet them again in the village. They were to have
+tea in the garden with the children and make it a little festival.
+
+What a funny little thing Meg was, she thought as she strolled down the
+drive under the splendid beeches. So determined to have her own way in
+small things, such an incarnation of self-sacrifice in big ones.
+
+A man was standing just outside the great gates in a patch of black
+shade thrown by a holly-tree in the lodge garden. Jan was long-sighted,
+and something in the figure and its pose caused her to stop suddenly. He
+wore the usual grey summer suit and a straw hat. Yet he reminded her of
+somebody, but him she had always seen in a topee, out of doors.
+
+Of course it was only a resemblance--but what was he waiting there for?
+
+He moved out from the patch of shade and looked up the drive through the
+open gates. He took off his hat and waved it, and came quickly towards
+her.
+
+"I couldn't wait any longer," he said. "I won't be the least bit of a
+nuisance. I've come to fish, and I'm staying at 'The Green Hart'.... And
+how are you?"
+
+She could never make it out, when she thought it over afterwards, but
+Jan found herself standing with both her hands in his and her beautiful
+black parasol tumbled unheeded in the dust.
+
+"I happened to meet the children and Miss Morton, and they asked me to
+tell you they've gone home. They also invited me to tea."
+
+"So do I," said Jan.
+
+"I should hardly have known Tony," he continued; "he looks capital. And
+as for little Fay--she's a picture, but she always was."
+
+"Did they know you?"
+
+"_Did_ they know me!"
+
+"Were they awfully pleased?"
+
+"They were ever so jolly; even Tony shouted."
+
+At the lodge they met the Squire. Jan introduced Peter and explained
+that he had just come down for a few days' fishing and was staying at
+"The Green Hart." The Squire proffered advice as to the best flies and a
+warning that he must not hope for much sport. The Amber was a difficult
+river, very; and variable; and it had been a particularly dry June.
+
+Peter bore up under this depressing intelligence and he and Jan walked
+on through warm, scented lanes to Wren's End; and Peter looked at Jan a
+good deal.
+
+Those who happened to be in London during the season of 1914 will
+remember that it was a period of powder and paint and frankest
+touching-up of complexions. The young and pretty were blackened and
+whitened and reddened quite as crudely as the old and ugly. There was no
+attempt at concealment. The faces of many Mayfair ladies filled Peter
+with disrespectful astonishment. He had not been home for four years,
+and then nice girls didn't do that sort of thing--much.
+
+Now one of Jan's best points was her complexion; it was so fair and
+fresh. The touch of sunburn, too, was becoming, for she didn't freckle.
+
+Peter found himself positively thankful to behold a really clean face;
+a face, too, that just then positively beamed with warm welcome and
+frank pleasure.
+
+A clean face; a cool, clean frock; kind, candid eyes and a gentle,
+sincere voice--yes, they were all there just as he remembered them, just
+as he had so often dreamt of them. Moreover, he decided there and then
+that the Georgian ladies knew what they were about when they powdered
+their hair--white hair, he thought, was extraordinarily becoming to a
+woman.
+
+"You are looking better than when I was in Bombay. I think your leave
+must have done you good already," said the kind, friendly voice.
+
+"I need a spell of country air, really to set me up," said Peter.
+
+They had an hilarious tea with the children on the Wren's lawn, and the
+tamest of the robins hopped about on the step just to show that he
+didn't care a fig for any of them.
+
+Meg was just going to take the children to bed when Mr. Withells brought
+Hugo back. It was an awkward moment. Peter knew far too much about Hugo
+to simulate the smallest cordiality; and Hugo was too well aware of some
+of the things Peter knew to feel at all comfortable in his presence. But
+he had no intention of giving way an inch. He took the chair Meg had
+just vacated and sat down. Mr. Withells, too, sat down for a few
+minutes, and no sooner had he done so than William dashed out from
+amongst them, and, returning, was accompanied by Captain Middleton.
+
+"No tea, thank you. Just got down from town, came with a message from
+my uncle--would Miss Ross's friend care for a rod on the Manor water on
+Monday? A brother officer who had been coming had failed at the last
+minute--there was room for four rods, but there wasn't a chance of much
+sport."
+
+Miles was introduced to Peter and sat down by him. The children rushed
+at Miles and, ably impeded by William, swarmed over him in riotous
+welcome, wholly regardless of their nurse's voice which summoned them to
+bed.
+
+Meg stood waiting.
+
+"Miss Morton's father lives in Cheltenham," Jan said to Mr. Withells,
+who seemed rather left out. "She's going to see him on Tuesday--to spend
+the day."
+
+"Then," said Mr. Withells in his clear staccato, "she must take the
+9.15--it's much the best train in the day. And the 4.55 back. No other
+trains are at all suitable. I hope you will be guided by me in this
+matter, Miss Morton. I've made the journey many times."
+
+So had Meg; but Mr. Withells always irritated her to such an extent that
+had it been possible, she would have declared her intention to go and
+return by quite different trains. As it was, she nodded pleasantly and
+said those were the very trains she had selected.
+
+Miles thrust his head out from among the encompassing three and
+respectfully implored Mr. Withells' advice about trains to Cricklade,
+which lay off the Cheltenham route, even going so far as to note the
+hours of departure and arrival carefully in a little book.
+
+Finally Meg came and disencumbered Miles of the children and bore them
+away.
+
+When her voice took on a certain tone it was as useless to cope with Meg
+as with Auntie Jan. They knew this, and like wise children gave in
+gracefully.
+
+Elaborate farewells had to be said to everybody, and with a final warm
+embrace for Miles, little Fay called to him "Tum and see me in my baff."
+
+"Captain Middleton will have gone long before you are ready for that,"
+Meg said inhospitably, and trying to look very tall and dignified she
+walked up the three steps leading to the nursery. But it is almost
+impossible to look imposing with a lagging child dragging at each hand,
+and poor Meg felt that her exit was far from effective.
+
+William settled himself comfortably across his master's knees and in two
+minutes was snoring softly.
+
+Miles manifested so keen an interest in Mr. Withells' exhibits (he had
+got a second prize and a highly commended) that the kindly little man
+was quite attracted; and when Miles inquired about trains to Cheltenham
+he gave him precisely the same advice that he had given Meg.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The station at Amber Guiting is seldom crowded; it's on a shuttle line,
+and except on market-day there is but little passenger traffic.
+
+Therefore a small young lady with rather conspicuously red hair, a neat
+grey coat and skirt, a shady grey straw hat trimmed with white clover
+and green leaves, and a green parasol, was noticeable upon the platform
+out of all proportion to her size.
+
+The train was waiting. The lady entered an empty third-class carriage,
+and sitting in the corner with her back to the engine, shut herself in.
+The train departed punctually, and she took out from her bag a note-book
+which she studied with frowning concentration.
+
+Ten minutes further down the line the train stops again at Guiting
+Green, and here the young lady looked out of the window to see whether
+anyone was travelling that she recognised.
+
+There was. But it was impossible to judge from the young lady's
+expression whether the recognition gave her pleasure or not.
+
+She drew in her head very quickly, but not before she had been seen.
+
+"Hullo, Miss Morton! Where are you going? May I get in here?"
+
+"Aren't you travelling first?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. Sure you don't mind? How jolly to have met you!"
+
+Miles looked so smiling, so big and well turned out, and pleased with
+life, that Meg's severe expression relaxed somewhat.
+
+"I suppose," she said, "you're just going to the junction. But why come
+to Guiting Green?"
+
+"I came to Guiting Green because it's exactly four miles from the Manor
+House. And I've walked those four miles, Miss Morton, walked 'em for
+the good of my health. Wish it wasn't so dusty, though--look at my
+boots! _I'm_ going to Cheltenham. Where are you going?"
+
+"Cheltenham?" Meg repeated suspiciously. "What are you going to do
+there?"
+
+"I'm going to see about a horse--not a dog this time--I hear that
+Smith's have got a horse that may suit me; really up to my weight they
+say it is, so I took the chance of going over while I'm with my
+uncle--it's a lot nearer than town, you know. But where are _you_
+going?"
+
+"I," said Meg, "am going to Cheltenham----"
+
+"To Cheltenham!" Miles exclaimed in rather overdone astonishment. "What
+an extraordinary coincidence! And what are _you_ going to buy in
+Cheltenham?"
+
+"I am going to see my father. I thought I had told you he lives there."
+
+"So you did, of course. How stupid of me to forget! Well, it's very
+jolly we should happen to be going down together, isn't it?"
+
+They looked at one another, and Miles laughed.
+
+"I'm not at all sure that we ought to travel together after we reach the
+junction, and I don't believe you've got a third-class ticket." Meg
+looked very prim.
+
+Miles produced his ticket--it _was_ third-class.
+
+"There!" he said triumphantly.
+
+"You would be much more comfortable in a smoker."
+
+"So would you. We'll take a smoker; I've got the sort of cigarette you
+like."
+
+At the junction they got a smoker, and Miles saw to it that they had it
+to themselves; he also persuaded the guard to give Meg a square wooden
+box to put her feet on, because he thought the seats were too high for
+her.
+
+It seemed a very short journey.
+
+Major Morton was awaiting Meg when they arrived; a little gentleman
+immaculately neat (it was quite clear whence Meg got her love of detail
+and finish)--who looked both washed-out and dried-up. He embraced her
+with considerable solemnity, exclaiming, "God bless you, my dear child!
+You look better than I expected."
+
+"Papa, dear, here is Captain Middleton, a friend from Amber Guiting. We
+happened to travel together."
+
+"Pleased to meet you, sir," said the little Major graciously; and
+somehow Miles contrived in two minutes so to ingratiate himself with
+Meg's "poor little papa" that they all walked out of the station
+together as a matter of course.
+
+Then came the question of plans.
+
+Meg had shopping to do, declared she had a list as long as her arm, but
+was entirely at her father's disposal as to whether she should do it
+before or after lunch.
+
+Miles boldly suggested she should do it now, at once, while it was still
+fairly cool, and then she could have all her parcels sent to the station
+to meet her. He seemed quite eager to get rid of Meg. The little Major
+agreed that this would be the best course. He would stroll round to his
+club while Meg was shopping, and meet her when she thought she would
+have finished. They walked to the promenade and dropped her at Cavendish
+House. Miles, explaining that he had to go to Smith's to look at a
+horse, asked for directions from the Major. Their way was the same, and
+without so much as bidding her farewell, Miles strolled up one of the
+prettiest promenades in England in company with her father. Meg felt
+rather dazed.
+
+She prided herself on having reduced shopping to a fine art, but to-day,
+somehow, she didn't get through as quickly as usual, and there was a
+number of items on her list still unticked when it was time to meet her
+father just outside his club at the top of the promenade.
+
+Major Morton was the essence of punctuality. Meg flew to meet him, and
+found he had waited five minutes. He was not, however, upset, as might
+have been expected. He took her to his rooms in a quiet terrace behind
+the promenade and comfortably near his club. The sun-blinds were down
+outside his sitting-room windows, and the room seemed cool and pleasant.
+
+Then it was that Meg discovered that her father was looking at her in
+quite a new way. Almost, in fact, as though he had never seen her
+before.
+
+Was it her short hair? she wondered.
+
+Yet that was not very noticeable under such a shady hat.
+
+Major Morton had vigorously opposed the nursemaid scheme. To the
+sympathetic ladies who attended the same strictly evangelical church of
+which he was a pillar, he confided that his only daughter did not care
+for "a quiet domestic life." It was a grief to him--but, after all,
+parents are shelved nowadays; every girl wants to "live her own life,"
+and he would be the last man to stand in the way of his child's
+happiness. The ladies felt very sorry for Major Morton and indignant
+with the hard-hearted, unfilial Meg. They did not realise that had Meg
+lived with her father--in rooms--and earned nothing, the Major's
+delicate digestion might occasionally have suffered, and Meg would
+undoubtedly have been half-starved.
+
+To-day, however, he was more hopeful about Meg than he had been for a
+long time. Since the Trent episode he had ceased even to imagine her
+possible marriage. By her own headstrong folly she had ruined all her
+chances. "The weariful rich" who had got her the post did not spare him
+this aspect of her deplorable conduct. To-day, however, there was a rift
+in these dark clouds of consequence.
+
+Captain Middleton--he only knows how--had persuaded Major Morton to go
+with him to see the horse, had asked his quite useless advice, and had
+subtly and insidiously conveyed to the Major, without one single
+incriminating sentence, a very clear idea as to his own feelings for the
+Major's daughter.
+
+Major Morton felt cheered.
+
+He had no idea who Miles really was, but he had remarked the gunner tie,
+and, asking to what part of the Royal Regiment Miles belonged, decided
+that no mere pauper could be a Horse-Gunner.
+
+He regarded his daughter with new eyes.
+
+She was undoubtedly attractive. He discovered certain resemblances to
+himself that he had never noticed before.
+
+Then he informed her that he had promised they would both lunch with her
+agreeable friend at the Queen's Hotel: "He made such a point of it,"
+said Major Morton, "I could hardly refuse; begged us to take pity on his
+loneliness, and so on--and I'm feeling rather better to-day."
+
+Meg decided that the tide of fate was too strong for her, she must just
+drift with it.
+
+It was a most pleasant lunch, save for one incident. Lady Penelope
+Pottinger and her husband, accompanied by Lottie Trent and a man, were
+lunching at another table.
+
+Lady Penelope's party came in late. Miles and his guests had already
+arrived at coffee when they appeared.
+
+They had to pass Miles' table, and Lady Penelope stopped; so did her
+husband. She shook hands with Meg. Miss Trent passed by with her nose in
+the air.
+
+Miles presented his relations to the Major and they passed on.
+
+The Major was quite pleased and rather flattered. He had no idea that
+the tall young woman with Lady Penelope had deliberately cut his host.
+But Meg knew just why she had done it.
+
+After lunch Miles very properly effaced himself, but made a point of
+asking the Major if he might act as Miss Morton's escort on the journey
+back to Amber Guiting.
+
+The Major graciously accompanied Meg while she did the rest of her
+shopping, and in the promenade they met the Pottinger party again.
+
+The 4.55 was crowded. Miles collected Meg's parcels and suggested to the
+Major that it would be less tiring for his daughter if they returned
+first-class. Should he change the tickets?
+
+The Major thought it a sensible proposition, especially with all those
+parcels. Meg would pay Captain Middleton the difference.
+
+Again an amiable porter secured them an empty carriage. The parcels
+spread themselves luxuriously upon the unoccupied seats. The Major
+kissed his daughter and gave her his benediction, shaking hands quite
+warmly with her "pleasant young friend."
+
+The 4.55 runs right up to the junction without a stop. Meg took off her
+best hat and placed it carefully in the rack. She leaned her bewildered
+head against the cushions and closed her eyes. She would drift with the
+tide just a few minutes more, and then----
+
+Miles put a box of groceries for Lady Mary under her feet. She smiled
+faintly, but did not speak.
+
+Presently she opened her eyes to find him regarding her with that
+expression she had surprised once or twice before, and never understood.
+
+"Tired?" he asked.
+
+"Only pleasantly. I think I've only travelled first-class about five
+times in my life before--and then it was with Mr. Ross."
+
+"And now it's with me, and I hope it's the first of many."
+
+"You say very odd things."
+
+"What I mean isn't in the least odd--it's the most natural thing in the
+world."
+
+"What is?"
+
+"To want to go on travelling with you."
+
+"If you're going to talk nonsense, I shall go to sleep again."
+
+"No, I don't think I can allow you to go to sleep. I want you to wake up
+and face facts."
+
+"Facts?"
+
+"A fact."
+
+"Facts are sometimes very unpleasant."
+
+"I hope the fact I want you to face isn't exactly that--if it is ...
+then I'm ... a jolly miserable chap. Miss Morton--Meg--you must see how
+it is with me--you must know that you're dearer to me than anything on
+earth. I think your father tumbled to it--and I don't think he minded
+... that I should want you for my wife."
+
+"My poor little papa would be relieved to think that anyone could...."
+
+"Could what?"
+
+"Care for me ... in that way."
+
+"Nonsense! But I'm exceedingly glad to have met your father."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because I wanted to meet him."
+
+"Again, why?"
+
+"Because he's your father."
+
+"Did you observe that Miss Lotty Trent cut you dead at the Queen's
+to-day?"
+
+"I did notice it, and, like you, I wonder why."
+
+"I can tell you."
+
+"I don't think you'd better bother. Miss Trent's opinion of me really
+doesn't matter----"
+
+"It was because you were with me."
+
+"But what a silly reason--if it is a reason."
+
+"Captain Middleton, will you answer a question quite truthfully?"
+
+"I'll try."
+
+"What have you heard about me in connection with the Trents?"
+
+"Not much, and that I don't believe."
+
+"But you must believe it, some of it. It may not be so bad--as it might
+have been--but I put myself entirely in the wrong. I deceived Mrs. Trent
+and I did a thing no girl in her senses ought to have done."
+
+"Look here, Meg," said Miles, leaning forward. "I don't want to know
+anything you don't choose to tell me; but since you _are_ on the
+subject--what did happen between you and that ... and Walter Brooke?"
+
+Meg, too, leant forward; the express swayed and lurched. Their faces
+were very near; their eyes met and held each other in a long, searching
+gaze on the one side and an answering look of absolute candour on the
+other.
+
+"I promised to go away with him, and I went away a few miles, and
+something came over me that I couldn't go any further, and I broke my
+promise and ran away. Jan knows it's true, for it was to them I went.
+But the Trents would never believe it, though Mr. Ross saw Mrs. Trent
+herself, and told her exactly what had happened. And I daresay ... they
+are quite justified."
+
+"And how many times have you seen him since?"
+
+"Never till the other day, when he nearly ran over William."
+
+"And how long ago is it since all this happened?"
+
+"Nearly six years."
+
+"Don't you think it's about time you put it all out of your mind?"
+
+"I had put it out of my mind ... till ... you came."
+
+"It didn't make any difference to me."
+
+"I shall never forget that," Meg said, so low that the rattle of the
+train wholly drowned her remark, but it couldn't conceal her smile.
+
+Miles lost his head. He kneeled down plump on the floor of that
+compartment and took her in his arms and kissed her.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"All the same, I don't believe I can marry you," she said later.
+
+"Why on earth not?"
+
+"Because I don't think I'm a suitable wife for you."
+
+"Surely I'm the best judge of that."
+
+"No, you're not a judge at all. You think you're in love with me...."
+
+"I'm hanged if I do--I _know_."
+
+"Because you're sorry for me----"
+
+"On the contrary, I'm sorry for myself. I think you're a hard-hearted
+... obstinate ... little...."
+
+Mr. Withells would have been scandalised at the conduct of Miles. He
+would undoubtedly have described it as both "insanitary and improper."
+
+"Oh, please listen!" Meg gasped. "Perhaps a long time hence ... if
+you're still of the same mind...."
+
+"Anyway, may I tell people?"
+
+"Not a soul. I won't have my Jan worried just now. I've undertaken those
+children ... and she's having a bad time with that brother-in-law----"
+
+"I say, Meg, what is it about that chap Tancred? I can't stick him....
+Is he a bad egg, or what?"
+
+"He is...."
+
+"Poor Miss Ross! But why does she have him there?"
+
+"Oh, it's a long story--and here we are at the junction, and I'm not
+going on first to Amber Guiting--so there!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan in the pony-cart was waiting outside when Meg came from the little
+station. Captain Middleton followed in her train, laden with parcels
+like a Father Christmas.
+
+He packed her and the parcels in, covered both the ladies with the
+dust-holland, announced that he had bought a charger, and waited to get
+into the Manor motor till they had driven out of the station.
+
+They neither of them spoke till they had turned into the road. Then Jan
+quoted softly: "When I go to see my poor little papa, I shall go by
+train _by myself_."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+A DEMONSTRATION IN FORCE
+
+
+Hugo was dissatisfied. So far, beyond a miserable ten pounds to buy some
+clothes, he had got no money out of Jan; and he was getting bored.
+
+To be sure, he still had most of the ten pounds, for he had gone and
+ordered everything in the market-town, where the name of Ross was
+considered safe as the Bank of England. So he hadn't paid for anything.
+
+Then there was that fellow Ledgard--what did he want hanging about,
+pretending to fish? He was after Jan and her money, that was his game.
+
+But however clear Peter Ledgard's nefarious intentions might be, Hugo
+confessed his sister-in-law puzzled him. She wasn't nearly as much
+afraid of him as he had expected. She was always gentle and courteous,
+but under the soft exterior he had occasionally felt a rock of
+determination, that was disconcerting.
+
+He had ceased to harp upon the string of his desolation. Somehow Jan
+contrived to show him that she didn't believe in it, and yet she never
+said one word to which he could take exception.
+
+It was awkward that his own people were all of them so unsympathetic
+about the children. His father and mother declared themselves to be too
+old to undertake them unless Hugo could pay liberally for their board
+and for a thoroughly capable nurse. Neither of his sisters would
+entertain the idea at all; and both wrote pointing out that until Hugo
+was able to make a home for them himself, he would be most foolish to
+interfere with the arrangements of a devoted aunt who appeared not only
+willing but anxious to assume their entire maintenance.
+
+He had told his people that his health forced him to relinquish his work
+in India. His brothers-in-law, although they had no idea of the real
+cause, thought there was something fishy about this, and were
+unsympathetic.
+
+Peter got at the doctor, and the doctor declared sea-air to be the one
+thing necessary to insure Hugo's complete restoration to health. Jan
+happened to mention that her brother-in-law's people lived in Guernsey,
+close to the shore. The doctor said he couldn't do better than go and
+stay with them, and that the journey wouldn't hurt him a bit.
+
+Still Hugo appeared reluctant to leave Wren's End.
+
+Peter came one day and demanded a business talk with him. It was a most
+unpleasant conversation. Peter declared on Jan's behalf that she was
+quite ready to help him to some new start in life, but that if it meant
+a partnership in any rubber plantation, fruit-farm, or business of any
+sort whatsoever, the money required must be paid through her lawyer
+directly into the hands of the planter, farmer, or merchant concerned.
+
+Hugo declared such an offer to be an insult. Peter replied that it was
+a great deal better than he deserved or could expect; and that he,
+personally, thought Miss Ross very silly to make it; but she did make
+it, and attached to its acceptance was a clause to the effect that until
+he could show he was in a position to maintain his family in comfort, he
+was to give their aunt an undertaking that he would not interfere with
+her arrangements for the welfare of the children.
+
+"I see no reason," said Hugo, "why you should interfere between my
+sister-in-law and me, but, of course, any fool could see what you're
+after. _You_ want her money, and when you've married her, I suppose my
+poor children are to be thrown out into the street, and me too far off
+to see after them."
+
+"Up to now," Peter retorted, "you have shown no particular desire to
+'see after' your children. Why are you such a fool, Tancred? Why don't
+you thankfully accept Miss Ross's generous offer, and try to make a
+fresh start?"
+
+"It's no business of yours what I do."
+
+"Certainly not, but your sister-in-law's peace and happiness is my
+business, because I have the greatest admiration, respect and liking for
+her."
+
+"_Les beaux yeux de sa cassette_," growled Hugo.
+
+"You _are_ an ass," Peter said wearily. "And you know very little of
+Miss Ross if you haven't seen by this time ..." Peter stopped.
+
+"Well, go on."
+
+"No," said Peter, "I won't go on, for it's running my horses on a rock.
+Think it over, that's all. But remember the offer does not remain open
+indefinitely."
+
+"Well, and if I choose to refuse it and go to law and _take_ my
+children--what then?"
+
+"No court in England would give you their custody."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because you couldn't show means to support them, and we could produce
+witnesses to prove that you are not a fit person to have the custody of
+children."
+
+"We should see about that."
+
+"Well, think it over. It's your affair, you know." And Peter went away,
+leaving Hugo to curse and bite his nails in impotent rage. Peter really
+was far from conciliatory.
+
+Jan needed a fright, Hugo decided; that's what she wanted to bring her
+to heel. And before very long he'd see that she got it. She shouldn't
+shelter herself for ever behind that supercilious beast, Ledgard. Hugo
+was quite ready to have been pleasant to Jan and to have met her more
+than half-way if she was reasonable, but since she had chosen to bring
+Ledgard into it, she should pay. After all, she was only a woman, and
+you can always frighten a woman if you go the right way about it. It was
+damned bad luck that Ledgard should have turned up just now. It was
+Ledgard he'd got to thank that Fay had made that infamously unjust will
+by which she left the remnant of her money to her children and not to
+her husband. Oh yes! he'd a lot to thank Ledgard for. Well, he wouldn't
+like it when Jan got hurt. Ledgard was odd about women. He couldn't
+bear to see them worried; he couldn't bear to see Fay worried,
+interfered then. A blank, blank, blank interfering chap, Ledgard was.
+_What Jan needed was a real good scare._
+
+They suggested Guernsey. Well, he'd go to Guernsey, and he wouldn't go
+alone. Hugo thoroughly enjoyed a plot. The twilight world that had been
+so difficult and perplexing to poor Fay had for him a sort of exciting
+charm. Wren's End had become dreadfully dull. For the first week or two,
+while he felt so ill, it had been restful. Now its regular hours and
+ordered tranquillity were getting on his nerves. All those portraits of
+his wife, too, worried him. He could go into no room where the lovely
+face, with youth's wistful wonder as to what life held, did not confront
+him with a reminder that the wife he had left to die in Bombay did not
+look in the least like that.
+
+There were few things in his life save miscalculation that he regretted.
+But he did feel uncomfortable when he remembered Fay--so trustful
+always, so ready to help him in any difficulty. People liked her; even
+women liked her in spite of her good looks, and Hugo had found the world
+a hard, unfriendly place since her death.
+
+The whole thing was getting on his nerves. It was time to shuffle the
+cards and have a new deal.
+
+He packed his suit-case which had been so empty when he arrived, and
+waited for a day when Peter had taken Jan, Meg and the children for a
+motor run to a neighbouring town. He took care to see that Earley was
+duly busy in the kitchen garden, and the maids safely at the back of the
+house. Then he carried it to the lodge gate himself and waited for a
+passing tradesman's cart. Fortune favoured him; the butcher came up with
+(had Hugo known it) veal cutlets for Hugo's own dinner. Hugo tipped the
+butcher and asked him to leave the suit-case at the station to be sent
+on as carted luggage to its address.
+
+Next morning he learned that Tony was to go with Earley to fetch extra
+cream from Mr. Burgess' farm.
+
+It was unfortunate that he couldn't get any of Tony's clothes without
+causing comment. He had tried the day before, but beyond a jersey and
+two little vests (which happened to be little Fay's), he had been unable
+to find anything. Well, Jan would be glad enough to send Tony's clothes
+when he let her know where they were to be sent. Tony had changed a good
+deal from the silent, solemn child he had disliked in India. He was
+franker and more talkative. Sometimes Hugo felt that the child wasn't
+such a bad little chap, after all. But the very evident understanding
+between Jan and Tony filled Hugo with a dull sort of jealousy. He had
+never tried to win the child, but nevertheless he resented the fact that
+Tony's attitude to Jan and Meg was one of perfect trust and
+friendliness. He never looked at them with the strange judging, weighing
+look that Hugo hated so heartily.
+
+He strolled into the drive and waited. Meg and Jan were busy in the
+day-nursery, making the little garments that were outgrown so fast.
+Little Fay was playing on the Wren's lawn and singing to herself:
+
+    The fox went out one moonlight night,
+    And he played to the moon to give him light,
+    For he had a long way to tlot that night
+    Before he could leach his den-oh.
+
+Hugo listened for a minute. What a clear voice the child had. He would
+like to have taken little Fay, but already he stood in wholesome awe of
+his daughter. She could use her thoroughly sound lungs for other
+purposes than song, and she hadn't the smallest scruple about drawing
+universal attention to any grievance. Now Tony would never make a scene.
+Hugo recognised and admired that quality in his queer little son. He did
+not know that Tony already ruled his little life by a categorical
+imperative of things a sahib must not do.
+
+At the drive gate he met Earley carrying the can of cream, with Tony
+trotting by his side.
+
+"I'm going into the village, Tony, and Auntie Jan says you may as well
+come with me for company. Will you come?"
+
+Tony looked dubious. Still, he remembered that Auntie Jan had said he
+must try and be kind to poor Daddie, who had been so ill and was so sad.
+
+"All right," he said with a little sigh, and took the hand Hugo held
+out.
+
+"He'll be quite safe with me, Earley," Hugo said with a pleasant smile.
+"Miss Ross knows I'm going to take him."
+
+Nevertheless Earley went to the back door and asked Hannah to inform her
+mistress that "Mr. Tancred had taken Mazter Tony along of 'im."
+
+Hannah was busy, and serene in her conception of Hugo as the sorrowing
+widower, did not think the fact that Tony had gone for a walk with his
+own father was worth a journey to the day-nursery.
+
+"How would you like a ride down to the junction?" Hugo said. "I believe
+we could just catch a train if we take the omnibus at 'The Green Hart.'
+I want to make inquiries about something for Auntie Jan."
+
+Tony loved trains; he had only been twice to the junction since he came
+to Wren's End; it was a fascinating place. Daddie seemed in an agreeable
+mood this morning. Auntie Jan would be pleased that he should be nice to
+him.
+
+It all fell out as if the fates had arranged things for Hugo. They saw
+very few people in the village; only one old woman accompanied them in
+the bus; he heard his father ask for a ticket to the junction, and they
+arrived without incident of any kind.
+
+The junction, however, was busy. There were quite a lot of people, and
+when Hugo went to the ticket-office he had to stand in a queue of others
+while Tony waited outside the long row.
+
+Suddenly Tony began to wonder why his father should go to the
+ticket-office at all to inquire for a parcel. Tony was observant, and
+just because everything was so different from things in India small
+incidents were impressed upon his mind. If his father was going on
+anywhere else, he wasn't going; for Peter had promised to take them out
+in his car again that afternoon. When Hugo reached the window of the
+ticket-office Tony heard something about Paddington.
+
+That decided him. Nothing would induce him to go to Paddington.
+
+He pushed his way among the crowd and ran for dear life up the stairs,
+and over the bridge to the other platform where the train for Amber
+Guiting was still waiting, lonely and deserted. He knew that train. It
+went up and down all day, for Amber Guiting was the terminus. No one was
+on the platform as he ran along. With the sure instinct of the hunted he
+passed the carriages with their shut doors. Right at the end was a van
+with empty milk-cans. He had seen a porter putting them in the moment
+the train stopped. Tony darted into the van and crouched down between
+the milk-cans and the wall. He thought of getting into one of them. The
+story of Morgiana and the Forty Thieves was clear in his mind, for Meg
+had told it to them the night before. But the cans were so high and
+narrow he decided that it was impossible. Someone slammed the door of
+the van. There came a bump and a jar, and the train moved out onto a
+siding till it should go back to Amber Guiting when the 1.30 from London
+came in. Tony sat quite still in the dark, stuffy van. His little heart
+was beating with hammer strokes against his ribs, but his face expressed
+nothing but scorn.
+
+Again his father had lied to him. Again he had said he was going to do
+one thing when he fully intended to do another. The pleasantness, the
+kindliness, the apparent desire for Tony's society were a cheat. Tony
+spoke rapidly to himself in Hindustani, and by the time he had finished
+expressing his views Hugo Tancred hadn't a shred of character left.
+
+He didn't know when the train would go back to Amber Guiting. It might
+not be till evening. Tony could wait. Some time it would go back, and
+once in that dear, safe place all would be well.
+
+He disliked the sound of Paddington; it had to do with London, he knew.
+He didn't mind London, but he wasn't going there with his father, and no
+Meg and no Jan and no little Fay and no kind sahibs who were _real_
+sahibs.
+
+He was very hungry, and his eyes grew a bit misty as he thought of
+little Fay consuming scones and milk at the "elevens" Meg was always so
+careful they should have.
+
+A new and troubling thought perturbed him. Did Auntie Jan know he had
+gone at all? Would she be frightened? Would she get that look on her
+dear face that he couldn't bear to see? That Auntie Jan loved them both
+with her whole heart was now one of the fixed stars in Tony's firmament
+of beliefs. He began to think that perhaps it would be better for Auntie
+Jan to give his father some of her twinkly things and let him go away
+and leave them in peace; but he dismissed that thought as cowardly and
+unworthy of a sahib.
+
+Oh, dear! it was very long sitting in the dark, scrunched up behind
+those cans. He must tell himself stories to pass the time; and he
+started to relate the interminable legend of Cocky-locky and Henny-Penny
+who by their superior subtlety evaded the snares set for them by
+Toddy-Loddy the fox. He felt a sort of kinship with those harried fowls.
+Gradually the constant repetition of the various other birds involved,
+"Juckie-Puckie, Goosie-Loosie, Turkey-lurkey and Swannie-Lonnie," had a
+soothing effect, and Tony fell asleep.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Meanwhile Hugo had hunted through every corner of the four platforms; he
+had even gone to look for the Amber Guiting train, but was told it
+always was moved on to a siding directly it had discharged its
+passengers.
+
+It was mysterious, it was profoundly annoying, but it was not, to Hugo,
+alarming. He suspected that Peter Ledgard was in some way mixed up in
+it; that he, himself, had been shadowed and that Peter had stolen Tony
+in the crowd. In his mistrustful wrath he endowed Peter with such
+abnormal foresight and acumen as he certainly did not possess.
+
+It really was an impossible situation. Hugo could not go about asking
+porters and people for a lost child, or the neighbourhood would be
+roused. He couldn't go back to Wren's End without Tony, or there would
+be the devil to pay. He even got a porter to look in every carriage of
+the side-tracked train for a mythical despatch-case, and accompanied him
+in his search. Naturally they didn't seek a despatch-case in the van.
+
+He had lost his train, but there was another, very slow, about
+three-quarters of an hour later, and this he decided to take. He would
+telegraph to Jan from London. Somehow he was not in the least concerned
+about the fate of Tony. Peter and Peter's car had something to do with
+this mysterious disappearance. He was sure of that.
+
+Well, if this particular deal had failed, he must shuffle the cards and
+deal again. In any case Jan should see that where his children were
+concerned he was not to be trifled with.
+
+He was sorry, though, he had bought the half-ticket for Tony, and to ask
+them to take it back might cause comment.
+
+As the slow train steamed out from the junction Hugo felt a very
+ill-used man.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At eleven o'clock Anne Chitt brought in the tray with two cups of milk
+and a plate of Hannah's excellent scones.
+
+"Please go into the kitchen garden and ask Master Tony to come for his
+lunch," Jan said.
+
+Presently Anne returned. "Master Tony ain't in the garden, miss; and
+'Annah says as 'e most likely ain't back yet, miss."
+
+"Back! Back from where?"
+
+"Please, miss, 'Annah says as 'is pa've took him with him down the
+village."
+
+Jan laid her sewing on the table and got up.
+
+"Is Earley in the garden?"
+
+"Yes, miss. I ast Earley an' 'e says the same as 'Annah. Mr. Tancred
+'ave took Master Tony with 'im."
+
+Anne went away, and Jan and Meg, who had stopped her machining to
+listen, stared at each other across the table.
+
+"I suppose they'll be back directly," Jan said uneasily. "I'll go and
+ask Earley when Hugo took Tony."
+
+"He got up to breakfast to-day for the first time," Meg remarked
+irrelevantly.
+
+Jan went out into the Wrens' garden and through Anthony's gate. She
+fumbled at the catch, for her hands trembled.
+
+Earley was picking peas.
+
+"What time did Mr. Tancred take Master Tony?" she asked.
+
+"Just as we got back from fetchin' the cream, miss. I should say as it
+was about 'alf-past nine. He did meet us at the lodge, and took the
+young gentleman with 'im for company--'e said so."
+
+"Thank you, Earley," Jan said quietly.
+
+Earley looked at her and over his broad, good-natured face there passed
+a shade of misgiving. "I did tell Hannah to let you know the minute I
+cum in, miss."
+
+"Thank you," Jan said again; "that's quite right."
+
+"Be you feelin' the 'eat, miss?" Earley asked anxiously. "I don't think
+as you ought to be out without an 'at."
+
+"No, I expect not. I'll go and get one."
+
+By lunch time there was still no sign of Hugo and Tony; and Jan was
+certainly as much scared as even Hugo could have wished.
+
+Meg had been down to the village and discovered that Hugo and Tony had
+gone by bus to the junction in time for the 10.23.
+
+Peter was playing golf with Squire Walcote on a little course he had
+made in some of his fields. It was impossible to go and hunt for Peter
+without giving away the whole situation, and Jan was loth to do that.
+
+She and Meg stared at one another in dismayed impotence.
+
+Jan ordered the pony-carriage; she would drive to the junction, leaving
+a note for Peter at "The Green Hart," but it was only too likely he
+would lunch with the Walcotes.
+
+"You must eat something," said Meg. "There's a train in at a quarter to
+two; you'd better meet that before you go to the junction; the guard
+might be able to tell you something."
+
+At lunch little Fay wept because there was no Tony.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+IN WHICH SEVERAL PEOPLE SPEAK THEIR MINDS
+
+
+"After all, you know," Meg said, with intent to comfort, "no great harm
+can happen to Tony. Hugo will only take the child a little way off, to
+see what he can get out of you."
+
+"It's the moral harm to Tony that I mind," Jan answered sadly. "He was
+getting so happy and trustful, so much more like other children. I know
+his father has got him to go away by some ruse, and he will be miserable
+and embittered because he has been cheated again."
+
+"Shall you drive to the junction if you hear nothing at the station?"
+
+"Yes, I think so, though I've little hope of learning anything there.
+You see, people come there from three directions. They couldn't possibly
+notice everybody as they do at a little station like this."
+
+"Wait," said Meg, "don't go to the junction. Have you forgotten Mr.
+Ledgard was to fetch us all at half-past two? He'll run you over in his
+car in a quarter the time you'd take to go with Placid, and be some use
+as well. You'd better come straight back here if you get no news, and
+I'll keep him till you get back if he turns up first."
+
+By this time the pony-cart was at the door. Meg helped Jan in, kissed
+her, and whispered, "Cheer up; I feel somehow you'll hear something,"
+and Jan drove off. She found a boy to hold the pony when she reached the
+station, and went in. The old porter was waiting for the train, and she
+asked if he happened to notice her little nephew that morning.
+
+"Yes, miss, I did see 'un along with a holder gentleman unbeknownst to
+me."
+
+Jan walked up and down in an agony of doubt and apprehension.
+
+The train came in. There were but few passengers, and among them was
+Miles, come down again for the week-end.
+
+He greeted Jan with effusion. Had she come to meet anyone, or was it a
+parcel?
+
+To his astonishment Miss Ross broke from him and rushed at the guard
+right up at the far end of the train.
+
+The guard evidently disclaimed all knowledge of the parcel, for Miles
+saw him shaking his head vigorously.
+
+"Any other luggage, sir?" asked the old porter, lifting out Miles'
+suit-case.
+
+"Yes, a box of rods in the van."
+
+The old porter went to the end of the train near where Jan had been to
+the guard three minutes before.
+
+He opened the van door and nearly tumbled backward in astonishment, for
+right in the doorway, blinking at the light, stood "Miss Rass' young
+gen'leman."
+
+"Well, I am blessed!" exclaimed the porter, and lifted him out.
+
+Tony was dreadfully dirty. The heat, the dust, the tears he had shed
+when he woke up with the putting in of luggage at the junction and
+couldn't understand what had happened to him, all combined to make him
+about the most miserable-looking and disreputable small boy you could
+imagine. He had left his hat behind the milk-cans.
+
+Jan had gone out of the station. She had passed Miles blindly, and her
+face caused that young man to whistle softly, just once. Then he dashed
+after her.
+
+"Your haunt bin askin' for you," the old porter said to Tony. "'Peared
+to me she was a bit worried-like."
+
+Tony moved stiffly down the little station, the old porter following
+with Miles' luggage on a truck.
+
+The ticket-collector stood in the doorway. Tony, of course, had none.
+"Don't you say nothin'," whispered the old porter. "'Is haunt'll make it
+good; there's some sort of a misteree."
+
+Tony felt queer and giddy. Jan, already in her little pony-trap, had
+started to drive away. Miles, waiting for his baggage beside his uncle's
+car, saw the dejected little figure appear in the station entrance.
+
+He let fly a real barrack-square bellow after Jan, and she pulled up.
+
+She looked back and saw the reason for Captain Middleton's amazing roar.
+
+She swung the indignant Placid round, and in two minutes she was out of
+the pony-trap and had Tony in her strong arms.
+
+Miles tipped the porter and drove off. He, too, realised that there was
+some sort of a "misteree," something painful and unpleasant for Miss
+Ross, and that she would probably prefer that no questions were asked.
+
+Whatever mischief could that young Tony have been after? And dared Miles
+call at Wren's End that evening, in the hope of a glimpse of Meg, or
+would it look inquisitive and ill-bred?
+
+Placid turned a mild, inquiring head to discover the reason for this new
+delay.
+
+When Jan, after paying Tony's fare back from the junction, had driven
+away, the old porter, the ticket-collector, and the station-master sat
+in conclave on the situation. And their unanimous conclusion was summed
+up by the old porter: "Byes be a mishtiful set of young varmints, an' it
+warn't no job for a lone 'ooman to 'ave to bring 'em up."
+
+The lone woman in question held her reins in one hand and her other arm
+very tightly round the dirty little boy on the seat beside her.
+
+As they drove through the village neither of them spoke, but when they
+reached the Wren's End Road, Tony burst into tears.
+
+"I _am_ so hungry," he wailed, "and I feel so nasty in my inside."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As Meg was putting him to bed that night she inquired if he had done
+anything with his green jersey, for she couldn't find it.
+
+"No," Tony answered. "I haven't had it for a long time--it's been too
+warm."
+
+"It's very odd," said Meg. "It has disappeared, and so have two vests
+of little Fay's that I put in the nursery ottoman to mend. Where can
+they be? I hate to lose things; it seems so untidy."
+
+"I 'spect," said Tony, thoughtfully, "my Daddie took them. He'd never
+leave without takin somefin."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There was a dinner-party at the Manor House. Peter had come down from
+town for it, and this time he was staying at Wren's End. Lady Penelope
+and her husband were to dine and sleep at the Manor, likewise Miles, who
+had come down with Peter; and Lady Pen contrived thoroughly to upset her
+aunt before dinner, by relating how she had met Miles with Miss Morton
+and her father in Cheltenham. And poor Lady Mary had been hoping that
+the unfortunate affair would die a natural death. She had asked the
+prettiest girl in the neighbourhood for Miles to take in, and now,
+looking down the table at him, she would have said he was as
+well-pleased with his neighbour as any young man could be. The Freams
+were there and Mr. Withells, the pretty girl's mamma and a bride and
+bridegroom--fourteen in all. A dangerous number to ask, the Squire had
+declared; one might so easily have fallen through. No one did, however,
+and Peter found himself allotted to Lady Penelope, while Jan's fate was
+the bridegroom. "His wife won't be jealous of Miss Ross, you know," Lady
+Mary had said while arranging her couples.
+
+It happened that Peter sat opposite to Jan, and he surveyed her across
+the sweet-peas with considerable satisfaction. He had never seen Jan in
+what her niece bluntly called "a nekked dless" before. To-night she wore
+black, in some soft, filmy stuff from which her fine arms and shoulders
+and beautiful neck stood out in challenging whiteness. Her hair, too,
+had "pretty twinkly things" in it, and she wore a long chain of small
+but well-matched pearls, her father's last gift to her. Yes, Jan was
+undoubtedly distinguished, and oh, thank heaven! she _had_ a clean face.
+
+Beautiful Lady Pen was painted to the eyes, and her maid was not quite
+skilful in blending her complexion rightly with her vivid hair;
+beautiful hair it was, with a large ripple that was most attractive, but
+Mr. Withells, sitting on the other side of Lady Pen, decided that he
+didn't approve of her. She was flamboyant and daring of speech. She made
+him nervous. He felt sincerely sorry for Pottinger.
+
+Peter found Lady Pen very amusing, and perhaps she rather neglected her
+other neighbour.
+
+The dinner was excellent and long; and after it the ladies, when they
+left the men to smoke, strolled about on the terrace, and Jan found
+herself side by side with Lady Penelope.
+
+"How's your little friend?" she asked abruptly. "I suppose you know my
+cousin's playin' round?"
+
+Jan was a little taller than Lady Pen, and turned her head slowly to
+look at her: "I'm afraid I don't quite understand," she said.
+
+"Surely," Lady Pen retorted, "you must have seen."
+
+"If you mean that Captain Middleton admires Miss Morton, I believe he
+does. But you see, to say that anyone is 'playing round' rather reflects
+on me, because she is in my charge."
+
+"I should say you've got a pretty good handful," Lady Pen said
+sympathetically.
+
+"I don't think you quite understand Miss Morton. I've known her, as it
+happens, known her well, for close upon nine years."
+
+"And you think well of her?"
+
+"It would be difficult to express how well."
+
+"You're a good friend, Miss Ross. I had occasion to think so once
+before--now I'm pretty sure of it. What's the sayin'--'Time tryeth
+thingummy'?"
+
+"Troth?" Jan suggested.
+
+"That's it. 'Time tryeth troth.' I never was any good at quotations and
+things. But now, look here, I'd like to ask you somethin' rather
+particular ..." Lady Pen took Jan's arm and propelled her gently down a
+side-walk out of earshot of the others. "Suppose you knew folks--and
+they weren't exactly friends, but pleasant, you know, and all that, and
+you were aware that they went about sayin' things about a third person
+who also wasn't exactly a friend, but ... well, likeable; and you
+believed that what the first lot said gave a wrong impression ... in
+short, was very damaging--none of it any business of yours, mind--would
+you feel called upon to do anything?"
+
+The two tall women stopped and faced one another.
+
+The moon shone full on Lady Pen's beautiful painted face, and Jan saw,
+for the first time, that the eyes under the delicately darkened eyebrows
+were curiously like Miles'.
+
+"It's always tiresome to interfere in other people's business," said
+Jan, "but it's not quite fair, is it, not to stand up for people if you
+believe an accusation to be untrue--whether you like them or not. You
+see, it may be such a serious thing for the person implicated."
+
+"I believe you're right," said Lady Pen, "but oh, lord! what a worry it
+will be."
+
+Lady Mary called to them to come, for the bride was going to sing.
+
+The bride's singing was not particularly pleasing, and she was followed
+by Miles, who performed "Drake's Drum," to his aunt's rather uncertain
+accompaniment, in a voice that shook the walls. Poor Mr. Withells fled
+out by the window, and sat on the step on his carefully-folded
+handkerchief, but even so the cold stones penetrated, and he came in
+again.
+
+And after "Drake's Drum" it was time to go home.
+
+Jan and Peter walked back through the scented night, Peter carrying her
+slippers in a silk bag, for the sternly economical Meg wouldn't hear of
+wasting good su�de slippers at 22s. 6d. a pair by walking half a mile in
+them, no matter how dry it was.
+
+When all the guests had gone, Lady Pen seized Miles by the arm and
+implored him to take her outside for a cigarette. "That little Withells
+had given her the hump."
+
+Lady Mary said it was bed-time and the servants wanted to lock up. The
+Squire and Mr. Pottinger melted away imperceptibly to smoke in peace
+elsewhere.
+
+Lady Pen, still holding Miles in an iron grip, pulled him over to the
+door, which she shut, led him back, and stood in front of Lady Mary, who
+was just going to ring for the servants to shut the windows.
+
+"Wait a minute, Aunt Mary. I've got somethin' to say, and I want to say
+it before Miles."
+
+"Oh, don't let us go into all that to-night," Lady Mary implored, "if
+what you have to say has anything to do with what you told me before
+dinner."
+
+"It has and it hasn't. One thing I've decided is that I've got to tell
+the Trents they are liars; and the other thing is that, though I
+disapprove with all my strength of the game Miles is playing, I believe
+that little girl is square...."
+
+"You see," Lady Pen went on, turning to Miles, "I've repeated things to
+Aunt Mary that I heard from the Trents lately--but I heard a different
+story at the time--and though I think you, Miles, are throwing yourself
+away, I won't be a party to spreadin' lies. Somethin' that _poudr�e_
+woman with the good skin said to-night made me feel a swab----"
+
+"I'm glad you've spoken up like this, Pen," Miles said slowly, "for if
+you hadn't, we couldn't have been friends any more. I promised Meg I
+wouldn't tell anybody--but I've asked her to marry me ... and though she
+isn't over keen, I believe I'll get her to do it some day."
+
+"Isn't over keen?" Lady Mary repeated indignantly. "Why, she ought to be
+down on her knees with joy!"
+
+Miles laughed. "She's not a kneeling sort, Aunt Mary. It's I who'll have
+to do the kneeling, I can tell you."
+
+Lady Pen was looking straight at her cousin with the beautiful candid
+eyes that were so like his own. "Just for curiosity," she said slowly,
+"I'd dearly like to know if Meg Morton ever said anything to you about
+me--anything rather confidential--I won't be offended, I'd just like to
+know."
+
+"About you?" Miles echoed in a puzzled voice.
+
+"About my appearance, you know--my looks."
+
+"I think she called you good-looking, like everybody else, but I don't
+remember that she was specially enthusiastic. To tell you the honest
+truth, Pen, we've had other things to talk about than you."
+
+"Now listen, you two," said Lady Pen. "That little girl is straight. You
+won't understand, Miles, but Aunt Mary will. Meg Morton knew I was
+against her--about you, Miles--women always know these things. And yet
+she held her tongue when she could have said something true that I'd
+rather not have talked about. You'll hold your tongue, old chap, and so
+will Aunt Mary. I've got her hair; got it on this minute. That's why
+she's such a croppy."
+
+Lady Mary sat down on the nearest chair and sighed deeply.
+
+"It's been a real satisfaction to me, this transformation, because I
+know where it came from."
+
+Miles took his cousin's hand and kissed it. "If somebody had to have it,
+I'm glad it's you," he said.
+
+"Yes, she's straight," Lady Pen repeated. "I don't believe there's many
+girls who would have kept quiet--not when the man they cared about was
+being got at. You may ring now, Aunt Mary. I'm through. Good night."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Do you realise," said Peter as they turned out of the dark Manor drive
+into the moonlit road, "that I've been here on and off over a month, and
+that we are now nearly at the end of July?"
+
+"You've only just come to _us_," said Jan. "You can't count the time you
+stayed at 'The Green Hart' as a visit."
+
+"And now I have come ... I'm not quite sure I've done wisely,
+unless...."
+
+"Unless what?"
+
+"Unless I can put something through that I came back from India to do."
+
+Jan did not answer. They walked on in silence, and Peter looked at the
+moon.
+
+"I think," he said, "you've always had a pretty clear idea why I came
+home from India ... haven't you?"
+
+"It was time for your leave," Jan said nervously. "It isn't good to
+stay out there too long."
+
+"I shouldn't have taken leave this year, though, if it hadn't been for
+you."
+
+"You've always been kind and helpful to me ... I hope it hasn't been
+very ... inconvenient."
+
+Peter laughed, and stopped in the middle of the road.
+
+"I'm fond of fencing," he said lightly, "and free play's all very well
+and pretty; but I've always thought that the real thing, with the
+buttons off the foils, must have been a lot more sport than anything we
+get now."
+
+Again Jan was silent.
+
+"You've fenced with me, Jan," he said slowly, "ever since I turned up
+that day unexpectedly. Now, I want a straight answer. Do you care at
+all, or have you only friendship for me? Look at me; tell me the truth."
+
+"It's all so complicated and difficult," she faltered, and her eyes fell
+beneath Peter's.
+
+"What is?"
+
+"This caring--when you aren't a free agent."
+
+"Free fiddlestick! You either care or you don't--which is it?"
+
+"I care a great deal too much for my own peace of mind," said Jan.
+
+"I am quite satisfied," said Peter. And if Mr. Withells had seen what
+happened to the "sensible" Miss Ross just then, his neatly-brushed hair
+would have stood straight on end.
+
+In the road, too!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+AUGUST, 1914
+
+
+"No," said Jan, "it would be like marrying a widow ... with
+encumbrances."
+
+"But you don't happen to be a widow--besides, if you were, and had a
+dozen encumbrances, if we want to get married it's nobody's business but
+our own."
+
+Peter spoke testily. He wanted Jan to marry him before he went back to
+India in October, and if he got the billet he hoped for, to follow him,
+taking the two children out, early in November.
+
+But Jan saw a thousand lions in the way. She was pulled in this
+direction and that, and though she knew she had got to depend on Peter
+to--as she put it--"a dreadful extent," yet she hesitated to saddle him
+with her decidedly explosive affairs, without a great deal more
+consideration than he seemed disposed to allow her.
+
+Hugo, for the present, was quiet. He was in Guernsey with his people,
+and beyond a letter in which he directly accused Peter Ledgard of
+abducting Tony when his father was taking him to visit his grandparents,
+Jan had heard nothing.
+
+By Peter's advice she did not answer this letter. But they both knew
+that Hugo was only waiting to make some other and more unpleasant
+demonstration than the last.
+
+"You see," Jan began again, "I've got so many people to think of. The
+children and Meg and the house and all the old servants.... You mustn't
+hustle me, dear."
+
+"Yes, I see all that; but I've got _you_ to think of, and if we're
+married and anything happens to me you'll get your pension, and I want
+you to have that."
+
+"And if anything happened to me, you'd be saddled with the care of two
+little children who've got a thoroughly unsatisfactory father, who can
+always make life hateful for them and for you. No, Peter, it wouldn't be
+fair--we must wait and see how things work out."
+
+"At present," Peter said gloomily, "it looks as if things were working
+out to a fair bust-up all round."
+
+This was on the 30th of July.
+
+Peter went up to London, intending to return on the first to stay over
+the Bank Holiday, but he did not come. He wanted to be within easy reach
+of recalling cablegram.
+
+Meg got a wire from Miles on Saturday: "Try to come up for to-morrow and
+Monday I can't leave town must see you."
+
+And half an hour after it, came a note from Squire Walcote, asking her
+to accept his escort, as he and Lady Mary were going up to the
+Grosvenor, and hoped Meg would be their guest.
+
+It was during their stay in London that Lady Mary and the Squire got the
+greatest surprise of their whole lives.
+
+Miles, looking bigger than ever in uniform, rushed in and demanded an
+interview with Meg alone in their private room. He showed her a special
+licence, and ordered, rather than requested, that she should marry him
+at once.
+
+"I can't," she said, "it's no use asking me ... I _can't_."
+
+"Listen; have you any objection to me?"
+
+Meg pulled a little away from him and pretended to look him up and down.
+"No ... in fact ... I love every bit of you--especially your boots."
+
+"Have you thought how likely it is that I may not come back ... if
+there's war?"
+
+"Don't!" said Meg. "Don't put it into words."
+
+"Then why won't you marry me, and let me feel that, whether I'm killed
+or not, I've had the thing I wanted most in this world?"
+
+"Dear, I can't help it, but I feel if I married you now ... you would
+never come back ... but if I wait ... if I don't try to grasp this
+wonderful thing too greedily ... it will come to us both. I _daren't_
+marry you, Miles."
+
+"Suppose I'm all smashed up ... I couldn't ask you then ... suppose I
+come back minus an arm or a leg, or blind or something?"
+
+"If the least little bit of you comes back, I'll marry that; not you or
+anyone else could stop me then."
+
+"You'd make it easier all round if you'd marry me now...."
+
+"That's it ... I don't want it to be easier. If I was your wife, how
+could I go on being nurse to those children?"
+
+"I wouldn't stop you--you could go back to Miss Ross and do just
+exactly what you're doing. I agree with you--the children are
+cheery----"
+
+Meg shook her head. "No; if I was your wife, it wouldn't do. As it is
+... the nursemaid has got her soldier, and that's as it should be."
+
+"Will you marry me the first leave I get, if I live to get any?"
+
+"I'll think about that."
+
+He gave her the ring she had refused before. Such an absurd little ring,
+with its one big sapphire set with diamonds, and "no backing to it,"
+Miles said.
+
+And he gave her a very heavy brass-studded collar for William, and on
+the plate was engraved her name and address.
+
+"You see," he explained, "Miss Ross would never really have him, and I'd
+like to think he was your dog. And here's his licence."
+
+Then Miles took her right up in his arms and hugged her close, and set
+her gently down and left her.
+
+That night he asked his uncle and a brother-officer to witness his will.
+He had left most of his money among his relations, but twenty thousand
+pounds he had left to Meg absolutely, in the event of his being killed
+before they were married.
+
+His uncle pointed out that there was nothing said about her possible
+marriage. "She'll be all the better for a little money of her own if she
+does marry," Miles said simply. "I don't want her to go mourning all her
+days, but I do want the capital tied up on her so that he couldn't
+waste it ... if he was an unfortunate sort of chap over money."
+
+The Squire blew his nose.
+
+"You see," Miles went on, "she's a queer little thing. If I left her too
+much, she'd refuse it altogether. Now I trust to you, Uncle Edward, to
+see that she takes this."
+
+"I'll do my best, my boy, I'll do my best," said the Squire; "but I hope
+with all my soul you'll make settlements on her yourself before long."
+
+"So do I, but you never can tell in war, you know. And we must always
+remember," Miles added with his broad, cheerful smile, "there's a good
+deal of target about me."
+
+Miles wrote to the little Major, a very manly, straightforward letter,
+telling him what he had done, but swearing him to secrecy as regarded
+Meg.
+
+He also wrote to Jan, and at the end, he said, "I am glad she is to be
+with you, because you really apreciate her."
+
+The one "p" in "appreciate" fairly broke Jan down. It was so like Miles.
+
+Meg, white-faced and taciturn, went back to Wren's End on Tuesday night.
+The Squire and Lady Mary remained in town.
+
+In answer to Jan's affectionate inquiries, Meg was brief and
+business-like. Yes; she had seen Miles several times. He was very busy.
+No, she did not expect to see him again before ... he left. Yes; he was
+going with the First Army.
+
+Jan asked no more questions, but was quietly, consistently kind. Meg
+was adorable with her children and surpassed herself in the telling of
+stories.
+
+The First Army left England for Flanders with the silence of a shadow.
+
+But Meg knew when it left.
+
+That night, Jan woke about one o'clock, conscious of a queer sound that
+she could neither define nor locate.
+
+She sat up in bed to listen, and arrived at the conclusion that it came
+from the day-nursery, which was below her room.
+
+Tony was sleeping peacefully. Jan put on her dressing-gown and went
+downstairs. The nursery door was not shut, and a shaft of light shone
+through it into the dark hall. She pushed it open a little way and
+looked in.
+
+Meg was sitting at the table, making muslin curtains as if her life
+depended on it. She wore her nightgown, and over it a queer little
+Japanese kimono of the green she loved. Her bare feet were pillowed upon
+William, who lay snoring peacefully under the table.
+
+Her face was set and absorbed. A grave, almost stern, little face. And
+her rumpled hair, pushed back from her forehead, gave her the look of a
+Botticelli boy angel. It seemed to merge into tongues of flame where the
+lamplight caught it.
+
+The window was wide open and the sudden opening of the door caused a
+draught, though the night was singularly still.
+
+The lamp flickered.
+
+Meg rested her hand on the handle of the sewing-machine, and the
+whirring noise stopped. She saw Jan in the doorway.
+
+"Dear," said Jan gently, standing where she was, half in and half out of
+the door, "are you obliged to do this?"
+
+Meg looked at her, and the dumb pain in that look went to Jan's heart.
+
+Jan came towards her and drew the flaming head against her breast.
+
+"I'm sorry I disturbed you," Meg murmured, "but I was _obliged_ to do
+something."
+
+William stirred at the voices, and turning his head tried to lick the
+little bare feet resting on his back.
+
+"Dearest, I really think you should go back to bed."
+
+"Very well," said Meg meekly. "I'll go now."
+
+"He," Jan continued, "would be very angry if he thought you were making
+curtains in the middle of the night."
+
+"He," Meg retorted, "is absurd--and dear beyond all human belief."
+
+"You see, he left you in my charge ... what will he say if--when he
+comes back--he finds a haggard Meg with a face like a threepenny-bit
+that has seen much service?"
+
+"All right, I'm coming."
+
+When Meg got back to her room, she went and leaned over little Fay
+sleeping in the cot beside her bed. Rosy and beautiful, warm and
+fragrant, the healthy baby brought comfort to Meg's stricken heart.
+
+Perhaps--who knows--the tramp of that silent army sounded in little
+Fay's ears, for she stretched out her dimpled arms and caught Meg round
+the neck.
+
+"Deah Med!" she sighed, and was still.
+
+William stood at attention.
+
+Presently Meg knelt down by her bed, and according to the established
+ritual he thrust his head into her encircling arm.
+
+"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered. "Oh, William, pray for
+your master as you never prayed before."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The strange tense days went on in August weather serene and lovely as
+had not been seen for years. Young men vanished from the country-side
+and older men wistfully wondered what they could do to help.
+
+Peter came down from Saturday to Monday, telling them that every officer
+and every civilian serving in India was recalled, but he had not yet
+learned when he was to sail.
+
+They were sitting in the wrens' garden with the children.
+
+"Earley's going," Tony said importantly.
+
+"Earley!" Jan exclaimed. "Going where?"
+
+"To fight, of course," little Fay chimed in.
+
+"Oh, poor dear Earley!" Jan sighed.
+
+"Happy, fortunate Earley," said Peter. "I wish I stood in his shoes."
+
+Earley joined the Gloucesters because, he said, "he couldn't abear to
+think of them there Germans comin' anigh Mother and them childring and
+the ladies; and he'd better go and see as they didn't."
+
+Mr. Withells called the men on his place together and told them that
+every man who joined would have his wages paid to his wife, and his wife
+or his mother, as the case might be, could stop on in her cottage. And
+Mr. Withells became a special constable, with a badge and a truncheon.
+But he worried every soldier that he knew with inquiries as to whether
+there wasn't a chance for him in _some_ battalion: "I've taken great
+care of my health," he said. "I do exercises every day after my bath;
+I'm young-looking for my age, don't you think? And anyway, a bullet
+might find me instead of a more useful man."
+
+No one laughed then at Mr. Withells and his exercises.
+
+Five days after the declaration of war Jan got a letter from Hugo
+Tancred. He was in London and was already a private in a rather famous
+cavalry regiment.
+
+"They didn't ask many questions," he wrote, "so I hadn't to tell many
+lies. You see, I can ride well and understand horses. If I get knocked
+out, it won't be much loss, and I know you'll look after Fay's kiddies.
+If I come through, perhaps I can make a fresh start somewhere. I've
+always been fond of a gamble, and this is the biggest gamble I've ever
+struck."
+
+Jan showed the letter to Peter, who gave it back to her with something
+like a groan: "Even the wrong 'uns get their chance, and yet I have to
+go back and do a deadly dull job, just because it _is_ my job."
+
+Peter went up to town and two days after came down again to "The Green
+Hart" to say good-bye. He had got his marching orders and was to sail in
+the _Somali_ from Southampton. Some fifteen hundred civilians and
+officers serving in India were sailing by that boat and the _Dongola_.
+
+By every argument he could bring forward he tried to get Jan to marry
+him before he sailed. Yet just because she wanted to do it so much, she
+held back. She, too, she kept telling herself, had her job, and she knew
+that if she was Peter's wife, nothing, not even her dear Fay's children,
+could be of equal importance with Peter.
+
+The children and Meg and the household had by much thinking grown into a
+sort of Frankenstein's monster of duty.
+
+Her attitude was incomprehensible to Peter. It seemed to him to be
+wrong-headed and absurd, and he began to lose patience with her.
+
+On his last morning he sought and found her beside the sun-dial in the
+wrens' garden.
+
+Meg had taken little Fay to see Lady Mary's Persian kittens, but Tony
+preferred to potter about the garden with the aged man who was trying to
+replace Earley. William was not allowed to call upon the kittens, as
+Fatima, their mother, objected to him vehemently, and Tony cared to go
+nowhere if William might not be of the party.
+
+Peter came to Jan and took both her hands and held them.
+
+"It's the last time I shall ask you, my dear. If you care enough, we
+can have these last days together. If you don't I must go, for I can't
+bear any more of this. Either you love me enough to marry me before I
+sail or you don't love me at all. Which is it?"
+
+"I do love you, you know I do."
+
+"Well, which is it to be?"
+
+"Peter, dear, you must give me more time. I haven't really faced it all.
+I can't do anything in such a hurry as that."
+
+Peter looked at her and shook his head.
+
+"You don't know what caring is," he said. "I can't stand any more of
+this. Do you see that motto on the sun-dial: 'I bide my time'--I've read
+it and read it, and I've said it over to myself and waited and hoped to
+move you. Now I can't wait any more."
+
+He kissed her, dropped her hand, and turning from her went out through
+the iron gate and down the drive. For a moment Jan stood by the sun-dial
+as though she, too, were stone.
+
+Then blindly she went up the steps into the empty nursery and sat down
+on an old sofa far back in the room. She leaned face-downward against
+the cushions, and great, tearing sobs broke from her.
+
+Peter was gone. He would never come back. She had driven him from her.
+And having done so she realised that he was the one person in the world
+she could not possibly do without.
+
+Tony's own hen had laid an egg. Carrying it very carefully in a
+cabbage-leaf, he went, accompanied by the faithful William, to show it
+to Auntie Jan, and was just in time to see Peter going down the drive.
+
+He went through the wrens' garden and in by the window. For a moment he
+didn't see his aunt; and was turning to go again when a strange sound
+arrested him, and he saw her all huddled up at the head of the sofa,
+with hidden face and heaving shoulders.
+
+He laid his egg on the table and went and pulled at her arm.
+
+"What is the matter?" he asked anxiously. "And why has Peter gone?"
+
+Jan raised her head; pride and shame and self-consciousness were dead in
+her: "He's gone," she sobbed. "He won't come back, and I shall never be
+happy any more," and down went her head again on her locked arms.
+
+Tony did not attempt to console her. He ran from the room, and Jan felt
+that this was only an added pang of abandonment.
+
+Down the drive ran Tony, with William galumphing beside him. But William
+was not happy, and squealed softly from time to time. He felt it unkind
+to leave a poor lady crying like that, and yet was constrained to go
+with Tony because Meg had left him in William's charge.
+
+Tony turned out of the gate and into the road.
+
+Far away in the distance was a man's figure striding along with
+incredible swiftness. Tony started to run all he knew. Now, seldom as
+William barked, he barked when people ran, and William's bark was so
+deep and sonorous and distinctive that it caused the swiftly striding
+man to turn his head. He turned his body, too, and came back to meet
+Tony and William.
+
+Tony was puffed and almost breathless, but he managed to jerk out: "You
+must go back; she's ... crying dreadful. You _must_ go back. Go quick;
+don't wait for us."
+
+Peter went.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan very rarely cried. When she did it hurt fiercely and absorbed all
+her attention. She was crying now as if she would never stop. If people
+seldom cry it has a devastating effect on their appearance when they do.
+Jan's eyelids were swollen, her nose scarlet and shiny, her features all
+bleared and blurred and almost scarred by tears.
+
+Someone touched her gently on the shoulder, and she looked up.
+
+"My dear," said Peter, "you must not cry like this. I was losing my
+temper--that's why I went off."
+
+Jan sprang to her feet and flung her arms round his neck. She pressed
+her ravaged face against his: "I'll do anything you like," she
+whispered, "if you'll only like it. I can't stand by myself any more."
+
+This was true, for as she spoke her knees gave under her.
+
+Peter held her close. Never had Jan looked less attractive and never had
+Peter loved her more, or realised so clearly how dear and foolish and
+wise and womanly she was.
+
+"You see," she sobbed, "you said yourself everyone _must_ do his job,
+and I thought----"
+
+"But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it, anyway."
+
+Jan sobbed now more quietly, with her head against his shoulder.
+
+Tony and William came and looked in at the window.
+
+His aunt was still crying, crying hard, though Peter was there close
+beside her, very close indeed.
+
+Surely this was most unreasonable.
+
+"She said," Tony remarked accusingly to Peter, "she was crying because
+you had gone, so I ran to fetch you back. And now I _have_ fetched you,
+she's crying worse nor ever."
+
+But William Bloomsbury knew better. William had cause to know the
+solitary bitter tears that hurt. These tears were different.
+
+So William wagged his tail and ran into the room, jumping joyously on
+Peter and Jan.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+
+
+The following corrections were made:
+
+p. 44: Daddy to Daddie, to match all other occurrences (Daddie was very
+daylight.)
+
+p. 113: log to long (long grey dust-cloak)
+
+p. 113: froward to forward (Anthony came forward)
+
+p. 118: bread-an-butter to bread-and-butter (several pieces of
+bread-and-butter)
+
+p. 152: minunte to minute (pondered this for a minute)
+
+p. 284: quit to quick ("I came as quick as I could,")
+
+p. 318: fluttered to flattered (rather flattered)
+
+In the Latin-1 plain text version, an a-macron and an o-breve have been
+removed from the word Jao! (p. 196).
+
+Inconsistencies in hyphenation (e.g. country-side vs. countryside) have
+not been changed. All dialect and "baby talk" has been left as in the
+original. Two different types of thought breaks were used in the
+original: extra whitespace between paragraphs (represented by 5 spaced
+asterisks in this text) and a line of 8 spaced asterisks (left as in the
+original.) Ellipses match the original, even when inconsistent. The
+exception is when they occur at the end of a paragraph, where they are
+always accompanied by a period.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JAN AND HER JOB ***
+
+***** This file should be named 29945-8.txt or 29945-8.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Jan and Her Job
+
+Author: L. Allen Harker
+
+Release Date: September 9, 2009 [EBook #29945]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JAN AND HER JOB ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Robert Cicconetti, S.D., and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
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+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<h1 class="first">JAN AND HER JOB</h1>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 325px;">
+<a name="Frontispiece" id="Frontispiece"></a>
+<a href="images/frontis-lg.jpg" class="noline">
+<img src="images/frontis-thumb.jpg" width="261" height="400" alt="" title="Frontispiece" />
+<span class="caption u"><br />&quot;But surely,&quot; said Peter, &quot;I <em>am</em> your job&mdash;part of it,
+anyway.&quot;</span></a>
+</div>
+
+<div class="tp">
+<h1>JAN AND HER JOB</h1>
+
+<p class="center sm">BY</p>
+
+<p class="center"><span class="lgr wide">L. ALLEN HARKER</span><br />
+<span class="smr">AUTHOR OF "A ROMANCE OF THE NURSERY"; "MISS ESPERANCE AND MR. WYCHERLY";<br />
+"MR. WYCHERLY'S WARDS"; "THE FFOLLIOTS OF REDMARLEY," ETC.</span></p>
+
+<p class="center sm pad-tb">ILLUSTRATED</p>
+
+<p class="center">NEW YORK<br />
+CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS<br />
+<span class="sm">1917</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<p class="center smcap">
+Copyright, 1917, by<br />
+Charles Scribner's Sons</p>
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 45px;">
+<img class="decoline" src="images/short-line-thin.png" width="45" height="1" alt="" title="" />
+</div>
+<p class="center">Published March, 1917</p>
+
+<div class="ded">
+<p class="center">TO<br />
+F. R. P.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Chary of praise and prodigal of counsel&mdash;<br />
+Who but thou?</i>"</p>
+
+<p class="ralign">R. L. S.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page vii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="front"><i>CONTENTS</i></h2>
+
+<table class="smcap" cellspacing="4" summary="Table of Contents">
+
+<tr class="sm"><td colspan="2" class="pad-l">CHAPTER</td><td align="right">PAGE</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right">I.</td> <td>Jan</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">II.</td> <td>Jan's Mail</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_13">13</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">III.</td> <td>Bombay</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">IV.</td> <td>The Beginning of the Job</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_39">39</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">V.</td> <td>The Children</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_52">52</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">VI.</td> <td>The Shadow Before</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_62">62</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">VII.</td> <td>The Human Touch</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_78">78</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">VIII.</td> <td>The End of the Dream</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_91">91</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">IX.</td> <td>Meg</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_97">97</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">X.</td> <td>Plans</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_124">124</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XI.</td> <td>The State of Peter</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_139">139</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XII.</td> <td>"The Best-Laid Schemes"</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_149">149</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XIII.</td> <td>The Wheels of Chance</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_162">162</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XIV.</td> <td>Perplexities</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_173">173</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XV.</td> <td>Wren's End</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_184">184</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XVI.</td> <td>"The Bludgeonings of Chance"</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XVII.</td> <td>"Though an Host Should Encamp Against
+        Me"</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_212">212</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td align="right"><!-- Page viii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span>
+XVIII.</td> <td>Meg and Captain Middleton</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_220">220</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XIX.</td> <td>The Young Idea</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_240">240</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XX.</td> <td>"One Way of Love"</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_252">252</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XXI.</td> <td>Another Way of Love</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_261">261</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XXII.</td> <td>The Encampment</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_276">276</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XXIII.</td> <td>Tactics</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_287">287</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XXIV.</td> <td>"The Way of a Man with a Maid"</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_303">303</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XXV.</td> <td>A Demonstration in Force</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_325">325</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XXVI.</td> <td>In Which Several People Speak Their Minds</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_339">339</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td align="right">XXVII.</td> <td>August, 1914</td> <td align="right"><a href="#Page_351">351</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<h2 class="front"><i>ILLUSTRATIONS</i></h2>
+
+<table cellspacing="4" summary="List of Illustrations">
+
+<tr><td class="hang">"But surely," said Peter, "I <em>am</em> your job&mdash;part of it,
+anyway"</td> <td align="right"><i><a href="#Frontispiece">Frontispiece</a></i></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td></td>
+<td align="right" class="sm">FACING<br /> PAGE</td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="hang">"It would make it easier for both of us if you'd face it,
+my dear"</td> <td align="right"><a href="#easier">66</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="hang">He washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+pointing out ... that he "went into all the
+corners"</td> <td align="right"><a href="#washed">156</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="hang">William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ...
+nice children</td> <td align="right"><a href="#William">188</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><!-- Page 1 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p>
+
+<h1 class="chap1">JAN AND HER JOB</h1>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER I<br />
+<span class="sub">JAN</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">S</span>HE was something of a puzzle to the other
+passengers. They couldn't quite place her.
+She came on board the P. and O. at Marseilles.
+Being Christmas week the boat was not crowded,
+and she had a cabin to herself on the spar deck,
+so there was no "stable-companion" to find out
+anything about her.</p>
+
+<p>The sharp-eyed Australian lady, who sat opposite
+her at the Purser's table, decided that she
+was not married, or even engaged, as she wore
+no rings of any kind. Besides, her name, "Miss
+Janet Ross," figured in the dinner-list and was
+plainly painted on her deck-chair. At meals she
+sat beside the Purser, and seemed more or less
+under his wing. People at her table decided that
+she couldn't be going out as a governess or she
+would hardly be travelling first class, and yet
+she did not look of the sort who globe-trot all
+by themselves.</p>
+
+<p>Rather tall, slender without being thin, she
+moved well. Her ringless hands were smooth
+and prettily shaped, so were her slim feet, and
+always singularly well-shod.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 2 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span></p><p>Perhaps her chief outward characteristic was
+that she looked delightfully fresh and clean. Her
+fair skin helped to this effect, and the trim suitability
+of her clothes accentuated it. And yet
+there was nothing challenging or particularly noticeable
+in her personality.</p>
+
+<p>Her face, fresh-coloured and unlined, was rather
+round. Her eyes well-opened and blue-grey, long-sighted
+and extremely honest. Her hair, thick
+and naturally wavy, had been what hairdressers
+call "mid-brown," but was now frankly grey,
+especially round the temples; and the grey hair
+puzzled people, so that opinions differed widely
+regarding her age.</p>
+
+<p>The five box-wallahs (gentlemen engaged in
+commercial pursuits are so named in the East to
+distinguish them from the Heaven-Born in the
+various services that govern India), who, with the
+Australian lady, sat opposite to her at table, decided
+that she was really young and prematurely
+grey. Between the courses they diligently took
+stock of her. The Australian lady disagreed with
+them. She declared Miss Ross to be middle-aged,
+to look younger than she was. In this the
+Australian lady was quite sincere. She could not
+conceive of any <em>young</em> woman neglecting the
+many legitimate means that existed of combating
+this most distressing semblance&mdash;if semblance it
+was&mdash;of age.</p>
+
+<p>The Australian lady set her down as a well-preserved
+forty at least.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Frewellen, the oldest and crossest and
+greediest of the five box-wallahs, declared that<!-- Page 3 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>
+he would lay fifteen rupees to five annas that
+she was under thirty; that her eyes were sad, and
+it was probably trouble that had turned her hair.
+At his time of life, he could tell a young woman
+when he saw one. No painted old harridan could
+deceive <em>him</em>. After all, if Miss Ross <em>had</em> grey
+hair, she had plenty of it, and it was her own.
+But Mr. Frewellen, who sat directly opposite her,
+was prejudiced in her favour, for she always let
+him take her roll if it was browner than his own.
+He also took her knife if it happened to be sharper
+than the one he had, and he insisted on her
+listening to his incessant grumbling as to the
+food, the service, the temperature, and the general
+imbecility and baseness of his fellow-creatures.</p>
+
+<p>Like the Ancient Mariner, he held her with his
+glittering spectacles. Miss Ross trembled before
+his diatribes. He spoke in a loud and rumbling
+voice, and made derogatory remarks about the
+other passengers as they passed to their respective
+tables. She would thankfully have changed hers,
+but that it might have seemed ungrateful to the
+Purser, into whose charge she had been given by
+friends; and the Purser had been most kind and
+attentive.</p>
+
+<p>The Australian lady was sure that the Purser
+knew more about Miss Ross than he would acknowledge&mdash;which
+he did. But when tackled by
+one passenger about another, he was discreet or
+otherwise in direct ratio to what he considered
+was the discretion of the questioner. And he
+was a pretty shrewd judge of character. He had<!-- Page 4 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>
+infinite opportunities of so judging. A sea-voyage
+lays bare many secrets and shows up
+human nature at its starkest.</p>
+
+<p>Janet Ross did not seek to make friends, but
+kindly people who spoke to her found her pleasant
+and not in the least disposed to be mysterious
+when questioned, though she never volunteered
+any information about herself. She was a
+good listener, and about the middle of any voyage
+that is a quality supplying a felt want. Mankind
+in general finds his own doings very interesting,
+and takes great pleasure in recounting the same.
+Even the most energetic young passenger cannot
+play deck-quoits all day, and mixed cricket
+matches are too heating to last long once Aden
+is left behind. A great many people found it
+pleasant to drop into a chair beside the quiet lady,
+who was always politely interested in their remarks.
+She looked so cool and restful in her
+white frock and shady hat. She did <em>not</em> buy a
+solar topee at Port Said, for though this was her
+first voyage she had not, it seemed, started quite
+unwarned.</p>
+
+<p>In the middle of the Indian Ocean she suddenly
+found favour in the eyes of Sir Langham Sykes,
+and when that was the case Sir Langham proclaimed
+his preference to the whole ship. No
+one who attracted his notice could remain in obscurity.
+When he was not eating he was talking,
+generally about himself, though he was also fond
+of asking questions.</p>
+
+<p>A short, stout man with a red face, little fierce
+blue eyes, a booming voice, noisy laugh and a<!-- Page 5 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>
+truculent, domineering manner, Sir Langham
+made his presence felt wherever he was.</p>
+
+<p>It was "her shape," as he called it, that first
+attracted his attention to Miss Ross, as he
+watched her walking briskly round and round
+the hurricane-deck for her morning constitutional.</p>
+
+<p>"That woman moves well," he remarked to
+his neighbour; "wonder if she's goin' out to be
+married. Nice-looking woman and pleasant, no
+frills about her&mdash;sort that would be kind in illness."</p>
+
+<p>And Sir Langham sighed. He couldn't take
+any exercise just then, for his last attack of gout
+had been very severe, and his left foot was still
+swathed and slippered.</p>
+
+<p>There was a dance that night on the hurricane-deck,
+and Sir Langham, while watching the
+dancers, talked at the top of his voice with the
+more important lady passengers. On such occasions
+he claimed close intimacy with the Reigning
+House, and at all times of day one heard such
+sentences as, "And <em>I</em> said to the Princess Henrietta,"
+with a full account of what he did say.
+And the things he declared he said, and the stories
+he told, certainly suggested a doubt as to whether
+the ladies of our Royal Family are quite as strait-laced
+as the ordinary public is led to believe.
+But then one had only Sir Langham's word for
+it. There was no possibility of questioning the
+Princess.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Sir Langham got tired of trying to
+drown the band&mdash;it was such a noisy band&mdash;and
+he hobbled down the companion on to the almost<!-- Page 6 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>
+deserted deck. Right up in the stern he spied
+Miss Ross, quite alone, sitting under an electric
+light absorbed in a book. Beside her was an
+empty chair with a comfortable leg-rest. Sir
+Langham never made any bones about interrupting
+people. It would not, to him, have seemed
+possible that a woman could prefer any form of
+literature to the charm of his conversation. So
+with a series of grunts he lowered himself into it,
+arranged his foot upon the rest, and, without asking
+permission, lit a cigar.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you care for dancin'?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>She closed her book. "Oh, yes," she said,
+"but I don't know many men on board, and there
+are such a lot of young people who do know one
+another. It's pretty to watch them; but the
+night is pretty, too, don't you think? The stars
+all seem so near compared to what they do at
+home."</p>
+
+<p>"I've seen too many Eastern nights to take
+much stock in 'em now," he said in a disparaging
+voice. "I take it this is all new to you&mdash;first
+voyage, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I've never been a long voyage before."</p>
+
+<p>"Goin' to India, I suppose. You'd have started
+sooner if you'd been goin' for the winter to Australia.
+Now what are you goin' to India <em>for</em>?"</p>
+
+<p>"To stay with my sister."</p>
+
+<p>"Married sister?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Older than you, then, of course."</p>
+
+<p>"No, younger."</p>
+
+<p>"Much younger?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 7 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span></p><p>"Three years."</p>
+
+<p>"Is she like you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not in the least. She is a beautiful person."</p>
+
+<p>"Been married long?"</p>
+
+<p>"Between five and six years. I'm to take her
+home at the end of the cold weather."</p>
+
+<p>"Any kids?"</p>
+
+<p>"Two."</p>
+
+<p>"And you haven't been out before?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; this is my first visit."</p>
+
+<p>"She's been home, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, once."</p>
+
+<p>"Is her husband in the Army?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>Had Sir Langham been an observant person he
+would have noted that her very brief replies did
+not exactly encourage further questions. But
+his idea of conversation was either a monologue
+or a means of obtaining information, so he instantly
+demanded, "What does her husband do?"</p>
+
+<p>The impulse of the moment urged her to reply,
+"What possible business is it of yours <em>what</em> he
+does?" But well-bred people do not yield to
+these impulses, so she answered quietly, "He's in
+the P.W.D."</p>
+
+<p>"Not a bad service, not a bad service, though
+not equal to the I.C.S. They've had rather a
+scandal in it lately. Didn't you see about it in
+the papers just before we left?"</p>
+
+<p>At that moment Sir Langham was very carefully
+flicking the ash from the end of his cigar,
+otherwise he might have observed that as he
+spoke his companion flushed. A wave of warm<!-- Page 8 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>
+colour surged over her face and bare neck and
+receded again, leaving her very pale. Her hands
+closed over the book lying in her lap, as if glad to
+hold on to something, and their knuckles were
+white against the tan.</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't you see it?" he repeated. "Some
+chap been found to have taken bribes over contracts
+in a native state. Regular rumpus there's
+been. Quite right, too; we sahibs must have
+clean hands. No dealing with brown people if
+you haven't clean hands&mdash;can't have rupees sticking
+to 'em in any Government transactions. Expect
+you'll hear all about it when you get out
+there&mdash;makes a great sensation in any service
+does that sort of thing. I don't remember the
+name of the chap&mdash;perhaps they didn't give it&mdash;do
+you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't see anything about it," she said
+quietly. "I was very busy just before I left, and
+hardly looked at a paper."</p>
+
+<p>"Where is your sister?"</p>
+
+<p>"In Bombay."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, got a billet there, has he? Expect you'll
+like Bombay; cheery place, in the cold weather,
+but not a patch on Calcutta, to my mind. I
+hear the Governor and his wife do the thing in
+style&mdash;hospitable, you know; got private means,
+as people in that position always ought to have."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't suppose I shall go out at all," she said.
+"My sister is ill, and I've got to look after her.
+Directly she is strong enough to travel I shall
+bring her home."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you <em>must</em> see something of the social life<!-- Page 9 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>
+of the place while you're there. D'you know
+what I thought? I thought you were goin' out
+to get married, and"&mdash;he continued gallantly&mdash;"I
+thought he was a deuced lucky chap."</p>
+
+<p>She smiled and shook her head. She was not
+looking at Sir Langham, but at the long, white,
+moonlit pathway of foam left in the wake of the
+ship.</p>
+
+<p>"I say," he went on confidentially, "what's
+your Christian name? I'm certain they don't
+call you Janet. Is it Nettie, now? I bet it's
+Nettie!"</p>
+
+<p>"My <em>family</em>," said Miss Ross somewhat coldly,
+"call me Jan."</p>
+
+<p>"Nice little name," he exclaimed, "but more
+like a boy's. Now, I never got a pet name. I
+started Langham, and Langham I've stopped,
+and I flatter myself I've made the name known
+and respected."</p>
+
+<p>He wanted her to look at him, and leaned towards
+her: "Look here, Miss Ross, I'm goin' to
+ask you a funny question, and it's not one you
+can ask most women&mdash;but you're a puzzle.
+You've got a face like a child, and yet you're as
+grey as a badger. What <em>is</em> your age?"</p>
+
+<p>"I shall be twenty-eight in March."</p>
+
+<p>She looked at him then, and her grey eyes were
+so full of amusement that, incredulous as he
+usually was as to other people's statements, he
+knew that she was speaking the truth.</p>
+
+<p>"Then why the devil don't you <em>do</em> something
+<em>to</em> it?" he demanded.</p>
+
+<p>She laughed. "I couldn't be bothered. And<!-- Page 10 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span>
+it might turn green, or something. I don't mind
+it. It began when I was twenty-three."</p>
+
+<p>"<em>I</em> don't mind it either," Sir Langham declared
+magnanimously; "but it's misleading."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sorry," she said demurely. "I wouldn't
+mislead anyone for the world."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, what age should you think <em>I</em> am? But
+I suppose you know&mdash;that's the worst of being a
+public character; when one gets nearly a column
+in <cite>Who's Who</cite>, everybody knows all about one.
+That's the penalty of celebrity."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mind people knowing your age?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not I! Nor anything else about me. <em>I've</em>
+never done anything to be ashamed of. Quite
+the other way, I can assure you."</p>
+
+<p>"How pleasant that must be," she said quietly.</p>
+
+<p>Sir Langham turned and looked suspiciously at
+her; but her face was guileless and calm, with no
+trace of raillery, her eyes still fixed on the long
+bright track of foam.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose you, now," he muttered hoarsely,
+"always sleep well, go off directly you turn in&mdash;eh?"</p>
+
+<p>Her quiet eyes met his; little and fierce and
+truculent, but behind their rather bloodshot
+boldness there lurked something else, and with a
+sudden pang of pity she knew that it was fear,
+and that Sir Langham dreaded the night.</p>
+
+<p>"As a rule I do," she said gently; "but of
+course I've known what it is to be sleepless, and
+it's horrid."</p>
+
+<p>"It's hell," said Sir Langham, "and I'm in it
+every night this voyage, for I've knocked off<!-- Page 11 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>
+morphia and opiates&mdash;they were playing the
+deuce with my constitution, and I've strength of
+mind for anything when I fairly take hold. But
+it's awful. When d'you suppose natural sleep
+will come back?"</p>
+
+<p>She knew that he did not lack physical courage,
+that he had fearlessly faced great dangers in
+many outposts of the world; but the demon of
+insomnia had got a hold of Sir Langham, and he
+dreaded the night unspeakably. At that moment
+there was something pathetic about the little,
+boastful, filibustering man.</p>
+
+<p>"I think you will sleep to-night," she said confidently,
+"especially if you go to bed early."</p>
+
+<p>She half rose as she spoke, but he put his hand
+on her arm and pressed her down in her chair
+again.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't go yet," he cried. "Keep on tellin' me
+I'll sleep, and then perhaps I shall. You look as
+if you could will people to do things. You're
+that quiet sort. Will me, there's a good girl.
+Tell me again I'll sleep to-night."</p>
+
+<p>It was getting late; the music had stopped and
+the dancers had disappeared. Miss Ross did not
+feel over comfortable alone with Sir Langham so
+far away from everybody else. Especially as
+she saw he was excited and nervous. Had he
+been drinking? she wondered. But she remembered
+that he had proclaimed far and wide that,
+because of his gout, he'd made a vow to touch
+no form of "alcoholic liquor" on the voyage, except
+on Christmas and New Year's Day. It was
+six days since Christmas, and already Aden was<!-- Page 12 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>
+left behind. No, it was just sheer nervous excitement,
+and if she could do him any good....</p>
+
+<p>"I feel sure you will sleep to-night," she said
+soothingly, "if you will do as I tell you."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll do any mortal thing. I've got a deck-cabin
+to myself. Will you keep willin' me when
+you turn in?"</p>
+
+<p>"Go to bed now," she said firmly. "Undress
+quickly, and then think about nothing ... and
+I'll do the rest."</p>
+
+<p>"You will, you promise?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but you must keep your mind a perfect
+blank, or I can't do anything."</p>
+
+<p>She stood up tall and straight. The moonlight
+caught her grey hair and burnished it to an
+aureole of silver.</p>
+
+<p>With many grunts Sir Langham pulled himself
+out of his chair. "No smokin'-room, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"Good night," Miss Ross said firmly, and left
+him.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't forget to ask your sister's husband
+about that chap in the P.W.D.," he called after
+her. "He's sure to know all about it. What's
+his name?&mdash;your brother-in-law, I mean."</p>
+
+<p>But Miss Ross had disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>"Now how the devil," he muttered, "am I to
+make my mind, <em>my</em> mind, a perfect blank?"</p>
+
+<p>Two hours later Sir Langham's snores grievously
+disturbed the occupants of adjacent cabins.</p>
+
+<p>In hers, Miss Ross sat by the open porthole
+reading and re-reading the mail that had reached
+her at Aden.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 13 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER II<br />
+<span class="sub">JAN'S MAIL</span></h2>
+
+<div class="letter">
+<p class="ralign"><i>Bombay</i>, <i>December</i> 13<i>th</i>.</p>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">M</span>Y DEAR JAN,</p>
+
+<p>It was a great relief to get your cable saying
+definitely that you were sailing by the <i>Carnduff</i>.
+Misfortunes seem to have come upon us
+in such numbers of late that I dreaded lest your
+departure might be unavoidably delayed or prevented.
+I will not now enter into the painful
+question of my shameful treatment by Government,
+but you can well understand that I shall
+leave no stone unturned to reverse their most
+unfair and unjust decision, and to bring my traducers
+to book. Important business having reference
+to these matters calls me away at once, as
+I feel it is most essential not to lose a moment,
+my reputation and my whole future being at
+stake. I shall therefore, to my great regret, be
+unable to meet you on your arrival in Bombay,
+and, as my movements for the next few months
+will be rather uncertain, I may find it difficult
+to let you have regular news of me. I would
+therefore advise you to take Fay and the children
+home as soon as all is safely over and she is able
+to travel, and I will join you in England if and
+when I find I can get away. I know, dear Jan,
+that you will not mind financing Fay to this<!-- Page 14 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>
+extent at present; as, owing to these wholly unexpected
+departmental complications, I am uncommonly
+hard up. I will, of course, repay you
+at the earliest possible opportunity.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Fay is not at all well; all these worries
+have been very bad for her, and I have been distracted
+by anxiety on her behalf, as well as about
+my own most distressing position, and a severe
+attack of fever has left me weak and ailing. I
+thought it better to bring Fay down to Bombay,
+where she can get the best medical advice, and
+her being there will save you the long, tiresome
+journey to Dariawarpur. It is also most convenient
+for going home. She is installed in a most
+comfortable flat, and we brought our own servants,
+so I hope you will feel that I have done
+my best for her.</p>
+
+<p>Fay will explain the whole miserable business
+to you, and although appearances may be against
+me, I trust that you will realise how misleading
+these may be. I cannot thank you enough for
+responding so promptly to our ardently expressed
+desire for your presence at this difficult time. It
+will make all the difference in the world to Fay;
+and, on her account, to me also.</p>
+
+<p>Believe me, always yours affectionately,<br />
+<span style="float:right;" class="smcap pad-r2">Hugo Tancred.</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<div class="letter">
+<p class="ralign"><i>Bombay, Friday.</i></p>
+
+<p>Jan my dear, my dear, are you really on your
+way? And shall I see your face and hear your
+kind voice, and be able to cry against your
+shoulder?</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 15 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>
+I can't meet you, my precious, because I don't
+go out. I'm afraid. Afraid lest I should see anyone
+who knew us at Dariawarpur. India is so
+large and so small, and people from everywhere
+are always in Bombay, and I couldn't bear it.</p>
+
+<p>Do you know, Jan, that when the very worst
+has happened, you get kind of numbed. You
+can't suffer any more. You can't be sorry or
+angry or shocked or indignant, or anything but
+just broken, and that's what I am.</p>
+
+<p>After all, I've one good friend here who knew
+us at Dariawarpur. He's got a job at the secretariat,
+and he tries to help me all he can. I don't
+mind him somehow. He understands. He will
+meet you and bring you to the bungalow, so look
+out for him when the boat gets in. He's tall and
+thin and clean-shaven and yellow, with a grave,
+stern face and beautiful kind eyes. Peter is an
+angel, so be nice to him, Jan dear. It has been
+awful; it will go on being awful; but it will be a
+little more bearable when you come&mdash;for me, I
+mean&mdash;for you it will be horrid. All of us on
+your hands, and no money, and me such a crock,
+and presently a new baby. The children are
+well. It's so queer to think you haven't seen
+"little Fay." Come soon, Jan, come soon, to
+your miserable <span style="float:right;" class="smcap pad-r2">Fay.</span></p></div>
+
+<p>Jan sat on her bunk under the open porthole.
+One after the other she held the letters open in
+her hand and stared at them, but she did not
+read. The sentences were burnt into her brain
+already.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 16 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span></p><p>Hugo Tancred's letter was dated. Fay's was
+not, and neither letter bore any address in Bombay.
+Now, Jan knew that Bombay is a large
+town; and that people like the Tancreds, who, if
+not actually in hiding, certainly did not seek to
+draw attention to their movements, would be
+hard to find. Fay had wholly omitted to mention
+the surname of the tall, thin, yellow man
+with the "grave, stern face and beautiful kind
+eyes." Even in the midst of her poignant anxiety
+Jan found herself smiling at this. It was so like
+Fay&mdash;so like her to give no address. And should
+the tall, thin gentleman fail to appear, what was
+Jan to do? She could hardly go about the ship
+asking if one "Peter" had come to fetch her.</p>
+
+<p>How would she find Fay?</p>
+
+<p>Would they allow her to wait at the landing-place
+till someone came, or were there stringent
+regulations compelling passengers to leave the
+docks with the utmost speed, as most of them
+would assuredly desire to do?</p>
+
+<p>She knitted her brows and worried a good deal
+about this; then suddenly put the question from
+her as too trivial when there were such infinitely
+greater problems to solve.</p>
+
+<p>Only one thing was clear. One central fact
+shone out, a beacon amidst the gloom of the "departmental
+complications" enshrouding the conduct
+of Hugo Tancred, the certainty that he had,
+for the present anyway, shifted the responsibility
+of his family from his own shoulders to hers. As
+she sat square and upright under the porthole,
+with the cool air from an inserted "wind-sail"<!-- Page 17 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>
+ruffling her hair, she looked as though she braced
+herself to the burden.</p>
+
+<p>She wished she knew exactly what had happened,
+what Hugo Tancred had actually done.
+For some years she had known that he was by
+no means scrupulous in money matters, and that
+very evening Sir Langham had made it clear to
+her that this crookedness had not stopped short
+at his official work. There had been a scandal,
+so far-reaching a scandal that it had got into the
+home papers.</p>
+
+<p>This struck Jan as rather extraordinary, for
+Hugo Tancred was by no means a stupid man.</p>
+
+<p>It is one thing to be pleasantly oblivious of
+private debts, to omit cheques in repayment of
+various necessaries got at the Stores by an obliging
+sister-in-law. One thing to muddle away in
+wild-cat speculations a wife's money that, but for
+the procrastination of an easy-going father, would
+have been tightly tied up&mdash;quite another to bring
+himself so nearly within the clutches of the law as
+to make it possible for the Government of India
+to dismiss him.</p>
+
+<p>And what was he to do? What did the future
+hold for him?</p>
+
+<p>Who would give employment to however able
+a man with such a career behind him?</p>
+
+<p>Jan's imagination refused to take such flights.
+Resolutely she put the subject from her and began
+to consider what her own best course would
+be with Fay, her nephew and niece, and, very
+shortly, a new baby on her hands.</p>
+
+<p>Jan was not a young woman to let things drift.<!-- Page 18 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>
+She had kept house for a whimsical, happy-go-lucky
+father since she was fourteen; mothered her
+beautiful young sister; and, at her father's death,
+two years before, had with quiet decision arranged
+her own life, wholly avoiding the discussion
+and the friction which generally are the lot
+of an unmarried woman of five-and-twenty left
+without natural guardians and with a large circle
+of friends and relations.</p>
+
+<p>It was nearly two o'clock when she undressed
+and went to bed, and before that she had drafted
+two cablegrams&mdash;one to a house-agent, the other
+to her bankers.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 19 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER III<br />
+<span class="sub">BOMBAY</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">F</span>OR Jan the next two days passed as in a
+more or less disagreeable dream. She could
+never afterwards recall very clearly what happened,
+except that Sir Langham Sykes seemed
+absolutely omnipresent, and made her, she felt,
+ridiculous before the whole ship, by proclaiming
+far and wide that she had bestowed upon
+him the healing gift of sleep.</p>
+
+<p>He was so effusive, so palpably grateful, that
+she simply could not undeceive him by telling
+him that after they parted the night before she
+had never given him another thought.</p>
+
+<p>When he was not doing this he was pursuing,
+with fulminations against the whole tribe of
+missionaries, two kindly, quiet members of the
+Society of Friends.</p>
+
+<p>In an evil moment they had gratified his insatiable
+curiosity as to the object of their voyage
+to India, which was to visit and report upon
+the missionary work of their community. Once
+he discovered this he never let them alone, and
+the deck resounded with his denunciations of
+all Protestant missionaries as "self-seeking, oily
+humbugs."</p>
+
+<p>They bore it with well-mannered resignation,
+and a common dislike for Sir Langham formed
+quite a bond of union between them and Jan.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 20 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span></p><p>There was the usual dance on New Year's
+Eve, the usual singing of "Auld Lang Syne"
+in two huge circles; and Jan would have enjoyed
+it all but for the heavy foreboding in her heart;
+for she was a simple person who responded easily
+to the emotions of others. Before she could
+slip away to bed Sir Langham cornered her again,
+conjuring her to "will" him to sleep and "to
+go on doin' it" after they parted in Bombay.
+He became rather maudlin, and she seized the
+opportunity of telling him that her best efforts
+would be wholly unavailing if he at all relaxed
+the temperate habits, so necessary for the cure
+of his gout, that he had acquired during the
+voyage. She was stern with Sir Langham, and
+her admonitions had considerable effect. He
+sought his cabin chastened and thoughtful.</p>
+
+<p>The boat was due early in the morning. Jan
+finished most of her packing before she undressed;
+then, tired and excited, she could not
+sleep. A large cockroach scuttling about her
+cabin did not tend to calm her nerves. She
+plentifully besprinkled the floor with powdered
+borax, kept the electric light turned on and the
+fan whirring, and lay down wide-awake to wait
+for the dawn.</p>
+
+<p>The ship was unusually noisy, but just about
+four o'clock came a new sound right outside her
+porthole&mdash;the rush alongside of the boat bearing
+the pilot and strange loud voices calling directions
+in an unknown tongue. She turned out
+her light (first peering fearfully under her berth
+to make sure no borax-braving cockroach was<!-- Page 21 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>
+in ambush) and knelt on her bed to look
+out and watch the boat with its turbaned occupants:
+big brown men, who shouted to one
+another in a liquid language full of mystery.</p>
+
+<p>For a brief space the little boat was towed
+alongside the great liner, then cast off, and presently&mdash;far
+away on the horizon&mdash;Jan saw a streak
+of pearly pinkish light, as though the soft blue
+curtain of the night had been lifted just a little;
+and against that luminous streak were hills.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of her anxiety, in spite of her fears as
+to the future, Jan's heart beat fast with pleasurable
+excitement. She was young and strong and
+eager, and here at last was the real East. A
+little soft wind caressed her tired forehead and
+she drank in the blessed coolness of the early
+morning.</p>
+
+<p>Both day and night come quickly in the East.
+Jan got up, had her bath, dressed, and by half-past
+six she was on deck. The dark-blue curtain
+was rolled up, and the scene set was the
+harbour of Bombay.</p>
+
+<p>Such a gracious haven of strange multi-coloured
+craft, with its double coast-line of misty hills
+on one side, and clear-cut, high-piled buildings,
+domes and trees upon the other.</p>
+
+<p>A gay white-and-gold launch, with its attendants
+in scarlet and white, came for certain passengers,
+who were guests of the Governor. The
+police launch, trim and business-like with its
+cheerful yellow-hatted sepoys, came for others.
+Jan watched these favoured persons depart in
+stately comfort, and went downstairs to get<!-- Page 22 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>
+some breakfast. Then came the rush of departure
+by the tender. So many had friends to
+meet them, and all seemed full of pleasure in
+arrival. Jan was just beginning to feel rather
+forlorn and anxious when the Purser, fussed and
+over-driven as he always is at such times, came
+towards her, followed by a tall man wearing a
+pith helmet and an overcoat.</p>
+
+<p>"Mr. Ledgard has come to meet you, Miss
+Ross, so you'll be all right."</p>
+
+<p>It was amazing how easy everything became.
+Mr. Ledgard's servants collected Jan's cabin
+baggage and took it with them in the tender
+and, on arrival, in a tikka-gharri&mdash;the little
+pony-carriage which is the gondola of Bombay&mdash;and
+almost before she quite realised that the
+voyage was over she found herself seated beside
+Peter in a comfortable motor-car, with a cheerful
+little Hindu chauffeur at the steering-wheel,
+sliding through wide, well-watered streets, still
+comparatively empty because it was so early.</p>
+
+<p>By mutual consent they turned to look at one
+another, and Jan noted that Peter Ledgard <em>was</em>
+thin and extremely yellow. That his eyes (hollow
+and tired-looking as are the eyes of so many
+officials in the East) <em>were</em> kind, and she thought
+she had never before beheld a firmer mouth or
+more masterful jaw.</p>
+
+<p>What Peter saw evidently satisfied him as to
+her common sense, for he plunged <i lang="la">in medias res</i>
+at once: "How much do you know of this unfortunate
+affair?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Very little," she answered, "and that little<!-- Page 23 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>
+extremely vague. Will you tell me has Hugo
+come to total grief or not?"</p>
+
+<p>"Officially, yes. He is finished, done for&mdash;may
+thank his lucky stars he's not in gaol. It's
+well you should know this at the very beginning,
+for of course he won't allow it, and poor Fay&mdash;Mrs.
+Tancred (I'm afraid we're rather free-and-easy
+about Christian names in India)&mdash;doesn't
+know the whole facts by a very long way. From
+what she tells me, I fear he has made away with
+most of her money, too. Was any of it tied up?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan shook her head. "We both got what
+money there was absolutely on my father's
+death."</p>
+
+<p>"Then," said Peter, "I fear you've got the
+whole of them on your hands, Miss Ross."</p>
+
+<p>"That's what I've come for," Jan said simply,
+"to take care of Fay and the children."</p>
+
+<p>Peter Ledgard looked straight in front of him.</p>
+
+<p>"It's a lot to put on you," he said slowly,
+"and I'm afraid you'll find it a bit more complicated
+than you expect. Will you remember
+that I'd like to help you all I can?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan looked at the stern profile beside her and
+felt vaguely comforted. "I shall be most grateful
+for your advice," she said humbly. "I know
+I shall need it."</p>
+
+<p>The motor stopped, and as she stepped from
+it in front of the tall block of buildings, Jan
+knew that the old easy, straightforward life was
+over. Unconsciously she stiffened her back and
+squared her shoulders, and looked very tall
+and straight as she stood beside Peter Ledgard<!-- Page 24 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>
+in the entrance. The pretty colour he had admired
+when he met her had faded from her cheeks,
+and the face under the shady hat looked grave
+and older.</p>
+
+<p>Peter said something to the smiling lift-man
+in an extremely dirty dhoti who stood salaaming
+in the entrance.</p>
+
+<p>"I won't come up now," he said to Jan.
+"Please tell Mrs. Tancred I'll look in about
+tea-time."</p>
+
+<p>As Jan entered the lift and vanished from his
+sight, Peter reflected, "So that's the much-talked-of
+Jan! Well, I'm not surprised Fay
+wanted her."</p>
+
+<p>The lift stopped. An elderly white-clad butler
+stood salaaming at an open door, and Jan followed
+him.</p>
+
+<p>A few steps through a rather narrow passage
+and she was in a large light room opening on to
+a verandah, and in the centre stood her sister
+Fay, with outstretched arms.</p>
+
+<p>A pathetic, inarticulate, worn and faded Fay:
+her pretty freshness dimmed. A Fay with dark
+circles round her hollow eyes and all the living
+light gone from her abundant fair hair. It was
+as though her face was covered by an impalpable
+grey mask.</p>
+
+<p>There was no doubt about it. Fay looked
+desperately ill. Ill in a way not to be accounted
+for by her condition.</p>
+
+<p>Clinging together they sat down on an immense
+sofa, exchanging trivial question and
+answer as to the matters ordinary happy folk<!-- Page 25 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>
+discuss when they first meet after a long absence.
+Jan asked for the children, who had not yet returned
+from their early morning walk with the
+ayah. Fay asked about the voyage and friends
+at home, and told Jan she had got dreadfully
+grey; then kissed her and leant against her just
+as she used to do when they were both children
+and she needed comfort.</p>
+
+<p>Jan said nothing to Fay about <em>her</em> looks, and
+neither of them so much as mentioned Hugo
+Tancred. But Jan felt a wild desire to get away
+by herself and cry and cry over this sad wraith
+of the young sister whose serene and happy
+beauty had been the family pride.</p>
+
+<p>And yet she was so essentially the same Fay,
+tender and loving and inconsequent, and full of
+pretty cares for Jan's comfort.</p>
+
+<p>The dining-room was behind the sitting-room,
+with only a curtain between, and as they sat at
+breakfast Fay was so eager Jan should eat&mdash;she
+ate nothing herself&mdash;so anxious lest she should
+not like the Indian food, that poor Jan, with a
+lump in her throat that choked her at every
+morsel, forced down the carefully thought-out
+breakfast and meekly accepted everything presented
+by the grey-haired turbaned butler who
+bent over her paternally and offered every dish
+much as one would tempt a shy child with some
+amusing toy.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Fay took her to see her room, large,
+bare and airy, with little furniture save the bed
+with its clean white mosquito curtains placed
+under the electric fan in the centre of the ceiling.<!-- Page 26 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>
+Outside the window was a narrow balcony, and
+Jan went there at once to look out; and though
+her heart was so heavy she was fain to exclaim
+joyfully at the beauty of the view.</p>
+
+<p>Right opposite, across Back Bay, lay the
+wooded villa-crowned slopes of Malabar Hill,
+flung like a garland on the bosom of a sea deeply
+blue and smiling, smooth as a lake, while below
+her lay the pageant of the street, with its ever-changing
+panorama of vivid life. The whole so
+brilliant, so various, so wholly unlike any beautiful
+place she had ever seen before that, artist's
+daughter she was, she cried eagerly to Fay, "Oh,
+come and look! Did you ever see anything so
+lovely? How Dad would have rejoiced in this!"</p>
+
+<p>Fay followed slowly: "I thought you'd like
+it," she said, evidently pleased by Jan's enthusiasm,
+"that's why I gave you this room. Look,
+Jan! There are the children coming, those two
+over by the band-stand. They see us. <em>Do</em> wave
+to them."</p>
+
+<p>The children were still a long way off. Jan
+could only see an ayah in her white draperies
+pushing a little go-cart with a child in it, and a
+small boy trotting by her side, but she waved as
+she was bidden.</p>
+
+<p>The room had evidently at one time been used
+as a nursery, for inside the stone balustrade was
+a high trellis of wood. Jan and Fay were both
+tall women, but even on them the guarding trellis
+came right up to their shoulders. Neither of
+them could really lean over, though Fay tried, in
+her eagerness to attract the attention of the little<!-- Page 27 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>
+group. Jan watched her sister's face and again
+felt that cruel constriction of the throat that
+holds back tears. Fay's tired eyes were so sad,
+so out of keeping with the cheerful movement of
+her hand, so shadowed by some knowledge she
+could not share.</p>
+
+<p>"You mustn't stand here without a hat," she
+said, turning to go in. "The sun is getting hot.
+You must get a topee this afternoon. Peter will
+take you and help to choose it."</p>
+
+<p>"Couldn't you come, if we took a little carriage?
+Does driving tire you when it's cool?"
+Jan asked as she followed her sister back into the
+room.</p>
+
+<p>"I never go out," Fay said decidedly. "I
+never shall again ... I mean," she added, "till
+it's all over. I couldn't bear it just now&mdash;I might
+meet someone I know."</p>
+
+<p>"But, Fay, it's very bad for you to be always
+indoors. Surely, in the early morning or the
+evening&mdash;you'll come out then?"</p>
+
+<p>Fay shook her head. "Peter has taken me
+out in the motor once or twice at night&mdash;but I
+don't really like it. It makes me so dreadfully
+tired. Don't worry me about that, Jan. I get
+plenty of air in the verandah. It's just as pretty
+there as in your balcony, and we can have comfortable
+chairs. Let's go there now. <em>You</em> shall
+go out as much as you like. I'll send Lalkhan
+with you, or Ayah and the children; and Peter
+will take you about all he can&mdash;he promised he
+would. Don't think I want to be selfish and
+keep you here with me all the time."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 28 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>
+The flat, weak voice, so nervous, so terrified
+lest her stronger sister should force her to some
+course of action she dreaded, went to Jan's
+heart.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear," she said gently, "I haven't come
+here to rush about. I've come to be with you.
+We'll do exactly what you like best."</p>
+
+<p>Fay clung to her again and whispered, "Later on
+you'll understand better&mdash;I'll be able to tell you
+things, and perhaps you'll understand ... though
+I'm not sure&mdash;you're not weak like me, you'd
+never go under ... you'd always fight...."</p>
+
+<p>There was a pattering of small feet in the passage.
+Little high voices called for "Mummy,"
+and the children came in.</p>
+
+<p>Tony, a grave-eyed, pale-faced child of five,
+came forward instantly, with his hand held out
+far in front of him. Jan, who loved little children,
+knew in a minute that he was afraid she would
+kiss him; so she shook hands with gentlemanly
+stiffness. Little Fay, on the contrary, ran forward,
+held up her arms "to be taken" and her
+adorably pretty little face to be kissed. She was
+startlingly like her mother at the same age, with
+bobbing curls of feathery gold, beseeching blue
+eyes and a complexion delicately coloured as the
+pearly pink lining of certain shells. She was,
+moreover, chubby, sturdy and robust&mdash;quite unlike
+Tony, who looked nervous, bleached and
+delicate.</p>
+
+<p>Tony went and leant against his mother, regarding
+Jan and his small sister with dubious,
+questioning eyes.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 29 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>
+Presently he remarked, "I wish she hadn't
+come."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Tony," Fay exclaimed reproachfully,
+"you must both love Auntie Jan very dearly.
+She has come such a long way to be good to us
+all."</p>
+
+<p>"I wish she hadn't," Tony persisted.</p>
+
+<p>"<em>I</em> sall love Auntie Dzan," Fay remarked,
+virtuously.</p>
+
+<p>It was pleasant to be cuddled by this friendly
+baby, and Jan laid her cheek against the fluffy
+golden head; but all the time she was watching
+Tony. He reminded her of someone, and she
+couldn't think who. He maintained his aloof
+and unfriendly attitude till Ayah came to take
+the children to their second breakfast. Little
+Fay, however, refused to budge, and when the
+meekly salaaming ayah attempted to take her,
+made her strong little body stiff, and screamed
+vigorously, clinging so firmly to her aunt that
+Jan had herself to carry the obstreperous baby
+to the nursery, where she left her lying on the
+floor, still yelling with all the strength of her
+evidently healthy lungs.</p>
+
+<p>When Jan returned, rather dishevelled&mdash;for
+her niece had seized a handful of her hair in the
+final struggle not to be put down&mdash;Fay said almost
+complacently, "You see, the dear little soul
+took a fancy to you at once. Tony is much more
+reserved and not nearly so friendly. He's very
+Scotch, is Tony."</p>
+
+<p>"He does what he's told, anyway."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, not always," Fay said reassuringly, "only<!-- Page 30 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>
+when he doesn't mind doing it. They've both got
+very strong wills."</p>
+
+<p>"So have I," said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>Fay sighed. "It was time you came to keep
+them in order. I can't."</p>
+
+<p>This was evident, for Fay had not attempted
+to interfere with her daughter beyond saying, "I
+expect she's hungry, that's why she's so fretty,
+poor dear."</p>
+
+<p>That afternoon Peter went to the flat and was
+shown as usual into the sitting-room.</p>
+
+<p>Jan and the children were in the verandah, all
+with their backs to the room, and did not notice
+his entrance as Jan was singing nursery-rhymes.
+Fay sat on her knee, cuddled close as though
+there were no such thing as tempers in the world.
+Tony sat on a little chair at her side, not very
+near, but still near enough to manifest a more
+friendly spirit than in the morning. Peter waited
+in the background while the song went on.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">I saw a ship a-sailing, a-sailing on the sea,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And it was full of pretty things for Tony, Fay and me.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">There was sugar in the cabin and kisses in the hold&mdash;&mdash;<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"Whose kisses?" Tony asked suspiciously.</p>
+
+<p>"Mummy's kisses, of course," said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>"Why doesn't it <em>say</em> so, then?" Tony demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"Mummy's kisses in the hold," Jan sang obediently&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">The sails were made of silk and the masts were made of gold.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Gold, gold, the masts were made of gold.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 31 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>
+"What nelse?" Fay asked before Jan could
+start the second verse.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">There were four-and-twenty sailors a-skipping on the deck,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And they were little white mice with rings about their neck.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The captain was a duck, with a jacket on his back,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And when the ship began to sail, the captain cried, "Quack! Quack!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Quack! Quack!" The captain cried, "Quack! Quack!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"What nelse?" Fay asked again.</p>
+
+<p>"There isn't any nelse, that's all."</p>
+
+<p>"Adain," said Fay.</p>
+
+<p>"Praps," Tony said thoughtfully, "there was
+<em>some</em> auntie's kisses in that hold ... just a
+few...."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sure there were," said a new voice, and
+Peter appeared on the verandah.</p>
+
+<p>The children greeted him with effusion, and
+when he sat down Tony sat on his knee. He was
+never assailed by fears lest Peter should want to
+kiss him. Peter was not that sort.</p>
+
+<p>"Sing nunner song," little Fay commanded.</p>
+
+<p>"Not now," Jan said; "we've got a visitor and
+must talk to him."</p>
+
+<p>"Sing nunner song," little Fay repeated firmly,
+just as though she had not heard.</p>
+
+<p>"Not now; some other time," Jan said with
+equal firmness.</p>
+
+<p>"Mack!" said the baby, and suited the action
+to the word by dealing her aunt a good hard
+smack on the arm.</p>
+
+<p>"You mustn't do that," said Jan; "it's not
+kind."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 32 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>
+"Mack, mack, mack," in <i lang="it">crescendo</i> with accompanying
+blows.</p>
+
+<p>Jan caught the little hand, while Peter and
+Tony, interested spectators, said nothing. She
+held it firmly. "Listen, little Fay," she said,
+very gently. "If you do that again I shall take
+you to Ayah in the nursery. Just once again,
+and you go."</p>
+
+<p>Jan loosed the little hand, and instantly it
+dealt her a resounding slap on the cheek.</p>
+
+<p>It is of no avail to kick and scream and wriggle
+in the arms of a strong, decided young aunt.
+For the second time that day, a vociferously
+struggling baby was borne back to the nursery.</p>
+
+<p>As the yells died away in the distance, Tony
+turned right round on Peter's knee and faced
+him: "She does what she says," he remarked in
+an awestruck whisper.</p>
+
+<p>"And a jolly good thing too," answered Peter.</p>
+
+<p>When Jan came back she brought her sister
+with her. Lalkhan brought tea, and Tony went
+with him quite meekly to the nursery. They
+heard him chattering to Lalkhan in Hindustani
+as they went along the passage.</p>
+
+<p>Fay looked a thought less haggard than in the
+morning. She had slept after tiffin; the fact that
+her sister was actually in the bungalow had a
+calming effect upon her. She was quite cheerful
+and full of plans for Jan's amusement; plans
+in which, of course, she proposed to take no part
+herself. Jan listened in considerable dismay
+to arrangements which appeared to her to make
+enormous inroads into Peter Ledgard's leisure<!-- Page 33 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
+hours. He and his motor seemed to be quite
+at Fay's disposal, and Jan found the situation
+both bewildering and embarrassing.</p>
+
+<p>"What a nuisance for him," she reflected, "to
+have a young woman thrust upon him in this
+fashion. It won't do to upset Fay, but I must
+tell him at the first opportunity that none of
+these projects hold good."</p>
+
+<p>Directly tea was over Fay almost hustled
+them out to go and buy a topee for Jan, and
+suggested that, having accomplished this, they
+should look in at the Yacht Club for an hour,
+"because it was band-night," and Jan would
+like the Yacht Club lawn, with the sea and the
+boats and all the cheerful people.</p>
+
+<p>As the car slid into the crowded traffic of the
+Esplanade Road, Peter pointed to a large building
+on the left, saying, "There's the Army and
+Navy Stores, quite close to you, you see. You
+can always get anything you want there. I'll
+give you my number ... not that it matters."</p>
+
+<p>"I've belonged for years to the one at home,"
+said Jan, "and I understand the same number
+will do."</p>
+
+<p>She felt she really could not be beholden to
+this strange young man for everything, even a
+Stores number; and that she had better make
+the situation clear at once that she had come to
+take care of Fay and not to be an additional
+anxiety to him. At that moment she felt almost
+jealous of Peter. Fay seemed to turn to him
+for everything.</p>
+
+<p>When they reached the shop where topees<!-- Page 34 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>
+were to be got, she heard a familiar, booming
+voice. Had she been alone she would certainly
+have turned and fled, deferring her purchase till Sir
+Langham Sykes had concluded his, but she could
+hardly explain her rather complicated reasons
+to Peter, who told the Eurasian assistant to bring
+topees for her inspection.</p>
+
+<p>Jan tried vainly to efface herself behind a
+tailor's dummy, but her back was reflected in
+the very mirror which also reproduced Sir Langham
+in the act of trying on a khaki-coloured
+topee. He saw her and at once hurried in her
+direction, exclaiming:</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, Miss Ross, run to earth! You slipped
+off this morning without bidding me good-bye,
+and I've been wonderin' all day where we should
+meet. Now let me advise you about your topee.
+<em>I'll</em> choose it for you, then you can't go wrong.
+Get a large one, mind, or the back of your nice
+little neck will be burnt the colour of the toast
+they gave us on the <i>Carnduff</i>&mdash;shockin' toast,
+wasn't it? No, not that shape, idiot ... unless
+you're goin' to ride, are you? If so, you must
+have one of each&mdash;a large one, I said&mdash;what the
+devil's the use of that? You must wear it <em>well</em>
+on your head, mind; you can't show much of
+that pretty grey hair that puzzled us all so&mdash;eh,
+w'at?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan had been white enough as she entered the
+shop, for she was beginning to feel quite amazingly
+tired; but now the face under the overshadowing
+topee was crimson and she was hopelessly
+confused and helpless in the overpowering<!-- Page 35 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>
+of Sir Langham, who, when he could
+for a moment detach his mind from Jan, looked
+with considerable curiosity at Peter.</p>
+
+<p>Peter stood there silent, aloof, detached; and
+he appeared quite cool. Jan felt the atmosphere
+to be almost insufferably close, and heaved a
+sigh of gratitude when he suddenly turned on
+an electric fan above her head.</p>
+
+<p>"I think this will do," she said, in a faint voice
+to the assistant, though the crinkly green lining
+round the crown seemed searing her very brain.</p>
+
+<p>Peter intervened, asking: "Is it comfortable?
+No ..." as she took it off. "I can see it isn't.
+It has marked your forehead already. Don't
+be in a hurry. They'll probably need to alter
+the lining. Some women have it taken out altogether.
+Pins keep it on all right."</p>
+
+<p>Thus encouraged, she tried on others, and all
+the time Sir Langham held forth at the top of
+his voice, interrupting his announcement that
+he was dining at Government House that very
+night to swear at the assistant when he brought
+topees that did not fit, and giving his opinion
+of her appearance with the utmost frankness,
+till Jan found one that seemed rather less uncomfortable
+than the rest. Then in desperation
+she introduced Sir Langham to Peter.</p>
+
+<p>"Your sister-in-law looks a bit tucked up," he
+remarked affably. "We'd better take her to
+the Yacht Club and give her a peg&mdash;she seems
+to feel the heat."</p>
+
+<p>Jan cast one despairing, imploring glance at
+Peter, who rose to the occasion nobly.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 36 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>
+"You're quite right," he said. "This place is
+infernally stuffy. Come on. They know where
+to send it. Good afternoon sir," and before she
+realised what had happened Peter seized her by
+the arm and swept her out of the shop and into
+the front seat of the car, stepped over her and
+himself took the steering-wheel.</p>
+
+<p>While Sir Langham's voice bayed forth a mixture
+of expostulation and assignation at the
+Yacht Club later on.</p>
+
+<p>"Now where shall we go?" asked Peter.</p>
+
+<p>"Not the Yacht Club," Jan besought him.
+"He's coming there; he said so. Isn't he dreadful?
+Did you mind very much being taken for
+my brother-in-law? He has no idea who he
+really is, or I wouldn't have let it pass ... but I
+felt I could never explain ... I'm so sorry...."</p>
+
+<p>Her face was white enough now.</p>
+
+<p>"It would have been absurd to explain, and
+it's I who should apologise for the free-and-easy
+way I carried you off, but it was clearly a case
+for strong measures, or he'd have insisted on
+coming with us. What an awful little man!
+Did you have him all the voyage? No wonder
+you look tired.... I hope he didn't sit at
+your table...."</p>
+
+<p>Once out of doors, the delicious breeze from
+the sea that springs up every evening in Bombay
+revived her. She forgot Sir Langham, for a
+few minutes she even forgot Fay and her anxieties
+in sheer pleasure in the prospect, as the car fell
+into its place in the crowded traffic of the Queen's
+Road.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 37 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>
+Jan never forgot that drive. He ran her out
+to Chowpatty, where the road lies along the
+shore and the carriages of Mohammedan, Hindu
+and Parsee gentlemen stand in serried rows while
+their picturesque occupants "eat the air" in
+passive and contented Eastern fashion; then
+up to Ridge Road on Malabar Hill, where he
+stopped that she might get out and walk to the
+edge of the wooded cliff and look down at the
+sea and the great city lying bathed in that clear
+golden light only to be found at sunset in the East.</p>
+
+<p>Peter enjoyed her evident appreciation of it
+all. She said very little, but she looked fresh
+and rested again, and he was conscious of a quite
+unusual pleasure in her mere presence as they
+stood together in the green garden, got and kept
+by such infinite pains and care, that borders the
+road running along the top of Malabar Hill.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly she turned. "We mustn't wait
+another minute," she said. "You, doubtless,
+want to go to the club. It has been very good
+of you to spend so much time with me. What
+makes it all so beautiful is that everywhere one
+sees the sea. I will tell Fay how much I have
+enjoyed it."</p>
+
+<p>Peter's eyes met hers and held them: "Try to
+think of me as a friend, Miss Ross. I can see you
+are thoroughly capable and independent; but,
+believe me, India is not like England, and a
+white woman needs a good many things done
+for her here if she's to be at all comfortable. I
+don't want to butt in and be a nuisance; but
+just remember I'm there when the bell rings&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 38 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>
+"I am not likely to forget," said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>Lights began to twinkle in the city below.
+The soft monotonous throb of tom-toms came
+beating through the ambient air like a pulse of
+teeming life; and when he left her at her sister's
+door the purple darkness of an Eastern night
+had curtained off the sea.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 39 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER IV<br />
+<span class="sub">THE BEGINNING OF THE JOB</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">F</span>AY was still lying on her long chair in the
+verandah when Jan got in. She had turned
+on the electric light above her head and had,
+seemingly, been working at some diminutive
+garment of nainsook and lace. She looked up
+at Jan's step, asking eagerly, "Well, did you
+like it? Did you see many people? Was the
+band good?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan sat down beside her and explained that
+Peter had taken her for a drive instead. She
+made her laugh over her encounter with Sir
+Langham, and was enthusiastic about the view
+from Malabar Hill. Then Fay sent her to say
+good night to the children, who were just getting
+ready for bed.</p>
+
+<p>As she went down the long passage towards
+the nursery, she heard small voices chattering in
+Hindustani, and as she opened the door little
+Fay was in the act of stepping out of all her
+clothes.</p>
+
+<p>Tony was already clad in pink pyjamas, which
+made him look paler than ever.</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay, naked as any shameless cherub on
+a Renaissance festoon, danced across the tiled
+floor, and, pausing directly in front of her aunt,
+announced:</p>
+
+<p>"I sall mack Ayah as muts as I like."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 40 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>
+The good-natured Goanese ayah salaamed and,
+beaming upon her charge, murmured entire acquiescence.</p>
+
+<p>Jan looked down at the absurd round atom
+who defied her, and, trying hard not to laugh,
+said:</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no, you won't."</p>
+
+<p>"I sall!" the baby declared even more emphatically,
+and, lifting up her adorable, obstinate
+little face to look at Jan, nodded her curly head
+vigorously.</p>
+
+<p>"I think not," Jan remarked rather unsteadily,
+"because if you do, people won't like you. We
+can none of us go about smacking innocent folks
+just for the fun of it. Everybody would be
+shocked and horrified."</p>
+
+<p>"Socked and hollified," echoed little Fay,
+delighted with the new words, "socked and
+hollified!... What nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>"What usually follows is that the disagreeable
+little girl gets smacked herself."</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Fay, but a thought doubtfully.
+"No," more firmly. Then with a smile that was
+subtly compounded of pathos and confidence,
+"Nobody would mack plitty little Fay ... 'cept
+... plapse ... Auntie Dzan."</p>
+
+<p>The stern aunt in question snatched up her
+niece to cover her with kisses. Ayah escaped
+chastisement that evening, for, arrayed in a
+white nighty, "plitty little Fay" sat good as
+gold on Jan's knee, absorbed in the interest of
+"This little pig went to market," told on her
+own toes. Even Tony, the aloof and unfriendly,<!-- Page 41 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>
+consented to unbend to the extent of being interested
+in the dialogue of "John Smith and
+Minnie Bowl, can you shoe a little foal?" and
+actually thrust out his own bare feet that Jan
+might make them take part in the drama of the
+"twa wee doggies who went to the market," and
+came back "louper-scamper, louper-scamper."</p>
+
+<p>At the end of every song or legend came the
+inevitable "What nelse?" from little Fay&mdash;and
+Jan only escaped after the most solemn promises
+had been exacted for a triple bill on the morrow.</p>
+
+<p>When she had changed and went back to the
+sitting-room, dinner was ready. Lalkhan again
+bent over her with fatherly solicitude as he
+offered each course, and this time Jan, being
+really hungry, rather enjoyed his ministrations.
+A boy assisted at the sideboard, and another
+minion appeared to bring the dishes from the
+kitchen, for the butler and the boy never left the
+room for an instant.</p>
+
+<p>Fay looked like a tired ghost, and Jan could
+see that it was a great effort to her to talk cheerfully
+and seem interested in the home news.</p>
+
+<p>After dinner they went back to the sitting-room.
+Lalkhan brought coffee and Fay lit a
+cigarette. Jan wandered round, looking at the
+photographs and engravings on the walls.</p>
+
+<p>"How is it," she asked, "that Mr. Ledgard
+seems to come in so many of these groups? Did
+you rent the flat from a friend of his?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't 'rent' the flat from anybody," Fay
+answered. "It's Peter's own flat. He lent it
+to us."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 42 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>
+Jan turned and stared at her sister. "Mr.
+Ledgard's flat!" she repeated. "And what is
+he doing?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's living at the club just now. He turned
+out when we came. Don't look at me like that,
+Jan.... There was nothing else to be done."</p>
+
+<p>Jan came back and sat on the edge of the
+big sofa. "But I understood Hugo's letter to
+say...."</p>
+
+<p>"Whatever Hugo said in his letter was probably
+lies. If Peter hadn't lent us his flat, I
+should have had nowhere to lay my head. Who
+do you suppose would let us a flat here, after all
+that has happened, unless we paid in advance,
+and how could we do that without any ready
+money? Why, a flat like this unfurnished costs
+over three hundred rupees a month. I don't
+know what a furnished flat would be."</p>
+
+<p>"But&mdash;isn't it ... taking a great deal from
+Mr. Ledgard?" Jan asked timidly.</p>
+
+<p>Fay stretched out her hand and suddenly
+switched off the lights, so that they were left together
+on the big sofa in the soft darkness.</p>
+
+<p>"Give me your hand, Jan. I shall be less
+afraid of you when I just feel you and can't see
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"Why should you be afraid of me?... Dear,
+dear Fay, you must remember how little I really
+know. How can I understand?"</p>
+
+<p>Fay leant against her sister and held her close.
+"Sometimes I feel as if I couldn't understand it
+all myself. But you mustn't worry about Peter's
+flat. We'll all go home the minute I can be<!-- Page 43 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>
+moved. He doesn't mind, really ... and there
+was nothing else to be done."</p>
+
+<p>"Does Hugo know you are here?"</p>
+
+<p>Fay laughed, a sad, bitter little laugh. "It
+was Hugo who asked Peter to lend his flat."</p>
+
+<p>"Then what about his servants? What has he
+done with them while you are here?"</p>
+
+<p>"These are his servants."</p>
+
+<p>"But Hugo said...."</p>
+
+<p>"Jan, dear, it is no use quoting Hugo to me.
+I can tell you the sort of thing he would say....
+Did he mention Peter at all?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly not. He said you were 'installed in
+a most comfortable flat' and had brought your
+own servants."</p>
+
+<p>"I brought Ayah&mdash;naturally, Peter hadn't an
+ayah. But why do you object to his servants?
+They're very good."</p>
+
+<p>"But don't they think it ... a little odd?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you can't bother about what servants
+think in India. They think us all mad anyway."</p>
+
+<p>There was silence for a few minutes while Jan
+realised the fact that, dislike it as she might, she
+seemed fated to be laid under considerable obligation
+to Mr. Peter Ledgard.</p>
+
+<p>"Where is Hugo?" she asked at last.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear, you appear to have heard from
+Hugo since I have. As to his whereabouts I
+haven't the remotest idea."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mean to say, Fay, that he hasn't let
+you know where he is?"</p>
+
+<p>"He didn't come with us to the flat because he
+was afraid he'd be seized for debts and things.<!-- Page 44 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>
+We've only been here a fortnight. He's probably
+on board ship somewhere&mdash;there hasn't been
+much time for him to let me know...."</p>
+
+<p>Fay spoke plaintively, as though Jan were
+rather hard on Hugo in expecting him to give his
+wife any account of his movements.</p>
+
+<p>Jan was glad it was dark. She felt bewildered
+and oppressed and very, very angry with her
+brother-in-law, who seemed to have left his
+entire household in the care of Peter Ledgard.
+Was Peter paying for their very food, she wondered?
+She'd put a stop to that, anyhow.</p>
+
+<p>"Jan"&mdash;she felt Fay lean a little closer&mdash;"don't
+be down on me. You've no idea how hard it has
+all been. You're such a daylight person yourself."</p>
+
+<p>"Hard on you, my precious! I could never
+feel the least little bit hard. Only it's all so
+puzzling. And what do you mean by a 'daylight
+person'?"</p>
+
+<p>"You know, Jan, for three months now I've
+been a lot alone, and I've done a deal of thinking&mdash;more
+than ever in all my life before; and it
+seems to me that the world is divided into three
+kinds of people&mdash;the daylight people, and the
+twilight people and the night people."</p>
+
+<p>Fay paused. Jan stroked her hot, thin hand,
+but did not speak, and the tired, whispering voice
+went on: "<em>We</em> were daylight people&mdash;Daddie was
+very daylight. There were never any mysteries;
+we all of us knew always where each of us was,
+and there were no secrets and no queer people
+coming for interviews, and it wouldn't have mat<!-- Page 45 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>tered
+very much if anyone <em>had</em> opened one of our
+letters. Oh, it's such an <em>easy</em> life in the daylight
+country...."</p>
+
+<p>"And in the twilight country?" asked Jan.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah, there it's very different. Everything is
+mysterious. You never know where anyone has
+gone, and if he's away queer people&mdash;quite horrid
+people&mdash;come and ask for him and won't go
+away, and sit in the verandah and cheek the
+butler and the boy and insist on seeing the 'memsahib,'
+and when she screws up her courage and
+goes to them, they ask for money, and show dirty
+bits of paper and threaten, and it's all awful&mdash;till
+somebody like Peter comes and kicks them
+out, and then they simply fly."</p>
+
+<p>In spite of her irritation at being beholden to
+him, Jan began to feel grateful to Peter.</p>
+
+<p>"Sometimes," Fay continued, "I think it would
+be easier to be a night person. They've no appearances
+to keep up. You see, what makes it so
+difficult for the twilight people is that they <em>want</em>
+to live in the daylight, and it's too strong for
+them. All the night people whom they know&mdash;and
+if you're twilight you know lots of 'em&mdash;come
+and drag them back. <em>They</em> don't care.
+They rather like to go right in among the daylight
+folk and scare and shock them, and make
+them uncomfortable. You <em>can't</em> suffer in the
+same way when you've gone under altogether."</p>
+
+<p>"But, Fay dear," Jan interposed, "you talk
+as though the twilight people couldn't help
+it...."</p>
+
+<p>"They can't&mdash;they truly can't."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 46 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>
+"But surely there's right and wrong, straightness
+and crookedness, and no one <em>need</em> be crooked."</p>
+
+<p>"People like you needn't&mdash;but everybody isn't
+strong like that. Hugo says every man has his
+price, and every woman too&mdash;Peter says so, too."</p>
+
+<p>"Then Peter ought to be ashamed of himself.
+Do you suppose <em>he</em> has his price?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, not in that way. He'd think it silly to
+be pettifogging and dishonest about money, or
+to go in for mad speculations run by shady companies;
+but he wouldn't think it <em>extraordinary</em>
+like you."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm afraid my education has been neglected.
+A great many things seem extraordinary to me."</p>
+
+<p>"You think it funny I should be living in
+Peter's flat, waited on by Peter's servants&mdash;but
+what else could I do?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan smiled in the darkness. She saw where
+her niece had got "what nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't it just a little&mdash;unusual?" she asked
+gently. "Is there no money at all, Fay? What
+has become of all your own?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's not all gone," Fay said eagerly. "I think
+there's nearly two thousand pounds left, but
+Peter made me write home&mdash;that was at Dariawarpur,
+before he came down here&mdash;and say no
+more was to be sent out, not even if I wrote myself
+to ask for it&mdash;and <em>he</em> wrote to Mr. Davidson
+too&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I know somebody wrote. Mr. Davidson was
+very worried ... but what <em>can</em> Hugo have done
+with eight thousand pounds in two years? Besides
+his pay...."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 47 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>
+"Eight thousand pounds doesn't go far when
+you've dealings with money-lenders and mines in
+Peru&mdash;but <em>I</em> don't understand it&mdash;don't ask me.
+I believe he left me a little money&mdash;I don't know
+how much&mdash;at a bank in Elphinstone Circle&mdash;but
+I haven't liked to write and find out, lest it
+should be very little ... or none...."</p>
+
+<p>"Mercy!" exclaimed Jan. "It surely would
+be better to know for certain."</p>
+
+<p>"When you've lived in the twilight country
+as long as I have you'll not want to know anything
+for certain. It's only when things are
+wrapped up in a merciful haze of obscurity that
+life is tolerable at all. Do you suppose I <em>wanted</em>
+to find out that my husband was a rascal? I
+shut my eyes to it as long as I could, and then
+Truth came with all her cruel tools and pried
+them open. Oh, Jan, it did hurt so!"</p>
+
+<p>If Fay had cried, if her voice had even broken
+or she had seemed deeply moved, it would have
+been more bearable. It was the poor thing's
+calm&mdash;almost indifference&mdash;that frightened Jan.
+For it proved that her perceptions were numbed.</p>
+
+<p>Fay had been tortured till she could feel nothing
+acutely any more. Jan had the feeling that
+in some dreadful, inscrutable way her sister was
+shut away from her in some prison-house of the
+mind.</p>
+
+<p>And who shall break through those strange, intangible,
+impenetrable walls of unshared experience?</p>
+
+<p>Jan swallowed her tears and said cheerfully:
+"Well, it's all going to be different now. You<!-- Page 48 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>
+needn't worry about anything any more. If
+Hugo has left no money we'll manage without.
+Mr. Davidson will let me have what I want ...
+but we must be careful, because of the children."</p>
+
+<p>"And you'll try not to mind living in Peter's
+flat?" Fay said, rubbing her head against Jan's
+shoulder. "It's India, you know, and men are
+very kind out here&mdash;much friendlier than they
+are at home."</p>
+
+<p>"So it seems."</p>
+
+<p>"You needn't think there's anything wrong,
+Jan. Peter isn't in love with me now."</p>
+
+<p>"Was he ever in love with you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, a bit, once; when he first came to
+Dariawarpur ... lots of them were then. I
+really was very pretty, and I had quite a little
+court ... but when the bad times came and
+people began to look shy at Hugo&mdash;everybody
+was nice to me always&mdash;then Peter seemed different.
+There was no more philandering, he was
+just ... Oh, Jan, he was just such a daylight
+person, and might have been Daddie. I should
+have died without him."</p>
+
+<p>"Fay, tell me&mdash;I'll never ask again&mdash;was Hugo
+unkind to you?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, Jan, truly not unkind. He shut me
+away from the greater part of his life ... and
+there were other people ... not ladies"&mdash;Fay
+felt the shoulder she leant against stiffen&mdash;"but
+I didn't know that for quite a long time ...
+and he wasn't ever surly or cross or grudging.
+He always wanted me to have everything very
+nice, and I really believe he always hoped the<!-- Page 49 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>
+mines and things would make lots of money....
+You know, Jan, I'd <em>rather</em> believe in people. I
+daresay you think I'm weak and stupid ...
+but I can never understand wives who set detectives
+on their husbands."</p>
+
+<p>"It isn't done by the best people," Jan said
+with a laugh that was half a sob. "Let's hope
+it isn't often necessary...."</p>
+
+<p>Fay drew a little closer: "Oh, you are dear not
+to be stern and scolding...."</p>
+
+<p>"It's not you I feel like scolding."</p>
+
+<p>"If you scolded him, he'd agree with every
+word, so that you simply couldn't go on ...
+and then he'd go away and do just the same
+things over again, and fondly hope you'd never
+hear of it. But he <em>was</em> kind in lots of ways.
+He didn't drink&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see anything so very creditable in
+that," Jan interrupted.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it's one of the things he didn't do&mdash;and
+we had the nicest bungalow in the station and
+by far the best motor&mdash;a much smarter motor
+than the Resident. And it was only when I discovered
+that Hugo had made out I was an heiress
+that I began to feel uncomfortable."</p>
+
+<p>"Was he good to the children?"</p>
+
+<p>"He hardly saw them. Children don't interest
+him much. He liked little Fay because she's so
+pretty, but I don't think he cared a great deal for
+Tony. Tony is queer and judging. Don't take
+a dislike to Tony, Jan; he needs a long time, but
+once you've got him he stays for ever&mdash;will you
+remember that?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 50 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>
+Again, Jan felt that cold hand laid on her heart,
+the hand of chill foreboding. She had noticed
+many times already that when Fay was off her
+guard she always talked as though, for her, everything
+were ended, and she was only waiting for
+something. There seemed no permanence in her
+relations with them all.</p>
+
+<p>A shadowy white figure lifted the curtain between
+the two rooms and stood salaaming.</p>
+
+<p>Jan started violently. She was not yet accustomed
+to the soundless naked feet of the servants
+whose presence might be betrayed by a rustle,
+never by a step.</p>
+
+<p>It was Ayah waiting to know if Fay would
+like to go to bed.</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I go, Jan? Are you tired?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan was, desperately tired, for she had had no
+sleep the night before, but Fay's voice had in it
+a little tremor of fear that showed she dreaded
+the night.</p>
+
+<p>"Send her to bed, poor thing. I'll look after
+you, brush your hair and tuck you up and
+all.... Fay, oughtn't you to have somebody
+in your room? Couldn't my cot be put in there,
+just to sleep?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Jan, would you? Don't you mind?"</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I help her to move it?" Jan said, getting
+up.</p>
+
+<p>Fay pulled her down again. "You funny Jan,
+you can't do that sort of thing here. The servants
+will do it."</p>
+
+<p>She sat up, gave a rapid, eager order to Ayah,
+and in a few minutes Jan heard her bed being<!-- Page 51 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>
+wheeled down the passage. Every room had
+wide double doors&mdash;like French rooms&mdash;and there
+was no difficulty.</p>
+
+<p>Fay sank down again among her cushions with
+a great sigh of relief: "I don't mind now how soon
+I go to bed. I shan't be frightened in the long
+dark night any more. Oh, Jan, you <em>are</em> a dear
+daylight person!"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 52 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER V<br />
+<span class="sub">THE CHILDREN</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">J</span>AN made headway with Tony and little Fay.
+An aunt who carried one pick-a-back; who
+trotted, galloped, or curvetted to command as
+an animated steed; who provided spades and
+buckets, and herself, getting up very early, took
+them and the children to an adorable sandy
+beach, deserted save for two or three solitary
+horsemen; an aunt who dug holes and built castles
+and was indirectly the means of thrilling rides
+upon a real horse, when Peter was encountered
+as one of the mounted few taking exercise before
+breakfast; such an aunt could not be regarded
+otherwise than as an acquisition, even though
+she did at times exert authority and insist upon
+obedience.</p>
+
+<p>She got it, too; especially from little Fay, who,
+hitherto, had obeyed nobody. Tony, less wilful
+and not so prone to be destructive, was secretly
+still unwon, though outwardly quite friendly.
+He waited and watched and weighed Jan in the
+balance of his small judgment. Tony was never
+in any hurry to make up his mind.</p>
+
+<p>One great hold Jan had was a seemingly inexhaustible
+supply of rhymes, songs, and stories,
+and she was, moreover, of a telling disposition.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 53 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>
+Both children had a quite unusual passion for
+new words. Little Fay would stop short in the
+midst of the angriest yells if anyone called her
+conduct in question by some new term of opprobrium.
+Ayah's vocabulary was limited, even in
+the vernacular, and nothing would have induced
+her to return railing for railing to the children,
+however sorely they abused her. But Jan occasionally
+freed her mind, and at such times her
+speech was terse and incisive. Moreover, she
+quickly perceived her power over her niece in this
+respect, and traded on the baby's quick ear and
+interest.</p>
+
+<p>One day there was a tremendous uproar in the
+nursery just after tiffin, when poor Fay usually
+tried to get the sleep that would partially atone
+for her restless night. Jan swept down the passage
+and into the room, to find her niece netted
+in her cot, and bouncing up and down like a
+newly-landed trout, while Ayah wrestled with a
+struggling Tony, who tried to drown his sister's
+screams with angry cries of "Let me get at her
+to box her," and, failing that, vigorously boxing
+Ayah.</p>
+
+<p>Jan closed the door behind her and stood where
+she was, saying in the quiet, compelling voice
+they had both already learned to respect: "It's
+time for Mummy's sleep, and how can Mummy
+sleep in such a pandemonium?"</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay paused in the very middle of a yell
+and her face twinkled through the restraining net.</p>
+
+<p>"Pandemolium," she echoed, joyously rolling
+it over on her tongue with obvious gusto.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 54 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>
+"Pandemolium."</p>
+
+<p>"She kickened and fit with me," Tony cried
+angrily. "I <em>must</em> box her."</p>
+
+<p>"Pandemolium?" little Fay repeated inquiringly.
+"What nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said Jan, trying hard not to laugh;
+"that's exactly what it was ... disgraceful."</p>
+
+<p>"What nelse?" little Fay persisted. She had
+heard disgraceful before. It lacked novelty.</p>
+
+<p>"All sorts of horrid things," said Jan. "Selfish
+and odious and ill-bred&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"White bled, blown bled, ill-bled," the person
+under the net chanted. "What nother bled?"</p>
+
+<p>"There's well-bred," said Jan severely, "and
+that's what neither you nor Tony are at the
+present moment."</p>
+
+<p>"There's toas' too," said the voice from under
+the net, ignoring the personal application. "Sall
+we have some?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly not," Jan answered with great
+sternness. "People who riot and brawl&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't like zose words," the netted one interrupted
+distastefully (R's always stumped her),
+"naughty words."</p>
+
+<p>"Not so naughty as the people who do it.
+Has Ayah had her dinner? No? Then poor
+Ayah must go and have it, and I shall stay here
+and tell a very soft, whispery story to people
+who are quiet and good, who lie in their cots and
+don't quarrel&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Or blawl" came from the net in a small determined
+voice. She could not let the new word
+pass after all.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 55 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span></p><p>"Exactly ... or brawl," Jan repeated in
+tones nothing like so firm.</p>
+
+<p>"She kickened and fit me, she did," Tony
+mumbled moodily as he climbed into his cot:
+"Can't I box her nor nothing?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not now," Jan said, soothingly. Ayah
+salaamed and hurried away. She, at all events,
+had cause to bless Jan, for now she got her meals
+with fair regularity and in peace.</p>
+
+<p>In a few minutes the room was as quiet as an
+empty church, save for a low voice that related
+an interminable story about "Cockie-Lockie and
+Henny-Penny going to tell the King the lift's fallen,"
+till one, at all events, of the "blawlers" was
+sound asleep.</p>
+
+<p>The voice ceased and Tony's head appeared
+over the rail of his cot.</p>
+
+<p>"Hush!" Jan whispered. "Sister's asleep.
+Just wait a few minutes till Ayah comes, then
+I'll take you away with me."</p>
+
+<p>Faithful Ayah didn't dawdle over her food.
+She returned, sat down on the floor beside little
+Fay's cot and started her endless mending.</p>
+
+<p>Jan carried Tony away with her along the
+passage and into the drawing-room. The verandah
+was too hot in the early afternoon.</p>
+
+<p>"Now what shall we do?" she asked, with a
+sigh, as she sat down on the big sofa. "<em>I'd</em> like
+to sleep, but I suppose you won't let me."</p>
+
+<p>Tony got off her knee and looked at her
+gravely.</p>
+
+<p>"You can," he said, magnanimously, "because
+you brought me. I hate bed. I'll build a temple<!-- Page 56 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>
+with my bricks and I won't knock it down. Not
+loud."</p>
+
+<p>And like his aunt he did what he said.</p>
+
+<p>Jan put her feet up and lay very still. For a
+week now she had risen early every morning to
+take the children out in the freshest part of the
+day. She seldom got any rest in the afternoon,
+as she saw to it that they should be quiet to let
+Fay sleep, and she went late to bed because the
+cool nights in the verandah were the pleasant
+time for Fay.</p>
+
+<p>Tony murmured to himself, but he made little
+noise with his stone bricks. And presently Jan
+was sleeping almost as soundly as her obstreperous
+niece.</p>
+
+<p>Tony did not repeat new words aloud as did
+his sister. He turned them over in his mind
+and treasured some simply because he liked the
+sound of them.</p>
+
+<p>There were two that he had carried in his
+memory for nearly half his life; two that had
+for him a mysterious fascination, a vaguely agreeable
+significance that he couldn't at all explain.
+One was "Piccadilly" and the other "Coln St.
+Aldwyn's." He didn't even know that they
+were the names of places at first, but he thought
+they had a most beautiful sound. Gradually
+the fact that they were places filtered into his
+mind, and for Tony Piccadilly seemed particularly
+rural. He connected it in some way with
+the duck-slaying Mrs. Bond of the Baby's Opera,
+a book he and Mummy used to sing from before
+she grew too tired and sad to sing. Before she<!-- Page 57 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>
+lay so many hours in her long chair, before the
+big man he called Daddie became so furtive and
+disturbing. Then Mummy used to tell him
+things about a place called Home, and though
+she never actually mentioned Piccadilly he had
+heard the word very often in a song that somebody
+sang in the drawing-room at Dariawarpur.</p>
+
+<p>Theatricals had been towards and Mummy
+was acting, and people came to practise their
+songs with her, for not only did she sing herself
+delightfully, but she played accompaniments
+well for other people. The play was a singing
+play, and the Assistant Superintendent of Police,
+a small, fair young man with next to no voice
+and a very clear enunciation, continually practised
+a song that described someone as walking
+"down Piccadilly with a tulip or a lily in his
+mediæval hand."</p>
+
+<p>Tony rather liked "mediæval" too, but not
+so much as Piccadilly. A flowery way, he was
+sure, with real grass in it like the Resident's
+garden. Besides, the "dilly" suggested "daffy-down
+dilly come up to town in a yellow petticoat
+and a green gown."</p>
+
+<p>But not even Piccadilly could compete with
+Coln St. Aldwyn's in Tony's affections. There
+was something about that suggestive of exquisite
+peace and loveliness, no mosquitoes and many
+friendly beasts. He had only heard the word
+once by chance in connection with the mysterious
+place called Home, in some casual conversation
+when no one thought he was listening.
+He seized upon it instantly and it became a<!-- Page 58 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>
+priceless possession, comforting in times of stress,
+soothing at all times, a sort of refuge from a
+real world that had lately been very puzzling
+for a little boy.</p>
+
+<p>He was certain that at Coln St. Aldwyn's
+there was a mighty forest peopled by all the
+nicest animals. Dogs that were ever ready to
+extend a welcoming paw, elephants and mild
+clumsy buffaloes that gave good milk to the
+thirsty. Little grey squirrels frolicked in the
+branches of the trees, and the tiny birds Mummy
+told him about that lived in the yew hedge at
+Wren's End. Tony had himself been to Wren's
+End he was told, but he was only one at the
+time, and beyond a feeling that he liked the
+name and that it was a very green place his ideas
+about it were hazy.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes he wished it had been called "Wren
+St. Endwyn's," but after mature reflection he
+decided it was but a poor imitation of the real
+thing, so he kept the two names separate in his
+mind.</p>
+
+<p>He had added two more names to his collection
+since he came to Bombay. "Mahaluxmi,"
+the road running beside the sea, where Peter
+sometimes took them and Auntie Jan for a drive
+after tea when it was high tide; and "Taraporevala,"
+who owned a famous book-shop in
+Medow Street where he had once been in a tikka-gharri
+with Auntie Jan to get some books for
+Mummy. Peter had recommended the shop,
+and the name instantly seized upon Tony's
+imagination and will remain with it evermore.<!-- Page 59 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>
+He never for one moment connected it with the
+urbane gentleman in eyeglasses and a funny
+little round hat who owned the shop. For Tony
+"Taraporevala" will always suggest endless vistas
+of halls, fitted with books, shelves, and tall stacks
+of books, and counters laden with piles of books.
+It seemed amazing to find anything so vast in
+such a narrow street. There was something
+magic about it, like the name. Tony was sure
+that some day when he should explore the forest
+of Coln St. Aldwyn he would come upon a little
+solid door in a great rock. A little solid door
+studded with heavy nails and leading to a magic
+cave full of unimaginable treasure. This door
+should only open to the incantation of "Taraporevala."
+None of your "abracadabras" for
+him.</p>
+
+<p>And just as Mummy had talked much of
+"Wren's End" in happier days, so now Auntie
+Jan told them endless stories about it and what
+they would all do there when they went home.
+Some day, when he knew her better, he would
+ask her about Coln St. Aldwyn's. He felt he
+didn't know her intimately enough to do so yet,
+but he was gradually beginning to have some
+faith in her. She was a well-instructed person,
+too, on the whole, and she answered a straight
+question in a straight way.</p>
+
+<p>It was one of the things Tony could never
+condone in the big man called Daddie, that he
+could never answer the simplest question. He
+always asked another in return, and there was
+derision of some sort concealed in this circuitous<!-- Page 60 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>
+answer. Doubtless he meant to be pleasant and
+amusing&mdash;Tony was just enough to admit that&mdash;but
+he was, so Tony felt, profoundly mistaken
+in the means he sought. He took liberties, too;
+punching liberties that knocked the breath out
+of a small boy's body without actually hurting
+much; and he never, never talked sense. Tony
+resented this. Like the Preacher, he felt there
+was a time to jest and a time to refrain from
+jesting, and it didn't amuse him a bit to be
+punched and rumpled and told he was a surly
+little devil if he attempted to punch back. In
+some vague way Tony felt that it wasn't playing
+the game&mdash;if it was a game. Often, too, for
+the past year and more, he connected the frequent
+disappearances of the big man with trouble
+for Mummy. Tony understood Hindustani as
+well as and better than English. His extensive
+vocabulary in the former would have astonished
+his mother's friends had they been able to translate,
+and he understood a good deal of the servants'
+talk. He felt no real affection for the big,
+tiresome man, though he admired him, his size,
+his good looks, and a way he had with grown-up
+people; but he decided quite dispassionately, on
+evidence and without any rancour, that the big
+man was a "budmash," for he, unlike Auntie
+Jan, never did anything he said he'd do. And
+when, before they left Dariawarpur, the big man
+entirely disappeared, Tony felt no sorrow, only
+some surprise that having said he was going he
+actually had gone. Auntie Jan never mentioned
+him, Mummy had reminded them both always to<!-- Page 61 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>
+include him when they said their prayers, but
+latterly Mummy had been too tired to come to
+hear prayers. Auntie Jan came instead, and
+Tony, watching her face out of half-shut eyes,
+tried leaving out "bless Daddie" to see if anything
+happened. Sure enough something did;
+Auntie Jan looked startled. "Say 'Bless Daddie,'
+Tony, 'and please help him.'"</p>
+
+<p>"To do what?" Tony asked. "Not to come
+back here?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think he'll come back here just now,"
+Auntie Jan said in a frightened sort of whisper,
+"but he needs help badly."</p>
+
+<p>Tony folded his hands devoutly and said,
+"Bless Daddie and please help him&mdash;to stay
+away just now."</p>
+
+<p>And low down under her breath Jan said,
+"Amen."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 62 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER VI<br />
+<span class="sub">THE SHADOW BEFORE</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">J</span>AN had been a week in Bombay, and her grave
+anxiety about Fay was in no way lessened.
+Rather did it increase and intensify, for not only
+did her bodily strength seem to ebb from her
+almost visibly day by day, but her mind seemed
+so detached and aloof from both present and
+future.</p>
+
+<p>It was only when Jan talked about the past,
+about their happy girlhood and their lovable
+comrade-father, that Fay seemed to take hold
+and understand. All that had happened before
+his death seemed real and vital to her. But when
+Jan tried to interest her in plans for the future,
+the voyage home, the children, the baby that
+was due so soon, Fay looked at her with tired,
+lack-lustre eyes and seemed at once to become
+absent-minded and irrelevant.</p>
+
+<p>She was ready enough to discuss the characters
+of the children, to impress upon Jan the fact that
+Tony was not unloving, only cautious and slow
+before he really gave his affection. That little
+Fay was exactly what she appeared on the surface&mdash;affectionate,
+quick, wilful, and already conscious
+of her own power through her charm.</p>
+
+<p>"I defy anybody to quarrel with Fay when
+she is willing to make it up," her mother said.
+"Tony melts like wax before the warmth of her<!-- Page 63 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>
+advances. She may have behaved atrociously to
+him five minutes before&mdash;Ayah lets her, and I
+am far too weak with her&mdash;but if <em>she</em> wants to
+be friends Tony forgets and condones everything.
+Was I very naughty to you, Jan, as a baby?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not that I can remember. I think you were
+very biddable and good."</p>
+
+<p>"And you?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan laughed&mdash;"There you have me. I believe
+I was most naughty and obstreperous, and have
+vivid recollections of being sent to bed for various
+offences. You see, Mother was far too strong
+and wise to spoil me as little Fay is spoilt.
+Father tried his best, but you remember Hannah?
+Could you imagine Hannah submitting for one
+moment to the sort of treatment that baby metes
+out to poor, patient Ayah every single day?"</p>
+
+<p>"By the way, how is Hannah?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hannah is in her hardy usual. She is going
+strong, and has developed all sorts of latent talent
+as a cook. She was with me in the furnished
+flat I rented till the day I left (I only took it by
+the month), and she'll be with us again when we
+all get back to Wren's End."</p>
+
+<p>"But I thought Wren's End was let?"</p>
+
+<p>"Only till March quarter-day, and I've cabled
+to the agent not to entertain any other offer, as
+we want it ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>"I like to think of the children at Wren's
+End," Fay said dreamily.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you like to think of yourself there, too?
+Would you like any other place better?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan's voice sounded constrained and a little<!-- Page 64 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>
+hard. People sometimes speak crossly when
+they are frightened, and just then Jan felt the
+cold, skinny hands of some unnameable terror
+clutching her heart. Why did Fay always exclude
+herself from all plans?</p>
+
+<p>They were, as usual, sitting in the verandah
+after dinner, and Fay's eyes were fixed on the
+deeply blue expanse of sky. She hardly seemed
+to hear Jan, for she continued: "Do you remember
+the sketch Daddie did of me against the yew
+hedge? I'd like Tony to have that some day if
+you'd let him."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course that picture is yours," Jan said,
+hastily. "We never divided the pictures when
+he died. Some were sold and we shared the
+money, but our pictures are at Wren's End."</p>
+
+<p>"I remember that money," Fay interrupted.
+"Hugo was so pleased about it, and gave me a
+diamond chain."</p>
+
+<p>"Fay, where do you keep your jewellery?"</p>
+
+<p>"There isn't any to keep now. He 'realised'
+it all long before we left Dariawarpur."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you mean, Fay? Has Hugo pawned
+it? All Mother's things, too?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know what he did with it," Fay said,
+wearily. "He told me it wasn't safe in Dariawarpur,
+as there were so many robbers about
+that hot weather, and he took all the things in
+their cases to send to the bank. And I never
+saw them again."</p>
+
+<p>Jan said nothing, but she reflected rather ruefully
+that when Fay married she had let her have
+nearly all their mother's ornaments, partly be<!-- Page 65 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>cause
+Fay loved jewels as jewels, and Jan cared
+little for them except as associations. "If I'd
+kept more," Jan thought, "they'd have come in
+for little Fay. Now there's nothing except what
+Daddie gave me."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you sorry, Jan?" Fay asked, presently.
+"I suppose there again you think I ought to
+have stood out, to have made inquiries and insisted
+on getting a receipt from the bank. But
+I knew very well they were not going to the bank.
+I don't think they fetched much, but Hugo looked
+a little less harassed after he'd got them. I've
+nothing left now but my wedding ring and the
+little enamel chain like yours, that Daddie gave
+us the year he had that portrait of Meg in the
+Salon and took us over to see it. Where is Meg?
+Has she come back yet?"</p>
+
+<p>"Meg is still in Bremen with an odious German
+family, but she leaves at the end of the
+Christmas holidays, as the girl is going to school,
+and Meg will be utilised to bring her over. Then
+she's to have a rest for a month or two, and I
+daresay she'd come to Wren's End and help us
+with the babies when we get back."</p>
+
+<p>Fay leant forward and said eagerly, "Try to
+get her, Jan. I'd love to think she was there to
+help you."</p>
+
+<p>"To help us," Jan repeated firmly.</p>
+
+<p>Fay sighed. "I can never think of myself as
+of much use any more; besides ... Oh, Jan,
+won't you face it? You who are so brave about
+facing things ... I don't believe I shall come
+through&mdash;this time."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 66 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>
+Jan got up and walked restlessly about the
+verandah. She tried to make herself say, heard
+her own voice saying without any conviction, that
+it was nonsense; that Fay was run down and
+depressed and no wonder; and that she would
+feel quite different in a month or two. And all
+the time, though her voice said these preposterously
+banal things, her brain repeated the doctor's
+words after his last visit: "I wish there was
+a little more stamina, Miss Ross. I don't like
+this complete inertia. It's not natural. Can't
+you rouse her at all?"</p>
+
+<p>"My sister has had a very trying time, you
+know. She seems thoroughly worn out."</p>
+
+<p>"I know, I know," the doctor had said. "A
+bad business and cruelly hard on her; but I wish
+we could get her strength up a bit somehow. I
+don't like it&mdash;this lack of interest in everything&mdash;I
+don't like it." And the doctor's thin, clever
+face looked lined and worried as he left.</p>
+
+<p>His words rang in Jan's ears, drowning her own
+spoken words that seemed such a hollow sham.</p>
+
+<p>She went and knelt by Fay's long chair. Fay
+touched her cheek very gently (little Fay had the
+same adorable tender gestures). "It would make
+it easier for both of us if you'd face it, my dear,"
+she said. "I could talk much more sensibly then
+and make plans, and perhaps really be of some
+use. But I feel a wretched hypocrite to talk of
+sharing in things when I know perfectly well I
+shan't be there."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you want to be there?" Jan asked,
+hoarsely.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<a name="easier" id="easier"></a>
+<a href="images/easier-lg.jpg" class="noline">
+<img src="images/easier-thumb.jpg" width="400" height="255" alt="" title="" />
+<span class="caption u"><br />&quot;It would make it easier for both of us if you&#39;d face it, my dear.&quot;</span>
+</a>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 67 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>
+Fay shook her head. "I know it's mean to
+shuffle out of it all, but I <em>am</em> so tired. Do you
+think it very horrid of me, Jan?"</p>
+
+<p>In silence Jan held her close; and in that moment
+she faced it.</p>
+
+<p>The days went on, strange, quiet days of brilliant
+sunshine. Their daily life shrouded from
+the outside world even as the verandah was
+shrouded from the sun when Lalkhan let down
+the chicks every day after tiffin.</p>
+
+<p>Peter was their only visitor besides the doctor,
+and Peter came practically every day. He generally
+took Jan out after tea, sometimes with the
+children, sometimes alone. He even went with
+her to the bank in Elphinstone Circle, so like a
+bit of Edinburgh, with its solid stone houses, and
+found that Hugo actually had lodged fifty pounds
+there in Fay's name. The clerks looked curiously
+at Jan, for they thought she was Mrs. Tancred.
+Every one in business or official circles in Bombay
+knew about Hugo Tancred. His conduct had,
+for a while, even ousted the usual topics of conversation&mdash;money,
+food, and woman&mdash;from the
+bazaars; and an exhaustive discussion of it was
+only kept out of the Native Press by the combined
+efforts of the Police and his own Department.
+Jan gained from Peter a fairly clear idea
+of the <i lang="fr">débâcle</i> that had occurred in Hugo Tancred's
+life. She no longer wondered that Fay refused
+to leave the bungalow. She began to feel
+branded herself.</p>
+
+<p>For Jan, Peter's visits had come to have something
+of the relief the loosening of a too-tight<!-- Page 68 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>
+bandage gives to a wounded man. He generally
+came at tea-time when Fay was at her best, and
+he brought her news of her little world at Dariawarpur.
+To her sister he seemed the one link
+with reality. Without him the heavy dream
+would have gone on unbroken. Fay was always
+most eager he should take Jan out, and, though
+at first Jan had been unwilling, she gradually
+came to look upon such times as a blessed break
+in the monotonous restraint of her day. With
+him she was natural, said what she felt, expressed
+her fears, and never failed to return comforted
+and more hopeful.</p>
+
+<p>One night he took her to the Yacht Club, and
+Jan was glad she had gone, because it gave her
+so much to tell Fay when she got back.</p>
+
+<p>It was a very odd experience for Jan, this tea
+on the crowded lawn of the Yacht Club. She
+turned hot when people looked at her, and Jan
+had always felt so sure of herself before, so proud
+to be a daughter of brilliant, lovable Anthony
+Ross.</p>
+
+<p>Here, she knew that her sole claim to notice
+was that she had the misfortune to be Hugo
+Tancred's sister-in-law. Fay, too, had once been
+joyfully proud and confident&mdash;and now!</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes in the long, still days Jan wondered
+whether their father had brought them up to
+expect too much from life, to take their happiness
+too absolutely as a matter of course. Anthony
+Ross had fully subscribed to the R.L.S. doctrine
+that happiness is a duty. When they were both
+quite little girls he had loved to hear them repeat:</p>
+<p><!-- Page 69 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span></p>
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">If I have faltered more or less<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In my great task of happiness;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If I have moved among my race<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And shown no glorious morning face;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If beams from happy human eyes<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Have moved me not; if morning skies,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Books, and my food and summer rain<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Knocked on my sullen heart in vain;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lord, Thy most pointed pleasure take,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And stab my spirit broad awake.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Surely as young girls they had both shown a
+"glorious morning face." Who more so than
+poor Fay? So gay and beautiful and kind.
+Why had this come upon her, this cruel, numbing
+disgrace and sorrow? Jan was thoroughly rebellious.
+Again she went over that time in Scotland
+six years before, when, at a big shooting-box up
+in Sutherland, they met, among other guests,
+handsome Hugo Tancred, home on leave. How
+he had, almost at first sight, fallen violently in
+love with Fay. How he had singled her out for
+every deferent and delicate attention; how she,
+young, enthusiastic, happy and flattered, had
+fallen quite equally in love with him. Jan recalled
+her father's rather comical dismay and
+astonishment. His horror when they pressed an
+immediate marriage, so that Fay might go out
+with Hugo in November. And his final giving-in
+to everything Fay wanted because Fay wanted it.</p>
+
+<p>Did her father really like Hugo Tancred? she
+wondered. And then came the certainty that he
+wouldn't ever have liked anybody much who
+wanted to marry either of them; but he was far
+too just and too imaginative to stand in the way<!-- Page 70 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>
+where, what seemed, the happiness of his daughter
+was concerned.</p>
+
+<p>"What a gamble it all is," thought Jan, and
+felt inclined to thank heaven that she was neither
+so fascinating nor as susceptible as Fay.</p>
+
+<p>How were they to help to set Hugo Tancred on
+his legs again, and reconstruct something of a
+future for Fay? And then there always sounded,
+like a knell, Fay's tired, pathetic voice: "Don't
+bother to make plans for me, Jan. For the children,
+yes, as much as you like. You are so clever
+and constructive&mdash;but leave me out, dear, for it's
+just a waste of time."</p>
+
+<p>And the dreadful part of it was that Jan felt
+a growing conviction that Fay was right. And
+what was more, that Peter felt about it exactly
+as Fay did, in spite of his matter-of-fact optimism
+at all such times as Jan dared to express her dread.</p>
+
+<p>Peter learned a good deal about the Ross family
+in those talks with Jan. She was very frank
+about her affairs, told him what money she had
+and how it was invested. That the old house in
+Gloucestershire was hers, left directly to her and
+not to her father, by a curious freak on the part
+of his aunt, one Janet Ross, who disapproved of
+Anthony's habit of living up to whatever he
+made each year by his pictures, and saving nothing
+that he earned.</p>
+
+<p>"My little girls are safe, anyway," he always
+said. "Their mother's money is tied up on
+them, though they don't get it except with my
+sanction till my death. I can't touch the capital.
+Why, then, shouldn't we have an occasional flut<!-- Page 71 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>ter
+when I have a good year, while we are all
+young and can enjoy things?"</p>
+
+<p>They had a great many flutters&mdash;for Anthony's
+pictures sold well among a rather eclectic set.
+His portraits had a certain <i lang="fr">cachet</i> that gave them
+a vogue. They were delicate, distinguished, and
+unlike other work. The beauties without brains
+never succeeded in getting Anthony Ross to paint
+them, bribed they never so. But the clever
+beauties were well satisfied, and the clever who
+were not at all beautiful felt that Anthony Ross
+painted their souls, so they were satisfied, too.
+Besides, he made their sittings so delightful and
+flirted with them with such absolute discretion
+always. The year that Hugo Tancred met Fay
+was a particularly good year, and Anthony had
+bought a touring-car, and they all went up to
+Scotland in it. The girls were always well dressed
+and went out a good deal. Young as she was,
+Jan was already an excellent manager and a
+pleasant hostess. She had been taking care of
+her father from the time she was twelve years
+old, and knew exactly how to manage him.
+When there was plenty of money she let him
+launch out; when it was spent she made him
+draw in again, and he was always quite ready to
+do so. Money as money had no charms for
+Anthony Ross, but the pleasures it could provide,
+the kindnesses it enabled him to do, the
+easy travel and the gracious life were precious to
+him. He abhorred debt in any form and paid
+his way as he went; lavishly when he had it,
+justly and exactly always.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 72 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>
+On hearing all this Peter came to the conclusion
+that Hugo Tancred was not altogether to
+blame if he had expected a good deal more financial
+assistance from his father-in-law than he got.
+Anthony made no marriage settlement on Fay.
+He allowed her two hundred a year for her personal
+expenses and considered that Hugo Tancred
+should manage the running of his own house out
+of his quite comfortable salary. He had, of
+course, no smallest inkling of Hugo's debts or
+gambling propensities. And all might have gone
+well if only Anthony Ross had made a new will
+when Fay married; a will which tied up her
+mother's money and anything he might leave her,
+so that she couldn't touch the capital. But nothing
+of the kind was done.</p>
+
+<p>It never occurred to Jan to think of wills.</p>
+
+<p>Anthony Ross was strong and cheerful and so
+exceedingly young at fifty-two that it seemed
+absurd that he should have grown-up daughters,
+quite ludicrous that he should be a grandfather.</p>
+
+<p>Many charming ladies would greatly like to
+have occupied the position of stepmother to
+"those nice girls," but Anthony, universal lover
+as he was within strictly platonic limits, showed
+no desire to give his girls anything of the sort.
+Jan satisfied his craving for a gracious and well-ordered
+comfort in all his surroundings. Fay
+gratified his æsthetic appreciation of beauty and
+gentleness. What would he do with a third
+woman who might introduce discord into these
+harmonies?</p>
+
+<p>Fay came home for a short visit when Tony<!-- Page 73 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>
+was six months old, as Hugo had not got a very
+good station just then. She was prettier than
+ever, seemed perfectly happy, and both Anthony
+and Jan rejoiced in her.</p>
+
+<p>After she went out the Tancreds moved to
+Dariawarpur, which was considered one of the
+best stations in their province, and there little
+Fay was born, and it was arranged that Jan and
+her father were to visit India and Fay during the
+next cold weather.</p>
+
+<p>But early in the following November Anthony
+Ross got influenza, recovered, went out too soon,
+got a fresh chill, and in two days developed double
+pneumonia.</p>
+
+<p>His heart gave out, and before his many friends
+had realised he was at all seriously ill, he died.</p>
+
+<p>Jan, stunned, bewildered, and heart-broken, yet
+contrived to keep her head. She got rid of the
+big house in St. George's Square and most of the
+servants, finally keeping only Hannah, her old
+Scottish nurse. She paid everybody, rendered
+a full account of her stewardship to Fay and Hugo,
+and then prepared to go out to India as had been
+arranged. Her heart cried out for her only sister.</p>
+
+<p>To her surprise this proposition met with but
+scant enthusiasm. It seemed the Tancreds' plans
+were uncertain; perhaps it might be better for
+Fay and the children to come home in spring instead
+of Jan going out to them. Hugo's letters
+were ambiguous and rather cold; Fay's a curious
+mixture of abandonment and restraint; but the
+prevailing note of both was "would she please do
+nothing in a hurry, but wait."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 74 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>
+So, of course, Jan waited.</p>
+
+<p>She waited two years, growing more anxious
+and puzzled as time went on. Her lawyer protested
+unavailingly at Hugo's perpetual demands
+(of course, backed up by Fay) for more and more
+capital that he might "re-invest" it. Fay's letters
+grew shorter and balder and more constrained.
+At last, quite suddenly, came the imperative
+summons to go out at once to be with Fay when
+the new baby should arrive.</p>
+
+<p>And now after three weeks in Bombay Jan
+felt that she had never known any other life, that
+she never would know any other life than this curious
+dream-like existence, this silent, hopeless waiting
+for something as afflicting as it was inevitable.</p>
+
+<p>There had been a great fire in the cotton green
+towards Colaba. It had blazed all night, and,
+in spite of the efforts of the Bombay firemen and
+their engines, was still blazing at six o'clock the
+following evening.</p>
+
+<p>Peter took Jan in his car out to see it. There
+was an immense crowd, so they left the car on its
+outskirts and plunged into the throng on foot.
+On either side of the road were tall, flimsy houses
+with a wooden staircase outside; those curious
+tenements so characteristic of the poorer parts of
+Bombay, and in such marked contrast to the
+"Fort," the European quarter of the town. They
+were occupied chiefly by Eurasians and very poor
+Europeans. That the road was a sea of mud,
+varied by quite deep pools of water, seemed the
+only possible reason why such houses were not
+also burning.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 75 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>
+Jan splashed bravely through the mud, interested
+and excited by the people and the leaping
+flames so dangerously near. It was growing
+dusk; the air was full of the acrid smell of burnt
+cotton, and the red glow from the sky was reflected
+on the grave brown faces watching the fire.</p>
+
+<p>Any crowd in Bombay is always extremely
+varied, and Jan almost forgot her anxieties in her
+enjoyment of the picturesque scene.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think the people ought to be allowed
+to throng on the top of that staircase," Peter said
+suddenly. "They aren't built to hold a number
+at once; there'll be an accident," and he left her
+side for a moment to speak to an inspector of
+police.</p>
+
+<p>Jan looked up at a tall house on her left, where
+sightseers were collecting on the staircase to get a
+better view. Every window was crowded with
+gazers, all but one. From one, quite at the top,
+a solitary watcher looked out.</p>
+
+<p>There was a sudden shout from the crowd below,
+a redder glow as more piled cotton fell into
+the general furnace and blazed up, and in that
+moment Jan saw that the solitary watcher was
+Hugo Tancred, and that he recognised her. She
+gave a little gasp of horror, which Peter heard as
+he joined her again. "What is it?" he said.
+"What has frightened you?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan pointed upwards. "I've just seen Hugo,"
+she whispered. "There, in one of those windows&mdash;the
+empty one. Oh, what can he be doing in
+those dreadful houses, and why is he in Bombay
+all this time and never a word to Fay?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 76 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>
+Jan was trembling. Peter put his hand under
+her arm and walked on with her.</p>
+
+<p>"I knew he was in Bombay," he said, "but
+I didn't think the poor devil was reduced to
+this."</p>
+
+<p>"What is to be done?" Jan exclaimed. "If
+he comes and worries Fay for money now, it will
+kill her. She thinks he is safely out of India.
+What <em>is</em> to be done?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing," said Peter. "He'll go the very
+minute he can, and you may be sure he'll raise
+the wind somehow. He's got all sorts of queer
+irons in the fire. He daren't appear at the flat,
+or some of his creditors would cop him for debt&mdash;it's
+watched day and night, I know. Just let
+it alone. I'd no idea he was hiding in this region
+or I wouldn't have brought you. We all want
+him to get clear. He might file his petition, but
+it would only rake up all the old scandals, and
+they know pretty well there's nothing to be got
+out of him."</p>
+
+<p>"He looked so dreadful, so savage and miserable,"
+Jan said with a half-sob.</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;naturally," said Peter. "You'd feel
+savage and miserable if you were in his shoes."</p>
+
+<p>"But oughtn't I to help him? Send him
+money, I mean."</p>
+
+<p>"Not one single anna. It'll take you all your
+time to get his family home and keep them when
+you get there. Have you seen enough? Shall
+we go back?"</p>
+
+<p>"You don't think he'll molest Fay?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm certain of it."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 77 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>
+"Please take me home. I shall never feel it
+safe to leave Fay again for a minute."</p>
+
+<p>"That's nonsense, you know," said Peter.</p>
+
+<p>"It's what I feel," said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>It was that night Tony's extempore prayer was
+echoed so earnestly by his aunt.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 78 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER VII<br />
+<span class="sub">THE HUMAN TOUCH</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">T</span>HREE days later Jan got a note from Peter
+telling her that Hugo Tancred had left
+Bombay and was probably leaving India at once
+from one of the smaller ports.</p>
+
+<p>He had not attempted to communicate in person
+or by letter with either Jan or his wife.</p>
+
+<p>Early in the morning, just a week from the
+time Jan had seen Hugo Tancred at the window
+of that tall house near the cotton green, Fay's
+third child, a girl, was still-born; and Fay, herself,
+never recovered consciousness all day. A
+most competent nurse had been in the house
+nearly a week, the doctor had done all that human
+skill could do, but Fay continued to sink rapidly.</p>
+
+<p>About midnight the nurse, who had been
+standing by the bed with her finger on Fay's
+pulse, moved suddenly and gently laid down the
+weak hand she had been holding. She looked
+warningly across at Jan, who knelt at the other
+side, her eyes fixed on the pale, beautiful face
+that looked so wonderfully young and peaceful.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly Fay opened her eyes and smiled.
+She looked right past Jan, exclaiming joyfully,
+"There you are at last, Daddie, and it's broad
+daylight."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>For Jan it was still the middle of the Indian
+night and very dark indeed.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 79 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>
+The servants were all asleep; the little motherless
+children safely wrapped in happy unconsciousness
+in their nursery with Ayah.</p>
+
+<p>The last sad offices had been done for Fay, and
+the nurse, tired out, was also sleeping&mdash;on Jan's
+bed.</p>
+
+<p>Jan, alone of all the household, kept watch,
+standing in the verandah, a ghostly figure, still
+in the tumbled white muslin frock she had had no
+time all day to change.</p>
+
+<p>It was nearly one o'clock. Motors and carriages
+were beginning to come back from Government
+House, where there was a reception. The
+motor-horns and horses' hoofs sounded loud in
+the wide silent street, and the head lights swept
+down the Queen's Road like fireflies in flight.</p>
+
+<p>Jan turned on the light in the verandah. Peter
+would perhaps look up and see her standing there,
+and realise why she kept watch. Perhaps he
+would stop and come up.</p>
+
+<p>She wanted Peter desperately.</p>
+
+<p>Compassed about with many relatives and innumerable
+friends at home, out here Jan was
+singularly alone. In all that great city she knew
+no one save Peter, the doctor and the nurse.
+Some few women, knowing all the circumstances,
+had called and were ready to be kind and helpful
+and friendly, as women are all over India, but
+Fay would admit none but Peter&mdash;even to see
+Jan; and always begged her not to return the
+calls "till it was all over."</p>
+
+<p>Well, it was all over now. Fay would never be
+timid and ashamed any more.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 80 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>
+Jan had not shed a tear. The longing to cry
+that had assailed her so continuously in her first
+week had entirely left her. She felt clear-headed
+and cold and bitterly resentful. She would like
+to have made Hugo Tancred go in front of her
+into that quiet room and forced him to look at
+the girlish figure on the bed&mdash;his handiwork.
+She wanted to hurt him, to make him more
+wretched than he was already.</p>
+
+<p>A car stopped in the street below. Jan went
+very quietly to the door of the flat and listened
+at the top of the staircase.</p>
+
+<p>Steps were on the stairs, but they stopped at
+one of the flats below.</p>
+
+<p>Presently another car stopped. Again she
+went out and listened. The steps came up and
+up and she switched on the light in the passage.</p>
+
+<p>This time it was Peter.</p>
+
+<p>He looked very tired.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought you would come," Jan said. "She
+died at midnight."</p>
+
+<p>Peter closed the outer door, and taking Jan
+by the arm led her back into the sitting-room,
+where he put her in a corner of the big sofa and
+sat down beside her.</p>
+
+<p>He could not speak, and Jan saw that the tears
+she could not shed were in his eyes, those large
+dark eyes that could appear so sombre and then
+again so kind.</p>
+
+<p>Jan watched him enviously. She was acutely
+conscious of trifling things. She even noticed
+what very black eyebrows he had and how&mdash;as
+always, when he was either angry or deeply<!-- Page 81 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>
+moved&mdash;the veins in his forehead stood out in a
+strongly-marked V.</p>
+
+<p>"It was best, I think," Jan said, and even to
+herself her voice sounded like the voice of a
+stranger. "She would have been very unhappy
+if she had lived."</p>
+
+<p>Peter started at the cool, hard tones, and looked
+at her. Then, simply and naturally, like a child,
+he took her hand and held it; and there was that
+in the human contact, in the firm, comfortable
+clasp, that seemed to break something down in
+Jan, and all at once she felt weak and faint and
+trembling. She leaned her head against the pillows
+piled high in the corner where Fay had always
+rested. The electric light in the verandah
+seemed suddenly to recede to an immense distance
+and became a tiny luminous pin-head, like
+a far lone star.</p>
+
+<p>She heard Peter moving about in the dining-room
+behind and clinking things, but she felt
+quite incapable of going to see what he was doing
+or of trying to be hospitable&mdash;besides, it was his
+house, he knew where things were, and she was
+so tired.</p>
+
+<p>And then he was standing over her, holding a
+tumbler against her chattering teeth.</p>
+
+<p>"Drink it," he said, and, though his voice
+sounded far away, it was firm and authoritative.
+"Quick; don't pretend you can't swallow, for you
+can."</p>
+
+<p>He tipped the glass, and something wet and
+cold ran over her chin: anything was better than
+that, and she tried to drink. As she did so she<!-- Page 82 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>
+realised she was thirsty, drank it all eagerly and
+gasped.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you had anything to eat all day?" the
+dominating voice went on; it sounded much
+nearer now.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't remember," she said, feebly. "Oh,
+why did you give me all that brandy, it's made
+me so muzzy and confused, and there's so much
+I ought to see to."</p>
+
+<p>"You rest a bit first&mdash;you'll be all right presently."</p>
+
+<p>Someone lifted her by the knees and put the
+whole of her on the sofa. It was very comfortable;
+she was not so cold now. She lay quite
+still and closed her eyes. She had not had a real
+night's sleep since she reached Bombay. Fay
+was always restless and nervous, and Jan had not
+had her clothes off for forty-eight hours. The
+long strain was over, there was nothing to watch
+and wait for now. She would do as that voice
+said, rest for a few minutes.</p>
+
+<p>There was a white chuddah shawl folded on
+the end of the sofa. Fay had liked it spread
+over her knees, for she was nearly always chilly.</p>
+
+<p>Peter opened it and laid it very lightly over
+Jan, who never stirred.</p>
+
+<p>Then he sat down in a comfortable chair some
+distance off, where she would see him if she woke,
+and reviewed the situation, which was unconventional,
+certainly.</p>
+
+<p>He had sent his car away when he arrived, as
+it was but a step to the Yacht Club where he
+slept. Now, he felt he couldn't leave, for if Jan<!-- Page 83 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>
+woke suddenly she would feel confused and probably
+frightened.</p>
+
+<p>"I never thought so little brandy could have
+had such an effect," Peter reflected half ruefully.
+"I suppose it's because she'd had nothing to eat.
+It's about the best thing that could have happened,
+but I never meant to hocus her like this."</p>
+
+<p>There she lay, a long white mound under the
+shawl. She had slipped her hand under her
+cheek and looked pathetically young and helpless.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder what I'd better do," thought Peter.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Grundy commanded him to go at once.
+Common humanity bade him stay.</p>
+
+<p>Peter was very human, and he stayed.</p>
+
+<p>About half-past five Jan woke. She was certainly
+confused, but not in the least frightened.
+It was light, not brilliantly light as it would be a
+little later on, but clear and opalescent, as though
+the sun were shining through fold upon fold of
+grey-blue gauze.</p>
+
+<p>The electric light in the verandah and the one
+over Peter's head were still burning and looked
+garish and wan, and Jan's first coherent thought
+was, "How dreadfully wasteful to have had them
+on all night&mdash;Peter's electric light, too"&mdash;and
+then she saw him.</p>
+
+<p>His body was crumpled up in the big chair; his
+legs were thrust out stiffly in front of him. He
+looked a heartrending interpretation of discomfort
+in his evening clothes, for he hadn't even
+loosened the collar. He had thought of it, but
+felt it might be disrespectful to Jan. Besides,<!-- Page 84 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>
+there was something of the chaperon about that
+collar.</p>
+
+<p>Jan's tears that had refused to soften sorrow
+during the anguish of the night came now, hot
+and springing, to blur that absurd, pathetic figure
+looped sideways in the big chair.</p>
+
+<p>It was so plain why he was there.</p>
+
+<p>She sniffed helplessly (of course, she had lost
+her handkerchief), and thrust her knuckles into
+her eyes like any schoolboy.</p>
+
+<p>When she could see again she noticed how thin
+was the queer, irregular face, with dark hollows
+round the eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder if they feed him properly at that
+Yacht Club," thought Jan. "And here are we
+using his house and his cook and everything."</p>
+
+<p>She swung her feet off the sofa and disentangled
+them from the shawl, folded it neatly and
+sat looking at Peter, who opened his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>For a full minute they stared at each other in
+silence, then he stretched himself and rose.</p>
+
+<p>"I say, have you slept?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Till a minute ago ... Mr. Ledgard ...
+why did you stay? It was angelic of you, but
+you must be so dreadfully tired. I feel absolutely
+rested and, oh, so grateful&mdash;but so
+ashamed...."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you must have some tea," said Peter,
+inconsequently. "I'll go and rouse up Lalkhan
+and the cook. We can't get any ourselves, for
+he locks up the whole show every blessed night."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>In the East burial follows death with the greatest
+possible speed. Peter and the doctor and<!-- Page 85 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>
+the nurse arranged everything. A friend of
+Peter's who had little children sent for Ayah and
+Tony and little Fay to spend the day, and Jan
+was grateful.</p>
+
+<p>Fay and her baby were laid in the English cemetery,
+and Jan was left to face the children as
+best she could.</p>
+
+<p>They had been happy, Ayah said, with the kind
+lady and her children. Tony went straight to
+his mother's room, the room that had been closed
+to him for three whole days.</p>
+
+<p>He came back to Jan and stood in front of her,
+searching her face with his grave, judging gaze.</p>
+
+<p>"What have you done with my Mummy?" he
+asked. "Have you carried her away and put her
+somewhere like you do Fay when she's naughty?
+You're strong enough."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Tony!" Jan whispered piteously. "I
+would have kept her if I could, but I wasn't
+strong enough for that."</p>
+
+<p>"Who has taken her, then?" Tony persisted.
+"Where is she? I've been everywhere, and she
+isn't in the bungalow."</p>
+
+<p>"God has taken her, Tony."</p>
+
+<p>"What for?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think," Jan said, timidly, "it was because
+she was very tired and ill and unhappy&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But is she happier now and better?"</p>
+
+<p>"I hope so, I believe she is ... quite happy
+and well."</p>
+
+<p>"You're sure?" And Tony's eyes searched
+Jan's face. "You're sure <em>you</em> haven't put her
+somewhere?"</p>
+
+<p>"Tony, I want Mummy every bit as much as<!-- Page 86 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>
+you do. Be a little good to me, sonny, for I'm
+dreadfully sad."</p>
+
+<p>Jan held out her hand and Tony took it doubtfully.
+She drew him nearer.</p>
+
+<p>"Try to be good to me, Tony, and love me a
+little ... it's all so hard."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll be good," he said, gravely, "because I
+promised Mummy ... but I can't love you yet&mdash;because&mdash;"
+here Tony sighed deeply, "I don't
+seem to feel like it."</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind," said Jan, lifting him on to her
+knee. "Never mind. I'll love you an extra lot
+to make up."</p>
+
+<p>"And Fay?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"And Fay&mdash;we must both love Fay more than
+ever now."</p>
+
+<p>"I do love Fay," Tony said, "because I'm used
+to her. She's been here a long time...."</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly his mouth went down at the corners
+and he leant against Jan's shoulder to hide his
+face. "I do want Mummy so," he whispered,
+as the slow, difficult tears welled over and fell.
+"I like so much to look at her."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>It was early afternoon, the hot part of the day.
+The children were asleep and Jan sat on the big
+sofa, finishing a warm jersey for little Fay to
+wear towards the end of the voyage. Peter, by
+means of every scrap of interest he possessed,
+had managed to secure her a three-berth cabin
+in a mail boat due to leave within the next fortnight.
+He insisted that she must take Ayah,
+who was more than eager to go, and that Ayah<!-- Page 87 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>
+could easily get a passage back almost directly
+with people he knew who were coming out soon
+after Jan got home. He had written to them,
+and they would write to meet the boat at Aden.</p>
+
+<p>There was nothing Peter did not seem able to
+arrange.</p>
+
+<p>In the flat below a lady was singing the "Indian
+Love Lyrics" from the "Garden of Khama."
+She had a powerful voice and sang with considerable
+passion.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Less than the dust beneath thy chariot wheel,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Less than the rust that never stained thy sword.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Jan frowned and fidgeted.</p>
+
+<p>The song went on, finished, and then the lady
+sang it all over again. Jan turned on the electric
+fan, for it was extremely hot, and the strong contralto
+voice made her feel even hotter. The
+whirr of the fan in no way drowned the voice,
+which now went on to proclaim with much <i lang="it">brio</i>
+that the temple bells were ringing and the month
+of marriages was drawing near. And then, very
+slowly and solemnly, but quite as loudly as before,
+came "When I am dying, lean over me tenderly&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Jan got up and stamped. Then she went
+swiftly for her topee and gloves and parasol, and
+fled from the bungalow.</p>
+
+<p>Lalkhan rushed after her to ask if she wanted
+a "tikka-gharri." He strongly disapproved of
+her walking in the streets alone, but Jan shook
+her head. The lift-man was equally eager to
+procure one, but again Jan defeated his desire<!-- Page 88 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>
+and walked out into the hot street. Somehow
+she couldn't bear "The Garden of Khama" just
+then. It was Hugo Tancred's favourite verse,
+and was among the few books Fay appeared to
+possess, Fay who was lying in the English cemetery,
+and so glad to be there ... at twenty-five.</p>
+
+<p>What was the good of life and love, if that was
+all it led to? In spite of the heat Jan walked
+feverishly and fast, down the shady side of the
+Mayo Road into Esplanade Road, where the big
+shops were, and, just then, no shade at all.</p>
+
+<p>The hot dust seemed to rise straight out of the
+pavement and strike her in the face, and all the
+air was full of the fat yellow smell that prevails
+in India when its own inhabitants have taken
+their mid-day meal.</p>
+
+<p>Each bare-legged gharri-man slumbered on
+the little box of his carriage, hanging on in that
+amazingly precarious fashion in which natives
+of the East seem able to sleep anywhere.</p>
+
+<p>On Jan went, anywhere, anywhere away from
+the garden of Khama and that travesty of love,
+as she conceived it. She remembered the day
+when she thought them such charming songs and
+thrilled in sympathy with Fay when Hugo sang
+them. Oh, why did that woman sing them to-day?
+Would she ever get the sound out of her
+ears?</p>
+
+<p>She had reached Churchgate Street, which was
+deserted and deep in shade. She turned down
+and presently came to the Cathedral standing in
+its trim garden bright with English flowers. The
+main door was open and Jan went in.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 89 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>
+Here the haunting love-lyrics were hushed. It
+was so still, not even a sweeper to break the
+blessed peace.</p>
+
+<p>Restlessly, Jan walked round the outer aisles,
+reading the inscriptions on marble tablets and
+brasses, many of them dating back to the later
+eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Men
+died young out in India in those days; hardly any
+seemed to live beyond forty-two, many died in
+the twenties. On nearly all the tablets the
+words "zeal" or "zealous" regularly appeared.
+With regard to their performance of their duties
+these dead and gone men who had helped to
+make the India of to-day had evidently had a
+very definite notion as to their own purpose in
+life. The remarks were guarded and remarkably
+free from exaggerated tributes to the virtues they
+celebrated. One Major-General Bellasis was described
+as "that very respectable Officer&mdash;who
+departed this life while he was in the meritorious
+discharge of his duty presiding at the Military
+Board." Others died "from exposure to the
+sun"; nearly all seemed to have displayed "unremitting"
+or "characteristic zeal" in the discharge
+of their duties.</p>
+
+<p>Jan sat down, and gradually it seemed as
+though the spirits and souls of those departed
+men, those ordinary everyday men&mdash;whose descendants
+might probably be met any day in the
+Yacht Club now&mdash;seemed to surround her in a
+great company, all pointing in one direction and
+with one voice declaring, "This is the <span class="smcap">Way</span>."</p>
+
+<p>Jan fell on her knees and prayed that her<!-- Page 90 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>
+stumbling feet might be guided upon it, that she
+should in no wise turn aside, however steep and
+stony it might prove.</p>
+
+<p>And as she knelt there came upon her the conviction
+that here was the true meaning of life as
+lived upon the earth; just this, that each should
+do his job.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 91 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII<br />
+<span class="sub">THE END OF THE DREAM</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">S</span>HE walked back rather slowly. It was a little
+cooler, but dusty, and the hot pavements
+made her feet ache. She was just wondering
+whether she would take a gharri when a motor
+stopped at the curb and Peter got out.</p>
+
+<p>"What are you doing?" he asked crossly.
+"Why are you walking in all this heat? You
+can't play these games in India. Get in."</p>
+
+<p>He held the door open for her.</p>
+
+<p>"Good afternoon, Mr. Ledgard," Jan said,
+sweetly. "Is it worth while for such a little
+way?"</p>
+
+<p>"Get in," Peter said again, and Jan meekly
+got in.</p>
+
+<p>"I was just coming to see you, and I could
+have taken you anywhere you wanted to go, if
+only you'd waited. Why didn't you take a
+gharri?"</p>
+
+<p>"Since you must know," Jan said, smiling at
+the angry Peter, "I went out because I wanted
+to go out. And I walked because I wanted to
+walk."</p>
+
+<p>"You can't do things just because you want
+to do 'em in this infernal country&mdash;you must consider
+whether it's a suitable time."</p>
+
+<p>Jan made no answer, and silence reigned till
+they reached the bungalow.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 92 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>
+Peter followed her in.</p>
+
+<p>"Where did you go?" he asked. "And why?"</p>
+
+<p>"I went to the Cathedral, and my reason was
+that I simply couldn't stay in the bungalow because
+the lady below was singing 'Less than the
+dust.'"</p>
+
+<p>"I know," Peter said grimly. "Just the sort
+of thing she would sing."</p>
+
+<p>"She sang very well," Jan owned honestly,
+"but when Fay was first engaged she and Hugo
+used to sing those songs to each other&mdash;it seemed
+all day long&mdash;and this afternoon I couldn't bear
+it. It seemed such a sham somehow&mdash;so false
+and unreal, if it only led&mdash;to this."</p>
+
+<p>"It's real enough while it lasts, you know,"
+Peter remarked in the detached, elderly tone he
+sometimes adopted. "That sort of thing's all
+right for an episode, but it's a bit too thin for
+marriage."</p>
+
+<p>"But surely episodes often end in marriage?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not that sort, and if they do it's generally
+pretty disastrous. A woman who felt she was
+less than the dust and rust and weeds and all
+that rot wouldn't be much good to a man who
+had to do his job, for she wouldn't do hers, you
+know."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you, too, think that's the main thing&mdash;to
+do your job?"</p>
+
+<p>"It seems to me it's the only thing that justifies
+one's existence. Anyway, to try to do it
+decently."</p>
+
+<p>"And you don't think one ought to expect to
+be happy and have things go smoothly?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 93 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>
+"Well, they won't always, you know, whether
+you expect it or not; but the job remains, so it's
+just as well to make up your mind to it."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," Jan said thoughtfully, "that's a
+religion."</p>
+
+<p>"It pans out as well as most," said Peter.</p>
+
+<p>The days that had gone so slowly went quickly
+enough now. Jan had much to arrange and no
+word came from Hugo. She succeeded in getting
+the monthly bills from the cook, and paid them,
+and very timidly she asked Peter if she might
+pay the wages for the time his servants had
+waited upon them; but Peter was so huffy and
+cross she never dared to mention it again.</p>
+
+<p>The night before they all sailed Peter dined
+with her, and, after dinner, took her for one last
+drive over Malabar Hill. The moon was full,
+and when they reached Ridge Road he stopped
+the car and they got out and stood on the cliff,
+looking over the city just as they had done on
+her first evening in Bombay.</p>
+
+<p>Some scented tree was in bloom and the air
+was full of its soft fragrance.</p>
+
+<p>For some minutes they stood in silence, then
+Jan broke it by asking: "Mr. Ledgard, could
+Hugo take the children from me?"</p>
+
+<p>"He could, of course, legally&mdash;but I don't for
+a minute imagine he will, for he couldn't keep
+them. What about his people? Will they want
+to interfere?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think so; from the little he told us
+they are not very well off. They live in Guernsey.
+His father was something in salt, I think, out<!-- Page 94 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>
+here. We've none of us seen them. They didn't
+come to Fay's wedding. I gather they are very
+strict in their views&mdash;both his father and mother&mdash;and
+there are two sisters. But Fay said Hugo
+hardly ever wrote&mdash;or heard from them."</p>
+
+<p>"There's just one thing you must face, Miss
+Ross," and Peter felt a brute as he looked at
+Jan pale and startled in the bright moonlight.
+"Hugo Tancred might marry again."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, surely no one would marry him after all
+this!"</p>
+
+<p>"Whoever did would probably know nothing
+of 'all this.' Remember Hugo Tancred has a
+way with women; he's a fascinating chap when
+he likes, he's good-looking and plausible, and always
+has an excellent reason for all his misfortunes.
+If he does marry again he'll marry money,
+and <em>then</em> he might demand the children."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps she wouldn't want them."</p>
+
+<p>"We'll hope not."</p>
+
+<p>"And I can do nothing&mdash;nothing to make
+them safe?"</p>
+
+<p>"I fear&mdash;nothing&mdash;only your best for them."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll do that," said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>They stood shoulder to shoulder in the scented
+stillness of the night. The shadows were black
+and sharp in the bright moonlight and the tom-toms
+throbbed in the city below.</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder," Jan said presently, "if I shall ever
+be able to do anything for you, Mr. Ledgard.
+You have done everything for us out here."</p>
+
+<p>"Would you really like to do something?"
+Peter asked eagerly. "I wouldn't have men<!-- Page 95 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>tioned
+it if you hadn't said that just now. Would
+you write pretty often? You see, I've no people
+of my very own. Aunts and uncles and cousins
+don't keep in touch with one out here. They're
+kind, awfully kind when I go home on leave, but
+it takes a man's own folk to remember to write
+every mail."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll write every mail," Jan promised eagerly,
+"and when you take your next leave, remember
+we expect you at Wren's End."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll remember," said Peter, "and it may be
+sooner than you think."</p>
+
+<p>They sailed next day. Jan had spent six weeks
+in Bombay, and the whole thing seemed a dream.</p>
+
+<p>The voyage back was very different from the
+voyage out. The boat was crowded, and nearly
+all were Service people going home on leave.
+Jan found them very kind and friendly, and the
+children, with plenty of others to play with,
+were for the most part happy and good.</p>
+
+<p>The journey across France was rather horrid.
+Little Fay was as obstreperous as Tony was disagreeably
+silent and aloof. Jan thanked heaven
+when the crowded train steamed into Charing
+Cross.</p>
+
+<p>There, at the very door of their compartment,
+a girl was waiting. A girl so small, she might
+have been a child except for a certain decision
+and capability about everything she did. She
+seized Jan, kissed her hurriedly and announced
+that she had got a nice little furnished flat for
+them till they should go to the country, and that
+Hannah had tea ready; this young person, her<!-- Page 96 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>self,
+helped to carry their smaller baggage to a
+taxi, packed them in, demanded Jan's keys and
+announced that she would bring the luggage in
+another taxi. She gave the address to the man,
+and a written slip to Jan, and vanished to collect
+their cabin baggage.</p>
+
+<p>It was all done so briskly and efficiently that
+it left Ayah and the children quite breathless,
+accustomed as they were to the leisurely methods
+of the East.</p>
+
+<p>"Who is vat mem?" asked little Fay, as the
+taxi door was slammed by this energetic young
+person.</p>
+
+<p>"Is she quite a mem?" suggested the accurate
+Tony. "Is she old enough or big enough?"</p>
+
+<p>"Who is vat mem?" little Fay repeated.</p>
+
+<p>"That," said Jan with considerable satisfaction
+in her voice, "is Meg."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 97 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER IX<br />
+<span class="sub">MEG</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">I</span>T was inevitable as the refrain of a <i lang="fr">rondeau</i>
+that when Jan said "that's Meg" little Fay
+should demand "What nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>Now there was a good deal of "nelse" about
+Meg, and she requires some explanation, going
+back several years.</p>
+
+<p>Like most Scots, Anthony Ross had been
+faithful to his relations whether he felt affection
+for them or not; sometimes even when they had
+not a thought in common with him and he rather
+disliked them than otherwise.</p>
+
+<p>And this was so in the case of one Amelia
+Ross, his first cousin, who was head-mistress of
+a flourishing and well-established school for
+"young ladies," in the Regent's Park district.</p>
+
+<p>She had been a head-mistress for many years,
+and was well over fifty when she married a meek,
+small, nothingly man who had what Thackeray
+calls "a little patent place." And it appeared
+that she added the husband to the school in much
+the same spirit as she would have increased the
+number of chairs in her dining-room, and with
+no more appreciable result in her life. On her
+marriage she became Mrs. Ross-Morton, and
+Mr. Morton went in and out of the front door,
+breakfasted and dined at Ribston Hall, caught<!-- Page 98 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>
+his bus at the North Gate and went daily to his
+meek little work. It is presumed that he lived
+on terms of affectionate intimacy with his wife,
+but no one who saw them together could have
+gathered this.</p>
+
+<p>Now Anthony Ross disliked his cousin Amelia.
+He detested her school, which he considered was
+one of the worst examples of a bad old period.
+He suspected her of being hard and grasping,
+he knew she was dull, and her husband bored
+him&mdash;not to tears, but to profanity. Yet since
+she was his cousin and a hard-working, upright
+woman, and since they had played together as
+children in Scotland and her father and mother
+had been kind to him then, he could never bring
+himself to drop Amelia. Not for worlds would
+he have allowed Jan or Fay to go to her school,
+but he did allow them, or rather he humbly entreated
+them, to visit it occasionally when invited
+to some function or other. Jan's education
+after her mother's death had been the thinnest
+scrape sandwiched between many household cares
+and much attendance upon her father's whims.
+Fay was allowed classes and visiting governesses,
+but their father could never bring himself to
+spare either of them to the regular discipline of
+school, and Cousin Amelia bewailed the desultory
+training of Anthony's children.</p>
+
+<p>In 1905, Jan and Fay had been to a party at
+Ribston Hall: tea in the garden followed by a
+pastoral play. Anthony was sitting in the balcony,
+smoking, when the girls came back. He
+saw their hansom and ran downstairs to meet<!-- Page 99 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>
+them, as he always did. They were a family who
+went in for affectionate greetings.</p>
+
+<p>"Daddie," cried Fay, seizing her father by the
+arm, "one of the seven wonders of the world has
+happened. We have found an interesting person
+at Ribston Hall."</p>
+
+<p>Jan took the other arm. "We can't possibly
+tell you all about it under an hour, so we'd better
+go and sit in the balcony." And they gently
+propelled him towards the staircase.</p>
+
+<p>"Not if you're going to discuss Cousin Amelia,"
+Anthony protested. "You have carrying voices,
+both of you."</p>
+
+<p>"Cousin Amelia is only incidental," Jan said,
+when they were all three seated in the balcony.
+"The main theme is concerned with a queer
+little pixie creature called Meg Morton. She's
+a pupil-governess, and she's sixteen and a half&mdash;just
+the same age as Fay."</p>
+
+<p>"She doesn't reach up to Jan's elbow," Fay
+added, "and she chaperons the girls for music
+and singing, and sits in the drawing-class because
+the master can't be quite seventy yet."</p>
+
+<p>"She's the wee-est thing you ever saw, and
+they dress her in Cousin Amelia's discarded Sunday
+frocks."</p>
+
+<p>"That's impossible," Anthony interrupted.
+"Amelia is so massive and square; if the girl's
+so small she'd look like 'the Marchioness.'"</p>
+
+<p>"She does, she does!" Jan cried delightedly.
+"Of course the garments are 'made down,' but
+in the most elderly way possible. Daddie, can
+you picture a Botticelli angel of sixteen, with<!-- Page 100 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>
+masses of Titian-red hair, clad in a queer plush
+garment once worn by Cousin Amelia, that retains
+all its ancient frumpiness of line. And it's
+not only her appearance that's so quaint, <em>she</em> is
+quaint inside."</p>
+
+<p>"We were attracted by her hair," Fay went
+on "(You'll go down like a ninepin before that
+hair), and we got her in a corner and hemmed
+her in and declared it was her duty to attend to
+us because we were strangers and shy, and in
+three minutes we were friends. Sixteen, Daddie!
+And a governess-pupil in Cousin Amelia's school.
+She's a niece of the little husband, and Cousin
+Amelia is preening herself like anything because
+she takes her for nothing and makes her work
+like ten people."</p>
+
+<p>"Did the little girl say so?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course not," Jan answered indignantly,
+"but Cousin Amelia did. Oh, how thankful I
+am she is <em>your</em> cousin, dear, and once-removed
+from us!"</p>
+
+<p>"How many generations will it take to remove
+her altogether?" Fay asked. "However," she
+added, "if we can have the pixie out and give
+her a good time I shan't mind the relationship so
+much. We <em>must</em> do something, Daddie. What
+shall it be?"</p>
+
+<p>Anthony Ross smoked thoughtfully and said
+very little. Perhaps he did not even listen with
+marked attention, because he was enjoying his
+girls. Just to see them healthy and happy; to
+know that they were naturally kind and gay;
+to hear them frank and eager and loquacious<!-- Page 101 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>&mdash;sometimes
+gave him a sensation of almost physical
+pleasure. He was like an idler basking in the
+sun, conscious of nothing but just the warmth
+and comfort of it.</p>
+
+<p>Whatever those girls wanted they always got.
+Anthony's diplomacy was requisitioned and was,
+as usual, successful; for, in spite of her disapproval,
+Mrs. Ross-Morton could never resist
+her cousin's charm. This time the result was
+that one Saturday afternoon in the middle of
+June little Meg Morton, bearing a battered
+leather portmanteau and clad in the most-recently-converted
+plush abomination, appeared at
+the tall house in St. George's Square to stay over
+the week-end.</p>
+
+<p>It was the mid-term holiday, and from the
+first moment to the last the visit was one almost
+delirious orgy of pleasure to the little pupil-governess.</p>
+
+<p>It was also a revelation.</p>
+
+<p>It would be hard to conceive of anything
+odder than the appearance of Meg Morton at
+this time. She just touched five feet in height,
+and was very slenderly and delicately made,
+with absurd, tiny hands and feet. Yet there
+was a finish about the thin little body that proclaimed
+her fully grown. Her eyes, with their
+thick, dark lashes, looked overlarge in the pale
+little pointed face; strange eyes and sombre,
+with big, bright pupil, and curious dark-blue iris
+flecked with brown. Her features were regular,
+and her mouth would have been pretty had the
+lips not lacked colour. As it was, all the colour<!-- Page 102 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>
+about Meg seemed concentrated in her hair;
+red as a flame and rippled as a river under a
+fresh breeze. There was so much of it, too, the
+little head seemed bowed in apology beneath
+its weight.</p>
+
+<p>Yet for the time being Meg forgot to be apologetic
+about her hair, for Anthony and his girls
+frankly admired it.</p>
+
+<p>These adorable, kind, amusing people actually
+admired it, and said so. Hitherto Meg's experience
+had been that it was a thing to be slurred
+over, like a deformity. If mentioned, it was to
+be deprecated. In the strictly Evangelical circles
+where hitherto her lot had been cast, they even
+tried vainly to explain it away.</p>
+
+<p>She had, of course, heard of artists, but she
+never expected to meet any. That sort of thing
+lay outside the lives of those who had to make
+their living as quickly as possible in beaten
+tracks; tracks so well-beaten, in fact, that all
+the flowers had been trodden underfoot and
+exterminated.</p>
+
+<p>Meg, at sixteen, had received so little from
+life that her expectations were of the humblest.
+And as she stood before the glass in a pretty
+bedroom, fastening her one evening dress (of
+shiny black silk that crackled, made with the
+narrow V in front affected by Mrs. Ross-Morton),
+preparatory to going to the play for the first
+time in her life, she could have exclaimed, like the
+little old woman of the story, "This be never I!"</p>
+
+<p>Anthony Ross was wholly surprising to Meg.</p>
+
+<p>This handsome, merry gentleman with thick,<!-- Page 103 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>
+brown hair as crinkly as her own; who was
+domineered over and palpably adored by these
+two, to her, equally amazing girls&mdash;seemed so
+very, very young to be anybody's father.</p>
+
+<p>He frankly owned to enjoying things.</p>
+
+<p>Now, according to Meg's experience, grown-up
+people&mdash;elderly people&mdash;seldom enjoyed anything;
+above all, never alluded to their enjoyment.</p>
+
+<p>Life was a thing to be endured with fortitude,
+its sorrows borne with Christian resignation;
+its joys, if there were any joys, discreetly slurred
+over. Joys were insidious, dangerous things
+that might lead to the leaving undone of obvious
+duties. To seek joy and insure its being shared
+by others, bravely and honestly believing it to
+be an excellent thing, was to Meg an entirely
+unknown frame of mind.</p>
+
+<p>After the play, in Meg's room the three girls
+were brushing their hair together; to be accurate,
+Jan was brushing Fay's and Meg admiring
+the process.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you any sisters?" Jan asked. She
+was always interested in people's relations.</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Meg. "There are, mercifully, only
+three of us, my two brothers and me. If there
+had been any more I don't know what my poor
+little Papa would have done."</p>
+
+<p>"Why do you call him your 'poor little papa'?"
+Fay asked curiously.</p>
+
+<p>"Because he is poor&mdash;dreadfully&mdash;and little,
+and very melancholy. He suffers so from depression."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 104 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>
+"Why?" asked the downright Jan.</p>
+
+<p>"Partly because he has indigestion, <em>constant</em>
+indigestion, and then there's us, and boys are
+so expensive, they will grow so. It upsets him
+dreadfully."</p>
+
+<p>"But they can't help growing," Fay objected.</p>
+
+<p>"It wouldn't matter so much if they didn't
+both do it at once. But you see, there's only a
+year between them, and they're just about the
+same size. If only one had been smaller, he
+could have worn the outgrown things. As it is,
+it's always new clothes for both of them. Papa's
+are no sort of use, and even the cheapest suits
+cost a lot, and boots are perfectly awful."</p>
+
+<p>Meg looked so serious that Fay and Jan, who
+were like the lilies of the field, and expected new
+and pretty frocks at reasonable intervals as a
+matter of course, looked serious too; for the
+first time confronted by a problem whose possibility
+they had never even considered before.</p>
+
+<p>"He must be pleased with you," Jan said,
+encouragingly. "<em>You're</em> not too big."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but then I'm not a boy. Papa's clothes
+would have made down for me beautifully if
+I'd been a boy; as it is, they're no use." Meg
+sighed, then added more cheerfully. "But I
+cost less in other ways, and several relations
+send old clothes to me. They are never too
+small."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you like the relations' clothes?" Fay
+asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course not," said Meg, simply. "They<!-- Page 105 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>
+are generally hideous; but, after all, they cover
+me and save expense."</p>
+
+<p>The spoiled daughters of Anthony Ross gazed
+at Meg with horror-stricken eyes. To them
+this seemed a most tragic state of things.</p>
+
+<p>"Do they all," Fay asked timidly, "wear
+such ... rich materials&mdash;like Cousin Amelia?"</p>
+
+<p>"They're fond of plush, as a rule, but there's
+velveteen as well, and sometimes a cloth dress.
+One was mustard-coloured, and embittered my
+life for a whole year."</p>
+
+<p>Jan suddenly ceased to brush Fay's hair and
+went and sat on the bed beside Meg and put her
+arm round her. Fay's pretty face, framed in
+fluffy masses of fair hair, was solemn in excess
+of sympathy.</p>
+
+<p>"I shouldn't care a bit if only the boys were
+through Sandhurst and safely into the Indian
+Army&mdash;but I do hate them having to go without
+nearly everything. Trevor's a King's Cadet,
+but they wouldn't give us two cadetships ...
+Still," she added, more cheerfully, "it's cheaper
+than anything else for a soldier's son."</p>
+
+<p>"Is your father a soldier?" asked Jan.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, a major in the Westshires; but he
+had to leave the Army because of his health, and
+his pension is very small, and mother had so
+little money. I sometimes think it killed her
+trying to do everything on nothing."</p>
+
+<p>"Were you quite small when she died?" Fay
+asked in a sympathetic whisper.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no; I was nearly twelve, and quite as big
+as I am now. Then I kept house while the boys<!-- Page 106 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>
+were at Bedford, but when they went to Sandhurst
+poor little Papa thought I'd better get
+some education, too, and Uncle John's wife
+offered to take me for nothing, so here I am.
+<span class="smcap">Here</span>, it's too wonderful. Who could have
+dreamed that Ribston Hall would lead to this?"
+And Meg snuggled down in Jan's kind embrace,
+her red hair spread around her like a veil.</p>
+
+<p>"Are some of the richly-dressed relations
+nice?" Jan asked hopefully.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know if you'd think them nice&mdash;you
+seem to expect such a lot from people&mdash;but
+they're quite kind&mdash;only it's a different sort of
+kindness from yours here. They don't laugh
+and expect you to enjoy yourself, like <em>your</em> father.
+My brothers say they are dull ... they call
+them&mdash;I'm afraid it's very ungrateful&mdash;the weariful
+rich. But I expect we're weariful to them
+too. I suppose poor relations <em>are</em> boring if you're
+well-off yourself. But we get pretty tired, too,
+when they talk us over."</p>
+
+<p>"But do you mean to say they talk you over
+<em>to</em> you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Always," Meg said firmly. "How badly we
+manage, how improvident we are, how Papa
+ought to rouse himself and I ought to manage
+better, and how foolish it is to let the boys go
+into the Army instead of banks and things ...
+And yet, you know, it hasn't cost much for
+Trevor, and once he's in he'll be able to manage,
+and Jo said he'd enlist if there was any more
+talk of banks, and poor little Papa had to give
+in&mdash;so there it is."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 107 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>
+"How much older are they than you?" Jan
+asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Trevor's nineteen and Jo's eighteen, and they
+are the greatest darlings in the world. They
+always lifted the heavy saucepans for me at
+Bedford, and filled the buckets and did the outsides
+of the windows, and carried up the coals to
+Papa's sitting-room before they went to school
+in the morning, and they very seldom grumbled
+at my cooking...."</p>
+
+<p>"But where were the servants?" Fay asked
+innocently.</p>
+
+<p>Meg laughed. "Oh, we couldn't have any
+servants. A woman came in the morning. Papa
+dined at his club, and I managed for the boys
+and me. But, oh dear, they do eat a lot, and
+joints are so dear. Sheep's heads and things
+pall if you have them more than once a week.
+They're such a mixty sort of meat, so gummy."</p>
+
+<p>"<em>I</em> can cook," Jan announced, then added
+humbly, "at least, I've been to classes, but I
+don't get much practice. Cook isn't at all fond
+of having me messing in her kitchen."</p>
+
+<p>"It isn't the cooking that's so difficult," said
+Meg; "it's getting things to cook. It's all very
+well for the books to say 'Take' this and that.
+My experience is that you can never 'take' anything.
+You have to buy every single ingredient,
+and there's never anything like enough. We
+tried being fruitarians and living on dates and
+figs and nuts all squashed together, but it didn't
+seem to come a bit cheaper, for the boys were
+hungry again directly and said it was hog-wash."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 108 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>
+"Was your papa a fruitarian too?" Fay asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no, he can't play those tricks; he has to
+be most careful. He never had his meals with
+us. Our meals would have been too rough for
+him. I got him breakfast and afternoon tea.
+He generally went out for the others."</p>
+
+<p>Jan and Fay looked thoughtful.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Amelia Ross-Morton was a fair judge of character.
+When she consented to take her husband's
+niece as a governess-pupil she had been dubious
+as to the result. She very soon discovered, however,
+that the small red-haired girl was absolutely
+trustworthy, that she had a power of keeping
+order quite disproportionate to her size, that she
+got through a perfectly amazing amount of work,
+and did whatever she was asked as a matter of
+course. Thus she became a valuable factor in
+the school, receiving nothing in return save her
+food and such clothes as Mrs. Ross-Morton considered
+too shabby for her own wear.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of the first year Meg ceased to
+receive any lessons. Her day was fully occupied
+in teaching the younger and chaperoning the
+elder girls. Only one stipulation did she make
+at the beginning of each term&mdash;that she should
+be allowed to accept, on all reasonable occasions,
+the invitations of Anthony Ross and his daughters,
+and she made this condition with so much
+firmness that Anthony's cousin knew better than
+to be unreasonably domineering, as was her usual
+habit. Moreover, though it was against her
+principles to do anything to further the enjoyment<!-- Page 109 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>
+of persons in a subordinate position, she
+was, in a way, flattered that Anthony and his
+girls should thus single out her "niece by marriage"
+and appear to enjoy her society.</p>
+
+<p>Thus it came about that Meg went a good deal
+to St. George's Square and nearly always spent
+part of each holiday with Fay and Jan wherever
+they happened to be.</p>
+
+<p>The queer clothes were kept for wear at Ribston
+Hall, and by degrees&mdash;although she never
+had any money&mdash;she became possessed of garments
+more suitable to her age and colouring.</p>
+
+<p>Again and again Anthony painted her. She
+sat for him with untiring patience and devotion.
+She was always entirely at her ease with him,
+and prattled away quite simply of the life that
+seemed to him so inexpressibly hard and dreary.</p>
+
+<p>Only once had he interfered on her behalf at
+Ribston Hall, and then sorely against Meg's will.
+She was sitting for him one day, with her veil of
+flaming hair spread round her, when she said,
+suddenly, "I wonder why it is incorrect to send
+invitations by post to people living in the same
+town?"</p>
+
+<p>"But it isn't," Anthony objected. "Everybody
+does it."</p>
+
+<p>"Not in schools," Meg said firmly. "Mrs.
+Ross-Morton will never send invitations to people
+living in London through the post&mdash;she says it
+isn't polite. They must go by hand."</p>
+
+<p>"I never heard such nonsense," Anthony exclaimed
+crossly. "If she doesn't send 'em by
+post, how <em>does</em> she send them?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 110 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>
+"I take them generally, in the evening, after
+school, and deliver them at all the houses. Some
+are fairly near, of course&mdash;a lot of her friends
+live in Regent's Park&mdash;but sometimes I have to
+go quite a long way by bus. I don't mind that
+in summer, when it's light, but in winter it's horrid
+going about the lonely roads ... People
+speak to one...."</p>
+
+<p>Anthony Ross stepped from behind his easel.</p>
+
+<p>"And what do you do?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"I run," Meg said simply, "and I can generally
+run much faster than they do ... but it's
+a little bit frightening."</p>
+
+<p>"It's infernal," Anthony said furiously. "I
+shall speak to Amelia at once. You are never to
+do it again."</p>
+
+<p>In vain did Meg plead, almost with tears, that
+he would do nothing of the kind. He was roused
+and firm.</p>
+
+<p>He did "speak to Amelia." He astonished
+that good lady as much as he annoyed her. Nevertheless
+Mrs. Ross-Morton used the penny post
+for her invitations as long as Meg remained at
+Ribston Hall.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of two years Major Morton, who
+had removed from Bedford to Cheltenham, wrote
+a long, querulous letter to his sister-in-law to the
+effect that if&mdash;like the majority of girls nowadays&mdash;his
+daughter chose to spend her life far from
+his sheltering care, it was time she earned something.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Ross-Morton replied that only now was
+Meg beginning to repay all the expense incurred<!-- Page 111 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>
+on her behalf in the way of board, clothing and
+tuition; and it was most unreasonable to expect
+any salary for quite another year.</p>
+
+<p>Major Morton decided to remove Meg from
+Ribston Hall.</p>
+
+<p>Many acrimonious letters passed between her
+aunt and her father before this was finally accomplished,
+and Meg left "under a cloud."</p>
+
+<p>To her great astonishment, her meek little
+uncle appeared at Paddington to see her off.
+Just as the train was starting he thrust an envelope
+into her hand.</p>
+
+<p>"It hasn't been fair," he almost shouted&mdash;for
+the train was already beginning to move. "You
+worked hard, you deserved some pay ... a
+little present ... but please don't mention it
+to your aunt ... She is so decided in her
+views...."</p>
+
+<p>When Meg opened the envelope she found
+three ten-pound notes. She had never seen so
+much money before, and burst into tears; but it
+was not because of the magnitude of the gift.
+She felt she had never properly appreciated her
+poor little uncle, and her conscience smote her.</p>
+
+<p>This was at Christmas.</p>
+
+<p>The weariful rich sat in conclave over Meg,
+and it was decided that she should in March
+go as companion and secretary to a certain Mrs.
+Trent slightly known to one of them.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Trent was kindly, careless, and quite
+generous as regards money. She had grown-up
+daughters, and they lived in one of the Home
+Counties where there are many country-houses<!-- Page 112 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>
+and plenty of sport. Meg proved to be exceedingly
+useful, did whatever she was asked to do,
+and a great many things no one had ever done
+before. She shared in the fun, and for the first
+time since her mother died was not overworked.</p>
+
+<p>Her employer was as keen on every form of
+pleasure as her own daughters. She exercised
+the very smallest supervision over them and
+none at all over the "quite useful" little companion.</p>
+
+<p>Many men came to the easy-going, lavish
+house, and Meg, with pretty frocks, abundant
+leisure and deliriously prim Ribston-Hallish
+manners, came in for her full share of admiration.</p>
+
+<p>It happened that at the end of July Anthony
+Ross came up to London in the afternoon to
+attend and speak at a dinner in aid of some
+artists' charity. He and Jan were staying with
+friends at Teddington; Fay, an aunt and the
+servants were already at Wren's End&mdash;all but
+Hannah, the severe Scottish housemaid, who
+remained in charge. She was grim and gaunt
+and plain, with a thick, black moustache, and
+Anthony liked her less than he could have wished.
+But she had been Jan's nurse, and was faithful
+and trustworthy beyond words. He would never
+let Jan go to the country ahead of him, for without
+her he always left behind everything most
+vital to his happiness, so she was to join him
+next day and see that his painting-tackle was
+all packed.</p>
+
+<p>The house in St. George's Square was nominally<!-- Page 113 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>
+shut up and shrouded in dust-sheets, but Hannah
+had "opened up" the dining-room on Anthony's
+behalf, and there he sat and slumbered till she
+should choose to bring him some tea.</p>
+
+<p>He was awakened by an opening door and
+Hannah's voice announcing, not tea, but:</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Morton to see you, sir."</p>
+
+<p>There seemed a thousand "r's" in both the
+Morton and the sir, and Anthony, who felt that
+there was something ominous and arresting in
+Hannah's voice, was wide-awake before she
+could shut the door again.</p>
+
+<p>Sure enough it was Meg, clad in a long grey
+dust-cloak and motor bonnet, the grey veil flung
+back from a very pale face.</p>
+
+<p>Meg, looking a wispy little shadow of woe.</p>
+
+<p>Anthony came forward with outstretched
+hands.</p>
+
+<p>"Meg, my child, what good wind has blown
+you here this afternoon? I thought you were
+having ever such a gay time down in the country."</p>
+
+<p>But Meg made no effort to grasp the greeting
+hands. On the contrary, she moved so that the
+whole width of the dining-room table was between
+them.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait," she said, "you mustn't shake hands
+with me till I tell you what I've done ... perhaps
+you won't want to then."</p>
+
+<p>And Anthony saw that she was trembling.</p>
+
+<p>"Come and sit down," he said. "Something's
+wrong, I can see. What is it?"</p>
+
+<p>But she stood where she was, looking at him<!-- Page 114 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>
+with large, tragic eyes; laid down a leather
+despatch-case she was carrying, and seized the
+edge of the table as if for support.</p>
+
+<p>"I'd rather not sit down yet," she said. "Perhaps
+when you've heard what I've got to tell
+you, you'll never want me to sit down in your
+house again ... and yet ... I did pray so
+you'd be here ... I knew it was most unlikely
+... but I did pray so ... And you <em>are</em> here."</p>
+
+<p>Anthony was puzzled. Meg was not given to
+making scenes or going into heroics.</p>
+
+<p>It was evident that something had happened
+to shake her out of her usual almost cynical
+calm.</p>
+
+<p>"You'd be much better to sit down," he said,
+soothingly. "You see, if you stand, so must I,
+and it's such an uncomfortable way of talking."</p>
+
+<p>She pulled out a chair and sat down at the
+table, took off her gloves, and two absurd small
+thumbs appeared above its edge, the knuckles
+white and tense with the strength of her grip.</p>
+
+<p>Anthony seated himself in a deep chair beside
+the fireplace. He was in shadow. Meg
+faced the light, and he was shocked at the appearance
+of the little smitten face.</p>
+
+<p>"Now tell me," he said gently, "just as little
+or as much as you like."</p>
+
+<p>"This morning," she said hoarsely, "I ran
+away with a man ... in a motor-car."</p>
+
+<p>Anthony was certainly startled, but all he said
+was, "That being the case, why are you here,
+my dear, and what have you done with him?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 115 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span></p><p>"He was married...."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you only just found that out?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I knew it all along. His wife is hard
+and disagreeable and older than he is ... and
+he's thirty-five ... and they can't live together,
+and she won't divorce him and he can't divorce
+her ... and I loved him so much and thought
+how beautiful it would be to give up everything
+and make it up to him."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes?" said Anthony, for Meg paused as
+though unable to go on.</p>
+
+<p>"And it seemed very wonderful and noble to
+do this, and I forgot my poor little Papa and
+those boys in India, and you and Jan and Fay
+and ... I was very mad and very happy ...
+till this morning, when we actually went off in
+his car."</p>
+
+<p>"But where," Anthony asked in a voice studiously
+even and quiet, "<em>are</em> he and his car?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," Meg said hopelessly, "unless
+they're still at the place where we had lunch ...
+and I don't suppose he'd stay there all this
+time...."</p>
+
+<p>Anthony felt a great desire to laugh, but Meg
+looked so woebegone and desperately serious
+that he restrained the impulse and said very
+kindly: "I don't yet understand how, having
+embarked upon such an enterprise, you happen
+to be here ... alone. Did you quarrel at lunch,
+or what?"</p>
+
+<p>"We didn't <em>have</em> lunch," Meg exclaimed with
+a sob. "At least, I didn't ... it was the lunch
+that did it."</p>
+
+<p>"Did what?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 116 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>
+"Made me realise what I had done, and go
+away."</p>
+
+<p>"Meg dear," said Anthony, striving desperately
+to keep his voice steady, "was it a very bad
+lunch?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," she answered with the utmost
+seriousness. "We hadn't begun; we were just
+going to, when I noticed his hands, and his nails
+were dirty, and they looked horrid, and suddenly
+it came over me that if I stayed ... those
+hands...."</p>
+
+<p>She let go of the table, put her elbows upon it
+and hid her face in her hands.</p>
+
+<p>Anthony made no sound, and presently, still
+with hidden face, she went on again:</p>
+
+<p>"And in that minute I saw what I was doing,
+and that I could never be the same again, and I
+remembered my poor little dyspeptic Papa, and
+my dear, dear brothers so far away in India ...
+and you and Jan and Fay&mdash;<em>all</em> the special people
+I pray for every single night and morning&mdash;and
+I felt that if I didn't get away that minute I
+should die...."</p>
+
+<p>"And how did you get away?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was quite simple. There was something
+wrong with the car (that's how he got his hands
+so dirty), and he'd sent for a mechanic, and just
+as we were sitting down to lunch, the waiter said
+the motor-man had come ... and he went out
+to the garage to speak to him...."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes?" Anthony remarked, for again Meg
+paused.</p>
+
+<p>"So I just walked out of the front door. No<!-- Page 117 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>
+one saw me, and the station was across the road,
+and I went right in and asked when there was a
+train to London, and there <em>was</em> one going in five
+minutes; so I took a ticket and came straight
+here, for I knew somehow, even if you were all
+away, Hannah would let me stay ... just to-night.
+I knew she would ..." and Meg began
+to sob feebly.</p>
+
+<p>And, as if in response to the mention of her
+name, Hannah appeared, bearing a tray with
+tea upon it. Hannah was short and square; she
+stumped as she walked, and she carried a tray
+very high and stately, as though it were a sacrifice.
+As she came in Meg rose and hastily moved to
+the window, standing there with her back to the
+room.</p>
+
+<p>"I thocht," said Hannah, as though challenging
+somebody to contradict her, "that Miss
+Morton would be the better for an egg to her
+tea. She looks just like a bit soap after a hard
+day's washing."</p>
+
+<p>"I had no lunch," said a muffled, apologetic
+voice from the window.</p>
+
+<p>"Come away, then, and take yer tea," Hannah
+said sharply. "Young leddies should have more
+sense than go fasting so many hours."</p>
+
+<p>As it was evident that Hannah had no intention
+of leaving the room till she saw Meg sitting
+at the table, the girl came back and sat
+down.</p>
+
+<p>"See that she gets her tea, sir," she said in a
+low, admonitory voice to Anthony. "She's
+pretty far through."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 118 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>
+The tray was set at the end of the table. Anthony
+came and sat down behind it.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll pour out," he said, "and until you've
+drunk one cup of tea, eaten one piece of bread-and-butter
+and one egg, you're not to speak one
+word. <em>I</em> will talk."</p>
+
+<p>He tried to, disjointedly and for the most part
+nonsense. Meg drank her tea, and to her own
+amazement ate up her egg and several pieces of
+bread-and-butter with the utmost relish.</p>
+
+<p>As the meal proceeded, Anthony noted that
+she grew less haggard. The tears still hung on
+her eyelashes, but the eyes themselves were a
+thought less tragic.</p>
+
+<p>When Hannah came for the tray she gave a
+grunt of satisfaction at the sight of the egg-shell
+and the empty plates.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," said Anthony, "we must thresh this
+subject out and settle what's to be done. I suppose
+you left a message for the Trents. What
+did you tell them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Lies," said Meg. "He said we must have a
+good start. His yacht was at Southampton.
+And I left a note that I'd been suddenly summoned
+to Papa, and would write from there.
+They'd all gone for a picnic, you know&mdash;and it
+was arranged I was to have a headache that
+morning ... I've got it now with a vengeance
+... It seemed rather fun when we were planning
+it. Now it all looks so mean and horrid ...
+Besides, lots of people saw us in his motor ...
+and people always know me again because of
+<!-- Page 119 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>my hair. Everyone knew him ... the whole
+county made a fuss of him, and it seemed so
+wonderful ... that he should care like that for
+me...."</p>
+
+<p>"Doubtless it did," said Anthony drily. "But
+we must consider what is to be done now. If you
+said you were going to your father, perhaps the
+best thing you can do is to go to him, and write
+to the Trents from there. I hope you didn't inform
+<em>him</em> of your intention?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," she faltered. "I was to write to him
+just before we sailed ... But you may be perfectly
+sure the Trents will find out ... He will
+probably go back there to look for me ... I
+expect he is awfully puzzled."</p>
+
+<p>"I expect he is, and I hope," Anthony added
+vindictively, "the fellow is terrified out of his
+life as well. He ought to be horsewhipped, and
+I'd like to do it. A babe like you!"</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Meg, firmly; "there you're wrong.
+I'm not a babe ... I knew what I was doing;
+but up to to-day it seemed worth it ... I never
+seemed to see till to-day how it would hurt other
+people. Even if he grew tired of me&mdash;and I had
+faced that&mdash;there would have been some awfully
+happy months ... and so long as it was only
+me, it didn't seem to matter. And when you've
+had rather a mouldy life...."</p>
+
+<p>"It can never be a case of 'only me.' As society
+is constituted, other people are always involved."</p>
+
+<p>"Yet there was Marian Evans ... he told
+me about her ... she did it, and everyone came
+round to think it was very fine of her really. She
+wrote, or something, didn't she?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 120 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>
+"She did," said Anthony, "and in several other
+respects her case was not at all analogous to
+yours. She was a middle-aged woman&mdash;you are
+a child...."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps, but I'm not an ignorant child...."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Meg!" Anthony protested.</p>
+
+<p>"I daresay about books and things I am, but
+I mean I haven't been wrapped in cotton-wool,
+and taken care of all my life, like Jan and Fay
+... I know about things. Oh dear, oh dear,
+will you forbid Jan ever to speak to me again?"</p>
+
+<p>"Jan!" Anthony repeated. "Jan! Why,
+she's the person of all others we want. We'll
+do nothing till she's here. Let's get her." And
+he pushed back his chair and rushed to the bell.</p>
+
+<p>Meg rushed after him: "You'll let her see me?
+You'll let her talk to me? Oh, are you sure?"</p>
+
+<p>The little hands clutched his arm, her ravaged,
+wistful face was raised imploringly to his.</p>
+
+<p>Anthony stooped and kissed the little face.</p>
+
+<p>"It's just people like Jan who are put into the
+world to straighten things out for the rest of us.
+We've wasted three-quarters of an hour already.
+Now we'll get her."</p>
+
+<p>"Is she on the telephone?" asked the practical
+Meg. "Not far off?"</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Jan was quite used to being summoned to her
+father in a tremendous hurry. She was back in
+St. George's Square before he started for the
+dinner. Meg was lying down in one of the dismantled
+bedrooms, and when Jan arrived she
+went straight to her father in his dressing-room.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 121 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>
+She found him on his knees, pursuing a refractory
+collar-stud under the wash-stand.</p>
+
+<p>"It's well you've come," he said as he got up.
+"I can't fasten my collar or my tie. I've had a
+devil of a time. My fingers are all thumbs and
+I'm most detestably sticky."</p>
+
+<p>He told Jan about Meg. She fastened his
+collar and arranged his tie in the neatest of bows.
+Then she kissed him on both cheeks and told
+him not to worry.</p>
+
+<p>"How can one refrain from worrying when
+the works of the devil and the selfishness of man
+are made manifest as they have been to-day?
+But for the infinite mercy of God, where would
+that poor silly child have been?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's just because the infinite mercy of God
+is so much stronger than the works of the devil
+or the selfishness of man, that you needn't worry,"
+said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>Anthony put his hands on Jan's shoulders and
+held her away from him.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know," he said, "I shall always like
+Hannah better after this. In spite of her
+moustache and her grimness, that child was
+sure Hannah would take her in, whether any
+of us were here or not. Now, how did she
+know?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because," said Jan, "things are revealed to
+babes like Meg that are hidden from men of
+the world like you. Hannah is all right&mdash;you
+don't appreciate Hannah, and you are rather
+jealous of her moustache."</p>
+
+<p>Anthony leant forward and kissed his tall<!-- Page 122 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>
+young daughter: "You are a great comfort,
+Jan," he said. "How do you do it?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan nodded at him. "It will all straighten
+out&mdash;don't you worry," she said.</p>
+
+<p>All the same, there was plenty of worry for
+everybody. The man, after his fashion, was
+very much in love with Meg. He was horribly
+alarmed by her sudden and mysterious disappearance.
+No one had seen her go, no one had
+noticed her.</p>
+
+<p>He got into a panic, and motored back to the
+Trents', arriving there just before dinner. Mrs.
+Trent, tired and cross after a wet picnic, had, of
+course, read Meg's note, thought it very casual
+of the girl and was justly incensed.</p>
+
+<p>On finding they knew no more of Meg's movements
+than he did himself, the man&mdash;one Walter
+Brooke&mdash;lost his head and confessed the truth
+to Mrs. Trent, who was much shocked and not
+a little frightened.</p>
+
+<p>Later in the evening she received a telegram
+from Jan announcing Meg's whereabouts.</p>
+
+<p>Jan had insisted on this, lest the Trents should
+suspect anything and wire to Major Morton.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Trent, quite naturally, refused to have
+anything further to do with Meg. She talked
+of serpents, and was very much upset. She wrote
+a dignified letter to Major Morton, explaining
+her reasons for Meg's dismissal. She also wrote
+to their relative among the weariful rich, through
+whom she had heard of Meg.</p>
+
+<p>Meg was more under a cloud than when she
+left Ribston Hall.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 123 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>
+But for Jan and Anthony she might have gone
+under altogether; but they took her down to
+Wren's End and kept guard over her. Anthony
+Ross dealt faithfully with the man, who went
+yachting at once.</p>
+
+<p>Meg recovered her poise, searched the advertisements
+of the scholastic papers industriously,
+and secured a post in a school for little
+boys, as Anthony forced his cousin Amelia to
+give her a testimonial.</p>
+
+<p>Here she worked hard and was a great success,
+for she could keep order, and that quality, where
+small boys are concerned, is much more valuable
+than learning. She stayed there for some years,
+and then her frail little ill-nourished body gave
+out, and she was gravely ill.</p>
+
+<p>When she recovered, she went as English
+governess to a rich German family in Bremen.
+The arrangement was only for one year, and at
+its termination she was free to offer to meet Jan
+and her charges.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 124 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER X<br />
+<span class="sub">PLANS</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="undrop">"</span><span class="dropcap">N</span>OW, chicks, this is London, the friendly
+town," Jan announced, as the taxi drove
+away from Charing Cross station.</p>
+
+<p>"Flendly little London, dirty little London,"
+her niece rejoined, as she bounced up and down
+on Jan's knee. She had slept during the very
+good crossing and was full of conversation and
+ready to be pleased with all she saw.</p>
+
+<p>Tony was very quiet. He had suffered far
+more in the swift journey across France than
+during the whole of the voyage, and it was difficult
+to decide whether he or Ayah were the more
+extraordinary colour. Greenish-white and miserable
+he sat beside his aunt, silent and observing.</p>
+
+<p>"Here's dear old Piccadilly," Jan exclaimed,
+as the taxi turned out of St. James's Street.
+"Doesn't it look jolly in the sunshine?"</p>
+
+<p>Tony turned even greener than before, and
+gasped:</p>
+
+<p>"This! Piccadilly!"</p>
+
+<p>This not very wide street with shops and great
+houses towering above them, the endless streams
+of traffic in the road and on the crowded pavements!</p>
+
+<p>"Did Mrs. Bond live in one of those houses?"
+he wondered, "and if so, where did she keep her<!-- Page 125 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>
+ducks? And where, oh, where, were the tulips
+and the lilies of his dream?"</p>
+
+<p>He uttered no sound, but his mind kept exclaiming,
+"This! Piccadilly?"</p>
+
+<p>"See," said Jan, oblivious of Tony and intent
+on keeping her lively niece upon her knee.
+"There's the Green Park."</p>
+
+<p>Tony breathed more freely.</p>
+
+<p>After all, there <em>were</em> trees and grass; good grass,
+and more of it than in the Resident's garden.
+He took heart a little and summoned up courage
+to inquire: "But where are the tulips?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's too early for tulips yet," Jan answered.
+"By and by there will be quantities. How did
+you know about them? Did dear Mummy tell
+you? But they're in Hyde Park, not here."</p>
+
+<p>Tony made no answer. He was, as usual,
+weighing and considering and making up his mind.</p>
+
+<p>Presently he spoke. "It's different," he said,
+slowly, "but I rather like to look at it."</p>
+
+<p>Tony never said whether he thought things
+were pretty or ugly. All he knew was that certain
+people and places, pictures and words, sometimes
+filled him with an exquisite sense of pleasure,
+while others merely bored or exasperated or
+were positively painful.</p>
+
+<p>His highest praise was "I like to look at it."
+When he didn't like to look at it, he had found it
+wiser to express no opinion at all, except in moments
+of confidential expansion, and these were
+rare with Tony.</p>
+
+<p>Meg had found them a nice little furnished flat
+on the fifth floor in one of the blocks behind Ken<!-- Page 126 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>sington
+High Street, and Hannah must surely
+have been waiting behind the door, so instantaneously
+was it opened, when Jan and her party
+left the lift.</p>
+
+<p>There were tears in Hannah's eyes and her
+nose was red as she welcomed "Miss Fay's motherless
+bairns." She was rather shocked that
+there was no sign of mourning about any of them
+except Jan, who wore&mdash;mainly as a concession to
+Hannah's prejudices&mdash;a thin black coat and
+skirt she had got just before she left Bombay.</p>
+
+<p>Tony stared stonily at Hannah and decided he
+did not like to look at her. She was as surprising
+as the newly-found Piccadilly, but she gratified
+no sensuous perception whatsoever.</p>
+
+<p>Ayah might not be exactly beautiful, but she
+was harmonious. Her body was well proportioned,
+her sari fell in gracious flowing lines, and
+she moved with dignity. Without knowing why,
+Tony felt that there was something pleasing to
+the eye in Ayah. Hannah, on the contrary, was
+the reverse of graceful; stumpy and heavy-footed,
+she gave an impression of abrupt terminations.
+Everything about her seemed too short except
+her caps, which were unusually tall and white
+and starchy. Her afternoon aprons, too, were
+stiffer and whiter and more voluminous than
+those of other folk. She did not regard these
+things as vain adornings of her person, rather
+were they the outward and visible sign of her
+office as housekeeper to Miss Ross. They were a
+partial expression of the dignity of that office,
+just as a minister's gown is the badge of his.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 127 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span></p><p>By the time everyone was washed and brushed
+Meg returned with the luggage and Hannah
+brought in tea.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought you'd like to give the bairns their
+tea yourself the first day, Miss Jan. Will that
+Hindu body have hers in the nursery?"</p>
+
+<p>"That would be best," Jan said hastily. "And
+Hannah, you mustn't be surprised if she sits on
+the floor. Indian servants always do."</p>
+
+<p>"<em>Nothing</em> she can do will surprise me," Hannah
+announced loftily. "I've not forgotten the body
+that came back with Mrs. Tancred, with a ring
+through her nose and a red wafer on her forehead."</p>
+
+<p>Jan, herself, went with Ayah to the nursery,
+where she found that in spite of her disparaging
+sniffs, Hannah had put out everything poor Ayah
+could possibly want.</p>
+
+<p>The children were hungry and tea was a lengthy
+meal. It was not until they had departed with
+Ayah for more washings that Jan found time to
+say: "Why don't you take off your hat, Meg
+dear? I can't see you properly in that extinguisher.
+Is it the latest fashion?"</p>
+
+<p>"The very latest."</p>
+
+<p>Meg looked queerly at Jan as she slowly took
+off her hat.</p>
+
+<p>"There!" she said.</p>
+
+<p>Her hair was cropped as short as a boy's, except
+for the soft, tawny rings that framed her
+face.</p>
+
+<p>"Meg!" Jan cried. "Why on earth have you
+cut off your hair?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 128 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>
+"Chill penury's the cause. I've turned it into
+good hard cash. It happens to be the fashionable
+colour just now."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you really need to? I thought you were
+getting quite a good salary with those Hoffmeyers."</p>
+
+<p>"No English governess gets a <em>good</em> salary in
+Bremen, and mine was but a modest remuneration,
+so I wanted more. Do you remember Lady
+Penelope Pottinger?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hazily. She was pretty, wasn't she ...
+and very smart?"</p>
+
+<p>"She was and is ... smarter than ever now&mdash;mind,
+I put you on your honour never to mention
+it&mdash;<em>she's</em> got my hair."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mean she asked you to sell it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, my child. I offered it for sale and she
+was all over me with eagerness to purchase.
+Hair's the defective wire in her lighting apparatus.
+Her own, at the best, is skimpy and
+straight, though very much my colour, and what
+with permanent waving and instantaneous hair
+colouring it was positively dwindling away."</p>
+
+<p>"I wish you had let it dwindle."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I rather like her&mdash;so I suggested she
+should give her own poor locks a rest and have
+an artistic <i lang="fr">postiche</i> made with mine; it made two,
+one to come and one to go&mdash;to the hairdresser.
+She looks perfectly charming. I'd no idea my
+hair was so decent till I saw it on her head."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope <em>I</em> never shall," Jan said gloomily. "I
+think it was silly of you, for it makes you look
+younger and more irresponsible than ever; and
+what about posts?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 129 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>
+"I've got a post in view where it won't matter
+if only I can run things my own way."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you have to go at once? I thought,
+perhaps&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I wish to take this post at once," Meg interposed
+quickly, "but it depends on you whether I
+get it."</p>
+
+<p>"On me?"</p>
+
+<p>"On no one else. Look here, Jan, will you
+take me on as nurse to Fay's children? A real
+nurse, mind, none of your fine lady arrangements;
+only you must pay me forty pounds a year. I
+can't manage with less if I'm to give my poor
+little Papa any chirps ... I suppose that's a
+frightful lot for a nurse?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not for a good nurse ... But, Meg, you
+got eighty when you taught the little boys, and
+I know they'd jump at you again in that school,
+hair or no hair."</p>
+
+<p>"Listen, Jan." Meg put her elbows on the
+table and leaned her sharp little chin on her two
+hands while she held Jan's eyes with hers. "For
+nine long years, except that time with the Trents,
+I've been teaching, teaching, teaching, and I'm
+sick of teaching. I'd rather sweep a crossing."</p>
+
+<p>"Yet you teach so well; you know the little
+boys adored you."</p>
+
+<p>"I love children and they usually like me. If
+you take me to look after Tony and little Fay, I'll
+do it thoroughly, I can promise you. I won't
+teach them, mind, not a thing&mdash;I'll make them
+happy and well-mannered; and, Jan, listen, do
+you suppose there's anybody, even the most<!-- Page 130 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>
+superior of elderly nurses, who would take the
+trouble for Fay's children that I should? If you
+let me come you won't regret it, I promise you."</p>
+
+<p>Meg's eyes, those curious eyes with the large
+pupil and blue iris flecked with brown, were very
+bright, her voice was earnest, and when it ceased
+it left a sense of tension in the very air.</p>
+
+<p>Jan put out her hand across the table, and
+Meg, releasing her sharp little chin, clasped it
+with hers.</p>
+
+<p>"So that's settled," Meg announced triumphantly.</p>
+
+<p>"No." Jan's voice was husky but firm. "It's
+not settled. I don't think you're strong enough;
+but, even so, if I could pay you the salary you
+ought to have, I'd jump at you ... but, my
+dear, I can't at present. I haven't the least idea
+what it will all cost, but the fares and things
+have made such a hole in this year's money I'll
+need to be awfully careful."</p>
+
+<p>"That's exactly why I want to come; you've
+no idea of being careful and doing things in a
+small way. I've done it all my life. You'll be
+far more economical with me than without me."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't tempt me," Jan besought her. "I see
+all that, but why should I be comfortable at your
+expense? I want you more than I can say.
+Fay wanted it too&mdash;she said so."</p>
+
+<p>"Did Fay actually say so? Did she?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, she did&mdash;not that you should be their
+nurse, we neither of us ever thought of that; but
+she did want you to be there to help me with the
+children. We used to talk about it."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 131 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>
+"Then I'm coming. I must. Don't you see
+how it is, Jan? Don't you realise that nearly all
+the happiness in my life&mdash;<em>all</em> the happiness since
+the boys left&mdash;has come to me through Mr. Ross
+and Fay and you? And now when there's a
+chance for me to do perhaps a little something
+in return ... If you don't let me, it's you who
+are mean and grudging. I shall be perfectly
+strong, if I haven't got to teach&mdash;mind, I won't
+do that, not so much as A.B.C."</p>
+
+<p>"I know it's wrong," Jan sighed, "just because
+it would be so heavenly to have you."</p>
+
+<p>Meg loosed the hand she held and stood up.
+She lifted her thin arms above her head, as
+though invoking some invisible power, stretched
+herself, and ran round the table to kiss Jan.</p>
+
+<p>"And do you never think, you dear, slow-witted
+thing, that it will be rather lovely for <em>me</em>
+to be with you? To be with somebody who is
+kind without being patronising, who treats one
+as a human being and not a machine, who sees
+the funny side of things and isn't condescending
+or improving if she doesn't happen to be cross?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm often cross," Jan said.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, and what if you are? Can't I be cross
+back? I'm not afraid of your crossness. You
+never hit below the belt. Now, promise me
+you'll give me a trial. Promise!"</p>
+
+<p>Meg's arms were round her neck, Meg's absurd
+cropped head was rubbing against hers. Jan was
+very lonely and hungry for affection just then,
+timid and anxious about the future. Even in
+that moment of time it flashed upon her what a<!-- Page 132 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>
+tower of strength this small, determined creature
+would be, and how infinitely hard it was to turn
+Meg from any course she had determined on.</p>
+
+<p>"For a little while, then," so Jan salved her
+conscience. "Just till we all shake down ...
+and your hair begins to grow."</p>
+
+<p>Meg stood up very straight and shook her
+finger at Jan. "Remember, I'm to be a real,
+proper nurse with authority, and a clinical thermometer
+... and a uniform."</p>
+
+<p>"If you like, and it's a pretty uniform."</p>
+
+<p>Meg danced gleefully round the table.</p>
+
+<p>"It will be lovely, it is lovely. I've got it all
+ready; green linen frocks, big <em>well</em>-fitting aprons,
+and such beautiful caps."</p>
+
+<p>"Not caps, Meg!" Jan expostulated. "Please
+not caps."</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly caps. How otherwise am I to
+cover up my head? I can't wear hats all the
+time. And how could I ever inspire those children
+with respect with a head like this? When
+I get into my uniform you'll see what a very
+superior nurse I look."</p>
+
+<p>"You'll look much more like musical comedy
+than sober service."</p>
+
+<p>"You mistake the situation altogether," Meg
+said loftily. "I take my position very seriously."</p>
+
+<p>"But you can't go about Wren's End in caps.
+Everybody knows you down there."</p>
+
+<p>"They'll find out they don't know me as well
+as they thought, that's all."</p>
+
+<p>"Meg, tell me, what did Hannah say when she
+saw your poor shorn head?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 133 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>
+"Hannah, as usual, referred to my Maker, and
+said that had He intended me to have short hair
+He would either have caused it not to grow or
+afflicted me with some disease which necessitated
+shearing; and she added that such havers are just
+flying in the face of Providence."</p>
+
+<p>"So they are."</p>
+
+<p>"All the more reason to cover them up, and I
+wish to impress the children."</p>
+
+<p>"Those children will be sadly browbeaten, I
+can see, and as for their poor aunt, she won't be
+able to call her soul her own."</p>
+
+<p>"That," Meg said, triumphantly, "is precisely
+why I'm so eager to come. When you've been
+an underling all your life you can't imagine what
+a joy it is to be top dog occasionally."</p>
+
+<p>"In that respect," Jan said firmly, "it must
+be turn and turn about. I won't let you come
+unless you promise&mdash;swear, here and now&mdash;that
+when I consider you are looking fagged&mdash;'a
+wispy wraith,' as Daddie used to say&mdash;if I command
+you to take a day in bed, in bed you will
+stay till I give you leave to get up. Unless you
+promise me this, the contract is off."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll promise anything you like. The idea of
+being <em>pressed</em> to remain in bed strikes me as
+merely comic. You have evidently no notion
+how persons in a subordinate position ought to
+be treated. Bed, indeed!"</p>
+
+<p>"I think you might have waited till I got back
+before you parted with your hair." Jan's tone
+was decidedly huffy.</p>
+
+<p>"Now don't nag. That subject is closed.<!-- Page 134 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>
+What about <em>your</em> hair. Do you know it is almost
+white?"</p>
+
+<p>"And what more suitable for a maiden aunt?
+As that is to be my <i lang="fr">rôle</i> for the future I may as
+well look the part."</p>
+
+<p>"But you don't&mdash;that's what I complain of.
+The whiter your hair grows the younger your
+face gets. You're a contradiction, a paradox,
+you provoke conjecture, you're indecently noticeable.
+Mr. Ross would have loved to paint
+you."</p>
+
+<p>Jan shook her head. "No, Daddie never
+wanted to paint anything about me except my
+arms."</p>
+
+<p>"He'd want to paint you now," Meg insisted
+obstinately. "<em>I</em> know the sort of person he liked
+to paint."</p>
+
+<p>"He never would paint people unless he <em>did</em>
+like them," Jan said, smiling as at some recollection.
+"Do you remember how he utterly refused
+to paint that rich Mr. Withells down at Amber
+Guiting?"</p>
+
+<p>"I remember," and Meg laughed. "He said
+Mr. Withells was puffy and stippled."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Tony had been cold ever since he reached the
+Gulf of Lyons, and he wondered what could be
+the matter with him, for he never remembered
+to have felt like this before. He wondered miserably
+what could be the reason why he felt so
+torpid and shivery, disinclined to move, and yet
+so uncomfortable when he sat still.</p>
+
+<p>After his bath, on that first night in London,<!-- Page 135 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>
+tucked into a little bed with a nice warm eiderdown
+over him, he still felt that horrid little
+trickle of ice-cold water down his spine and could
+not sleep.</p>
+
+<p>His cot was in Auntie Jan's room with a tall
+screen round it. The rooms in the flat were
+small, tiny they seemed to Tony, after the lofty
+spaciousness of the bungalow in Bombay, but
+that didn't seem to make it any warmer, because
+Auntie Jan's window was wide open as it would
+go&mdash;top and bottom&mdash;and chilly gusts seemed to
+blow round his head in spite of the screen. Ayah
+and little Fay were in the nursery across the passage,
+where there was a fire. There was no fire
+in this wind-swept chamber of Auntie Jan's.</p>
+
+<p>Tony dozed and woke and woke and dozed,
+getting colder and more forlorn and miserable
+with each change of position. The sheets seemed
+made of ice, so slippery were they, so unkind and
+unyielding and unembracing.</p>
+
+<p>Presently he saw a dim light. Auntie Jan had
+come to bed, carrying a candle. He heard her
+say good night to the little mem who had met
+them at the station, and the door was shut.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of her passion for fresh air, Jan shivered
+herself as she undressed. She made a somewhat
+hasty toilet, said her prayers, peeped round
+the screen to see that Tony was all right, and
+hopped into bed, where a hot-water bottle put in
+by the thoughtful Hannah was most comforting.</p>
+
+<p>Presently she heard a faint, attenuated sniff.
+Again it came, this time accompanied by the
+ghost of something like a groan.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 136 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>
+Jan sat up in bed and listened. Immediately
+all was perfectly still.</p>
+
+<p>She lay down again, and again came that sad
+little sniff, and undoubtedly it was from behind
+the screen that it came.</p>
+
+<p>Had Tony got cold?</p>
+
+<p>Jan leapt out of bed, switched on the light and
+tore away the screen from around his bed.</p>
+
+<p>Yes; his doleful little face was tear-stained.</p>
+
+<p>"Tony, Tony darling, what is the matter?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," he sobbed. "I feel so funny."</p>
+
+<p>Jan put her hand on his forehead&mdash;far from
+being hot, the little face was stone-cold. In a
+moment she had him out of bed and in her warm
+arms. As she took him she felt the chill of the
+stiff, unyielding small body.</p>
+
+<p>"My precious boy, you're cold as charity!
+Why didn't you call me long ago? Why didn't
+you tell Auntie Jan?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't ... know ... what it was," he
+sobbed.</p>
+
+<p>In no time Tony was put into the big bed, the
+bed so warm from Auntie Jan's body, with a
+lovely podgy magic something at his feet that
+radiated heat. Auntie Jan slammed down the
+window at the bottom, and then more fairness!
+She struck a match, there was a curious sort of
+"plop," and a little fire started in the grate, an
+amazing little fire that grew redder and redder
+every minute. Auntie Jan put on a blue dressing-gown
+over the long white garment that she wore,
+and bustled about. Tony decided that he "liked
+to look at her" in this blue robe, with her hair<!-- Page 137 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>
+in a great rope hanging down. She was very
+quick; she fetched a little saucepan and he heard
+talking in the passage outside, but no one else
+came in, only Auntie Jan.</p>
+
+<p>Presently she gave him milk, warm and sweet,
+in a blue cup. He drank it and began to feel
+much happier, drowsy too, and contented. Presently
+there was no light save the red glow of the
+fairy fire, and Auntie Jan got into bed beside
+him.</p>
+
+<p>She put her arm about him and drew him so
+that his head rested against her warm shoulder.
+He did not repulse her, he did not speak, but
+lay stiff and straight with his feet glued against
+that genial podgy something that was so infinitely
+comforting.</p>
+
+<p>"You are kind," Tony said suddenly. "I
+believe you."</p>
+
+<p>The stiff little body relaxed and lay against
+hers in confiding abandonment, and soon he
+was sound asleep.</p>
+
+<p>What a curious thing to say! Jan lay awake
+puzzling. Tragedy lay behind it. Only five
+years old, and yet, to Tony, belief was a more
+important thing than love. She thought of
+Fay, hectic and haggard, and again she seemed
+to hear her say in her tired voice, trying to explain
+Tony: "He's not a cuddly child; he's queer
+and reserved and silent, but if he once trusts you
+it's for always; he'll love you then and never
+change."</p>
+
+<p>Jan could just see, in the red glow from the
+fire, the little head that lay so confidingly against<!-- Page 138 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>
+her shoulder, the wide forehead, the peacefully
+closed eyes. And suddenly she realised that the
+elusive resemblance to somebody that had always
+evaded her was a likeness to that face she
+saw in the glass every time she did her hair. She
+kissed him very softly, praying the while that
+she might never fail him; that he might always
+have reason to trust her.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 139 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XI<br />
+<span class="sub">THE STATE OF PETER</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">M</span>EANWHILE Peter was making discoveries
+about himself. He went back to his flat
+on the evening of the day Jan and the children
+sailed. Swept and garnished and exceedingly
+tidy, it appeared to have grown larger during
+his absence and seemed rather empty. There
+was a sense of unfilled spaces that caused him
+to feel lonely.</p>
+
+<p>That very evening he decided he must get a
+friend to chum with him. The bungalow was
+much too big for one person.</p>
+
+<p>This had never struck him before.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of their excessive neatness there remained
+traces of Jan and the children in the
+rooms. The flowers on the dinner-table proclaimed
+that they had been arranged by another
+hand than Lalkhan's. He was certain of that
+without Lalkhan's assurance that the Miss-Sahib
+had done them herself before she sailed
+that very morning.</p>
+
+<p>When he went to his desk after dinner&mdash;never
+before or after did Peter possess such an orderly
+bureau&mdash;he found a letter lying on the blotting-pad,
+and on each side of the heavy brass inkstand
+were placed a leaden member of a camel-corps
+and an India-rubber ball with a face painted<!-- Page 140 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>
+upon it, which, when squeezed, expressed every
+variety of emotion. These, Lalkhan explained,
+were parting gifts from the young sahib and
+little Fay respectively, and had been so arranged
+by them just before they sailed.</p>
+
+<p>The day before Jan had told the children that
+all this time they had been living in Peter's house
+and that she was sure Mummy would want them
+to be very grateful (she was careful to talk a
+great deal about Mummy to the children lest
+they should forget her); that he had been very
+kind to them all, and she asked if there was anything
+of their very own they would like to leave
+for Peter as a remembrance.</p>
+
+<p>Tony instantly fetched the camel-corps soldier
+that kept guard on a chair by his cot every night;
+that Ayah had not been permitted to pack because
+it must accompany him on the voyage. It
+was, Jan knew, his most precious possession, and
+she assured him that Peter would be particularly
+gratified by such a gift.</p>
+
+<p>Not to be outdone by her brother, little Fay
+demanded her beloved ball, which was already
+packed for the voyage in Jan's suit-case.</p>
+
+<p>Peter sat at his desk staring at the absurd
+little toys with very kind eyes. He understood.
+Then he opened Jan's letter and read it through
+quite a number of times.</p>
+
+<p>"Dear Mr. Ledgard," it ran.</p>
+
+<p>"Whatever Mr. Kipling may say of the Celt,
+the lowland Scot finds it very difficult to express
+strong feeling in words. If I had tried to tell
+you, face to face, how sensible I am of your kind<!-- Page 141 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>ness
+and consideration for us during the last sad
+weeks&mdash;I should have cried. You would have
+been desperately uncomfortable and I&mdash;miserably
+ashamed of myself. So I can only try to write
+something of my gratitude.</p>
+
+<p>"We have been your guests so long and your
+hospitality has been so untiring in circumstances
+sad and strange enough to try the patience of the
+kindest host, that I simply cannot express my
+sense of obligation; an obligation in no wise burdensome
+because you have always contrived to
+make me feel that you took pleasure in doing all
+you have done.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish there had been something belonging to
+my sister that I could have begged you to accept
+as a remembrance of her; but everything she had
+of the smallest value has disappeared&mdash;even her
+books. When I get home I hope to give you one
+of my father's many portraits of her, but I will
+not send it till I know whether you are coming
+home this summer. Please remember, should
+you do so, as I sincerely hope you will, that nowhere
+can there be a warmer welcome for you
+than at Wren's End. It would be the greatest
+possible pleasure for the children and me to see
+you there, and it is a good place to slack in and
+get strong. And there I hope to challenge you to
+the round of golf we never managed during my
+time in India.</p>
+
+<p>"Please try to realise, dear Mr. Ledgard, that
+my sense of your kindness is deep and abiding,
+and, believe me, yours, in most true gratitude,</p>
+
+<p class="ralign smcap">"Janet Ross."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 142 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>
+For a long time Peter sat very still, staring at
+the cheerful, highly-coloured face painted on Fay's
+ball. Cigarette after cigarette did he smoke as he
+reviewed the experience of the last six weeks.</p>
+
+<p>For the first time since he became a man he
+had been constantly in the society of a woman
+younger than himself who appeared too busy and
+too absorbed in other things to remember that
+she was a woman and he a man.</p>
+
+<p>Peter was ordinarily susceptible, and he was
+rather a favourite with women because of his
+good manners; and his real good-nature made
+him ready to help either in any social project that
+happened to be towards or in times of domestic
+stress. Yet never until lately had he seen so
+much of any woman not frankly middle-aged
+without being conscious that he <em>was</em> a man and
+she a woman, and this added, at all events, a
+certain piquancy to the situation.</p>
+
+<p>Yet he had never felt this with Jan.</p>
+
+<p>Quite a number of times in the course of his
+thirty years he had fallen in love in an agreeably
+surface sort of way without ever being deeply
+stirred. Love-making was the pleasantest game
+in the world, but he had not yet felt the smallest
+desire to marry. He was a shrewd young man,
+and knew that marriage, even in the twentieth
+century, at all events starts with the idea of permanence;
+and, like many others who show no
+inclination to judge the matrimonial complications
+of their acquaintance, he would greatly
+have disliked any sort of scandal that involved
+himself or his belongings.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 143 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>
+He was quite as sensitive to criticism as other
+men in his service, and he knew that he challenged
+it in lending his flat to Mrs. Tancred. But here
+he felt that the necessities of the case far outweighed
+the possibilities of misconception, and
+after Jan came he thought no more about it.</p>
+
+<p>Yet in a young man with his somewhat cynical
+knowledge of the world, it was surprising that
+the thought of his name being coupled with Jan's
+never crossed his mind. He forgot that none of
+his friends knew Jan at all, but that almost every
+evening they did see her with him in the car&mdash;sometimes,
+it is true, accompanied by the children,
+but quite as often alone&mdash;and that during
+her visit his spare time was so much occupied in
+looking after the Tancred household that his
+friends saw comparatively little of him, and
+Peter was, as a rule, a very sociable person.</p>
+
+<p>Therefore it came upon him as a real shock
+when people began to ask him point-blank
+whether he was engaged to Jan, and if so, what
+they were going to do about Tancred's children.
+Rightly or wrongly, he discerned in the question
+some veiled reflection upon Jan, some implied
+slur upon her conduct. He was consequently
+very short and huffy with these inquisitive ones,
+and when he was no longer present they would
+shake their heads and declare that "poor old
+Peter had got it in the neck."</p>
+
+<p>If so, poor old Peter was, as yet, quite unconscious
+of anything of the kind.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless he found himself constantly thinking
+about her. Everything, even the familiar<!-- Page 144 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>
+streets and roads, served to remind him of her,
+and when he went to bed he nearly always
+dreamed about her. Absurd, inconsequent, unsatisfactory
+dreams they were; for in them she
+was always too busy to pay any attention to him
+at all; she was wholly absorbed by what it is to
+be feared Peter sometimes called "those confounded
+children." Though even in his dream
+world he was careful to keep his opinion to himself.</p>
+
+<p>Why on earth should he always dream of Jan
+during the first part of the night?</p>
+
+<p>Lalkhan could have thrown some light upon
+the subject. But naturally Peter did not confide
+his obsession to Lalkhan.</p>
+
+<p>Just before she left Jan asked Lalkhan where
+the sahib's linen was kept, and on being shown
+the cupboard which contained the rather untidy
+little piles of sheets, pillow-cases, and towels that
+formed Peter's modest store of house linen, she rearranged
+it and brought sundry flat, square muslin
+bags filled with dried lavender. Lace-edged bags
+with lavender-coloured ribbon run through insertion
+and tied in bows at the two corners. These
+bags she placed among the sheets, much to the
+wonder of Lalkhan, who, however, decided that it
+was kindly meant and therefore did not interfere.</p>
+
+<p>The odour was not one that commended itself
+to him. It was far too faint and elusive. He
+could understand a liking for attar of roses, of
+jessamine, of musk, or of any of the strong scents
+beloved by the native of India. Yet had she
+proposed to sprinkle the sheets with any of these<!-- Page 145 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span>
+essences he would have felt obliged to interfere, as
+the sahib swore violently and became exceedingly
+hot and angry did any member of his household
+venture into his presence thus perfumed. Even
+as it was he fully expected that his master would
+irritably demand the cause of the infernal smell
+that pervaded his bed; so keen are the noses of
+the sahibs. Whereupon Lalkhan, strong in rectitude,
+would relate exactly what had happened,
+produce one of the Jan-incriminating muslin bags,
+escape further censure, and doubtless be commanded
+to burn it and its fellows in the kitchen
+stove. But nothing of the kind occurred, and,
+as it is always easier to leave a thing where it has
+been placed than to remove it, the lavender remained
+among the sheets in humble obscurity.</p>
+
+<p>The old garden at Wren's End abounded in
+great lavender bushes, and every year since it
+became her property Jan made lavender sachets
+which she kept in every possible place. Her own
+clothes always held a faint savour of lavender,
+and she had packed these bags as much as a
+matter of course as she packed her stockings.
+It seemed a shame, though, to take them home
+again when she could get plenty more next summer,
+so she left them in the bungalow linen cupboard.
+They reproduced her atmosphere; therefore
+did Peter dream of Jan.</p>
+
+<p>A fortnight passed, and on their way to catch
+the homeward mail came Thomas Crosbie and
+his wife from Dariawarpur to stay the night.
+Next morning at breakfast Mrs. Crosbie, young,
+pretty and enthusiastic, expatiated on the com<!-- Page 146 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>fort
+of her room, finally exclaiming: "And how,
+Mr. Ledgard, do you manage to have your sheets
+so deliciously scented with lavender&mdash;d'you get
+it sent out from home every year?"</p>
+
+<p>"Lavender?" Peter repeated. "I've got no
+lavender. My people never sent me any, and
+I've certainly never come across any in India."</p>
+
+<p>"But I'm convinced everything smelt of lavender.
+It made me think of home so. If I hadn't
+been just going I'd have been too homesick for
+words. I'm certain of it. Think! You must
+have got some from somewhere and forgotten
+it."</p>
+
+<p>Peter shook his head. "I've never noticed it
+myself&mdash;you really must be mistaken. What
+would I be doing with lavender?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was there all the same," Mrs. Crosbie continued.
+"I'm certain of it. You must have got
+some from somewhere. Do find out&mdash;I'm sure
+I'm not wrong. Ask your boy."</p>
+
+<p>Peter said something to Lalkhan, who explained
+volubly. Tom Crosbie grinned; he understood
+even fluent Hindustani. His wife did not. Peter
+looked a little uncomfortable. Lalkhan salaamed
+and left the room.</p>
+
+<p>"Well?" Mrs. Crosbie asked.</p>
+
+<p>"It seems," Peter said slowly, "there <em>is</em> something
+among the sheets. I've sent Lalkhan to
+get it."</p>
+
+<p>Lalkhan returned, bearing a salver, and laid on
+the salver was one of Jan's lavender bags. He
+presented it solemnly to his master, who with
+almost equal solemnity handed it to Mrs. Crosbie.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 147 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>
+"There!" she said. "Of course I knew I
+couldn't be mistaken. Now where did you get
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was, I suppose, put among the things
+when poor Mrs. Tancred had the flat. I never
+noticed, of course&mdash;it's such an unobtrusive sort
+of smell...."</p>
+
+<p>"Hadn't she a sister?" Mrs. Crosbie asked,
+curiously, holding the little sachet against her
+soft cheek and looking very hard at Peter.</p>
+
+<p>"She had. It was she who took the children
+home, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"Older or younger than Mrs. Tancred?"</p>
+
+<p>"Older."</p>
+
+<p>"How much older?"</p>
+
+<p>"I really don't know," said the mendacious
+Peter.</p>
+
+<p>"Was she awfully pretty, too?"</p>
+
+<p>"Again, I really don't know. I never thought
+about her looks ... she had grey hair...."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh!" Mrs. Crosbie exclaimed&mdash;a deeply disappointed
+"Oh." "Probably much older, then.
+That explains the lavender bags."</p>
+
+<p>Silent Thomas Crosbie looked from his wife to
+Peter with considerable amusement. He realised,
+if she didn't, that Peter was most successfully
+putting her off the scent of more than lavender;
+but men are generally loyal to each other in these
+matters, and he suddenly took his part in the
+conversation and changed the subject.</p>
+
+<p>Among Peter's orders to his butler that morning
+was one to the effect that nothing the Miss-Sahib
+had arranged in the bungalow was to be<!-- Page 148 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>
+disturbed, and the lavender bag was returned to
+rejoin its fellows in the cupboard.</p>
+
+<p>It was four years since Peter had had any
+leave, and it appeared that the lavender had the
+same effect upon him as upon Mrs. Crosbie. He
+felt homesick&mdash;and applied for leave in May.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 149 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XII<br />
+<span class="sub">"THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES"</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">P</span>ETER had been as good as his word, and
+had found a family returning to India who
+were glad to take Ayah back to Bombay. And
+she, though sorry to leave Jan and the children,
+acquiesced in all arrangements made for her with
+the philosophic patience of the East. March
+was a cold month, and she was often rather miserable,
+in spite of her pride in her shoes and
+stockings and the warm clothes Jan had provided
+for her.</p>
+
+<p>Before she left Jan interviewed her new mistress
+and found her kind and sensible, and an
+old campaigner who had made the voyage innumerable
+times.</p>
+
+<p>It certainly occurred to Jan that Peter had
+been extraordinarily quick in making this arrangement,
+but she concluded that he had written
+on the subject before they left India. She
+had no idea that he had sent a long and costly
+cable on the subject. His friend thought him
+very solicitous for her comfort, but set it down
+entirely to her own merits and Peter's discriminating
+good sense.</p>
+
+<p>When the day came Jan took Ayah to her new
+quarters in a taxi. Of course Ayah wept, and<!-- Page 150 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>
+Jan felt like weeping herself, as she would like
+to have kept her on for the summer months.
+But she knew it wouldn't do; that apart from
+the question of expense, Hannah could never
+overcome her prejudices against "that heathen
+buddy," and that to have explained that poor
+Ayah was a Roman Catholic would only have
+made matters worse. Hannah was too valuable
+in every way to upset her with impunity, and the
+chance of sending Ayah back to India in such
+kind custody was too good to lose.</p>
+
+<p>Meg had deferred the adoption of the musical-comedy
+costume until such time as she took over
+Ayah's duties. She in no way interfered, but was
+helpful in so many unobtrusive ways that Jan,
+while she still felt guilty in allowing her to stay
+at all, acknowledged she could never have got
+through this time without her.</p>
+
+<p>Fortunately the day of Ayah's departure was
+fine, so that while Jan took her to her destination
+Meg took the children to spend the afternoon at
+the Zoo. To escort little Fay about London was
+always rather an ordeal to anyone of a retiring
+disposition. She was so fearless, so interested in
+her fellow-creatures, and so ready at all times and
+in all places to enter into conversation with absolute
+strangers, preferably men, that embarrassing
+situations were almost inevitable; and her speech,
+high and clear and carrying&mdash;in spite of the missing
+"r"&mdash;rendered it rarely possible to hope
+people did not understand what she said.</p>
+
+<p>They went by the Metropolitan to Baker
+Street and sat on one of the small seats at right<!-- Page 151 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>
+angles to the windows, and a gentleman wearing
+a very shiny top-hat sat down opposite to them.</p>
+
+<p>He looked at little Fay; little Fay looked at
+him and, smiling her adorable, confident smile,
+leant forward, remarking: "Sahib, you wear a
+very high hat."</p>
+
+<p>Instantly the eyes of all the neighbouring passengers
+were fixed upon the hat and its owner.
+His, however, were only for the very small lady
+that faced him; the small lady in a close white
+bonnet and bewitching curls that bobbed and
+fluttered in the swaying of the train.</p>
+
+<p>He took off the immaculate topper and held it
+out towards her. "There," he said, "would you
+like to look at it?"</p>
+
+<p>Fay carefully rubbed it the wrong way with a
+tentative woolly-gloved finger. "Plitty, high
+hat," she cooed. "Can plitty little Fay have it
+to keep?"</p>
+
+<p>But the gentleman's admiration did not carry
+him as far as this. Somewhat hastily he withdrew
+his hat, smoothed it (it had just been ironed)
+and placed it on his head again. Then he became
+aware of the smiling faces and concentrated
+gaze of his neighbours; also, that the attractive
+round face that had given him so much pleasure
+had exchanged its captivating smile for a pathetic
+melancholy that even promised tears. He turned
+extremely red and escaped at the next station.
+Whereupon ungrateful little Fay, who had never
+had the slightest intention of crying, remarked
+loftily: "Tahsome man dawn."</p>
+
+<p>When at last they reached the Zoo Meg took<!-- Page 152 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>
+it upon herself to remonstrate with her younger
+charge.</p>
+
+<p>"You mustn't ask strangers for things, dear;
+you really mustn't&mdash;not in the street or in the
+train."</p>
+
+<p>"What for?" asked Fay. She nearly always
+said, "What for" when she meant "Why"; and
+it was as hard-worked a phrase as "What nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because people don't do it, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"They do&mdash;I've heard 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, beggars perhaps, but not nice little
+girls."</p>
+
+<p>"Do nasty little girls?"</p>
+
+<p>"<em>Only</em> nasty little girls would do it, I think."</p>
+
+<p>Fay pondered this for a minute, then in a
+regretfully reflective voice she said sadly: "Vat
+was a nasty, gleedy sahib in a tlain."</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all," Meg argued, struggling with her
+mirth. "How would you have liked it if he'd
+asked you to give him your bonnet 'to keep'?"</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay hastily put up her hands to her
+head to be sure her bonnet was in its place, then
+she inquired with great interest: "What's 'is
+place, deah Med?"</p>
+
+<p>"Deah Med" soon found herself followed round
+by a small crowd of other sight-seers who waited
+for and greeted little Fay's unceasing comments
+with joyful appreciation. Such popular publicity
+was not at all to Meg's taste, and although the
+afternoon was extremely cold her cheeks never
+ceased to burn till she got the children safely
+back to the flat again. Tony was gloomy and
+taciturn. Nobody took the slightest notice of<!-- Page 153 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span>
+him. Weather that seemed to brace his sister to
+the most energetic gaiety only made him feel
+torpid and miserable. He was not naughty,
+merely apathetic, uninterested, and consequently
+uninteresting. Meg thought he might be homesick
+and sad about Ayah, and was very kind and
+gentle, but her advances met with no response.</p>
+
+<p>By this time Tony was sure of his aunt, but he
+had by no means made up his mind about Meg.</p>
+
+<p>When they got back to Kensington Meg joyously
+handed over the children to Jan while she
+retired to her room to array herself in her uniform.
+She was to "take over" from that moment,
+and approached her new sphere with high
+seriousness and an intense desire to be, as she
+put it, "a wild success."</p>
+
+<p>For weeks she had been reading the publications
+of the P. N. E. U. and the "Child-Study
+Society," to say nothing of Manuals upon "Infant
+Hygiene," "The Montessori Method" and
+"The Formation of Character." Sympathy and
+Insight, Duty and Discipline, Self-Control and
+Obedience, Regularity and Concentration of Effort&mdash;all
+with the largest capitals&mdash;were to be
+her watchwords. And she buttoned on her well-fitting
+white linen apron (newest and most approved
+hospital pattern, which she had been
+obliged to make herself, for she could buy nothing
+small enough) in a spirit of dedication as sincere
+as that imbuing any candidate for Holy Orders.
+Then, almost breathlessly, she put her
+cap upon her flaming head and surveyed the general
+effect in the long glass.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 154 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>
+Yes, it was all very satisfactory. Well-hung,
+short, green linen frock&mdash;was it a trifle short?
+Yet the little feet in the low-heeled shoes were
+neat as the ankles above them were slim, and one
+needed a short skirt for "working about."</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps there <em>was</em> a touch of musical comedy
+about her appearance, but that was merely because
+she was so small and the cap, a muslin cap
+of a Quakerish shape, distinctly becoming. Well,
+there was no reason why she should want to look
+hideous. She would not be less capable because
+she was pleasing to the eye.</p>
+
+<p>She seized her flannel apron from the bed
+where she had placed it ready before she went
+out, and with one last lingering look at herself
+went swiftly to her new duties.</p>
+
+<p>Tea passed peacefully enough, though Fay
+asked embarrassing questions, such as "Why you
+wear suts a funny hat?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because I'm an ayah," Meg answered quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"Ayahs don't wear zose kind of hats."</p>
+
+<p>"English ayahs do, and I'm going to be your
+ayah, you know."</p>
+
+<p>Fay considered Meg for a minute. "No," she
+said, shaking her head. "<em>No.</em>"</p>
+
+<p>"Have another sponge-finger," Jan suggested
+diplomatically, handing the dish to her niece,
+and the danger was averted.</p>
+
+<p>They played games with the children after tea
+and all went well till bed-time. Meg had begged
+Jan to leave them entirely to her, and with considerable
+misgiving she had seen Meg marshal
+the children to the bathroom and shut the door.<!-- Page 155 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>
+Tony was asked as a favour to go too this first
+evening without Ayah, lest little Fay should feel
+lonely. It was queer, Jan reflected when left
+alone in the drawing-room, how she seemed to
+turn to the taciturn Tony for help where her obstreperous
+niece was concerned. Over and over
+again Tony had intervened and successfully prevented
+a storm.</p>
+
+<p>Meg turned on the bath and began to undress
+little Fay. She bore this with comparative
+meekness, but when all her garments had been
+removed she slipped from Meg's knees and, standing
+squarely on the floor, announced:</p>
+
+<p>"I want my own Ayah. Engliss Ayah not
+wass me. Own Ayah muss come bat."</p>
+
+<p>"She can't, my darling; she's gone to other
+little girls, you know&mdash;we told you many days
+ago."</p>
+
+<p>"She muss come bat&mdash;'<i>jaldi</i>,'" shouted Fay&mdash;"jaldi"
+being Hindustani for "quickly."</p>
+
+<p>Meg sighed. "I'm afraid she can't do that.
+Come, my precious, and let me bathe you; you'll
+get cold standing there."</p>
+
+<p>With a quick movement Meg seized the plump,
+round body. She was muscular though so small,
+and in spite of little Fay's opposition she lifted
+her into the bath. She felt Tony pull at her
+skirts and say something, but was too busy to
+pay attention.</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay was in the bath sure enough, but to
+wash her was quite another matter. You may
+lead a sturdy infant of three to the water in a
+fixed bath, but no power on earth can wash that<!-- Page 156 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>
+infant if it doesn't choose. Fay screamed and
+struggled and wriggled and kicked, finally slipping
+right under the water, which frightened her
+dreadfully; she lost her breath for one second,
+only to give forth ear-splitting yells the next.
+She was slippery as a trout and strong as a leaping
+salmon.</p>
+
+<p>Jan could bear it no longer and came in. Meg
+had succeeded in lifting the terrified baby out of
+the bath, and she stood on the square of cork defying
+the "Engliss Ayah," wet from her topmost
+curl to her pink toes, but wholly unwashed.</p>
+
+<p>Tony ran to Jan and under all the din contrived
+to say: "It's the big bath; she's frightened.
+Ayah never put her in the big bath."</p>
+
+<p>Meg had forgotten this. The little tin bath
+they had brought from India for the voyage
+stood in a corner.</p>
+
+<p>It was filled, while Fay, wrapped in a Turkish
+towel, sobbed more quietly, ejaculating between
+the gurgles: "Nasty hat, nasty Engliss Ayah. I
+want my own deah Ayah!"</p>
+
+<p>When the bath was ready poor Meg again approached
+little Fay, but Fay would have none
+of her.</p>
+
+<p>"No," she wailed, "Engliss Ayah in nasty hat
+<em>not</em> wass me. Tony wass me, <em>deah</em> Tony."</p>
+
+<p>She held out her arms to her brother, who
+promptly received her in his.</p>
+
+<p>"You'd better let me," he said to the anxious
+young women. "We'll never get her finished else."</p>
+
+<p>So it ended in Tony's being arrayed in the
+flannel apron which, tied under his arm-pits, was<!-- Page 157 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>
+not so greatly too long. With his sleeves turned
+up he washed his small sister with thoroughness
+and despatch, pointing out somewhat proudly that
+he "went into all the corners."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 375px;">
+<a name="washed" id="washed"></a>
+<a href="images/washed-lg.jpg" class="noline">
+<img src="images/washed-thumb.jpg" width="231" height="400" alt="" title="" />
+<span class="caption u"><br />He washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+pointing out ... that he &quot;went into all the corners.&quot;</span></a>
+</div>
+
+<p>The washing-glove was very large on Tony's
+little hand, and he used a tremendous lot of soap&mdash;but
+Fay became all smiles and amiability during
+the process. Meg and Jan had tears in their
+eyes as they watched the quaint spectacle. There
+was something poignantly pathetic in the clinging
+together of these two small wayfarers in a
+strange country, so far from all they had known
+and shared in their short experience.</p>
+
+<p>Meg's "nasty hat" was rakishly askew upon
+her red curls, for Fay had frequently grabbed at
+it in her rage, and the beautiful green linen gown
+was sopping wet.</p>
+
+<p>"Engliss Ayah clying!" Fay remarked surprisedly.
+"What for?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because you wouldn't let me bathe you," said
+Meg dismally. Her voice broke. She really was
+most upset. As it happened, she did the only
+thing that would have appealed to little Fay.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't cly, deah Med," she said sweetly.
+"You sall dly me."</p>
+
+<p>And Meg, student of so many manuals, humbly
+and gratefully accepted the task.</p>
+
+<p>It had taken exactly an hour and a quarter to
+get Fay ready for bed. Indian Ayah used to do
+it in fifteen minutes.</p>
+
+<p>Consistently and cheerfully gracious, Fay permitted
+Meg to carry her to her cot and tuck her
+in.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 158 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
+Meg lit the night-light and switched off the
+light, when a melancholy voice began to chant:</p>
+
+<p>"<em>My</em> Ayah always dave me a choccly."</p>
+
+<p>Now there was no infant in London less deserving
+of a choccly at that moment than troublesome
+little Fay. "Nursery Hygiene" proclaimed
+the undeniable fact that sweetmeats last thing
+at night are most injurious. Duty and Discipline
+and Self-Control should all have pointed out the
+evil of any indulgence of the sort. Yet Meg,
+with all her theories quite fresh and new, and
+with this excellent opportunity of putting them
+into practice, extracted a choccly from a box on
+the chest of drawers; and when the voice, "like
+broken music," announced for the third time,
+"<em>My</em> Ayah always dave me a choccly," "So will
+this Ayah," said Meg, and popped it into the
+mouth whence the voice issued.</p>
+
+<p>There was a satisfied smacking and munching
+for a space, when the voice took up the tale:</p>
+
+<p>"Once Tony had thlee&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>But what it was Tony once had "thlee" of Meg
+was not to know that night, for naughty little
+Fay fell fast asleep.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>For a week Tony bathed his sister every night.
+Neither Jan nor Meg felt equal to facing and
+going through again the terrors of that first night
+without Ayah. Little Fay was quite good&mdash;she
+permitted Meg to undress her and even to put
+her in the little bath, but once there she always
+said firmly, "Tony wass me," and Tony did.</p>
+
+<p>Then he burned his hand.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 159 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>
+He was never openly and obstreperously disobedient
+like little Fay. On the whole he preferred
+a quiet life free from contention. But very
+early in their acquaintance Jan had discovered
+that what Tony determined upon that he did,
+and in this he resembled her so strongly that she
+felt a secret sympathy with him, even when such
+tenacity of purpose was most inconvenient.</p>
+
+<p>He liked to find things out for himself, and no
+amount of warning or prohibition could prevent
+his investigations. Thus it came about that,
+carefully guarded as the children were from any
+contact with the fires, Tony simply didn't believe
+what was told him of their dangers.</p>
+
+<p>Fires were new to him. They were so pretty,
+with their dancing flames, it seemed a pity to
+shut them in behind those latticed guards Auntie
+Jan was so fond of. Never did Tony see the
+fires without those tiresome guards and he wanted
+to very much.</p>
+
+<p>One afternoon just before tea, while Meg was
+changing little Fay's frock, he slipped across to
+the drawing-room where Auntie Jan was busy
+writing a letter. Joy! the guard was off the fire;
+he could sit on the rug and watch it undisturbed.
+He made no noise, but knelt down softly in front
+of it and stretched out his hands to the pleasant
+warmth. It was the sort of fire Tony liked to
+watch, red at the heart, with little curling flames
+that were mirrored in the tiled hearth.</p>
+
+<p>Jan looked up from her writing and saw him
+there, saw also that there was no guard, but, as
+little Fay had not yet come, thought Tony far<!-- Page 160 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>
+too sensible to interfere with the fire in any way.
+She went on with her writing; then when she
+looked again something in the intentness of his
+attitude caused her to say: "Be sure you don't
+get too near the fire, Tony; it hurts badly to be
+burned."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Auntie Jan," Tony said meekly.</p>
+
+<p>She wrote a few lines more, looked up, and
+held her breath. It would have been an easy
+matter even then to dash across and put on the
+guard; but in a flash Jan realised that to let Tony
+burn himself a little at that moment might save
+a very bad accident later on. There was nothing
+in his clothes to catch alight. His woollen jersey
+fitted closely.</p>
+
+<p>Exactly as though he were going to pick a
+flower, with curved hand outstretched Tony
+tried to capture and hold one of the dancing
+flames. He drew his hand back very quickly,
+and Jan expected a loud outcry, but none came.
+He sat back on the hearth-rug and rocked his
+body to and fro, holding the burnt right hand
+with his left, but he did not utter a sound.</p>
+
+<p>"It does hurt, doesn't it?" said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>He started at the quiet voice and turned a little
+puckered face towards her. "Yes," he said,
+with a big sigh; "but I know now."</p>
+
+<p>"Come with me and I'll put something on it
+to make it hurt less," said Jan, and crossed to the
+door.</p>
+
+<p>"Hadn't we better," he said, rather breathlessly,
+"put that thing on for fear of Fay?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan carefully replaced the "thing" and took<!-- Page 161 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>
+him to her room, where she bandaged the poor
+little hand with carron-oil and cotton-wool. The
+outer edge was scorched from little finger to
+wrist. She made no remark while she did it,
+and Tony leaned confidingly against her the
+while.</p>
+
+<p>"Is that better?" she asked, when she had fastened
+the final safety-pin in the bandage. There
+was one big tear on Tony's cheek.</p>
+
+<p>"It's nice and cool, that stuff. <em>Why</em> does it
+hurt so, Auntie Jan? It looks so kind and
+pretty."</p>
+
+<p>"It is kind and pretty, only we mustn't go too
+near. Will you be sure and tell Fay how it can
+hurt?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll <em>tell</em> her," he promised, but he didn't seem
+to have much hope of the news acting as a deterrent.</p>
+
+<p>When at bed-time Jan announced that Tony
+could not possibly bathe Fay because he mustn't
+get his hand wet or disturb the dressing, she and
+Meg tremblingly awaited the awful fuss that
+seemed bound to follow.</p>
+
+<p>But Fay was always unexpected. "Then Med
+muss wass me," she remarked calmly. The good
+custom was established and Meg began to perk
+up again.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 162 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII<br />
+<span class="sub">THE WHEELS OF CHANCE</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">M</span>EG was out walking with the children in
+Kensington Gardens, and Hannah was paying
+the tradesmen's books. It was the only way
+to make Hannah take the air, to send her, as she
+put it, "to do the messages." She liked paying
+the books herself, for she always suspected Jan of
+not counting the change.</p>
+
+<p>Jan was alone in the flat and was laying tea
+for the children in the dining-room when "ting"
+went the electric bell. She opened the door to
+find upon the threshold an exceedingly tall young
+man; a well-set-up, smart young man with square
+shoulders, who held out his hand to her, saying
+in a friendly voice: "You may just happen to
+remember me, Miss Ross, but probably not.
+Colonel Walcote's my uncle, and he's living in
+your house, you know. My name's Middleton
+... I <em>hope</em> you remember me, for I've come to
+ask a favour."</p>
+
+<p>As he spoke he gave Jan his card, and on it
+was "Captain Miles Middleton, R. H. A.," and
+the addresses of two clubs.</p>
+
+<p>She led him to the little drawing-room, bracing
+herself the while to be firm in her refusal if the
+Walcotes wanted the house any longer, good tenants
+though they were.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 163 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>
+She was hopelessly vague about her guest, but
+felt she had met him somewhere. She didn't like
+to confess how slight her recollection was, for he
+looked so big and brown and friendly it seemed
+unkind.</p>
+
+<p>He sat down, smoothed his hat, and then with
+an engaging smile that showed his excellent teeth,
+began: "I've come&mdash;it sounds rather farcical,
+doesn't it&mdash;about a dog?"</p>
+
+<p>"A dog?" Jan repeated vaguely. "What
+dog?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, he's my dog at present, but I want him
+to be your dog&mdash;if you'll have him."</p>
+
+<p>"You want to give me a dog&mdash;but why? Or
+do you only want me to keep him a bit for you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it's like this, Miss Ross; it would be
+cheek to ask you to keep a young dog, and when
+you'd had all the trouble of him and got fond of
+him&mdash;and you'll get awfully fond of him, if you
+have him&mdash;to take him away again. It wouldn't
+be fair, it really wouldn't ... so...."</p>
+
+<p>"Wait a bit," said the cautious Jan. "What
+sort of a dog is he ... if it is a he...."</p>
+
+<p>"He's a bull-terrier...."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, but I don't think I'm very fond of bull-terriers
+... aren't they fierce and doesn't one
+always associate them with public-houses? I
+couldn't have a fierce dog, you know, because of
+the two children."</p>
+
+<p>"They're always nice with children," Captain
+Middleton said firmly. "And as for the pothouse
+idea&mdash;that's quite played out. I suppose
+it was that picture with the mug and the clay<!-- Page 164 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>
+pipe. He'd <em>love</em> the children; he's only a child
+himself, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"A puppy! Oh, Captain Middleton, wouldn't
+he eat all our shoes and things and tear up all the
+rugs?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think he's past that, I do really&mdash;he'll be a
+year old on Monday. He'll be a splendid watchdog,
+and he's not a bit deaf&mdash;lots of 'em are, you
+know&mdash;and he's frightfully well-bred. Just you
+look at the pedigree ..." and Captain Middleton
+produced from his breast-pocket a folded
+foolscap document which he handed to Jan.</p>
+
+<p>She gazed at it with polite interest, though it
+conveyed but little to her mind. The name
+"Bloomsbury" seemed to come over and over
+again. There were many dates and other names,
+but "Bloomsbury" certainly prevailed, and it
+was evident that Captain Middleton's dog had
+a long pedigree; it was all quite clearly set down,
+and, to Jan, very bewildering.</p>
+
+<p>"His points are on the back page," Captain
+Middleton said proudly, "and there isn't a single
+one a perfect bull-terrier ought to have that
+William Bloomsbury hasn't got."</p>
+
+<p>"Is that his name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but I call him William, only he is of the
+famous Bloomsbury strain, you know, and one
+can't help being a bit proud of it."</p>
+
+<p>"But," Jan objected, "if he's so well-bred and
+perfect, he must be valuable&mdash;so why should you
+want to give him to me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll explain," said Captain Middleton. "You
+see, ever since they've been down at Wren's End,<!-- Page 165 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>
+my aunt kept him for me. He's been so happy
+there, Miss Ross, and grown like anything.
+We're stationed in St. John's Wood just now,
+you know, and he'd be certain to be stolen if I
+took him back there. And now my aunt's coming
+to London to a flat in Buckingham Gate.
+Now London's no life for a dog&mdash;a young dog,
+anyway&mdash;he'd be miserable. I've been down to
+Wren's End very often for a few days' hunting,
+and I can see he's happy as a king there, and we
+may be ordered anywhere any day ... and I
+don't want to sell him ... You see, I know if
+you take him you'll be good to him ... and he
+<em>is</em> such a nice beast."</p>
+
+<p>"How do you know I'd be good to him? You
+know nothing about me."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't I just! Besides, I've seen you, I'm
+seeing you now this minute ... I don't want to
+force him on you, only ... a lady living alone
+in the country ought to have a dog, and if you
+take William you won't be sorry&mdash;I can promise
+you that. He's got the biggest heart, and he's
+the nicest beast ... and the most faithful...."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you sure he'll be quite gentle with the
+children?"</p>
+
+<p>"He's gentle with everybody, and they're well
+known to be particularly good with children ...
+you ask anyone who knows about dogs. He was
+given me when he was three weeks old, and I
+could put him in my pocket."</p>
+
+<p>Captain Middleton was rather appealing just
+then, so earnest and big and boyish. His face
+was broad though lean, the features rather blunt,<!-- Page 166 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>
+the eyes set wide apart; clear, trustworthy, light-blue
+eyes. He looked just what he was&mdash;a
+healthy, happy, prosperous young Englishman
+without a real care in the world. After all, Jan
+reflected, there was plenty of room at Wren's
+End, and it was good for the children to grow up
+with animals.</p>
+
+<p>"I had thought of an Airedale," she said
+thoughtfully, "but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"They're good dogs, but quarrelsome&mdash;fight
+all the other dogs round about. Now William
+isn't a fighter unless he's unbearably provoked,
+then, of course, he fights to kill."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh dear!" sighed Jan, "that's an awful prospect.
+Think of the trouble with one's neighbours&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But I assure you, it doesn't happen once in a
+blue moon. I've never known him fight yet."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll tell you what, Captain Middleton; let me
+keep him for the present, till you know where
+you're going to be stationed, and then, if you find
+you can have him, he's there for you to take. I'll
+do my best for him, but I want you to feel he's
+still your dog...."</p>
+
+<p>"It's simply no end good of you, Miss Ross.
+I'd like you to have him though ... May I put
+it this way? If you don't like him, find him a
+nuisance or want to get rid of him, you send for
+me and I'll fetch him away directly. But if you
+like him, he's your dog. There&mdash;may I leave it
+at that?"</p>
+
+<p>"We'll try to make him happy, but I expect
+he'll miss you dreadfully.... I know nothing<!-- Page 167 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>
+about bull-terriers; do they need any special
+treatment?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh dear, no. William's as strong as a young
+calf. Just a bone occasionally and any scraps
+there are. There's tons of his biscuits down
+there ... only two meals a day and no snacks
+between, and as much exercise as is convenient&mdash;though,
+mind you, they're easy dogs in that way&mdash;they
+don't need you to be racing about all day
+like some."</p>
+
+<p>The present fate of William Bloomsbury with
+the lengthy and exalted pedigree being settled,
+Jan asked politely for her tenants, Colonel and
+Mrs. Walcote, heard that it had been an excellent
+and open season, and enjoyed her guest's real
+enthusiasm about Wren's End.</p>
+
+<p>After a few minutes of general conversation he
+got up to go. She saw him out and rang up the
+lift, but no lift came. She rang again and again.
+Nothing happened. Evidently something had
+gone wrong, and she saw people walking upstairs
+to the flats below. Just as she was explaining the
+mishap to her guest, the telephone bell sounded
+loudly and persistently.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh dear!" she cried. "Would you mind
+very much stopping a young lady with two little
+children, if you meet them at the bottom of the
+stairs, and tell her she is on no account to carry
+up little Fay. It's my friend, Miss Morton; she's
+out with them, and she's not at all strong; tell her
+to wait for me. I'll come the minute I've answered
+this wretched 'phone."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you worry, Miss Ross, I'll stop 'em<!-- Page 168 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>
+and carry up the kiddies myself," Captain Middleton
+called as he started to run down, and Jan
+went back to answer the telephone.</p>
+
+<p>He ran fast, for Jan's voice had been anxious
+and distressed. Five long flights did he descend,
+and at the bottom he met Meg and the children
+just arrived to hear the melancholy news from
+the hall porter.</p>
+
+<p>Meg always wheeled little Fay to and from
+the gardens in the funny little folding "pram"
+they had brought from India. The plump baby
+was a tight fit, but the queer little carriage was
+light and easily managed. The big policeman
+outside the gate often held up the traffic to let
+Meg and her charges get across the road safely,
+and she would sail serenely through the avenue
+of fiercely panting monsters with Tony holding
+on to her coat, while little Fay waved delightedly
+to the drivers. That afternoon she was very
+tired, for it had started to rain, cold, gusty March
+rain. She had hurried home in dread lest Tony
+should take cold. It seemed the last straw,
+somehow, that the lift should have gone wrong.
+She left the pram with the porter and was just
+bracing herself to carry heavy little Fay when
+this very tall young man came dashing down the
+staircase, saw them and raised his hat. "Miss
+Morton? Miss Ross has just entrusted me with
+a message ... that I'm to carry her niece upstairs,"
+and he took little Fay out of Meg's arms.</p>
+
+<p>Meg looked up at him. She had to look up a
+long way&mdash;and he looked down into a very small
+white face.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 169 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>
+The buffeting wind that had given little Fay
+the loveliest colour, and Tony a very pink nose,
+only left Meg pallid with fatigue; but she smiled
+at Captain Middleton, and it was a smile of such
+radiant happiness as wholly transfigured her face.
+It came from the exquisite knowledge that Jan
+had thought of her, had known she would be
+tired.</p>
+
+<p>To be loved, to be remembered, to be taken
+care of was to Meg the most wonderful thing in
+the world. It went to her head like wine.</p>
+
+<p>Therefore did she smile at Captain Middleton
+in this distracting fashion. It started tremblingly
+at the corners of her mouth, and then&mdash;quite
+suddenly&mdash;her wan little face became dimpled
+and beseeching and triumphant all at once.</p>
+
+<p>It had no connection whatsoever with Captain
+Middleton, but how was he to know that?</p>
+
+<p>It fairly bowled him, middle stump, first ball.</p>
+
+<p>No one had ever smiled at him like that before.
+It turned him hot and cold, and gave him
+a lump in his throat with the sheer heartrending
+pathos of it. And he felt an insane desire to lie
+down and ask this tiny, tired girl to walk upon
+him if it would give her the smallest satisfaction.</p>
+
+<p>The whole thing passed in a flash, but for him
+it was one of those illuminating beams that discovers
+a hitherto undreamed-of panorama.</p>
+
+<p>He caught up little Fay, who made no objection,
+and ran up all five flights about as fast as
+he had run down. Jan was just coming out of
+the flat.</p>
+
+<p>"Here's one!" he cried breathlessly, depositing<!-- Page 170 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>
+little Fay. "And now I'll go down and give the
+little chap a ride as well."</p>
+
+<p>He met them half-way up. "Now it's your
+turn," he said to Tony. "Would you like to
+come on my back?"</p>
+
+<p>Tony, though taciturn, was not unobservant.
+"I think," he said solemnly, "Meg's more tired
+nor me. P'raps you'd better take her."</p>
+
+<p>Meg laughed, and what the rain and wind
+could not do, Tony managed. Her cheeks grew
+rosy.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm afraid I should be rather heavy, Tony
+dear, but it's kind of you to think of it."</p>
+
+<p>She looked up at Captain Middleton and smiled
+again. What a kind world it was! And really
+that tall young man was rather a pleasant person.
+So it fell out that Tony was carried the
+rest of the way, and he had a longer ride than
+little Fay; for his steed mounted the staircase
+soberly, keeping pace with Meg; they even paused
+to take breath on the landings. And it came
+about that Captain Middleton went back into
+the flat with the children, showing no disposition
+to go away, and Jan could hardly do less than
+ask him to share the tea she had laid in the
+dining-room.</p>
+
+<p>There he got a shock, for Meg came to tea in
+her cap and apron.</p>
+
+<p>Out of doors she wore a long, warm coat that
+entirely covered the green linen frock, and a little
+round fur hat. This last was a concession to
+Jan, who hated the extinguisher. So Meg looked
+very much like any other girl. A little younger,<!-- Page 171 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>
+perhaps, than any young woman of twenty-five
+has any business to look, but pretty in her queer,
+compelling way.</p>
+
+<p>That she looked even prettier in her uniform
+Captain Middleton would have been the first to
+allow; but he hated it nevertheless. There
+seemed to him something incongruous and wrong
+for a girl with a smile like that to be anybody's
+nursemaid.</p>
+
+<p>To be sure, Miss Ross was a brick, and this
+queer little servant of hers called her by her
+Christian name and contradicted her flatly twice
+in the course of tea. Miss Morton certainly did
+not seem to be downtrodden ... but she wore
+a cap and an apron&mdash;a very becoming Quakerish
+cap ... without any strings ... and&mdash;"it's a
+d&mdash;&mdash;d shame," was the outcome of all Captain
+Middleton's reflections.</p>
+
+<p>"Would the man never go?" Jan wondered,
+when after a prolonged and hilarious tea he followed
+the enraptured children back to the drawing-room
+and did tricks with the fire-irons.</p>
+
+<p>Meg had departed in order to get things ready
+for the night, and he hung on in the hope that
+she would return. Vain hope; there was no sign
+of her.</p>
+
+<p>He told the children all about William Bloomsbury
+and exacted promises that they would love
+him very much. He discussed, with many interruptions
+from Fay, who wanted all his attention,
+the entire countryside round about Wren's
+End; and, at last, as there seemed really no
+chance of that extraordinary girl's return, he<!-- Page 172 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>
+heaved his great length out of his chair and bade
+his hostess a reluctant farewell several times over.</p>
+
+<p>In the passage he caught sight of Meg going
+from one room to another with her arms full of
+little garments.</p>
+
+<p>"Ah," he cried, striding towards her. "Good
+night, Miss Morton. I hope we shall meet again
+soon," and he held out his hand.</p>
+
+<p>Meg ignored the hand, her own arms were so
+full of clothes: "I'm afraid that's not likely," she
+said, with unfeeling cheerfulness. "We all go
+down to the country on Monday."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, yes, I know. Jolly part of the world it
+is, too. I expect I shall be thereabouts a good
+deal this summer, my relations positively swarm
+in that county."</p>
+
+<p>"Good-bye," said Meg, and turned to go. Jan
+stood at the end of the passage, holding the door
+open.</p>
+
+<p>"I say, Miss Morton, you'll try and like my
+William, won't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I like all sensible animals," was Meg's response,
+and she vanished into a bedroom.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 173 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XIV<br />
+<span class="sub">PERPLEXITIES</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="undrop">"</span><span class="dropcap">D</span>ON'T you think it is very extraordinary
+that I have never had one line from Hugo
+since the letter I got at Aden?" asked Jan.</p>
+
+<p>It was Friday evening, the Indian mail was in,
+and there was a letter from Peter&mdash;the fourth
+since her return.</p>
+
+<p>"But you've heard of him from Mr. Ledgard,"
+Meg pointed out.</p>
+
+<p>"Only that he had gone to Karachi from Bombay
+just before Fay died&mdash;surely he would see
+papers there. It seems so heartless never to
+have written me a line&mdash;I can't believe it, somehow,
+even of Hugo&mdash;he must be ill or something."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps he was ashamed to write. Perhaps
+he felt you would simply loathe him for being
+the cause of it all."</p>
+
+<p>"I did, I do," Jan exclaimed; "but all the same
+he is the children's father, and he was her husband&mdash;I
+don't want anything very bad to happen
+to him."</p>
+
+<p>"It would simplify things very much," Meg
+said dreamily.</p>
+
+<p>Jan held up her hand as if to ward off a blow.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't, Meg; sometimes I find myself wishing
+something of the kind, and I know it's wrong and<!-- Page 174 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>
+horrible. I want as far as I can to keep in the
+right with regard to Hugo, to give him no grievance
+against me. I've written to that bank
+where he left the money, and asked them to
+forward the letters if he has left any address.
+I've told him exactly where we are and what we
+propose to do. Beyond the bare facts of Fay's
+death&mdash;I told him all about her illness as dispassionately
+as I could&mdash;I've never reproached
+him or said anything cruel. You see, the man is
+down and out; though Mr. Ledgard always declared
+he had any amount of mysterious wires to
+pull. Yet, I can't help wondering whether he is
+ill somewhere, with no money and no friends, in
+some dreadful native quarter."</p>
+
+<p>"What about the money in the bank, then?
+Did you use it?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan blushed. "No, I couldn't bear to touch
+his money ... Mr. Ledgard said it was idiotic...."</p>
+
+<p>"So it was; it was Fay's money, not his. For
+all your good sense, Jan, sometimes you're sentimental
+as a schoolgirl."</p>
+
+<p>"I daresay it was stupid, and I didn't dare to
+tell Mr. Ledgard I'd left it," Jan said humbly;
+"but I felt that perhaps that money might help
+him if things got very desperate; I left it in his
+name and a letter telling him I had done so ...
+I didn't <em>give</em> him any money...."</p>
+
+<p>"It was precisely the same thing."</p>
+
+<p>"And he may never have got the letter."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope he hasn't."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Meg, I do so hate uncertainty. I'd<!-- Page 175 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>
+rather know the worst. I always have the foreboding
+that he will suddenly turn up at Wren's
+End and threaten to take the children away ...
+and get money out of me that way ... and
+there's none to spare...."</p>
+
+<p>"Jan, you've got into a thoroughly nervous,
+pessimistic state about Hugo. Why in the world
+should he <em>want</em> the children? They'd be terribly
+in his way, and wherever he put them he'd have
+to pay <em>something</em>. You know very well his
+people wouldn't keep them for nothing, even if
+he were fool enough (for the sake of blackmailing
+you) to threaten to place them there. His sisters
+wouldn't&mdash;not for nothing. What did Fay say
+about his sisters? I remember one came to the
+wedding, but she has left no impression on my
+mind. He has two, hasn't he?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but only one came, the Blackpool one.
+But Fay met both of them, for she spent a week-end
+with each, with Hugo, after she was married."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, and what did she say?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan laughed and sighed: "She said&mdash;you remember
+how Fay could say the severest things
+in the softest, gentlest voice&mdash;that 'for social
+purposes they were impossible, but they were
+doubtless excellent and worthy of all esteem and
+that they were exactly suited to the <i lang="fr">milieu</i> in
+which they lived.'"</p>
+
+<p>"And where do they live?"</p>
+
+<p>"One lives at Blackpool&mdash;she's married to ...
+I forget exactly what he is&mdash;but it's something to
+do with letting houses. They're quite well off
+and all her towels had crochet lace at the ends.<!-- Page 176 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>
+Fay was much impressed by this, as it scratched
+her nose. They also gave you 'doylies' at afternoon
+tea and no servant ever came into the room
+without knocking."</p>
+
+<p>"Any children?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, three."</p>
+
+<p>"And the other sister?"</p>
+
+<p>"She lives at Poulton-le-Fylde, and her husband
+had to do with a newspaper syndicate.
+Quite amusing he was, Fay says, but very shaky
+as to the letter 'H.'"</p>
+
+<p>"Would they like the children?"</p>
+
+<p>"They might, for they've none of their own,
+but they certainly wouldn't take them unless
+they were paid for, as they were not well off.
+They were rather down on the Blackpool sister,
+Fay said, for extravagance and general swank."</p>
+
+<p>"What about the grandparents?"</p>
+
+<p>"In Guernsey? They're quite nice old people,
+I believe, but curiously&mdash;of course I'm quoting
+Fay&mdash;comatose and uninterested in things,
+'behindhand with the world,' she said. They
+thought Hugo very wonderful, and seemed rather
+afraid of him. What he has told them lately I
+don't know. He wrote very seldom, they said;
+but <em>I've</em> written to them, saying I've got the
+children and where we shall be. If they express
+a wish to see the children I'll ask them to Wren's
+End. If, as would be quite reasonable, they say
+it's too far to come&mdash;they're old people, you
+know&mdash;I suppose one of us would need to take
+them over to Guernsey for a visit. I do so want
+to do the right thing all round, and then they<!-- Page 177 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>
+can't say I've kept the children away from their
+father's relations."</p>
+
+<p>"Scotch people always think such a lot about
+relations," Meg grumbled. "I should leave them
+to stew in their own juice. Why should you
+bother about them if he doesn't?"</p>
+
+<p>"They're all quite respectable, decent folk, you
+know, though they mayn't be our kind. The
+father, I fancy, failed in business after he came
+back from India. Fay said he was very meek
+and depressed always. I think she was glad none
+of them came to the wedding except the Blackpool
+sister, for she didn't want Daddie to see
+them. He thought the Blackpool sister dreadful
+(he told me afterwards that she 'exacerbated his
+mind and offended his eye'), but he was charming
+to her and never said a word to Fay."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see much sign of Hugo and his people
+in the children."</p>
+
+<p>"We can't tell, they're so little. One thing
+does comfort me, they show no disposition to tell
+lies; but that, I think, is because they have never
+been frightened. You see, everyone bowed down
+before them; and whatever Indian servants may
+be in other respects, they seem to me extraordinarily
+kind and patient with children."</p>
+
+<p>"Jan, what are your views about the bringing
+up of children?... You've never said ... and
+I should like to know. You see, we're both"&mdash;here
+Meg sighed deeply and looked portentously
+grave&mdash;"in a position of awful responsibility."</p>
+
+<p>They were sitting on each side of the hearth,
+with their toes on the fender. Meg had been<!-- Page 178 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>
+sewing at an overall for little Fay, but at that
+moment she laid it on her knee and ran her hands
+through her cropped hair, then about two inches
+long all over her head, so that it stood on end
+in broken spirals and feathery curls above her
+bright eyes. In the evening the uniform was
+discarded "by request."</p>
+
+<p>Jan looked across at her and laughed.</p>
+
+<p>So funny and so earnest; so small, and yet so
+great with purpose.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think I've any views. R. L. S. summed
+up the whole duty of children ages ago, and it's
+our business to see that they do it&mdash;that's all.
+Don't you remember:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">A child should always say what's true,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And speak when he is spoken to,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And behave mannerly at table:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">At least as far as he is able.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>It's no use to expect too much, is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"If you expect to get the second injunction
+carried out in the case of your niece you're a most
+optimistic person. For three weeks now I've
+been perambulating Kensington Gardens with
+those children, and I have never in the whole
+course of my life entered into conversation with
+so many strangers, and it's always she who begins
+it. Then complications arise and I have to
+intervene. I don't mind policemen and park-keepers
+and roadmen, but I rather draw the line
+at idly benevolent old gentlemen who join our
+party and seem to spend the whole morning with
+us...."</p>
+
+<p>"But, Meg, that never happens when I'm with<!-- Page 179 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>
+you. I confess I've left you to it this last
+week...."</p>
+
+<p>"And what am I here for except to be left to
+it&mdash;I don't mean that anyone's rude or pushing&mdash;but
+Miss Tancred <em>is</em> so friendly, and I'm not
+dignified and awe-inspiring like you, you great
+big Jan; and the poor men are encouraged, directly
+and deliberately encouraged, by your niece.
+I never knew a child with such a continual flow
+of conversation."</p>
+
+<p>"Poor Meg," said Jan, "you won't have much
+more of it. Little Fay <em>is</em> a handful, I confess;
+but I always feel it must be a bit hard to be
+hushed continually&mdash;and just when one feels particularly
+bright and sparkling, to have all one's
+remarks cut short...."</p>
+
+<p>"You needn't pity that child. No amount of
+hushing has any effect; you might just as well
+hush a blackbird or a thrush. Don't look so
+worried, Jan. Did Mr. Ledgard say anything
+about Hugo in that letter to-night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Only that he was known to have left Karachi
+in a small steamer going round the coast, but
+after that nothing more. Mr. Ledgard has a
+friend in the Police, and even there they've heard
+nothing lately. I think myself the Indian Government
+<em>wants</em> to lose sight of Hugo. He's inconvenient
+and disgraceful, and they'd like him
+blotted out as soon as possible."</p>
+
+<p>"What else does Mr. Ledgard say? He seems
+to write good long letters."</p>
+
+<p>"He is coming home at the end of April for
+six months."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 180 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
+"Oh ... then we shall see him, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"I hope so."</p>
+
+<p>Meg looked keenly at Jan, who was staring
+into the fire, her eyes soft and dreamy; and almost
+as if she was unconsciously thinking aloud,
+she said: "I do hope, if Hugo chooses to turn up,
+he'll wait till Mr. Ledgard is back in England."</p>
+
+<p>"You think he could manage him?"</p>
+
+<p>"I know he could."</p>
+
+<p>"Then let us pray for his return," said Meg.</p>
+
+<p>The clock on the mantelpiece struck eleven.</p>
+
+<p>"Bed-time," said Meg, "but I must have just
+one cigarette first. That's what's so lovely
+about being with you, Jan&mdash;you don't mind. Of
+course I'd never do it before the children."</p>
+
+<p>"You wouldn't shock them if you did. Fay
+smoked constantly."</p>
+
+<p>Meg lit her cigarette and clearly showed her
+real enjoyment. She had taken to it first when
+she was about fifteen, as she found it helped her
+to feel less hungry. Now it had become as much
+a necessity to her as to many men, and the long
+abstinence of term-time had always been a penance.</p>
+
+<p>She made some good rings, and, leaning forward
+to look through them at Jan, said: "By the
+way, I must just tell you that for the last three
+afternoons we've met that Captain Middleton in
+the Gardens."</p>
+
+<p>"Well?"</p>
+
+<p>"And he talks everlastingly about his dog&mdash;that
+William Bloomsbury creature. I know <em>all</em>
+the points of a bull-terrier now&mdash;'Well-set head<!-- Page 181 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>
+gradually tapering to muzzle, which is very powerful
+and well-filled up in front of the eyes. Nose
+large and black. Teeth dead-level and big' ...
+oh! and reams more, every bit of him accurately
+described."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a little afraid of those teeth so 'dead-level
+and big'&mdash;I foresee trouble."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, no," said Meg easily. "He's evidently a
+most affectionate brute. That young man puzzles
+me. He's manifestly devoted to the dog,
+but he's so sure he'd be stolen he'd rather have
+him away from him down at Wren's End than
+here with him, to run that risk."</p>
+
+<p>"Surely," said Jan, "Kensington Gardens are
+some distance from St. John's Wood."</p>
+
+<p>"So one would think, but the rich and idle take
+taxis, and he seems to think he can in some way
+insure the welfare of his dog through the children
+and me."</p>
+
+<p>"And what about the old gentlemen? Do
+they join the party as well?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, dear no; no old gentlemen would dare to
+come within miles of us with that young man in
+charge of little Fay. He's like your Mr. Ledgard&mdash;very
+protective."</p>
+
+<p>"I like him for being anxious about his dog,
+but I'm not quite so sure that I approve of the
+means he takes to insure its happiness."</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't encourage him in the least, I assure
+you. I pointed out that he most certainly ought
+not to be walking about with a nurse and two
+children. That the children without the nurse
+would be all right, but that my being there<!-- Page 182 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
+made the whole thing highly inexpedient, and
+<i lang="la">infra dig</i>."</p>
+
+<p>"Meg!... you didn't!"</p>
+
+<p>"I did, indeed. There was no use mincing
+matters."</p>
+
+<p>"And what did he say?"</p>
+
+<p>"He said, 'Oh, that's all bindles'&mdash;whatever
+that may mean."</p>
+
+<p>"You mustn't go to the Gardens alone any
+more. I'll come with you to-morrow, or, better
+still, we'll all go to Kew if it's fine."</p>
+
+<p>"I <em>should</em> be glad, though I grudge the fares;
+but you needn't come. I know how busy you
+are, with Hannah away and so much to see to&mdash;and
+what earthly use am I if I can't look after
+the children without you?"</p>
+
+<p>"You do look after the children without me
+for hours and hours on end. I could never trust
+anyone else as I do you."</p>
+
+<p>"I <em>am</em> getting to manage them," Meg said
+proudly; "but just to-day I must tell you&mdash;it
+was rather horrid&mdash;we came face to face with the
+Trents in the Baby's Walk. Mrs. Trent and
+Lotty, the second girl, the big, handsome one&mdash;and
+he evidently knows them...."</p>
+
+<p>"Who evidently knows them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Captain Middleton, silly! (I told you he was
+with us, talking about his everlasting dog)&mdash;and
+they greeted him with effusion, so he had to stop.
+But you can imagine how they glared at me. Of
+course I walked on with Tony, but little Fay
+had his hand&mdash;I was wheeling the go-cart thing
+and she stuck firmly to him, and I heard her in<!-- Page 183 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>terrupting
+the conversation all the time. He
+followed us directly, I'll say that for him, but it
+was a bad moment ... You see, they had a
+right to glare...."</p>
+
+<p>"They had nothing of the kind. I wish I got
+the chance of glaring at them. Daddie <em>saw</em> Mrs.
+Trent; he explained everything, and she said she
+quite understood."</p>
+
+<p>"She would, to him, he was so nice always; but
+you see, Jan, I know what she believes and what
+she has said, and what she will probably say to
+Captain Middleton if she gets the chance."</p>
+
+<p>Meg's voice broke. "Of course I don't
+care&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She held her tousled head very high and stuck
+out her sharp little chin.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear," said Jan, "what with my gregarious
+niece and my too-attractive nurse, I think
+it's a good thing we're all going down to Wren's
+End, where the garden-walls are high and the
+garden fairly large. Besides all that, there will
+be that dog with the teeth 'dead-level and big.'"</p>
+
+<p>"Remember," said Meg. "He treated me like
+a princess always."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 184 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XV<br />
+<span class="sub">WREN'S END</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">I</span>T stands just beyond the village of Amber
+Guiting, on the side furthest from the station,
+which is a mile from the village.</p>
+
+<p>"C. C. S. 1819" is carved above the front door,
+but the house was built a good fifty years previous
+to that date.</p>
+
+<p>One Charles Considine Smith, who had been a
+shipper of sherry in Billiter Street, in the City of
+London, bought it in that year from a Quaker
+called Solomon Page, who planted the yew hedge
+that surrounds the smooth green lawn seen from
+the windows of the morning-room. There was a
+curious clause attached to the title-deeds, which
+stipulated that no cats should be kept by the
+owner of Wren's End, lest they should interfere
+with the golden-crested wrens that built in the
+said yew hedge, or the brown wrens building at
+the foot of the hedges in the orchard. Appended
+to this injunction were the following verses:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">If aught disturb the wrens that build,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">If ever little wren be killed<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">By dweller in Wren's End&mdash;<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Misfortunes&mdash;whence he shall not know&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Shall fall on him like noiseless snow,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And all his steps attend.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<!-- Page 185 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span><span class="i0">Peace be upon this house; and all<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That dwell therein good luck befall,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That do the wrens befriend.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Charles Considine Smith faithfully kept to his
+agreement regarding the protection of the wrens,
+and much later wrote a series of articles upon
+their habits, which appeared in the <cite>North Cotswold
+Herald</cite>. He seems to have been on friendly
+terms with Solomon Page, who, having inherited
+a larger property in the next county, removed
+thence when he sold Wren's End.</p>
+
+<p>In 1824 Smith married Tranquil Page, daughter
+of Solomon. She was then thirty-seven years
+old, and, according to one of her husband's diaries,
+"a staid person like myself." She was
+twenty years younger than her husband and
+bore him one child, a daughter also named Tranquil.</p>
+
+<p>She, however, appears to have been less staid
+than her parents, for she ran away before she
+was twenty with a Scottish advocate called James
+Ross.</p>
+
+<p>The Smiths evidently forgave the wilful Tranquil,
+for, on the death of Charles, she and her
+husband left Scotland and settled with her mother
+at Wren's End. She had two children, Janet, the
+great-aunt who left Jan Wren's End, and James,
+Jan's grandfather, who was sent to Edinburgh for
+his education, and afterwards became a Writer to
+the Signet. He married and settled in Edinburgh,
+preferring Scotland to England, and it was with
+his knowledge and consent that Wren's End was
+left to his sister Janet.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 186 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>
+Janet never married. She was energetic, prudent,
+and masterful, having an excellent head
+for business. She was kind to her nephews and
+nieces in a domineering sort of way, and had
+always a soft place in her heart for Anthony,
+though she regarded him as more or less of a
+scatter-brain. When she was nearly eighty she
+commanded his little girls to visit her. Jan was
+then fourteen and Fay eleven. She liked them
+because they had good manners and were neither
+of them in the least afraid of her. And at her
+death, six years later, she left Wren's End to
+Jan absolutely&mdash;as it stood; but she left her
+money to Anthony's elder brother, who had a
+large family and was not particularly well off.</p>
+
+<p>That year was a good artistic year for Anthony,
+and he spent over five hundred pounds in&mdash;as he
+put it&mdash;"making Jan's house habitable."</p>
+
+<p>This proved not a bad investment, for they
+had let it every winter since to Colonel Walcote
+for the hunting season, as three packs of hounds
+met within easy reach of it; and although the
+stabling accommodation at Wren's End was but
+small, plenty of loose boxes were always obtainable
+from Farmer Burgess quite near.</p>
+
+<p>Amber Guiting is a big village, almost a little
+town. It possesses an imposing main street
+wherein are several shops, among them a stationer's
+with a lending library in connection with
+Mudie's; a really beautiful old inn with a courtyard;
+and grave-looking, dignified houses occupied
+by the doctor, a solicitor, and several other
+persons of acknowledged gentility.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 187 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>
+There were many "nice places" round about,
+and altogether the inhabitants of Amber Guiting
+prided themselves, with some reason, on the
+social and æsthetic advantages of their neighbourhood.
+Moreover, it is not quite three hours
+from Paddington. You catch the express from
+the junction.</p>
+
+<p>Notwithstanding all these agreeable circumstances,
+William Bloomsbury was very lonely and
+miserable.</p>
+
+<p>All the friends he knew and loved had gone,
+leaving him in the somewhat stepmotherly charge
+of a caretaker from the village, who was supposed
+to be getting the house ready for its owner. To
+join her came Hannah&mdash;having left her young
+ladies with an "orra-buddy" in the flat. And
+after Hannah came the caretaker-lady did not
+stop long, for their ideas on the subject of cleanliness
+were diametrically opposed. Hannah was
+faithful and punctual as regarded William's meals;
+but though his body was more comfortable than
+during the caretaker's reign, his heart was empty
+and hungry, and he longed ardently for social intercourse
+and an occasional friendly pat.</p>
+
+<p>Presently in Hannah's train came Anne Chitt,
+a meek young assistant from the village, who
+did occasionally gratify William's longing for a
+little attention; but so soon as she began to pat
+him and say he was a good dog, she was called
+away by Hannah to sweep or dust or wash something.
+In William's opinion the whole house
+was a howling wilderness where pails of water
+easily upset, and brooms that fell upon the un<!-- Page 188 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>suspecting
+with resounding blows lay ambushed
+in unexpected places.</p>
+
+<p>Men and dogs alike abhor "spring-cleaning,"
+and William's heart died within him.</p>
+
+<p>There came a day, however, when things were
+calmer. The echoing, draughty house grew still
+and warm, and a fire was lit in the hall. William
+lay in front of it unmolested; but he felt dejected
+and lonely, and laid his head down on his crossed
+paws in patient melancholy.</p>
+
+<p>Late in the afternoon, there came a sound of
+wheels in the drive. Hannah and Anne Chitt,
+decorous in black dresses and clean aprons, came
+into the hall and opened the front door, and in
+three minutes William knew that happier times
+were in store for him. The "station-fly" stopped
+at the door, and regardless of Hannah's reproving
+voice he rushed out to welcome the strangers.
+Two children, nice children, who appeared as
+glad to see him as he was to see them, who wished
+him many happy returns of his birthday&mdash;William
+had forgotten it was his birthday&mdash;and were
+as lavish with pats and what little Fay called
+"stlokes" as Hannah had been niggardly. There
+were also two young ladies, who addressed him
+kindly and seemed pleasantly aware of his existence,
+and William liked young ladies, for the
+three Miss Walcotes had thoroughly spoiled him.
+But he decided to attach himself most firmly to
+the children and the very small young lady.
+Perhaps they would stay. In his short experience
+grown people had a cruel way of disappearing.
+<!-- Page 189 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>
+There was that tall young man ... William
+hardly dared let himself think about that
+tall young man who had allowed him to lie upon
+his bed and was so kind and jolly. "Master"
+William had called him. Ah, where was he?
+Perhaps he would come back some day. In the
+meantime here were plenty of people to love.
+William cheered up.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 335px;">
+<a name="William" id="William"></a>
+<a href="images/william-lg.jpg" class="noline">
+<img src="images/william-thumb.jpg" width="264" height="400" alt="" title="" />
+<span class="caption u"><br />William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ...
+nice children.</span></a>
+</div>
+
+<p>He wished to ingratiate himself, and proceeded
+to show off his one accomplishment. With infinite
+difficulty and patience the Miss Walcotes
+had taught him to "give a paw"; so now, on this
+first evening, William followed the children about
+solemnly offering one paw and then the other;
+a performance which was greeted with acclamation.</p>
+
+<p>When the children went to the bathroom he
+somehow got shut outside. So he lay down and
+breathed heavily through the bottom of the door
+and varied this by thin, high-pitched yelps&mdash;which
+were really squeals, and very extraordinary
+as proceeding from such a large and heavy dog.</p>
+
+<p>"William wants to come in," Tony said. He
+still always accompanied his sister to the bath.</p>
+
+<p>Meg was seized with an inspiration. "I know
+why," she exclaimed. "He expects to see little
+Fay in the big bath."</p>
+
+<p>Fay looked from Meg to her brother and from
+her brother to Meg.</p>
+
+<p>Another dismal squeal from under the door.</p>
+
+<p>"Does he tluly espect it?" she asked anxiously.</p>
+
+<p>"I think so," Meg said gravely, "and we can't
+let him in if you're going to be washed in the
+little bath; he'd be so disappointed."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 190 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>
+The little bath stood ready on its stand. Fay
+turned her back upon it and went and looked
+over the edge of the big bath. It was a very big
+bath, white and beautiful, with innumerable silvered
+handles that produced sprays and showers
+and waves and all sorts of wonders. An extravagance
+of Anthony's.</p>
+
+<p>"Will William come in, too?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"No; he'd make such a mess; but he'd love
+to see you. We'll all bathe William some other
+time."</p>
+
+<p>More squeals from outside, varied by dolorous
+snores.</p>
+
+<p>"Let him in," said little Fay. "I'll show him
+me."</p>
+
+<p>Quick as thought Meg lifted her in, opened the
+door to the delighted William, who promptly
+stood on his hind legs, with his front paws on the
+bath, and looked over the edge at little Fay.</p>
+
+<p>"See me swim," she exclaimed proudly, sitting
+down in the water, while William, with his tongue
+hanging out and a fond smile of admiration on
+his foolish countenance, tried to lick the plump
+pink shoulders presented to his view. "This is
+a muts nicer baff than the nasty little one. I
+can't think what you bringed it for, deah Med."</p>
+
+<p>"Deah Med" and Tony nodded gaily to one
+another.</p>
+
+<p>Hannah had made William sleep in the scullery,
+which he detested. She put his basket
+there and his blanket, and he was warm enough,
+but creature comforts matter little to the right
+kind of dog. It's human fellowship he craves.<!-- Page 191 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>
+That night she came to fetch him at bed-time,
+and he refused point-blank to go. He put his
+head on Meg's knee and gazed at her with beseeching
+eyes that said as plainly as possible:
+"Don't banish me&mdash;where you go I go&mdash;don't
+break my heart and send me away into the
+cold."</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps the cigarette smoke that hung about
+Meg gave him confidence. His master smelt like
+that. And William went to bed with his master.</p>
+
+<p>"D'you think he might sleep in the dressing-room?"
+Meg asked. "I know how young dogs
+hate to be alone at night. Put his basket there,
+Hannah&mdash;I'll let him out and see to him, and you
+could get him first thing in the morning."</p>
+
+<p>Hannah gave a sniff of disapproval, but she
+was always very careful to do whatever Meg
+asked her at once and ungrudgingly. It was
+partly an expression of her extreme disapproval of
+the uniform. But Meg thought it was prompted
+entirely by Hannah's fine feeling, and loved her
+dearly in consequence.</p>
+
+<p>Nearly all the bedrooms at Wren's End had
+dressing-rooms. Tony slept in Jan's, with the
+door between left open. Fay's little cot was
+drawn up close to Meg's bed. William and his
+basket occupied the dressing-room, and here, also,
+the door was left open.</p>
+
+<p>While Meg undressed, William was quite still
+and quiet, but when she knelt down to say her
+prayers he was overcome with curiosity, and, getting
+out of his basket, lurched over to her to see
+what she was about. Could she be crying that<!-- Page 192 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>
+she covered her face? William couldn't bear
+people to cry.</p>
+
+<p>He thrust his head under her elbow. She put
+her arm round his neck and he sat perfectly still.</p>
+
+<p>"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered.</p>
+
+<hr class="wide" />
+
+<p>"I like to look at it," said Tony.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, London may be very gay, but it's nothing
+to the countryside," sang Meg.</p>
+
+<p>"What nelse?" inquired little Fay, who could
+never be content with a mere snatch of song.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, there's heaps and heaps of nelse," Jan
+answered. "Come along, chicks, we'll go and
+see everything. This is home, you know, where
+dear Mummy wanted you to be."</p>
+
+<p>It was their first day at Wren's End, and the
+weather was kind. They were all four in the
+drive, looking back at the comfortable stone-fronted
+Georgian house. The sun was shining, a
+cheerful April sun that had little warmth in it
+but much tender light; and this showed how all
+around the hedges were getting green; that buds
+were bursting from brown twigs, as if the kind
+spring had covered the bare trees with a thin
+green veil; and that all sorts of green spears were
+thrusting up in the garden beds.</p>
+
+<p>Down the drive they all four ran, accompanied
+by a joyfully galumphing William, who was in
+such good spirits that he occasionally gave vent
+to a solemn deep-chested bark.</p>
+
+<p>When they came to the squat grey lodge, there
+was Mrs. Earley standing in her doorway to wel<!-- Page 193 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>come
+them. Mrs. Earley was Earley's mother,
+and Earley was gardener and general factotum at
+Wren's End. Mrs. Earley looked after the chickens,
+and when she had exchanged the news with
+Jan, and rather tearfully admired "poor Mrs.
+Tancred's little 'uns," she escorted them all to
+the orchard to see the cocks and hens and chickens.
+Then they visited the stable, where Placid,
+the pony, was sole occupant. In former years
+Placid had been kept for the girls to drive in the
+governess-cart and to pull the heavy lawn-mower
+over the lawns. And Hannah had been wont to
+drive him into Amesberrow every Sunday, that
+she might attend the Presbyterian church there.
+She put him up at a livery-stable near her church
+and always paid for him herself. Anthony Ross
+usually had hired a motor for the summer months.
+Now they would depend entirely on Placid and a
+couple of bicycles for getting about. All round
+the walled garden did they go, and Meg played
+horses with the children up and down the broad
+paths while Jan discussed vegetables with Earley.
+And last of all they went to the back door to
+ask Hannah for milk and scones, for the keen,
+fresh air had made them all hungry.</p>
+
+<p>Refreshed and very crumby, they were starting
+out again when Hannah laid a detaining hand on
+Jan's arm: "Could you speak a minute, Miss
+Jan?"</p>
+
+<p>The children and Meg gone, Hannah led the
+way into the kitchen with an air of great mystery;
+but she did not shut the doors, as Anne
+Chitt was busy upstairs.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 194 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span>
+"What is it, Hannah?" Jan asked nervously,
+for she saw that this summons portended something
+serious.</p>
+
+<p>"It's about Miss Morton I want to speak, Miss
+Jan. I was in hopes she'd never wear they play-acting
+claes down here ..." (when Hannah was
+deeply earnest she always became very Scotch),
+"but it seems I hoped in vain. And what am I
+to say to ither folk when they ask me about her?"</p>
+
+<p>"What is there to say, Hannah, except that she
+is my dear friend, and by her own wish is acting
+as nurse to my sister's children?"</p>
+
+<p>"I ken that; I'm no sayin' a word against that;
+but first of all she goes and crops her hair&mdash;fine
+hair she had too, though an awfu-like colour&mdash;and
+not content with flying in the face of Providence
+that way, she must needs dress like a servant.
+And no a weiss-like servant, either, but
+one o' they besoms ye see on the hoardings in
+London wha act in plays. Haven't I seen the
+pictures mysel'? 'The Quaker Gerrl,' or some
+such buddy."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I assure you, Hannah, Miss Morton in
+no way resembles those ladies, and I can't see
+that it's any business of ours what she wears.
+You know that she certainly does what she has
+undertaken to do in the best way possible."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm no saying a word against her wi' the children,
+and there never was a young lady who gave
+less trouble, save in the way o' tobacco ash, and
+was more ready to help&mdash;but yon haverals is very
+difficult to explain. <em>You</em> may understand, Miss
+Jan. I may <em>say</em> I understand&mdash;though I don't<!-- Page 195 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>&mdash;but
+who's to make the like o' that Anne Chitt
+understand? Only this morning she keeps on at
+me wi' her questions like the clapper o' a bell.
+'Is she a servant? If she's no, why does she
+wear servants' claes? Why does she have hair
+like a boy? Has she had a fever or something
+wrong wi' her heid? Is she one of they suffragette
+buddies and been in prison?'&mdash;till I was
+fair deeved and bade the lassie hold her tongue.
+But so it will be wherever Miss Morton goes in
+they fantastic claes. Now, Miss Jan, tell me the
+honest truth&mdash;did you ever see a self-respecting,
+respectable servant in the like o' yon? Does she
+<em>look</em> like any servant you've ever heard tell of
+out of a stage-play?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a bit, Hannah; she looks exactly like herself,
+and therefore not in the least like any other
+person. Don't you worry. Miss Morton requires
+no explanation. All we must do is to see
+that she doesn't overwork herself."</p>
+
+<p>"Then ye'll no speak to her, Miss Jan?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not I, Hannah. Why should I dictate to her
+as to what she wears? She doesn't dictate to me."</p>
+
+<p>This was not strictly true, for Meg was most
+interfering in the matter of Jan's clothes. Hannah
+shook her head. "I thocht it my duty to
+speak, Miss Jan, and I'll say no more. But it's
+sheer defiance o' her Maker to crop her heid and
+to clothe herself in whim-whams, when she could
+be dressed like a lady; and I'm real vexed she
+should make such an object of herself when she
+might just be quite unnoticeable, sae wee and
+shelpit as she is."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 196 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>
+"I'm afraid," said Jan, "that Miss Morton will
+never be quite unnoticeable, whatever she may
+wear. But don't let us talk about it any more.
+You understand, don't you, Hannah?"</p>
+
+<p>When Jan's voice took that tone Hannah knew
+that further argument was unavailing.</p>
+
+<p>Jan turned to go, and saw Tony waiting for
+her in the open doorway. Neither of them had
+either heard or seen him come.</p>
+
+<p>Quite silently he took her hand and did not
+speak till they were well away from the house.
+Meg and little Fay were nowhere in sight. Jan
+wondered how much he had heard.</p>
+
+<p>"She's a very proud cook, isn't she?" he said
+presently.</p>
+
+<p>"She's a very old servant," Jan explained,
+"who has known me all my life."</p>
+
+<p>"If," said Tony, as though after deep thought,
+"she gets very chubbelsome, you send for me.
+Then I will go to her and say '<i>Jāŏ!</i>'" Tony
+followed this up by some fluent Hindustani which,
+had Jan but known it, seriously reflected on the
+character of Hannah's female ancestry. "I'll say
+'<i>Jāŏ!</i>'," he went on. "I'll say it several times
+very loud, and point to the door. Then she'll
+roll up her bedding, and you'll give her money
+and her chits, and she will depart."</p>
+
+<p>They had reached a seat. On this Jan sank,
+for the vision of Tony pointing majestically down
+the drive while little Hannah staggered into the
+distance under a rolled-up mattress, was too much
+for her.</p>
+
+<p>"But I don't want her to go," she gasped. "I
+love her dearly."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 197 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>
+"She should not speak to you like that; she
+scolded you," he said firmly. "She is a servant
+... She <em>is</em> a servant?" he added doubtfully.</p>
+
+<p>"How much did you hear of what she said?
+Did you understand?"</p>
+
+<p>"I came back directly to fetch you, I thought
+she <em>sounded</em> cross. Mummy was afraid when
+people were cross; she liked me to be with her. I
+thought you would like me to be with you. If
+she was very rude I could beat her. I beat the
+boy&mdash;not Peter's boy, our boy&mdash;he was rude to
+Mummy. He did not dare to touch me because
+I am a sahib ... I will beat Hannah if you like."</p>
+
+<p>Tony stood in front of Jan, very earnest, with
+an exceedingly pink nose, for the wind was keen.
+He had never before said so much at one time.</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I go back and beat her?" he asked
+again.</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly not," Jan cried, clutching Tony
+lest he should fly off there and then. "We don't
+<em>do</em> such things here at home. Nobody is beaten,
+ever. I'm sure Peter never beats his servants."</p>
+
+<p>"No," Tony allowed. "A big sahib must not
+strike a servant, but I can, and I do if they are
+rude. She was rude about Meg."</p>
+
+<p>"She didn't mean to be rude."</p>
+
+<p>"She found fault with her clothes and her hair.
+She is a very proud and impudent cook."</p>
+
+<p>"Tony dear, you really don't understand. She
+wasn't a bit rude. She was afraid other people
+might mistake Meg for a servant. She was all
+<em>for</em> Meg&mdash;truly she was."</p>
+
+<p>"She scolded you," he rejoined obstinately.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 198 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>
+"Not really, Tony; she didn't mean to scold."</p>
+
+<p>Tony looked very hard at Jan.</p>
+
+<p>In silence they stared at one another for quite
+a minute. Jan got up off the seat.</p>
+
+<p>"Let's go and find the others," she said.</p>
+
+<p>"She is a very proud cook," Tony remarked
+once more.</p>
+
+<p>Jan sighed.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>That night while she was getting ready for bed
+Tony woke up. His cot was placed so that he
+could see into Jan's room, and the door between
+was always left open. She was standing before
+the dressing-table, taking down her hair.</p>
+
+<p>Unlike the bedrooms at the flat, the room was
+not cold though both the windows were open.
+Wren's End was never cold, though always fresh,
+for one of Anthony's earliest improvements had
+been a boiler-house and central heating, with
+radiators set under the windows, so that they
+could always stand open.</p>
+
+<p>Jan had not put on her dressing-gown, and her
+night-dress had rather short, loose sleeves that
+fell back from her arms as she raised them.</p>
+
+<p>He watched the white arm wielding the brush
+with great pleasure; he decided he liked to look
+at it.</p>
+
+<p>"Auntie Jan!"</p>
+
+<p>She turned and flung her hair back from her
+face in a great silver cloud.</p>
+
+<p>"You awake, sonny! Did I make a noise?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I just woke. Auntie Jan, will Daddie
+ever come here?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 199 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>
+"I expect so."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, listen. If he does, he shan't take your
+things, your pretty twinkly things. I won't let
+him."</p>
+
+<p>Jan stood as if turned to stone.</p>
+
+<p>"He took Mummy's. I saw him; I couldn't
+stop him, I was so little. But she <em>said</em>&mdash;she said
+it twice before she went away from that last bungalow&mdash;she
+said: 'Take care of Auntie Jan, Tony;
+don't let Daddie take her things.' So I won't."</p>
+
+<p>Tony was sitting up. His room was all in
+darkness; two candles were lit on Jan's dressing-table.
+He could see her, but she couldn't see
+him.</p>
+
+<p>She came to him, stooped over him, and laid
+her cheek against his so that they were both
+veiled with her hair. "Darling, I don't think
+poor Daddie would want to take my things. You
+must try not to think hardly of Daddie."</p>
+
+<p>Tony parted the veil of hair with a gentle hand
+so that they could both see the candles.</p>
+
+<p>"You don't know my Daddie ... much," he
+said, "do you?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan shuddered.</p>
+
+<p>"I saw him," he went on in his queer little
+unemotional voice. "I saw him take all her
+pretty twinkly things; and her silver boxes. I'm
+glad I sleep here."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she mind much?" Jan whispered.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. She didn't see him take them,
+only me. She hadn't come to bed. She never
+said nothing to me&mdash;only about you."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't expect," Jan made a great effort to<!-- Page 200 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>
+speak naturally, "that Daddie would care about
+my things ... It's different, you see."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad I sleep here," Tony repeated, "and
+there's William only just across the passage."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 201 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XVI<br />
+<span class="sub">"THE BLUDGEONINGS OF CHANCE"</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">T</span>HEY had been at Wren's End nearly three
+weeks, and sometimes Jan wondered if she
+appeared to Tony as unlike her own conception
+of herself as Tony's of his father was unlike what
+she had pictured him.</p>
+
+<p>She knew Hugo Tancred to be dishonest,
+shifty, and wholly devoid of a sense of honour,
+but she had up till quite lately always thought
+of him as possessing a lazy sort of good-nature.</p>
+
+<p>Tony was changing this view.</p>
+
+<p>He was not yet at all talkative, but every now
+and then when he was alone with her he became
+frank and communicative, as reserved people
+often will when suddenly they let themselves go.
+And his very simplicity gave force to his revelations.</p>
+
+<p>During their last year together in India it was
+evident that downright antagonism had existed
+between Hugo Tancred and his little son. Tony
+had weighed his father and found him wanting;
+and it was clear that he had tried to insert his
+small personality as a buffer between his father
+and mother.</p>
+
+<p>Jan talked constantly to the children of their
+mother. Her portraits, Anthony's paintings and<!-- Page 202 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>
+sketches, were all over the house, in every variety
+of happy pose. One of the best was hung at the
+foot of Tony's cot. The gentle blue eyes seemed
+to follow him in wistful benediction, and alone in
+bed at night he often thought of her, and of his
+home in India. It was, then, quite natural that
+he should talk of them to this Auntie Jan who
+had evidently loved his mother well; and from
+Tony Jan learned a good deal more about her
+brother-in-law than she had ever heard from his
+wife.</p>
+
+<p>Tony loved to potter about with his aunt in
+the garden. She worked really hard, for there
+was much to do, and he tried his best to assist,
+often being a very great hindrance; but she never
+sent him away, for she desired above all things
+to gain his confidence.</p>
+
+<p>One day after a hard half-hour's weeding, when
+Tony had wasted much time by pulling up several
+sorts of the wrong thing, Jan felt her temper
+getting edgy, so they sat down to rest upon one
+of the many convenient seats to be found at
+Wren's End. Anthony hated a garden where
+you couldn't sit comfortably and smoke, wheresoever
+the prospect was pleasing.</p>
+
+<p>Tony sat down too, looking almost rosy after
+his labours.</p>
+
+<p>He didn't sit close and cuddly, as little Fay
+would have done, but right at the other end of
+the seat, where he could stare at her. Every day
+was bringing Tony more surely to the conclusion
+that "he liked to look at" his aunt.</p>
+
+<p>"You like Meg, don't you?" he said.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 203 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>
+"No," Jan shook her head. "I don't like her.
+I love her; which is quite a different thing."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you like people and love them?"</p>
+
+<p>"I like some people&mdash;a great many people&mdash;then
+there are others, not so many, that I love&mdash;you're
+one of them."</p>
+
+<p>"Is Fay?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly, dear little Fay."</p>
+
+<p>"And Peter?"</p>
+
+<p>For a moment Jan hesitated. With heightened
+colour she met Tony's grave, searching eyes.
+Above everything she desired to be always true
+and sincere with him, that he might, as on that
+first night in England, feel that he "believed"
+her. "I have every reason to love Mr. Ledgard,"
+she said slowly: "he was so wonderfully kind to
+all of us." She was determined to be loyal to
+Peter with poor Fay's children. Jan hated ingratitude.
+To have said she only liked Peter
+must have given Tony the impression that she
+was both forgetful and ungrateful. She would
+not risk that even though she might risk misunderstanding
+of another kind if he ever repeated
+her words to anybody else.</p>
+
+<p>Her heart beat rather faster than was comfortable,
+and she was thankful that she and Tony
+were alone.</p>
+
+<p>"Who <em>do</em> you like?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Nearly everybody; the people in the village,
+our good neighbours ... Can't you see the difference
+yourself? Now, you love your dear
+Mummy and you like ... say, William&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"No," Tony said firmly, "I love William. I<!-- Page 204 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>
+don't think," he went on, "I like people ...
+much. Either I love them like you said, or I
+don't care about them at all ... or I hate them."</p>
+
+<p>"That," said Jan, "is a mistake. It's no use
+to hate people."</p>
+
+<p>"But if you feel like it ... I hate people if
+they cheat me."</p>
+
+<p>"But who on earth would cheat you? What
+do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"Once," said Tony, and by the monotonous,
+detached tone of his voice Jan knew he was going
+to talk about his father, "my Daddie asked me
+if I'd like to see smoke come out of his ears ...
+an' he said: 'Put your hand here on me and
+watch very careful.'" Tony pointed to Jan's
+chest. "I put my hand there and I watched and
+watched an' he hurt me with the end of his cigar.
+There's the mark!" He held out a grubby little
+hand, back uppermost, for Jan's inspection, and
+there, sure enough, was the little round white
+scar.</p>
+
+<p>"And what did you do?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"I bit him."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Tony, how dreadful!"</p>
+
+<p>"I shouldn't of minded so much if he'd really
+done it&mdash;the smoke out of his ears, I mean; but
+not one teeniest little puff came. I watched so
+careful ... He cheated me."</p>
+
+<p>Jan said nothing. What could she say? Hot
+anger burned in her heart against Hugo. She
+could have bitten him herself.</p>
+
+<p>"Peter was there," Tony went on, "and Peter
+said it served him right."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 205 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span>
+"Yes," said Jan, grasping at this straw, "but
+what did Peter say to you?"</p>
+
+<p>"He said, 'Sahibs don't cry and sahibs don't
+bite,' and if I was a sahib I mustn't do it, so I
+don't. I don't bite people often."</p>
+
+<p>"I should hope not; besides, you know, sometimes
+quite good-natured people will do things in
+fun, never thinking it will hurt."</p>
+
+<p>Tony gazed gloomily at Jan. "He cheated
+me," he repeated. "He said he would make it
+come out of his ears, and it didn't. He didn't
+like me&mdash;that's why."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think you ought to say that, and be
+so unforgiving. I expect Daddie forgot all about
+your biting him directly, and yet you remember
+what he did after this long time."</p>
+
+<p>Poor Jan did try so hard to be fair.</p>
+
+<p>"I wasn't afraid of him," Tony went on, as
+though he hadn't heard, "not really. Mummy
+was. She was drefully afraid. He said he'd
+whip me because I was so surly, and she was
+afraid he would ... I <em>knew</em> he wouldn't, not unless
+he could do it some cheaty way, and you
+can't whip people that way. But it frightened
+Mummy. She used to send me away when he
+came...."</p>
+
+<p>Tony paused and knitted his brows, then suddenly
+he smiled. "But I always came back very
+quick, because I knew she wanted me, and I
+liked to look at him. He liked Fay, I suppose
+he liked to look at her, so do I. Nobody wants
+to look at me ... much ... except Mummy."</p>
+
+<p>"I do," Jan said hastily. "I like to look at<!-- Page 206 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>
+you just every bit as much as I like to look at
+Fay. I think you care rather too much what
+people look like, Tony."</p>
+
+<p>"It does matter a lot," Tony said obstinately.</p>
+
+<p>"Other things matter much more. Courage
+and kindness and truth and honesty. Look at
+Mr. Ledgard&mdash;he's not what you'd call a beautiful
+person, and yet I'm sure we all like to look
+at him."</p>
+
+<p>"Sometimes you say Peter, and sometimes Mr.
+Ledgard. Why?"</p>
+
+<p>Again Jan's heart gave that queer, uncomfortable
+jump. She certainly always <em>thought</em> of him
+as Peter. Quite unconsciously she occasionally
+spoke of him as Peter. Meg had observed this,
+but, unlike Tony, made no remark.</p>
+
+<p>"Why?" Tony repeated.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," Jan mumbled feebly, "it's because
+I hear the rest of you do it. I've no sort of right
+to."</p>
+
+<p>"Auntie Jan," Tony said earnestly. "What is
+a devil?"</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't the remotest idea, Tony," Jan replied,
+with the utmost sincerity.</p>
+
+<p>"It isn't anything very nice, is it, or nice to
+look at?"</p>
+
+<p>"It might be," said Jan, with Scottish caution.</p>
+
+<p>"Daddie used to call me a surly little devil&mdash;when
+I used to come back because Mummy was
+frightened ... she was always frightened when
+he talked about money, and he did it a lot ...
+When he saw me, he would say: 'Wot you do<!-- Page 207 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>ing
+here, you surly little devil&mdash;listening, eh?'"
+Tony's youthful voice took on such a snarl that
+Jan positively jumped, and put out her hand
+to stop him. "'I'll give you somefin to listen
+to....'"</p>
+
+<p>"Tony, Tony, couldn't you try to forget all
+that?"</p>
+
+<p>Tony shook his head. "No! I shall never
+forget it, because, you see, it's all mixed up with
+Mummy so, and you said"&mdash;here Tony held up
+an accusing small finger at Jan&mdash;"you said I was
+never to forget her, not the least little bit."</p>
+
+<p>"I know I did," Jan owned, and fell to pondering
+what was best to be done about these memories.
+Absently she dug her hoe into the ground,
+making ruts in the gravel, while Tony watched
+her solemnly.</p>
+
+<p>"Then why," he went on, "do you not want
+me to remember Daddie?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because," said Jan, "everything you seem to
+remember sounds so unkind."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I can't help that," Tony answered.</p>
+
+<p>Jan arose from the seat. "If we sit idling here
+all afternoon," she remarked severely, "we shall
+never get that border weeded for Earley."</p>
+
+<p>The afternoon post came in at four, and when
+Jan went in there were several letters for her on
+the hall-table, spread out by Hannah in a neat
+row, one above the other. It was Saturday, and
+the Indian mail was in. There was one from
+Peter, but it was another letter that Jan seized
+first, turning it over and looking at the post-mark,
+which was remarkably clear. She knew<!-- Page 208 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>
+the excellent handwriting well, though she had
+seen it comparatively seldom.</p>
+
+<p>It was Hugo Tancred's; and the post-mark
+was Port Said. She opened it with hands that
+trembled, and it said:</p>
+
+<div class="letter"><p>"<span class="smcap">My Dear Jan</span>,</p>
+
+<p>"In case other letters have miscarried, which
+is quite possible while I was up country, let me
+assure you how grateful I am for all you did for
+my poor wife and the children&mdash;and for me in
+letting me know so faithfully what your movements
+have been. I sent to the bank for your
+letters while passing through Bombay recently,
+and but for your kindness in allowing the money
+I had left for my wife's use to remain to my
+credit, I should have been unable to leave India,
+for things have gone sadly against me, and the
+world is only too ready to turn its back upon a
+broken man.</p>
+
+<p>"When I saw by the notice in the papers that
+my beloved wife was no more, I realised that for
+me the lamp is shattered and the light of my life
+extinguished. All that remains to me is to make
+the best of my poor remnant of existence for the
+sake of my children.</p>
+
+<p>"We will talk over plans when we meet. I
+hope to be in England in about another month,
+perhaps sooner, and we will consult together as
+to what is best to be done.</p>
+
+<p>"I have no doubt it will be possible to find a
+good and cheap preparatory school where Tony
+can be safely bestowed for the present, and one<!-- Page 209 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>
+of my sisters would probably take my precious
+little Fay, if you find it inconvenient to have her
+with you. A boy is always better at school as
+soon as possible, and I have strong views as to
+the best methods of education. I never for a
+moment forget my responsibilities towards my
+children and the necessity for a father's supreme
+authority.</p>
+
+<p>"You may be sure that, in so far as you make
+it possible for me to do so, I will fall in with
+your wishes regarding them in every way.</p>
+
+<p>"It will not be worth your while writing to
+me here, as my plans are uncertain. I will try
+to give you notice of my arrival, but may reach
+you before my next letter.</p>
+
+<p class="ralign"><span class="pad-r4">"Yours affectionately,</span><br />
+<span class="smcap">"Hugo Tancred</span>."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Still as a statue sat Jan. From the garden
+came the cheerful chirruping of birds and constant,
+eager questioning of Earley by the children.
+Earley's slow Gloucestershire speech rumbled on
+in muffled <i lang="it">obbligato</i> to the higher, carrying, little
+voices.</p>
+
+<p>The whirr of a sewing-machine came from the
+morning-room, now the day-nursery, where Meg
+was busy with frocks for little Fay.</p>
+
+<p>In a distant pantry somebody was clinking teacups.
+Jan shivered, though the air from the
+open window was only fresh, not cold. At that
+moment she knew exactly how an animal feels
+when caught in a trap. Hugo Tancred's letter
+was the trap, and she was in it. With the ex<!-- Page 210 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>ception
+of the lie about other letters&mdash;Jan was
+perfectly sure he had written no other letters&mdash;and
+the stereotyped phrases about shattered
+lamps and the wife who was "no more," the letter
+was one long menace&mdash;scarcely veiled. That
+sentence, "in so far as you make it possible for
+me to do so, I will fall in with your wishes regarding
+them in every way," simply meant that if
+Jan was to keep the children she must let Hugo
+make ducks and drakes of her money; and if he
+took her money, how could she do what she
+ought for the children?</p>
+
+<p>And he was at Port Said; only a week's journey.</p>
+
+<p>Why had she left that money in Bombay?
+Why had she not listened to Peter? Sometimes
+she had thought that Peter held rather a cynically
+low view of his fellow-creatures&mdash;some of
+his fellow-creatures. Surely no one could be all
+bad? Jan had hoped great things of adversity
+for Hugo Tancred. Peter indulged in no such
+pleasant illusions, and said so. "Schoolgirl sentimentality"
+Meg had called it, and so it was.
+"No doubt it will be possible to find some cheap
+preparatory school for Tony."</p>
+
+<p>Would he try to steal Tony?</p>
+
+<p>From the charitable mood that hopeth all
+things Jan suddenly veered to a belief in all
+things evil of her brother-in-law. At that moment
+she felt him capable of murdering the child
+and throwing his little body down a well, as they
+do in India.</p>
+
+<p>Again she shivered.</p>
+
+<p>What was she to do?</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 211 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>
+So helpless, so unprotected; so absolutely at
+his mercy because she loved the children. "Never
+let him blackmail you," Peter had said. "Stand
+up to him always, and he'll probably crumple
+up."</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly, as though someone had opened shutters
+in a pitch-dark room, letting in the blessed
+light, Jan remembered there was also a letter
+from Peter.</p>
+
+<p>She crossed the hall to get it, though her legs
+shook under her and her knees were as water.</p>
+
+<p>She felt she couldn't get back to the window-seat,
+so she sat on the edge of the gate-table and
+opened the letter.</p>
+
+<p>A very short letter, only one side of a page.</p>
+
+<div class="letter">
+<p class="smcap">"Dear Miss Ross,</p>
+
+<p>"This is the last mail for a bit, for I come
+myself by the next, the <i>Macedonia</i>. You may
+catch me at Aden, but certainly a note will get
+me at Marseilles, if you are kind enough to write.
+Tancred has been back in Bombay and gone
+again in one of the smaller home-going boats.
+Where he got the money to go I can't think, for
+from many sources lately I've heard that his various
+ventures have been far from prosperous, and
+no one will trust him with a rupee.</p>
+
+<p>"So look out for blackmail, and be firm, mind.</p>
+
+<p>"I go to my aunt in Artillery Mansions on
+arrival. When may I run down to see you all?</p>
+
+<p class="ralign"><span class="pad-r3">"Yours always sincerely,</span><br />
+"<span class="smcap">Peter Ledgard</span>."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 212 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XVII<br />
+<span class="sub">"THOUGH AN HOST SHOULD ENCAMP AGAINST ME"</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">T</span>HE flap of the gate-leg table creaked under
+Jan's weight, but she dug her heels into
+the rug and balanced, for she felt incapable of
+moving.</p>
+
+<p>Peter was coming home; if the worst came to
+the worst he would deal with Hugo, and a respite
+would be gained. But Peter would go out to
+India again and Hugo would not. The whole
+miserable business would be repeated&mdash;and how
+could she continue to worry Peter with her affairs?
+What claim had she upon him? As though she
+were some stranger seeing it for the first time,
+Jan looked round the square, comfortable hall.
+She saw it with new eyes sharpened by apprehension;
+yet everything was solidly the same.</p>
+
+<p>The floor with its draught-board pattern of
+large, square, black and white stones; the old
+dark chairs; the high bookcases at each side of
+the hearth; the wide staircase with its spacious,
+windowed turning and shallow steps, so easily
+traversed by little feet; the whole steeped in that
+atmosphere of friendly comfort that kind old
+houses get and keep.</p>
+
+<p>Such a good place to be young in.</p>
+
+<p>Such a happy place, so safe and sheltered and
+pleasant.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 213 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>
+Outside the window a wren was calling to his
+mate with a note that sounded just like a faint
+kiss; such a tender little song.</p>
+
+<p>The swing door was opened noisily and Anne
+Chitt appeared bearing the nursery tea-tray, deposited
+it in the nursery, opened the front door,
+thumped on the gong and vanished again. Meg
+came out from the nursery with two pairs of
+small slippers in her hand: "Where are my children?
+I left little Fay with Earley while I finished
+the overalls; he's a most efficient under-nurse&mdash;I
+suppose you left Tony with him too.
+Such a lot of letters for you. Did you get your
+mail? I heard from both the boys. Ah, sensible
+Earley's taking them round to the back door.
+Where's William's duster? Hannah does make
+such a fuss about paw-marks." And Meg, too,
+vanished through the swing door.</p>
+
+<p>Slowly Jan dragged herself off the table, gathered
+up her unread letters, and went into the
+nursery. She felt as though she were dreadfully
+asleep and couldn't awake to realise the wholesome
+everyday world around her.</p>
+
+<p>Vaguely she stared round the room, the most
+charming room in Wren's End. Panelled in
+wood long since painted white, with two delightful
+rounded corner cupboards, it gave straight
+on to the wrens' sunk lawn from a big French
+window with steps, an anachronism added by
+Miss Janet Ross. Five years ago Anthony had
+brought a beautiful iron gate from Venice that
+fitted into the archway, cut through the yew
+hedge and leading to the drive. Jan had given<!-- Page 214 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>
+this room to the children because in summer they
+could spend the whole day in its green-walled
+garden, quite safe and shut in from every possibility
+of mischief. A sun-dial was in the centre,
+and in one corner a fat stone cherub upheld a
+bath for the birds. Daffodils were in bloom on
+the banks, and one small single tulip of brilliant
+red. Jan went out and stood on the top step.</p>
+
+<p>Long immunity from menace of any kind had
+made all sorts of little birds extraordinarily bold
+and friendly. Even the usually shy and furtive
+golden-crested wrens fussed in and out under the
+yew hedge quite regardless of Jan.</p>
+
+<p>Through an open window overhead came the
+sound of cheerful high voices, and little Fay
+started to sing at the top of her strong treble:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Thlee mice went into a hole to spin,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Puss came by, and puss peeped in;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">What are you doing, my littoo old men?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">We're weaving coats for gentoomen.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>"Is that what I've been doing?" thought Jan.
+"Weaving coats of many colours out of happy
+dreams?" Were she and the children the mice,
+she wondered.</p>
+
+<p>Marauding cats had been kept away from
+Wren's End for over a hundred years. "The
+little wrens that build" had been safe enough.
+But what of these poor human nestlings?</p>
+
+<p>"Shall I come and help loo to wind up loo
+thleds?" sang little Fay. "Oh, no, Missis Pussy,
+you'd bite off our heads!" And Tony joined in
+with a shout: "Oh, no, Missis Pussy, you'd bite
+off our heads."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 215 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>
+The voices died away, the children were coming
+downstairs.</p>
+
+<p>Jan drank three cups of tea and crumbled one
+piece of bread and butter on her plate. The rest
+of the party were hungry and full of adventures.
+Before she joined Earley little Fay had been to
+the village with Meg to buy tape, and she had a
+great deal to say about this expedition. Meg
+saw that something was troubling Jan, and wondered
+if Mr. Ledgard had given her fresh news of
+Hugo. But Meg never asked questions or worried
+people. She chattered to the children, and
+immediately after tea carried them off for the
+usual washing of hands.</p>
+
+<p>Jan went out into the hall; the door was open
+and the sunny spring evening called to her. When
+she was miserable she always wanted to walk, and
+she walked now; swiftly down the drive she went
+and out along the road till she came to the church,
+which stood at the end of the village nearest to
+Wren's End.</p>
+
+<p>She turned into the churchyard, and up the
+broad pathway between the graves to the west
+door.</p>
+
+<p>Near the door was a square headstone marking
+the grave of Charles Considine Smith; and
+she paused beside it to read once more the somewhat
+strange inscription.</p>
+
+<p>Under his name and age, cut deep in the moss-grown
+stone, were the words: "<i>Though an host
+should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear.</i>"</p>
+
+<p>Often before Jan had wondered what could
+have caused Tranquil, his wife, to choose so<!-- Page 216 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span>
+strenuous an epitaph. Tranquil, who had never
+stirred twenty miles from the place where she
+was born; whose very name, so far as they could
+gather, exemplified her life.</p>
+
+<p>What secret menace had threatened this "staid
+person," this prosperous shipper of sherry who,
+apparently, had spent the evening of his life in
+observing the habits of wrens.</p>
+
+<p>Why should his gentle wife have thus commemorated
+his fighting spirit?</p>
+
+<p>Be the reason what it might, Jan felt vaguely
+comforted. There was triumph as well as trust
+in the words. Whatever it was that had threatened
+him, he had stood up to it. His wife knew
+this and was proud.</p>
+
+<p>Jan tried the heavy oak door and it yielded,
+and from the soft mildness of the spring evening,
+so full of happy sounds of innocent life, she passed
+into the grey and sacred silence of the church.</p>
+
+<p>It was cold in the beautiful old fourteenth-century
+church, with that pervading smell of badly-burning
+wood that is so often found in country
+churches till all attempt at heating ceases for the
+summer. But nothing could mar the nobility of
+its austerely lovely architecture; the indefinable,
+exquisite grace that soothes and penetrates.</p>
+
+<p>She went and knelt in the Wren's End pew
+where Charles Considine Smith's vast prayer-book
+still stood on the book-board. And even as
+in the Bombay Cathedral she had prayed that
+strength might be given to her to walk in the
+Way, so now she prayed for courage and a quiet,
+steadfast mind.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 217 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span></p><p>Her head was bowed and buried in her hands:
+"<i>My heart shall not fear</i>," she whispered; but she
+knew that it did fear, and fear grievously.</p>
+
+<p>The tense silence was broken by an odd, fitful,
+pattering sound; but Jan, absorbed in her petition
+for the courage she could not feel, heard nothing.</p>
+
+<p>Something clumsy, warm, and panting pushed
+against her, and she uncovered her face and
+looked down upon William trying to thrust his
+head under her arm and join in her devotions.</p>
+
+<p>And William became a misty blur, for her
+eyes filled with tears; he looked so anxious and
+foolish and kind with his tongue hanging out and
+his absurd, puzzled expression.</p>
+
+<p>He was puzzled. Part of the usual ritual had
+been omitted.</p>
+
+<p>She ought, by all known precedents, to have
+put her arm round his neck and have admonished
+him to "pray for his Master." But she did
+nothing of the kind, only patted him, with no
+sort of invitation to join in her orisons.</p>
+
+<p>William was sure something was wrong somewhere.</p>
+
+<p>Then Jan saw Tony sitting at the far end of
+the seat, hatless, coatless, in his indoor strap
+shoes; and he was regarding her with grave, understanding
+eyes.</p>
+
+<p>In a moment she was back in the present and
+vividly alive to the fact that here was chilly,
+delicate Tony out after tea, without a coat and
+sitting in an ice-cold church.</p>
+
+<p>She rose from her knees, much to William's
+satisfaction, who did not care for religious ser<!-- Page 218 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>vices
+in which he might not take an active part.
+He trotted out of the pew and Jan followed him,
+stooping to kiss Tony as she passed.</p>
+
+<p>"It's too cold for you here, dear," she whispered;
+"let us come out."</p>
+
+<p>She held out her hand and Tony took it, and
+together they passed down the aisle and into the
+warmer air outside.</p>
+
+<p>"How did you know I was here?" she asked,
+as they hurried into the road.</p>
+
+<p>"I saw you going down the drive from the
+bathroom window, and so I runned after you,
+and William came too."</p>
+
+<p>"But what made you come after me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because I thought you looked frightened, and
+I didn't like it; you looked like Mummy did
+sometimes."</p>
+
+<p>No one who has seen fear stamped upon a
+woman's face ever forgets it. Tony had watched
+his aunt all tea-time, and this quite new expression
+troubled him. Mummy had always seemed
+to want him when she looked like that; perhaps
+Auntie Jan would want him too. The moment
+his hands were dried he had rushed past Meg and
+down the stairs with William in his wake. Meg
+had not tried to stop him, for she, too, realised
+that something worried Jan, and she knew that
+already there had arisen an almost unconscious
+<i lang="fr">entente</i> between these two. But she had no idea
+that he had gone out of doors. She dressed little
+Fay and took her out to the garden, thinking
+that Tony and Jan were probably in the nursery,
+and she was careful not to disturb them.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 219 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span>
+"Are you cold, Tony?" Jan asked anxiously,
+walking so fast that Tony had almost to run to
+keep up with her.</p>
+
+<p>"No, not very; it's a nice coldness rather, don't
+you think?"</p>
+
+<p>"Tony, will you tell me&mdash;when Daddie was
+angry with you, were you never frightened?"</p>
+
+<p>Tony pulled at her hand to make her go more
+slowly. "Yes," he said, "I used to feel frightened
+inside, but I wouldn't let him know it, and
+then&mdash;it was funny&mdash;but quite sunn'ly I wasn't
+frightened any more. You try it."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean," Jan asked earnestly, "that if
+you don't let anyone else know you are frightened,
+you cease to be frightened?"</p>
+
+<p>"Something like that," Tony said; "it just
+happens."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 220 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XVIII<br />
+<span class="sub">MEG AND CAPTAIN MIDDLETON</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">M</span>EG had worked hard and faithfully ever
+since Ayah left. Very soon after she took
+over the children entirely she discovered that,
+however naughty and tiresome they were in many
+respects, they were quick-witted and easily interested.
+And she decided there and then that
+to keep them good she must keep them well
+amused, and it acted like a charm.</p>
+
+<p>She had the somewhat rare power of surrounding
+quite ordinary everyday proceedings with a
+halo of romance, so that the children's day developed
+into a series of entrancing adventures.</p>
+
+<p>With Meg, enthusiastic make-believe had never
+wholly given place to common sense. Throughout
+the long, hard days of her childhood and
+early apprenticeship to a rather unkindly world
+she had pretended joyously, and invented for
+herself all sorts of imaginary pleasures to take
+the place of those tangible ones denied to her.
+She had kept the width and wistfulness of the
+child's horizon with a good deal of the child's
+finality and love of detail; so that she was as
+responsive to the drama of common things as
+the children themselves.</p>
+
+<p>Thus it came about that the daily donning of
+the uniform was in very truth symbolic and in<!-- Page 221 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span>spiring;
+and once the muslin cap was adjusted,
+she felt herself magically surrounded by the atmosphere
+most conducive to the production of
+the Perfect Nurse.</p>
+
+<p>For Tony and little Fay getting up and going
+to bed resolved themselves into feats of delicious
+dexterity that custom could not stale. The underneaths
+of tables were caves and dungeons,
+chairs became chariots at will, and every night
+little Fay waved a diminutive pocket-handkerchief
+to Tony from the deck of an ocean-going
+P. and O.</p>
+
+<p>The daily walks, especially since they came to
+Wren's End, were filled with hopeful possibilities.
+And to hunt for eggs with Mrs. Earley, or gather
+vegetables with her son, partook of the nature
+of a high and solemn quest. It was here Meg
+showed real genius. She drew all the household
+into her net of interest. The children poked their
+busy fingers into everybody's pies, and even stern
+Hannah was compelled, quite unconsciously, to
+contribute her share in the opulent happiness of
+their little world.</p>
+
+<p>But it took it out of Meg.</p>
+
+<p>For weeks she had been on the alert to prevent
+storms and tempests. Now that the children's
+barometer seemed at "set fair" she suddenly
+felt very tired.</p>
+
+<p>Jan had been watching her, and on that particular
+Sunday, had she been able to catch Meg
+before she got up, Jan would have dressed the
+children and kept her in bed. But Meg was too
+nimble for her, washed and dressed her charges,<!-- Page 222 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>
+and appeared at breakfast looking a "wispy
+wraith."</p>
+
+<p>She had slept badly; a habit formed in her
+under-nourished youth which she found hard to
+break; and she had, in consequence, been sitting
+up in bed at five in the morning to make buttonholes
+in garden smocks for Tony.</p>
+
+<p>This would have enraged Jan had she but
+known it. But Meg, frank and honest as the
+day in most things, was, at times, curiously secretive;
+and so far had entirely eluded Jan's vigilance.
+By the time Anne Chitt came with the
+awakening tea there wasn't a vestige of smock,
+needles, or cotton to be seen, and so far lynx-eyed
+little Fay had never awoke in time to catch her
+at it.</p>
+
+<p>This morning, however, Jan exerted her authority.
+She slung the hammock between two
+trees in the sunniest part of the garden; she
+wrapped Meg in her own fur coat, which was far
+too big for Meg; covered her with a particularly
+soft, warm rug, gave her a book, a sun-umbrella,
+and her cigarette case; and forbade her to move
+till lunch-time unless it rained.</p>
+
+<p>Then she took the two children and William
+into Squire Walcote's woods for the morning and
+Meg fell fast asleep.</p>
+
+<p>Warm with the double glow that came from
+being wrapped in Jan's coat because Jan loved
+her; lulled by the songs of birds and a soft, shy
+wind that ruffled the short hair about her forehead,
+little Meg was supremely happy. To be
+tired, to be made to rest, to be kissed and tucked<!-- Page 223 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span>
+in and sternly commanded to stay where she was
+till she was fetched&mdash;all this, so commonplace to
+cherished, cared-for folk, seemed quite wonderful
+to Meg, and she snuggled down among the
+cushions in blissful content.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, on that same Sunday morning,
+Captain Middleton, at Amber Guiting Manor,
+was trying to screw his courage up to the announcement
+that he did not intend to accompany
+his aunt and uncle to church. Lady Mary Walcote
+was his mother's only sister, and Mrs. Walcote,
+wife of Jan's tenant, was one of his father's,
+so that he spoke quite truly when he told Meg he
+had "stacks of relations down at Amber Guiting."</p>
+
+<p>Colonel Walcote was much better off than his
+elder brother, the squire of Amber Guiting, for
+he benefited by the Middleton money.</p>
+
+<p>Miles Middleton's father was the originator of
+"Middleton's Made Starch," which was used
+everywhere and was supposed to be superior to
+all other starches. Why "Made" scoffers could
+never understand, for it required precisely the
+same treatment as other starches. But the British
+Public believed in it, the British Public also
+bought it in large quantities, and George Middleton,
+son of Mutton-Pie Middleton, a well-to-do
+confectioner in Doncaster, became an exceedingly
+rich man. He did not marry till he was forty,
+and then he married "family," for Lady Agnes
+Keills, younger daughter of Lord Glencarse, had
+a long pedigree and no dower at all. She was a
+good wife to him, gentle, upright, and always
+affectionate. She adored their only child, Miles,<!-- Page 224 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>
+and died quite suddenly from heart failure, just
+after that cheerful youth had joined at Woolwich.
+George Middleton died some three years
+later, leaving his money absolutely to his son,
+who came of age at twenty-five. And, so far,
+Miles had justified his father's faith in him, for
+he had never done anything very foolish, and a
+certain strain of Yorkshire shrewdness prevented
+him from committing any wild extravagance.</p>
+
+<p>He was generous, kindly, and keen on his profession,
+and he had reached the age of thirty-two
+without ever having felt any overwhelming desire
+to marry; though it was pretty well known
+that considerable efforts to marry him suitably
+had been made by both mothers and daughters.</p>
+
+<p>The beautiful and level-headed young ladies of
+musical comedy had failed to land this considerable
+fish, angled they never so skilfully; though
+he frankly enjoyed their amusing society and was
+quite liberal, though not lavish, in the way of
+presents.</p>
+
+<p>Young women of his own rank were pleasant to
+him, their mothers cordial, and no difficulty was
+ever put in the way of his enjoying their society.
+But he was not very susceptible. Deep in his
+heart, in some dim, unacknowledged corner, there
+lay a humble, homely desire that he might <em>feel</em> a
+great deal more strongly than he had felt yet,
+when the time and the woman came to him.</p>
+
+<p>Never, until Meg smiled at him when he offered
+to carry little Fay up that long staircase, had the
+thought of a girl thoroughly obsessed him; and it
+is possible that even after their meetings in Ken<!-- Page 225 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>sington
+Gardens her image might gradually have
+faded from his mind, had it not occurred to Mrs.
+Trent to interfere.</p>
+
+<p>He had seen a good deal of the Trents while
+hunting with the Pytchley two winters ago.
+Lotty was a fearless rider and what men called "a
+real good sort." At one time it had sometimes
+crossed Captain Middleton's mind that Lotty
+wouldn't make half a bad wife for a Horse Gunner,
+but somehow it had always stopped at the
+idea, and when he didn't see Lotty he never
+thought about her at all.</p>
+
+<p>Now that he no longer saw Meg he thought
+about her all day and far into the night. His
+sensations were so new, so disturbing and unpleasant,
+his life was so disorganised and upset,
+that he asked himself in varying degrees of ever-accumulating
+irritation: "What the deuce was
+the matter?"</p>
+
+<p>Then Mrs. Trent asked him to luncheon.</p>
+
+<p>She was staying with her daughters at the
+Kensington Palace Hotel, and they had a suite
+of rooms. Lotty and her sister flew away before
+coffee was served, as they were going to a <i lang="fr">matinée</i>,
+and Miles was left <i lang="fr">tête-à-tête</i> with Mrs. Trent.</p>
+
+<p>She was most motherly and kind.</p>
+
+<p>Just as he was wondering whether he might
+now decently take leave of her, she said: "Captain
+Middleton, I'm going to take a great liberty
+and venture to say something to you that perhaps
+you will resent ... but I feel I must do it
+because your mother was such a dear friend of
+mine."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 226 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span>
+This was a piece of information for Miles, who
+knew perfectly well that Lady Agnes Middleton's
+acquaintance with Mrs. Trent had been of the
+slightest. However, he bowed and looked expectant.</p>
+
+<p>"I saw you the other day walking with Miss
+Morton in Kensington Gardens; apparently she is
+now in charge of somebody's children. May I
+ask if you have known her long?"</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Trent looked searchingly at Miles, and
+there was an inflection on the "long" that he felt
+was in some way insulting to Meg, and he stiffened
+all over.</p>
+
+<p>"Before I answer that question, Mrs. Trent,
+may I ask why you should want to know?"</p>
+
+<p>"My dear boy, I see perfectly well that it must
+seem impertinent curiosity on my part. But I
+assure you my motive for asking is quite justifiable.
+Will you try not to feel irritated and believe
+that what I am doing, I am doing for the
+best?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have not known Miss Morton very long;
+why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know the people she is living with at
+present?"</p>
+
+<p>Again that curious inflection on the "present."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, and so do my people; they think all
+the world of her."</p>
+
+<p>"Of Miss Morton?" Shocked astonishment
+was in Mrs. Trent's voice.</p>
+
+<p>"I was not speaking of Miss Morton just then,
+but of the lady she is with. I've no doubt,
+though," said Miles stoutly, "they'd think just<!-- Page 227 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>
+the same of Miss Morton if they knew her. They
+may know her, too; it's just a chance we've never
+discussed her."</p>
+
+<p>"It is very difficult and painful for me to say
+what I have got to say ... but if Miss Morton
+is in charge of the children of a friend of your
+family, I think you ought to know she is not a
+suitable person to be anything of the kind."</p>
+
+<p>"I say!" Miles exclaimed, "that's a pretty
+stiff thing to say about any girl; a dangerous
+thing to say; especially about one who seems to
+need to earn her own living."</p>
+
+<p>"I know it is; I hate to say it ... but it
+seemed to me the other day&mdash;I hope I was mistaken&mdash;that
+you were rather ... attracted, and
+knowing what I do I felt I must speak, must warn
+you."</p>
+
+<p>Miles got up. He seemed to tower above the
+table and dwarf the whole room. "I'd rather
+not hear any more, Mrs. Trent, please. It seems
+too beastly mean somehow for me to sit here and
+listen to scandal about a poor little unprotected
+girl who works hard and faithfully&mdash;mind you,
+I've seen her with those children, and she's perfectly
+wonderful. Don't you see yourself how I
+can't <em>do</em> it?"</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Trent sat on where she was and smiled at
+Miles, slowly shaking her head. "Sit down, my
+dear boy. Your feelings do you credit; but we
+mustn't be sentimental, and facts are facts. I
+have every reason to know what I'm talking
+about, for some years ago Miss Morton was in
+my service."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 228 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span>
+Miles did not sit down. He stood where he
+was, glowering down at Mrs. Trent.</p>
+
+<p>"That doesn't brand her, does it?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>Still smiling maternally at him, Mrs. Trent
+continued: "She left my service when she ran
+away with Mr. Walter Brooke&mdash;you know him, I
+think? Disgraceful though it was, I must say
+this of him, that he never made any concealment
+of the fact that he was a married man. She did
+it with her eyes open."</p>
+
+<p>"If," Miles growled, "all this happened 'some
+years ago' she must have been about twelve at
+the time, and Brooke ought to have been hounded
+out of society long ago."</p>
+
+<p>"I needn't say that <em>we</em> have cut him ever since.
+She was, I believe, about nineteen at the time.
+She did not remain with him, but you can understand
+that, naturally, I don't want <em>you</em> to get
+entangled with a girl of that sort."</p>
+
+<p>Miles picked up his hat and stick. "I wish you
+hadn't told me," he groaned. "I don't think a
+bit less highly of her, but you've made <em>me</em> feel
+such a low-down brute, I can't bear it. Good-bye&mdash;I've
+no doubt you did it for the best ...
+but&mdash;&mdash;" And Miles fairly ran from the room.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Trent drummed with her fingers on the
+table and looked thoughtful. "It was quite time
+somebody interfered," she reflected. And then
+she remembered with annoyance that she had
+not found out the name of Meg's employer.</p>
+
+<p>Miles strode through Kensington Gore and past
+Knightsbridge, when he turned down Sloane
+Street till he came to a fencing school he fre<!-- Page 229 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>quented.
+Here he went in and had a strenuous
+half-hour with the instructor, but nothing served
+to restore his peace of mind. He was angry and
+hurt and horribly worried. If it was true, if the
+whole miserable story was true, then he knew
+that something had been taken from him. Something
+he had cherished in that dim, secret corner
+of his heart. Its truth or untruth did not affect
+his feeling for Meg. But if it were true, then he
+had irretrievably lost something intangible, yet
+precious. Young men like Miles never mention
+ideals, but that's not to say that in some very
+hidden place they don't exist, like buried treasure.</p>
+
+<p>All the shrewd Yorkshire strain in him shouted
+that he must set this doubt at rest. That whatever
+was to be his action in the future he must
+know and face the truth. All the delicacy, the
+fine feeling, the sensitiveness he got from his
+mother, made him loathe any investigation of
+the kind, and his racial instincts battled together
+and made him very miserable indeed.</p>
+
+<p>When he left the fencing school, he turned into
+Hyde Park. The Row was beginning to fill, and
+suddenly he came upon his second cousin, Lady
+Penelope Pottinger, sitting all alone on a green
+chair with another empty one beside it. Miles
+dropped into the empty chair. He liked Lady
+Pen. She was always downright and sometimes
+very amusing. Moreover she took an intelligent
+interest in dogs, and knew Amber Guiting and its
+inhabitants. So Miles dexterously led the conversation
+round to Jan and Wren's End.</p>
+
+<p>Lady Pen was looking very beautiful that<!-- Page 230 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>
+afternoon. She wore a broad-leaved hat which
+did not wholly conceal her glorious hair. Hair
+the same colour as certain short feathery rings
+that framed a pale, pathetic little face that
+haunted him.</p>
+
+<p>"Talking of Amber Guiting," he said, "did
+you ever come across a Miss Morton down there?
+A friend of Miss Ross."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Pen turned and looked hard at him. "Oh
+dear, yes; she's rather a pal of mine. I knew her
+long before I met her at the Ross's. Why, I
+knew her when she was companion at the Trents,
+poor little devil."</p>
+
+<p>"Did she have a bad time there? Weren't
+they nice to her?"</p>
+
+<p>"At first they were nice enough, but afterwards
+it was rotten. Clever little thing she is,
+but poor as a rat. What do you know about
+her?"</p>
+
+<p>Again Lady Pen looked hard at Miles. She
+was wondering whether Meg had ever given
+away the reason for that short hair of hers.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I've met her just casually, you know,
+with Miss Ross. She strikes me as a ... rather
+unusual sort of girl."</p>
+
+<p>"Ever mention me?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, never that I can remember. I haven't
+seen much of her, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, my son, the less you see of her the better,
+for her, I should say. She's a clever, industrious,
+good little thing, but she's not in your
+row. After all, these workin' girls have their
+feelin's."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 231 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>
+"I don't fancy Miss Morton is at all the susceptible
+idiot you appear to think her. It's other
+people's feelings I should be afraid of, not hers."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I grant you she's attractive enough to
+some folks. Artists, for instance, rave over her.
+At least, Anthony Ross did. Queer chap, that;
+would never paint me. Now can you understand
+any man in his senses refusin' to paint me?"</p>
+
+<p>"It seems odd, certainly."</p>
+
+<p>"He painted her, for nothin' of course, over
+an' over again ... just because he liked doin'
+it. Odd chap he was, but very takin'. You
+couldn't dislike him, even when he refused to
+paint you. Awful swank though, wasn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Were his pictures of Miss Morton&mdash;sold?"</p>
+
+<p>"Some were, I believe; but Janet Ross has got
+a lot of 'em down at Wren's End. She always
+puts away most of her father's paintin's when
+she lets the house. But you take my advice,
+Miley, my son: you keep clear of that little
+girl."</p>
+
+<p>This was on Thursday, and, of course, after
+two warnings in one afternoon, Miles went down
+to Amber Guiting on Saturday night.</p>
+
+<p>"Aunt Mary, it's such a lovely morning, should
+you mind very much if I go for a stroll in the
+woods&mdash;or slack about in the fresh air, instead of
+going to church?"</p>
+
+<p>At the word "stroll" he had seen an interested
+expression lighten up Squire Walcote's face, and
+the last thing he wanted was his uncle's society
+for the whole morning.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't feel up to much exercise," Miles went<!-- Page 232 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>
+on, trying to look exhausted and failing egregiously.
+"I've had rather a hard week in town.
+I'll give the vicar a turn in the evening, I will
+truly."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary smiled indulgently on this large
+young man, who certainly looked far from delicate.
+But only a hard-hearted woman could
+have pointed this out at such a moment, and
+where her nephew was concerned Lady Mary's
+heart was all kindly affection. So she let him off
+church.</p>
+
+<p>Miles carried out a pile of books to a seat in
+the garden and appeared to be settled down to
+a studious morning. He waved a languid hand
+to his aunt and uncle as they started for church,
+and the moment they were out of sight laid down
+his book and clasped his hands behind his head.</p>
+
+<p>The vicar of Amber Guiting was a family man
+and merciful. The school children all creaked
+and pattered out of church after morning prayer,
+and any other small people in the congregation
+were encouraged to do likewise, the well-filled
+vicarage pew setting the example. Therefore,
+Miles reckoned, that even supposing Miss Morton
+took the little boy to church (he couldn't conceive
+of anyone having the temerity to escort
+little Fay thither), they would come out in about
+three-quarters of an hour after the bell stopped.
+But he had no intention of waiting for that. The
+moment the bell ceased he&mdash;unaccompanied by
+any of the dogs grouped about him at that moment&mdash;was
+going to investigate the Wren's End
+garden. He knew every corner of it, and he in<!-- Page 233 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>tended
+to unearth Meg and the children if they
+were to be found.</p>
+
+<p>Besides, he ardently desired to see William.</p>
+
+<p>William was a lawful pretext. No one could
+see anything odd in his calling at Wren's End to
+see William. It was a perfectly natural thing
+to do.</p>
+
+<p>Confound Mrs. Trent.</p>
+
+<p>Confound Pen, what did she want to interfere
+for?</p>
+
+<p>Confound that bell. Would it never stop?</p>
+
+<p>Yes it had. No it hadn't. Yes ... it had.</p>
+
+<p>Give a few more minutes for laggards, and
+then&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Three melancholy and disappointed dogs were
+left in the Manor Garden, while Miles swung
+down the drive, past the church, and into the
+road that led to Wren's End.</p>
+
+<p>What a morning it was!</p>
+
+<p>The whole world seemed to have put on its
+Sunday frock. There had been rain in the night,
+and the air was full of the delicious fresh-washed
+smell of spring herbage. Wren's End seemed
+wonderfully quiet and deserted as Miles turned
+into the drive. As he neared the house he paused
+and listened, but there was no sound of high little
+voices anywhere.</p>
+
+<p>Were they at church, then?</p>
+
+<p>They couldn't be indoors on such a beautiful
+day.</p>
+
+<p>Miles whistled softly, knowing that if William
+were anywhere within hearing, that would bring
+him at the double.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 234 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>
+But no joyfully galumphing William appeared
+to welcome him.</p>
+
+<p>He had no intention of ringing to inquire. No,
+he'd take a good look round first, before he went
+back to hang about outside the church.</p>
+
+<p>It was pleasant in the Wren's End garden.</p>
+
+<p>Presently he went down the broad central path
+of the walled garden, with borders of flowers and
+beds of vegetables. Half-way down, in the sunniest,
+warmest place, he came upon a hammock
+slung between an apple-tree not quite out and a
+pear-tree that was nearly over, and a voice from
+the hammock called sleepily: "Is that you,
+Earley? I wish you'd pick up my cigarette case
+for me; it's fallen into the lavender bush just
+below."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Miss," a voice answered that was certainly
+not Earley's.</p>
+
+<p>Meg leaned out of the hammock to look behind
+her.</p>
+
+<p>"Hullo!" she said. "Why are you not in
+church? I can't get up because I'm a prisoner
+on <i lang="fr">parole</i>. Short of a thunderstorm nothing is
+to move me from this hammock till Miss Ross
+comes back."</p>
+
+<p>Miles stood in the pathway looking down at
+the muffled figure in the hammock. There was
+little to be seen of Meg save her rumpled, hatless
+head. She was much too economical of her precious
+caps to waste one in a hammock. She had
+slept for nearly two hours, then Hannah roused
+her with a cup of soup. She was drowsy and
+warm and comfortable, and her usually pale<!-- Page 235 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>
+cheeks were almost as pink as the apple-blossom
+buds above her head.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you want to sleep? Or may I stop and
+talk to you a bit?" Miles asked, when he had
+found the somewhat battered cigarette case and
+restored it to her.</p>
+
+<p>"As I'm very plainly off duty, I suppose you
+may stay and talk&mdash;if I fall asleep in the middle
+you must not be offended. You'll find plenty of
+chairs in the tool house."</p>
+
+<p>When Miles returned Meg had lit her cigarette,
+and he begged a light from her.</p>
+
+<p>What little hands she had! How fine-grained
+and delicate her skin!</p>
+
+<p>Again he felt that queer lump in his throat at
+the absurd, sweet pathos of her.</p>
+
+<p>He placed his chair where he had her full in
+view, not too near, yet comfortably so for conversation.
+Jan had swung the hammock very
+high, and Meg looked down at Miles over the
+edge.</p>
+
+<p>"It is unusual," she said, "to find a competent
+nurse spending her morning in this fashion, but
+if you know Miss Ross at all, you will already
+have realised that under her placid exterior she
+has a will of iron."</p>
+
+<p>"I shouldn't say <em>you</em> were lacking in determination."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I'm nothing to Jan. <em>She</em> exerts physical
+force. Look at me perched up here! How can I
+get down without a bad fall, swathed like a
+mummy in wraps; while my employer does my
+work?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 236 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span>
+"But you don't want to get down. You look
+awfully comfortable."</p>
+
+<p>"I am awfully comfortable&mdash;but it's most ...
+unprofessional&mdash;please don't tell anybody else."</p>
+
+<p>Meg closed her eyes, looking rather like a
+sleepy kitten, and Miles watched her in silence
+with a pain at his heart. Something kept saying
+over and over again: "Six years ago that girl
+there ran off with Walter Brooke. Six years ago
+that apparently level-headed, sensible little person
+was dazzled by the pinchbeck graces of that
+epicure in sensations." Miles fully granted his
+charm, his gentle melancholy, his caressing manner;
+but with it all Miles felt that he was so
+plainly "a wrong-'un," so clearly second-rate and
+untrustworthy&mdash;and a nice girl ought to recognise
+these things intuitively.</p>
+
+<p>Miles looked very sad and grave, and Meg,
+suddenly opening her eyes, found him regarding
+her with this incomprehensible expression.</p>
+
+<p>"You are not exactly talkative," she said.</p>
+
+<p>"I thought, perhaps, you wanted to rest, and
+would rather not talk. Maybe I'm a bit of a
+bore, and you'd rather I went away?"</p>
+
+<p>"You have not yet asked after William."</p>
+
+<p>"I hoped to find William, but he's nowhere to
+be seen."</p>
+
+<p>"He's with Jan and the children. I think"&mdash;here
+Meg lifted her curly head over the edge of
+the hammock&mdash;"he is the very darlingest animal
+in the world. I love William."</p>
+
+<p>"You do! I knew you would."</p>
+
+<p>"I do. He's so faithful and kind and understanding."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 237 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span>
+"Has he been quite good?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well ... once or twice he may have been a
+little&mdash;destructive&mdash;but you expect that with
+children."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope you punish him."</p>
+
+<p>"Jan does. Jan has a most effectual slap, but
+there's always a dreadful disturbance with the
+children on these occasions. Little Fay roars the
+house down when William has to be chastised."</p>
+
+<p>"What has he done?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not going to tell tales of William."</p>
+
+<p>Miles and Meg smiled at one another, and
+Walter Brooke faded from his mind.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps," he said, and paused, "you will by
+and by allow to William's late master a small
+portion of that regard?"</p>
+
+<p>"If William's master on further acquaintance
+proves half as loyal and trustworthy as William&mdash;I
+couldn't help it."</p>
+
+<p>"I wonder what you mean exactly by loyal and
+trustworthy?"</p>
+
+<p>"They're not very elastic terms, are they?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you think they mean rather the same
+thing?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a bit," Meg cried eagerly; "a person
+might be ever so trustworthy and yet not loyal.
+I take it that trustworthy and honest in tangible
+things are much the same. Loyalty is something
+intangible, and often means belief in people when
+everything seems against them. It's a much
+rarer quality than to be trustworthy. William
+would stick to one if one hadn't a crust, just because
+he liked to be there to make things a bit
+less wretched."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 238 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span>
+Miles smoked in silence for a minute, and
+again Meg closed her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"By the way," he said presently, "I didn't
+know you and my cousin Pen were friends. I
+met her in the Park the day before yesterday.
+Her hair's rather the same colour as yours&mdash;handsome
+woman, isn't she?"</p>
+
+<p>Meg opened her eyes and turned crimson.
+Had the outspoken Lady Pen said anything
+about her hair, she wondered.</p>
+
+<p>Miles, noting the sudden blush, put it down
+to Lady Pen's knowledge of what had happened
+at the Trents, and the miserable feelings of doubt
+and apprehension came surging back.</p>
+
+<p>"She's quite lovely," said Meg.</p>
+
+<p>"A bit too much on the big side, don't you
+think?"</p>
+
+<p>"I admire big women."</p>
+
+<p>Silence fell again. Meg pulled the rug up
+under her chin.</p>
+
+<p>Surely it was not quite so warm as a few minutes
+ago.</p>
+
+<p>Miles stood up. "I have a guilty feeling that
+Miss Ross will strongly disapprove of my disturbing
+you like this. If you will tell me which
+way they have gone I will go and meet them."</p>
+
+<p>"They've gone to your uncle's woods, and I
+think they must be on their way home by now.
+If you call William he'll answer."</p>
+
+<p>"I won't say good-bye," said Miles, "because
+I shall come back with them."</p>
+
+<p>"I shall be on duty then," said Meg. "Good-bye."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 239 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>
+She turned her face from him and nestled
+down among her cushions. For a full minute he
+stood staring at the back of her head, with its
+crushed and tumbled tangle of short curls.</p>
+
+<p>Then quite silently he took his way out of the
+Wren's End garden.</p>
+
+<p>Meg shut her eyes very tight. Was it the
+light that made them smart so?</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 240 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XIX<br />
+<span class="sub">THE YOUNG IDEA</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">S</span>QUIRE WALCOTE had given the Wren's
+End family the run of his woods, and, what
+was even more precious, permission to use the
+river-path through his grounds. Lady Mary,
+who had no children of her own, was immensely
+interested in Tony and little Fay, and would
+give Jan more advice as to their management in
+an hour than the vicar's wife ever offered during
+the whole of their acquaintance. But then <em>she</em>
+had a family of eight.</p>
+
+<p>But the first time Tony went to the river Jan
+took him alone; and not to the near water in
+Squire Walcote's grounds, but to the old bridge
+that crossed the Amber some way out of the village.
+It was the typical Cotswold bridge, with
+low parapets that make such a comfortable seat
+for meditative villagers. Just before they reached
+it she loosed Tony's hand, and held her breath to
+see what he would do. Would he run straight
+across to get to the other side, or would he look
+over?</p>
+
+<p>Yes. He went straight to the low wall;
+stopped, looked over, leaned over, and stared
+and stared.</p>
+
+<p>Jan gave a sigh of relief.</p>
+
+<p>The water of the Amber just there is deep and<!-- Page 241 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>
+clear, an infinite thing for a child to look down
+into; but it was not of that Jan was thinking.</p>
+
+<p>Hugo was no fisherman. Water had no attraction
+for him, save as a pleasant means of taking
+exercise. He was a fair oar; but for a stream
+that wouldn't float a boat he cared nothing at all.</p>
+
+<p>Charles Considine Smith had angled diligently.
+In fact, he wrote almost as much about the habits
+of trout as about wrens. James Ross, the gallant
+who carried off the second Tranquil, had
+been fishing at Amber Guiting when he first
+saw her. Anthony's father fished and so did
+Anthony; and Jan, herself, could throw a fly
+quite prettily. Yet, your true fisherman is born,
+not made; it is not a question of environment,
+but it is, very often, one of heredity; for the tendency
+comes out when, apparently, every adverse
+circumstance has combined to crush it.</p>
+
+<p>And no mortal who cares for or is going to care
+for fishing can ever cross a bridge without stopping
+to look down into the water.</p>
+
+<p>"There's a fish swimming down there," Tony
+whispered (was it instinct made him whisper?
+Jan wondered), "brown and speckledy, rather
+like the thrushes in the garden."</p>
+
+<p>Jan clutched nervously at the little coat while
+Tony hung over so far that only his toes were on
+the ground. She had brought a bit of bread in
+her pocket, and let him throw bits to the greedy,
+wily old trout who had defied a hundred skilful
+rods. On that first day old Amber whispered
+her secret to Tony and secured another slave.</p>
+
+<p>For Jan it was only another proof that Tony<!-- Page 242 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>
+possessed a sterling character. Since her sister's
+disastrous marriage she had come to look upon a
+taste for fishing as more or less of a moral safeguard.
+She had often reflected that if only Fay
+had not been so lukewarm with regard to the
+gentle craft&mdash;and so bored in a heavenly place
+where, if it did rain for twenty-three of the
+twenty-four hours, even a second-rate rod might
+land fourteen or fifteen pounds of good sea-trout
+in an afternoon&mdash;she could never have
+fallen in love with Hugo Tancred, who was equally
+without enthusiasm and equally bored till he
+met Fay. Jan was ready enough now to blame
+herself for her absorption at this time, and would
+remember guiltily the relief with which she and
+her father greeted Fay's sudden willingness to
+remain a week longer in a place she previously
+had declared to be absolutely unendurable.</p>
+
+<p>The first time Tony's sister went to Amber
+Bridge Meg took them both. Little Fay descended
+from her pram just before they reached
+it, declaring it was a "nice dly place to walk."
+She ran on a little ahead, and before Meg realised
+what she was doing, she had scrambled up on
+to the top of the low wall and run briskly along
+it till her progress was stopped by a man who
+was leaning over immersed in thought. He
+nearly fell in himself, when a clear little voice
+inquired, "Do loo mind if I climb over loo?"</p>
+
+<p>It was Farmer Burgess, and he clasped the
+tripping lady of the white woolly gaiters in a
+pair of strong arms, and lifted her down just as
+the terrified Meg reached them.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 243 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span>
+"Law, Missie!" gasped Mr. Burgess, "you
+mustn't do the like o' that there. It's downright
+fool'ardy."</p>
+
+<p>"Downlight foolardy," echoed little Fay. "And
+what nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>According to Mr. Burgess it was dangerous
+and a great many other things as well, but he
+lost his heart to her in that moment, and she
+could twist him round her little finger ever after.</p>
+
+<p>To be told that a thing was dangerous was to
+add to its attractions. She was absolutely without
+fear, and could climb like a kitten. She
+hadn't been at Wren's End a week before she was
+discovered half-way up the staircase on the outside
+of the banisters. And when she had been
+caught and lifted over by a white-faced aunt,
+explained that it was "muts the most instasting
+way of going up tairs."</p>
+
+<p>When asked how she expected to get to the
+other side at the top, she giggled derisively and
+said "ovel."</p>
+
+<p>Jan seriously considered a barbed-wire entanglement
+for the outside edge of her staircase after
+that.</p>
+
+<p>While Meg rested in the hammock Jan spent a
+strenuous morning in Guiting Woods with the
+children and William. Late windflowers were
+still in bloom, and early bluebells made lovely
+atmospheric patches under the trees, just as
+though a bit of the sky had fallen, as in the oft-told
+tale of "Cockie Lockie." There were primroses,
+too, and white violets, so that there were
+many little bunches with exceedingly short stalks<!-- Page 244 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>
+to be arranged and tied up with the worsted provident
+Auntie Jan had brought with her; finally
+they all sat down on a rug lined with mackintosh,
+and little Fay demanded "Clipture."</p>
+
+<p>"Clipture" was her form of "Scripture," which
+Auntie Jan "told" every morning after breakfast
+to the children. Jan was a satisfactory narrator,
+for the form of her stories never varied. The
+Bible stories she told in the actual Bible words,
+and all children appreciate their dramatic simplicity
+and directness.</p>
+
+<p>That morning Joseph and his early adventures
+and the baby Moses were the favourites, and
+when these had been followed by "The Three
+Bears" and "Cock Robin," it was time to collect
+the bouquets and go home. And on the way
+home they met Captain Middleton. William
+spied him afar off, and dashed towards him with
+joyful, deep-toned barks. He was delighted to
+see William, said he had grown and was in the
+pink of condition; and then announced that he
+had already been to Wren's End and had seen
+Miss Morton. There was something in the tone
+of this avowal that made Jan think. It was
+shy, it was proud, it seemed to challenge Jan to
+find any fault in his having done so, and it was
+supremely self-conscious. He walked back with
+them to the Wren's End gate, and then came a
+moment of trial for William.</p>
+
+<p>He wanted to go with his master.</p>
+
+<p>He wanted to stay with the children.</p>
+
+<p>Captain Middleton settled it by shaking each
+offered paw and saying very seriously: "You<!-- Page 245 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>
+must stay and take care of the ladies, William.
+I trust you." William looked wistfully after the
+tall figure that went down the road with the
+queer, light, jumpetty tread of all men who ride
+much.</p>
+
+<p>Then he trotted after Jan and the children and
+was exuberantly glad to see Meg again.</p>
+
+<p>She declared herself quite rested; heard that
+they had seen Captain Middleton, and met unmoved
+the statement that he was coming to tea.</p>
+
+<p>But she didn't look nearly so well rested as
+Jan had hoped she would.</p>
+
+<p>After the children's dinner Meg went on duty,
+and Jan saw no more of the nursery party till
+later in the afternoon. The creaking wheels of
+two small wheelbarrows made Jan look up from
+the letters she was writing at the knee-hole table
+that stood in the nursery window, and she beheld
+little Fay and Tony, followed by Meg knitting
+busily, as they came through the yew archway
+on to the lawn.</p>
+
+<p>Meg subsided into one of the white seats, but
+the children processed solemnly round, pausing
+under Jan's window.</p>
+
+<p>"I know lots an' lots of Clipture," her niece's
+voice proclaimed proudly as she sat down heavily
+in her wheelbarrow on the top of some garden
+produce she had collected.</p>
+
+<p>"How much do you know?" Tony asked sceptically.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, lots an' lots, all about poor little Jophez
+in the bullushes, and his instasting dleams."</p>
+
+<p>"Twasn't Jophez," Tony corrected. "It was<!-- Page 246 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span>
+Mophez in the bulrushes, and he didn't have no
+dreams. That was Jophez."</p>
+
+<p>"How d'you know," Fay persisted, "that poor
+little Mophez had no dleams? Why <em>shouldn't</em> he
+have dleams same as Jophez?"</p>
+
+<p>"It doesn't say so."</p>
+
+<p>"It doesn't say he <em>didn't</em> have dleams. He
+<em>had</em> dleams, I tell you; I know he had. Muts
+nicer dleams van Jophez."</p>
+
+<p>"Let's ask Meg; she'll know."</p>
+
+<p>Jan gave a sigh of relief. The children had
+not noticed her, and Meg had a fertile mind.</p>
+
+<p>The wheelbarrows were trundled across the
+lawn and paused in front of Meg, while a lively
+duet demanded simultaneously:</p>
+
+<table class="duet">
+<tr><td rowspan="2" class="lg">{</td><td>"<em>Did</em> little Mophez have dleams?"</td></tr>
+<tr><td>"<em>Didn't</em> deah littoo Mophez have dleams?"</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>When Meg had disentangled the questions and
+each child sat down in a wheelbarrow at her
+feet, she remarked judicially: "Well, there's
+nothing said about little Moses' dreams, certainly;
+but I should think it's quite likely the
+poor baby did have dreams."</p>
+
+<p>"What sort of dleams? Nicer van sheaves
+and sings, wasn't they?"</p>
+
+<p>"I should think," Meg said thoughtfully,
+"that he dreamed he must cry very quietly lest
+the Egyptians should hear him."</p>
+
+<p>"Deah littoo Mophez ... and what nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>Meg was tempted and fell. It was very easy
+for her to invent "dleams" for "deah littoo
+Mophez" lying in his bulrush ark among the
+flags at the river's edge. And, wholly regardless<!-- Page 247 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>
+of geography, she transported him to the Amber,
+where the flags were almost in bloom at that
+moment, such local colour adding much to the
+realism of her stories.</p>
+
+<p>Presently William grew restless. He ran to
+Anthony's Venetian gate in the yew hedge and
+squealed (William never whined) to get out.
+Tony let him out, and he fled down the drive to
+meet his master, who had come a good half-hour
+too soon for tea.</p>
+
+<p>Jan continued to try and finish her letters
+while Captain Middleton, coatless, on all-fours,
+enacted an elephant which the children rode in
+turn. When he had completely ruined the knees
+of his trousers he arose and declared it was time
+to play "Here we go round the mulberry-bush,"
+and it so happened that once or twice he played
+it hand-in-hand with Meg.</p>
+
+<p>Jan left her letters and went out.</p>
+
+<p>The situation puzzled her. She feared for
+Meg's peace of mind, for Captain Middleton
+was undoubtedly attractive; and then she found
+herself fearing for his.</p>
+
+<p>After tea and more games with the children
+Captain Middleton escorted his hostess to church,
+where he joined his aunt in the Manor seat.</p>
+
+<p>During church Jan found herself wondering
+uneasily:</p>
+
+<p>"Was everybody going to fall in love with
+Meg?"</p>
+
+<p>"Would Peter?"</p>
+
+<p>"What a disagreeable idea!"</p>
+
+<p>And yet, why should it be?</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 248 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>
+Resolutely she told herself that Peter was at
+perfect liberty to fall in love with Meg if he liked,
+and set herself to listen intelligently to the Vicar's
+sermon.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Meg started to put her children to bed, only
+to find that her fertility of imagination in the
+afternoon was to prove her undoing in the evening;
+for her memory was by no means as reliable
+as her powers of invention.</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay urgently demanded the whole cycle
+of little Mophez' dleams over again. And for
+the life of her Meg couldn't remember them
+either in their proper substance or sequence&mdash;and
+this in spite of the most persistent prompting,
+and she failed utterly to reproduce the entertainment
+of the afternoon. Both children were
+disappointed, but little Fay, accustomed as she
+was to Auntie Jan's undeviating method of
+narrating "Clipture," was angry as well. She
+fell into a passion of rage and nearly screamed
+the house down. Since the night of Ayah's departure
+there had not been such a scene.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Meg vowed (though she knew she would
+break her vow the very first time she was
+tempted) that never again would she tamper
+with Holy Writ, and for some weeks she coldly
+avoided both Jophez and Mophez as topics of
+conversation.</p>
+
+<p>Meg could never resist playing at things,
+and what "Clipture" the children learned from
+Jan in the morning they insisted on enacting with
+Meg later in the day.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 249 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>
+Sometimes she was seized with misgiving as
+to the propriety of these representations, but
+dismissed her doubts as cowardly.</p>
+
+<p>"After all," she explained to Jan, "we only
+play the very human bits. I never let them
+pretend to be anybody divine ... and you
+know the people&mdash;in the Old Testament, anyway&mdash;were
+most of them extremely human,
+not to say disreputable at times."</p>
+
+<p>It is possible that "Clipture's" supreme attraction
+for the children was that it conveyed
+the atmosphere of the familiar East. The New
+Testament was more difficult to play at, but,
+being equally dramatic, the children couldn't
+see it.</p>
+
+<p>"Can't we do one teeny miracle?" Tony would
+beseech, but Meg was firm; she would have
+nothing to do with either miracles nor yet with
+angels. Little Fay ardently desired to be an
+angel, but Meg wouldn't have it at any price.</p>
+
+<p>"You're not in the least <em>like</em> an angel, you
+know," she said severely.</p>
+
+<p>"What for?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because angels are <em>perfectly</em> good."</p>
+
+<p>"I could <em>pletend</em> to be puffectly good."</p>
+
+<p>"Let's play Johnny Baptist," suggested the
+ever-helpful Tony, "and we could pittend to
+bring in his head on a charger."</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly not," Meg said hastily. "That
+would be a horrid game."</p>
+
+<p>"Let me be the daughter!" little Fay implored,
+"and dance in flont of Helod."</p>
+
+<p>This was permitted, and Tony, decorated<!-- Page 250 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>
+with William's chain, sat gloomily scowling at
+the gyrations of "the daughter," who, assisted
+by William, danced all over the nursery: and
+Meg, watching the representation, decided that
+if the original "daughter" was half as bewitching
+as this one, there really might have been
+some faint excuse for Herod.</p>
+
+<p>Hannah had no idea of these goings-on, or
+she would have expected the roof to fall in and
+crush them. Yet she, too, was included among
+the children's prophets, owing to her exact and
+thorough knowledge of "Clipture." Hannah's
+favourite part of the Bible was the Book of
+Daniel, which she knew practically by heart;
+and her rendering of certain chapters was&mdash;though
+she would have hotly resented the phrase&mdash;extremely
+dramatic.</p>
+
+<p>It is so safe and satisfying to know that your
+favourite story will run smoothly, clause for
+clause, and word for word, just as you like it
+best, and the children were always sure of this
+with Hannah.</p>
+
+<p>Anne Chitt would listen open-mouthed in
+astonishment, exclaiming afterwards, "Why,
+'Annah, wot a tremenjous lot of Bible verses
+you 'ave learned to be sure."</p>
+
+<p>The children once tried Anne Chitt as a storyteller,
+but she was a failure.</p>
+
+<p>As she had been present at several of Hannah's
+recitals of the Three Children and the burning
+fiery furnace, they thought it but a modest demand
+upon her powers. But when&mdash;instead of
+beginning with the sonorous "<i>Then an herald<!-- Page 251 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>
+cried aloud, To you it is commanded, O people,
+nations and languages</i>"&mdash;when she wholly omitted
+any reference to "<i>the sound of cornet, flute, harp,
+sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer</i>, and all kinds of
+musick"&mdash;and essayed to tell the story in broad
+Gloucestershire and her own bald words, the
+disappointed children fell upon her and thumped
+her rudely upon the back; declaring her story
+to be "<i>kutcha</i>" and she, herself, a <i>budmash</i>.
+Which, being interpreted, meant that her story
+was most badly made and that she, herself, was
+a rascal.</p>
+
+<p>Anne Chitt was much offended, and complained
+tearfully to Jan that she "wouldn't 'ave said
+nothin' if they'd called 'er or'nery names, but
+them there Injian words was more than she
+could abear."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 252 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XX<br />
+<span class="sub">"ONE WAY OF LOVE"</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">A</span>MONG the neighbours there was none
+more assiduous in the matter of calls and
+other friendly manifestations than Mr. Huntly
+Withells&mdash;emphasis on the "ells"&mdash;who lived at
+Guiting Grange, about a couple of miles from
+Wren's End. Mr. Withells was settled at the
+Grange some years before Miss Janet Ross left
+her house to Jan, and he was already a person
+of importance and influence in that part of the
+county when Anthony Ross and his daughters
+first spent a whole summer there.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Withells proved most neighbourly. He
+had artistic leanings himself, and possessed some
+good pictures; among them, one of Anthony's,
+which naturally proved a bond of union. He did
+not even so much as sketch, himself&mdash;which
+Anthony considered another point in his favour&mdash;but
+he was a really skilled photographer,
+possessed the most elaborate cameras, and obtained
+quite beautiful results.</p>
+
+<p>Since Jan's return from India he had completely
+won her heart by taking a great many
+photographs of the children, pictures delightfully
+natural, and finished as few amateurs contrive
+to present them.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 253 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>
+It was rumoured in Amber Guiting that Mr.
+Withells' views on the subject of matrimony
+were "peculiar"; but all the ladies, especially
+the elderly ladies, were unanimous in declaring
+that he had a "beautiful mind."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Fream, the vicar's wife, timidly confided
+to Jan that Mr. Withells had told her husband
+that he cared only for "spiritual marriage"&mdash;whatever
+that might be; and that, as yet, he
+had met no woman whom he felt would see eye
+to eye with him on this question. "He doesn't
+approve of caresses," she added.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, who wants to caress him?" Jan asked
+bluntly.</p>
+
+<p>Meg declared there was one thing she could
+not bear about Mr. Withells, and that was the
+way he shook hands, "exactly as if he had no
+thumbs. If he's so afraid of touching one as
+all that comes to, why doesn't he let it alone?"</p>
+
+<p>Yet the apparently thumbless hands were
+constantly occupied in bearing gifts of all kinds
+to his friends.</p>
+
+<p>In appearance he was dapper, smallish, without
+being undersized, always immaculately neat
+in his attire, with a clean-shaven, serious, rather
+sallow face, which was inclined to be chubby as
+to the cheeks. He wore double-sighted pince-nez,
+and no mortal had ever seen him without
+them. His favourite writer was Miss Jane Austen,
+and he deplored the licentious tendency of
+so much modern literature; frequently, and with
+flushed countenance, denouncing certain books
+as an "outrage." He was considered a very<!-- Page 254 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>
+well-read man. He disliked anything that was
+"not quite nice," and detested a strong light,
+whether it were thrown upon life or landscape;
+in bright sunshine he always carried a white
+umbrella lined with green. The game he played
+best was croquet, and here he was really first
+class; but he was also skilled in every known
+form of Patience, and played each evening unless
+he happened to be dining out.</p>
+
+<p>As regards food he was something of a faddist,
+and on the subject of fresh air almost a monomaniac.
+He declared that he could not exist
+for ten minutes in a room with closed windows,
+and that the smell of apples made him feel positively
+faint; moreover, he would mention his
+somewhat numerous antipathies as though there
+were something peculiarly meritorious in possessing
+so many. This made his entertainment
+at any meal a matter of agitated consideration
+among the ladies of Amber Guiting.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, he kept an excellent and hospitable
+table himself, and in no way forced his
+own taste upon others. He disliked the smell
+of tobacco and hardly ever drank wine, yet he
+kept a stock of excellent cigars and his cellar
+was beyond reproach.</p>
+
+<p>He had been observing Jan for several years,
+and was rapidly coming to the conclusion that
+she was an "eminently sensible woman." Her
+grey hair and the way she had managed everything
+for her father led him to believe that she
+was many years older than her real age. Recently
+he had taken to come to Wren's End on<!-- Page 255 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>
+one pretext and another almost every day. He
+was kind and pleasant to the children, who
+amused and pleased him&mdash;especially little Fay;
+but he was much puzzled by Meg, whom he had
+known in pre-cap-and-apron days while she was
+staying at Wren's End.</p>
+
+<p>He couldn't quite place Meg, and there was
+an occasional glint in her queer eyes that he
+found disconcerting. He was never comfortable
+in her society, for he objected to red hair almost
+as strongly as to a smell of apples.</p>
+
+<p>He really liked the children, and since he
+knew he couldn't get Jan without them he was
+beginning to think that in such a big house as
+the Grange they would not necessarily be much
+in the way. He knew nothing whatever about
+Hugo Tancred.</p>
+
+<p>Jan satisfied his fastidious requirements. She
+was dignified, graceful, and, he considered, of
+admirable parts. He felt that in a very little
+while he could imbue Jan with his own views as
+to the limitations and delicate demarcations of
+such a marriage as he contemplated.</p>
+
+<p>She was so sensible.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile the object of these kind intentions
+was wholly unaware of them. She was just then
+very much absorbed in her own affairs and considerably
+worried about Meg's. For Captain
+Middleton's week-end was repeated on the following
+Saturday and extended far into the next
+week. He came constantly to Wren's End,
+where the children positively adored him, and
+he seemed to possess an infallible instinct which<!-- Page 256 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span>
+led him to the village whensoever Meg and her
+charges had business there.</p>
+
+<p>On such occasions Meg was often quite rude
+to Captain Middleton, but the children and
+William more than atoned for her coldness by
+the warmth of their welcome, and he attached
+himself to them.</p>
+
+<p>In fact, as regards the nursery party at Wren's
+End, Miles strongly resembled William before a
+fire&mdash;you might drive him away ninety and
+nine times, he always came thrusting back with
+the same expression of deprecating astonishment
+that you could be other than delighted to
+see him.</p>
+
+<p>Whither was it all tending? Jan wondered.</p>
+
+<p>No further news had come from Hugo; Peter,
+she supposed, had sailed and was due in London
+at the end of the week.</p>
+
+<p>Then Mr. Huntly Withells asked her one afternoon
+to bicycle over to see his spring irises&mdash;he
+called them "<i>irides</i>," and invariably spoke of
+"<i>croci</i>," and "<i>delphinia</i>"&mdash;and as Meg was taking
+the children to tea at the vicarage, Jan went.</p>
+
+<p>To her surprise, she found herself the sole
+guest, but supposed she was rather early and
+that his other friends hadn't come yet.</p>
+
+<p>They strolled about the gardens, so lovely in
+their spring blossoming, and it happened that
+from one particular place they got a specially
+good view of the house.</p>
+
+<p>"How much larger it is than you would think,
+looking at the front," Jan remarked. "You
+don't see that wing at all from the drive."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 257 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>
+"There's plenty of room for nephews and
+nieces," Mr. Withells said jocularly.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you many nephews and nieces?" she
+asked, turning to look at him, for there was
+something in the tone of his voice that she could
+not understand.</p>
+
+<p>"Not of my own," he replied, still in that
+queer, unnatural voice, "but you see my wife
+might have ... if I was married."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you thinking of getting married?" she
+asked, with the real interest such a subject always
+rouses in woman.</p>
+
+<p>"That depends," Mr. Withells said consciously,
+"on whether the lady I have in mind
+... er ... shall we sit down, Miss Ross? It's
+rather hot in the walks."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, not yet," Jan exclaimed. She couldn't
+think why, but she began to feel uncomfortable.
+"I must see those Darwin tulips over there."</p>
+
+<p>"It's very sunny over there," he objected.
+"Come down the nut-walk and see the <i>myosotis
+arvensis</i>; it is already in bloom, the weather has
+been so warm.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Ross," Mr. Withells continued seriously,
+as they turned into the nut-walk which led back
+towards the house, "we have known each other
+for a considerable time...."</p>
+
+<p>"We have," said Jan, as he had paused, evidently
+expecting a reply.</p>
+
+<p>"And I have come to have a great regard for
+you...."</p>
+
+<p>Again he paused, and Jan found herself silently
+whispering, "Curtsy while you're thinking<!-- Page 258 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>&mdash;it
+saves time," but she preserved an outward
+silence.</p>
+
+<p>"You are, if I may say so, the most sensible
+woman of my acquaintance."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," said Jan, but without enthusiasm.</p>
+
+<p>"We are neither of us quite young"&mdash;(Mr.
+Withells was forty-nine, but it was a little hard
+on Jan)&mdash;"and I feel sure that you, for instance,
+would not expect or desire from a husband those
+constant outward demonstrations of affection
+such as handclaspings and kisses, which are so
+foolish and insanitary."</p>
+
+<p>Jan turned extremely red and walked rather
+faster.</p>
+
+<p>"Do not misunderstand me, Miss Ross," Mr.
+Withells continued, looking with real admiration
+at her downcast, rosy face&mdash;she must be quite
+healthy he thought, to look so clean and fresh
+always&mdash;"I lay down no hard-and-fast rules.
+I do not say should my wife desire to kiss me
+sometimes, that I should ... repulse her."</p>
+
+<p>Jan gasped.</p>
+
+<p>"But I have the greatest objection, both on
+sanitary and moral grounds to&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't imagine anyone <em>wanting</em> to kiss you,"
+Jan interrupted furiously; "you're far too puffy
+and stippled."</p>
+
+<p>And she ran from him as though an angry
+bull were after her.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Withells stood stock-still where he was,
+in pained astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>He saw the fleeing fair one disappear into the<!-- Page 259 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>
+distance and in the shortest time on record he
+heard the clanging of her bicycle bell as she
+scorched down his drive.</p>
+
+<p>"Puffy and stippled"&mdash;"Puffy and stippled"!</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Withells repeated to himself this rudely
+personal remark as he walked slowly towards
+the house.</p>
+
+<p>What could she mean?</p>
+
+<p>And what in the world had he said to make
+her so angry?</p>
+
+<p>Women were really most unaccountable.</p>
+
+<p>He ascended his handsome staircase and went
+into his dressing-room, and there he sought his
+looking-glass, which stood in the window, and
+surveyed himself critically. Yes, his cheeks
+<em>were</em> a bit puffy near the nostrils, and, as is generally
+the case in later life, the pores of the skin
+were a bit enlarged, but for all that he was quite
+a personable man.</p>
+
+<p>He sighed. Miss Ross, he feared, was not
+nearly so sensible as he had thought.</p>
+
+<p>It was distinctly disappointing.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>For the first mile and a quarter Jan scorched
+all she knew. The angry blood was thumping
+in her ears and she exclaimed indignantly at
+intervals, "How dared he! How dared he!"</p>
+
+<p>Then she punctured a tyre.</p>
+
+<p>There was no hope of getting it mended till
+she reached Wren's End, when Earley would
+do it for her. As she pushed her bicycle along
+the lane she recovered her sense of humour and
+she laughed. And presently she became aware<!-- Page 260 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>
+of a faint, sweet, elusive perfume from some
+flowering shrub on the other side of somebody's
+garden wall.</p>
+
+<p>It strongly resembled the smell of a blossoming
+tree that grew on Ridge Road, Malabar
+Hill. And in one second Jan was in Bombay,
+and was standing in the moonlight, looking up
+into a face that was neither puffy nor stippled
+nor prim; but young and thin and worn and very
+kind. And the exquisite understanding of that
+moment came back to her, and her eyes filled
+with tears.</p>
+
+<p>Yet in another moment she was again demanding
+indignantly, "How dared he!"</p>
+
+<p>She went straight to her room when she got
+in, and, like Mr. Withells, she went and looked
+at herself in the glass.</p>
+
+<p>Unlike Mr. Withells, she saw nothing there
+to give her any satisfaction. She shook her
+head at the person in the glass and said aloud:</p>
+
+<p>"If that's all you get by trying to be sensible,
+the sooner you become a drivelling idiot the
+better for your peace of mind&mdash;and your
+vanity."</p>
+
+<p>The person in the glass shook her head back
+at Jan, and Jan turned away thoroughly disgusted
+with such a futile sort of <i lang="la">tu quoque</i>.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 261 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XXI<br />
+<span class="sub">ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">M</span>EG and the children, returning from their
+tea-party at the vicarage, were stopped
+continually in their journey through the main
+street by friendly folk who wanted to greet the
+children. It was quite a triumphal progress,
+and Meg was feeling particularly proud that
+afternoon, for her charges, including William,
+had all behaved beautifully. Little Fay had
+refrained from snatching other children's belongings
+with the cool remark, "Plitty little
+Fay would like 'at"; Tony had been quite merry
+and approachable; and William had offered
+paws and submitted to continual pullings, pushings
+and draggings with exemplary patience.</p>
+
+<p>Once through the friendly, dignified old street,
+they reached the main road, which was bordered
+by rough grass sloping to a ditch surmounted
+by a thick thorn hedge. They were rather late,
+and Meg was wheeling little Fay as fast as she
+could, Tony trotting beside her to keep up,
+when a motor horn was sounded behind them
+and a large car came along at a good speed.
+They were all well to the side of the road, but
+William&mdash;with the perverse stupidity of the
+young dog&mdash;above all, of the young bull-terrier&mdash;chose
+that precise moment to gambol aim<!-- Page 262 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>lessly
+right into the path of the swiftly-coming
+motor, just as it seemed right upon him; and
+this, regardless of terrified shouts from Meg and
+the children, frantic sounding of the horn and
+violent language from the driver of the car.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed that destruction must inevitably
+overtake William when the car swerved violently
+as the man ran it down the sloping bank, where
+it stuck, leaving William, unscathed and rather
+alarmed by all the clamour, to run back to his
+family.</p>
+
+<p>Meg promptly whacked him as hard as she
+could, whereupon, much surprised, he turned
+over on his back, waving four paws feebly in
+the air.</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you keep your dog at the side?"
+the man shouted with very natural irritation as
+he descended from his seat.</p>
+
+<p>"He's a naughty&mdash;stupid&mdash;puppy," Meg ejaculated
+between the whacks. "It wasn't your
+fault in the least, and it was awfully good of you
+to avoid him."&mdash;Whack&mdash;whack.</p>
+
+<p>The man started a little as she spoke and
+came across the road towards them.</p>
+
+<p>Meg raised a flushed face from her castigation
+of William, but the pretty colour faded quickly
+when she saw who the stranger was.</p>
+
+<p>"Meg!" he exclaimed. "<em>You!</em>"</p>
+
+<p>For a tense moment they stared at one another,
+while the children stared at the stranger.
+He was certainly a handsome man; melancholy,
+"interesting." Pale, with regular features and
+sleepy, smallish eyes set very near together.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 263 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>
+"If you knew how I have searched for you,"
+he said.</p>
+
+<p>His voice was his great charm, and would
+have made his fortune on the stage. It could
+convey so much, could be so tender and beseeching,
+so charged with deepest sadness, so musical
+always.</p>
+
+<p>"Your search cannot have been very arduous,"
+Meg answered drily. "There has never been
+any mystery about my movements." And she
+looked him straight in the face.</p>
+
+<p>"At first, I was afraid ... I did not try to
+find you."</p>
+
+<p>"You were well-advised."</p>
+
+<p>"Who is 'at sahib?" little Fay interrupted
+impatiently. "Let us go home." She had no
+use for any sahib who ignored her presence.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, we'd better be getting on," Meg said
+hurriedly, and seized the handle of the pram.</p>
+
+<p>But he stood right in their path.</p>
+
+<p>"You were very cruel," the musical voice
+went on. "You never seemed to give a thought
+to all <em>I</em> was suffering."</p>
+
+<p>Meg met the sleepy eyes, that used to thrill
+her very soul, with a look of scornful amusement
+in hers that was certainly the very last expression
+he had ever expected to see in them.</p>
+
+<p>She had always dreaded this moment.</p>
+
+<p>Realising the power this man had exercised
+over her, she always feared that should she meet
+him again the old glamour would surround him;
+the old domination be reasserted. She forgot
+that in five years one's standards change.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 264 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>
+Now that she did meet him she discovered
+that he held no bonds with which to bind her.
+That what she had dreaded was a chimera. The
+real Walter Brooke, the moment he appeared in
+the flesh, destroyed the image memory had set
+up; and Meg straightened her slender shoulders
+as though a heavy burden had dropped from
+them.</p>
+
+<p>The whole thing passed like a flash.</p>
+
+<p>"You were very cruel," he repeated.</p>
+
+<p>"There is no use going into all that," Meg
+answered in a cheerful, matter-of-fact tone.
+"Good-bye, Mr. Brooke. We are most grateful
+to you for not running over William, who is,"
+here she raised her voice for the benefit of the
+culprit, "a naughty&mdash;tiresome dog."</p>
+
+<p>"But you can't leave me like this. When can
+I see you again&mdash;there is so much I want to
+explain...."</p>
+
+<p>"But I don't want any explanations, thank
+you. Come children, we <em>must</em> go."</p>
+
+<p>"Meg, listen ... surely you have some little
+feeling of kindness towards me ... after all
+that happened...."</p>
+
+<p>He put his hand on Meg's arm to detain her,
+and William, who had never been known to
+show enmity to human creature, gave a deep
+growl and bristled. A growl so ominous and
+threatening that Meg hastily loosed the pram
+and caught him by the collar with both hands.</p>
+
+<p>Tony saw that Meg was flustered and uncomfortable.
+"Why does he not go?" he asked.
+"I thought he was a sahib, but I suppose he is<!-- Page 265 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>
+the gharri-wallah. We have thanked him&mdash;does
+he want backsheesh? Give him a rupee."</p>
+
+<p>"He <em>does</em> want backsheesh," the deep, musical
+voice went on&mdash;"a little pity, a little common
+kindness."</p>
+
+<p>It was an embarrassing situation. William was
+straining at his collar and growling like an incipient
+thunderstorm.</p>
+
+<p>"We have thanked you," Tony said again
+with dignity. "We have no money, or we would
+reward you. If you like to call at the house,
+Auntie Jan always has money."</p>
+
+<p>The man smiled pleasantly at Tony.</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, young man. You have told me
+exactly what I wanted to know. So you are
+with your friends?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't hold this dog much longer," Meg
+gasped. "If you don't go&mdash;you'll get bitten."</p>
+
+<p>William ceased to growl, for far down the road
+he had heard a footstep that he knew. He still
+strained at his collar, but it was in a direction
+that led away from Mr. Walter Brooke. Meg
+let go and William swung off down the road.</p>
+
+<p>"Shall we all have a lide in loo ghalli?" little
+Fay asked&mdash;it seemed to her sheer waste of time
+to stand arguing in the road when a good car
+was waiting empty. The children called every
+form of conveyance a "gharri."</p>
+
+<p>"We shall meet again," said this persistent
+man. "You can't put me off like this."</p>
+
+<p>He raised his voice, for he was angry, and its
+clear tones carried far down the quiet road.</p>
+
+<p>"There's Captain Middleton with William,"<!-- Page 266 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>
+Tony said suddenly. "Perhaps <em>he</em> has some
+money."</p>
+
+<p>Meg paled and crimsoned, and with hands
+that trembled started to push the pram at a
+great pace.</p>
+
+<p>The man went back to his car, and Tony, regardless
+of Meg's call to him, ran to meet William
+and Miles.</p>
+
+<p>The back wheels of the car had sunk deeply
+into the soft wet turf. It refused to budge.
+Miles came up. He was long-sighted, and he
+had seen very well who it was that was talking
+to Meg in the road. He had also heard Mr.
+Brooke's last remark.</p>
+
+<p>Till lately he had only known Walter Brooke
+enough to dislike him vaguely. Since his interview
+with Mrs. Trent this feeling had intensified
+to such an extent as surprised himself. At the
+present moment he was seething with rage, but
+all the same he went and helped to get the car
+up the bank, jacking it up, and setting his great
+shoulders against it to start it again.</p>
+
+<p>All this Tony watched with deepest interest,
+and Meg waited, fuming, a little way down the
+road, for she knew it was hopeless to get Tony
+to come till the car had once started. Once on
+the hard road again, it bowled swiftly away
+and to her immense relief passed her without
+stopping.</p>
+
+<p>She saw that Miles was bringing Tony, and
+started on again with little Fay.</p>
+
+<p>Fury was in her heart at Tony's disobedience,
+and behind it all a dull ache that Miles should<!-- Page 267 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span>
+have heard, and doubtless misunderstood, Walter
+Brooke's last remark.</p>
+
+<p>Tony was talking eagerly as he followed, but
+she was too upset to listen till suddenly she
+heard Miles say in a tone of the deepest satisfaction,
+"Good old William."</p>
+
+<p>This was too much.</p>
+
+<p>She stopped and called over her shoulder:
+"He isn't good at all; he's a thoroughly tiresome,
+disobedient, badly-trained dog."</p>
+
+<p>They came up with her at that, and William
+rolled over on his back, for he knew those tones
+portended further punishment.</p>
+
+<p>"He's an ass in lots of ways," Miles allowed,
+"but he is an excellent judge of character."</p>
+
+<p>And as if in proof of this William righted himself
+and came cringing to Meg to try and lick the
+hand that a few minutes ago had thumped him
+so vigorously.</p>
+
+<p>Meg looked up at Miles and he looked down
+at her, and his gaze was pained, kind and grave.
+<em>His</em> eyes were large and well-opened and set
+wide apart in his broad face. Honest, trustworthy
+eyes they were.</p>
+
+<p>Very gently he took the little pram from her,
+for he saw that her hands were trembling:
+"You've had a fright," he said. "I know what
+it is. I had a favourite dog run over once. It's
+horrible, it takes months to get over it. I can't
+think why dogs are so stupid about motors ...
+must have been a near shave that ... very
+decent of Brooke&mdash;he's taken pounds off his car
+with that wrench."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 268 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span>
+While Miles talked he didn't look at Meg.</p>
+
+<p>"I say, little Fay," he suddenly suggested,
+"wouldn't you like to walk a bit?" and he lifted
+her out. "There, that's better. Now, Miss
+Morton, you sit down a minute; you've had a
+shake, you know. I'll go on with the kiddies."</p>
+
+<p>Meg was feeling a horrible, humiliating desire
+to cry. Her eyes were bright with unshed tears,
+her knees refused to bear her. Thankfully she
+sat down on the foot-board of Fay's little pram.
+The tall figure between the two little ones suddenly
+grew blurred and dim. Furtively she
+blew her nose and wiped her eyes. They were
+not a stone's throw from the lodge at Wren's
+End.</p>
+
+<p>How absurd to be sitting there!</p>
+
+<p>And yet she didn't feel inclined to move just
+yet.</p>
+
+<p>"'Ere, my dear, you take a sip o' water; the
+gentleman's told me all about it. Them sort
+o' shocks fair turns one over."</p>
+
+<p>And kind Mrs. Earley was beside her, holding
+out a thick tumbler. Meg drank the deliciously
+cold water and arose refreshed.</p>
+
+<p>And somehow the homely comfort of Mrs.
+Earley's presence made her realise wherein lay
+the essential difference between these two men.</p>
+
+<p>"He still treats me like a princess," she
+thought, "even though he thinks ... Oh, what
+<em>can</em> he think?" and Meg gave a little sob.</p>
+
+<p>"There, there!" said Mrs. Earley, "don't you
+take on no more, Miss. The dear dog bain't
+'urted not a 'air of him. 'E cum frolicking in<!-- Page 269 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span>
+that friendly&mdash;I sometimes wonders if there do
+be anyone as William 'ud ever bite. 'E ain't
+much of a watchdog, I fear."</p>
+
+<p>"He nearly bit someone this afternoon," Meg
+said.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'm not sorry to yer it. It don't do
+for man nor beast to be too trustful&mdash;not in this
+world it don't."</p>
+
+<p>At the drive gate Miles was standing.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Earley took the pram with her for Earley
+to clean, and Meg and Miles walked on together.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sorry you've had this upset," he said.
+"I've talked to William like a father."</p>
+
+<p>"It wasn't only William," Meg murmured.</p>
+
+<p>They were close to the house, and she stopped.</p>
+
+<p>"Good night, Captain Middleton. I must go
+and put my children to bed; we're late."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't want to seem interfering, Miss
+Morton, but don't you let anyone bully you into
+picking up an acquaintance you'd rather drop."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," said Meg, "one always has to
+pay for the things one has done."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yes, sooner or later; but it's silly to
+pay Jew prices."</p>
+
+<p>"Ah," said Meg, "you've never been poor
+enough to go to the Jews, so you can't tell."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Miles walked slowly back to Amber Guiting
+that warm May evening. He had a good deal
+to think over, for he had come to a momentous
+decision. When he thought of Meg as he had
+just seen her&mdash;small and tremulous and tearful&mdash;he
+clenched his big hands and made a sound<!-- Page 270 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>
+in his throat not unlike William's growl. When
+he pictured her angry onslaught upon William,
+he laughed. But the outcome of his reflections
+was this&mdash;that whether in the past she had really
+done anything that put her in Walter Brooke's
+power, or whether he was right to trust to that
+intangible quality in her that seemed to give
+the direct lie to the worst of Mrs. Trent's story,
+Meg appeared to him to stand in need of some
+hefty chap as a buffer between her and the hard
+world, and he was very desirous of being that
+same for Meg.</p>
+
+<p>His grandfather, "Mutton-Pie Middleton," had
+married one of his own waitresses for no other
+reason than that he found she was "the lass for
+him"&mdash;and he might, so the Doncaster folk
+thought, have looked a good deal higher for a
+wife, for he was a "warm" man at the time.
+Miles strongly resembled his grandfather. He
+was somewhat ruefully aware that in appearance
+there was but little of the Keills about him.
+He could just remember the colossal old man
+who must have weighed over twenty stone in
+his old age, and Miles, hitherto, had refused to
+buy a motor for his own use because he knew
+that if he was to keep his figure he must walk,
+and walk a lot.</p>
+
+<p>Like his grandfather, he was now perfectly
+sure of himself; Meg "was the lass for him";
+but he was by no means equally sure of her.
+By some infallible delicacy of instinct&mdash;and this
+he certainly did not get from the Middletons&mdash;he
+knew that what the world would regard as a<!-- Page 271 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>
+magnificent match for Meg, might be the very
+circumstance that would destroy his chance
+with her. The Middletons were all keenly alive
+to the purchasing powers of money, and saw
+to it that they got their money's worth.</p>
+
+<p>All the same, a man's a man, whether he be
+rich or poor, and Miles still remembered the way
+Meg had smiled upon him the first time they
+ever met. Surely she could never have smiled
+at him like that unless she had rather liked
+him.</p>
+
+<p>It was the pathos of Meg herself&mdash;not the
+fact that she had to work&mdash;that appealed to
+Miles. That she should cheerfully earn her own
+living instead of grousing in idleness in a meagre
+home seemed to him merely a matter of common
+sense. He knew that if he had to do it he could
+earn his, and the one thing he could neither
+tolerate nor understand about a good many of
+his Keills relations was their preference for any
+form of assistance to honest work. He helped
+them generously enough, but in his heart of
+hearts he despised them, though he did not confess
+this even to himself.</p>
+
+<p>As he drew near the Manor House he saw
+Lady Mary walking up and down outside, evidently
+waiting for him.</p>
+
+<p>"Where have you been, Miles?" she asked,
+impatiently. "Pen has been here, and wanted
+specially to see you, but she couldn't stay any
+longer, as it's such a long run back. She motored
+over from Malmesbury."</p>
+
+<p>"What did she want?" Miles asked. "She's<!-- Page 272 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>
+always in a stew about something. One of her
+Pekinese got pip, or what?"</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary took his arm and turned to walk
+along the terrace. "I think," she said, and
+stopped. "Where <em>were</em> you, Miles?"</p>
+
+<p>"I strolled down the village to get some tobacco,
+and then I saw a chap who'd got his motor
+stuck, and helped him, and then ..." Here
+Miles looked down at his aunt, who looked up
+at him apprehensively. "I caught up with Miss
+Morton and the children, and walked back to
+Wren's End with them. There, Aunt Mary,
+that's a categorical history of my time since tea."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary pressed his arm. "Miles, dear,
+do you think it's quite wise to be seen about so
+much with little Miss Morton ... wise for her
+I mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"I hope I'm not the sort of chap it's bad to
+be seen about with...."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course not, dear Miles, but, you see, her
+position...."</p>
+
+<p>"What's the matter with her position?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course I know it's most creditable of her
+and all that ... but ... when a girl has to
+go out as a sort of nursery governess, it is different,
+isn't it, dear? I mean...."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Aunt Mary, I'm awfully interested&mdash;different
+from what?"</p>
+
+<p>"From girls who lead the sheltered life, girls
+who don't work ... girls of our own class."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know," Miles said thoughtfully,
+"that I should say Pen, for instance, lives exactly
+a <em>sheltered</em> life, should you?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 273 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>
+"Pen is married."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, but before she was married ... eh,
+Aunt Mary? Be truthful, now."</p>
+
+<p>Miles held his aunt's arm tightly within his,
+and he stooped and looked into her face.</p>
+
+<p>"And does the fact that Pen is married explain
+or excuse her deplorable taste in men?
+Which does it do, Aunt Mary? Speak up,
+now."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary laughed. "I'm not here to defend
+Pen; I'm here to get your answer as to
+whether you think it's ... quite fair to make
+that little Miss Morton conspicuous by running
+after her and making her the talk of the entire
+county, for that's what you're doing."</p>
+
+<p>"What good old Pen has been telling you I'm
+doing, I suppose."</p>
+
+<p>"I had my own doubts about it without any
+help from Pen ... but she said Alec Pottinger
+had been talking...."</p>
+
+<p>"Pottinger's an ass."</p>
+
+<p>"He doesn't talk <em>much</em>, anyhow, Miles, and
+she felt if <em>he</em> said anything...."</p>
+
+<p>"Look here, Aunt Mary, how's a chap to go
+courting seriously if he doesn't run after a girl?...
+he can't work it from a distance ... not
+unless he's one of those poet chaps, and puts
+letters in hollow trees and so on. And you don't
+seem to have provided any hollow trees about
+here."</p>
+
+<p>"Courting ... seriously!" Lady Mary repeated
+with real horror in her tones. "Oh,
+Miles, you can't mean that!"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 274 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>
+"Surely you'd not prefer I meant the other
+thing?"</p>
+
+<p>"But, Miles dear, think!"</p>
+
+<p>"I have thought, and I've thought it out."</p>
+
+<p>"You mean you want to <em>marry</em> her?"</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary spoke in an awed whisper.</p>
+
+<p>"Just exactly that, and I don't care who
+knows it; but I'm not at all sure she wants to
+marry me ... that's why I don't want to rush
+my fences and get turned down. I'm a heavy
+chap to risk a fall, Aunt Mary."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Miles! this is worse than anything Pen
+even dreamt of."</p>
+
+<p>"What is? If you mean that she probably
+won't have me&mdash;I'm with you."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course she'd jump at you&mdash;any girl would....
+But a little nursemaid!"</p>
+
+<p>"Come now, Aunt Mary, you know very well
+she's just as good as I am; better, probably, for
+she's got no pies nor starch in her pedigree. Her
+father's a Major and her mother was of quite
+good family&mdash;and she's got lots of rich, stingy
+relations ... and she doesn't sponge on 'em.
+What's the matter with her?"</p>
+
+<p>"Please don't do anything in a hurry, dear
+Miles."</p>
+
+<p>"I shan't, if you and Pen and the blessed
+'county,' with its criticism and gossip, don't
+drive me into it ... but the very first word
+you either say or repeat to me against Miss
+Morton, off I go to her and to the old Major....
+So now we understand each other, Aunt
+Mary&mdash;eh?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 275 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span>
+"There are things you ought to know, Miles."</p>
+
+<p>"You may depend," said Miles grimly, "that
+anything I ought to know I shall be told ...
+over and over again ... confound it....
+And remember, Aunt Mary, that what I've told
+you is not in the least private. Tell Pen, tell
+Mrs. Fream, tell Withells, but just leave me to
+tell Miss Ross, that's all I beg."</p>
+
+<p>"Miles, I shall tell nobody, for I hope ... I
+hope&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"'Hope told a flattering tale,'" said Miles,
+and kissed his aunt ... but to himself he said:
+"I've shut their mouths for a day or two anyway."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 276 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XXII<br />
+<span class="sub">THE ENCAMPMENT</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">I</span>T was the morning of the first Monday in
+June, and Tony had wandered out into the
+garden all by himself. Monday mornings were
+very busy, and once Clipture was over Jan and
+Meg became socially useless to any self-respecting
+boy.</p>
+
+<p>There was all the washing to sort and divide
+into two large heaps: what might be sent to
+Mrs. Chitt in the village, and what might be
+kept for the ministrations of one Mrs. Mumford,
+who came every Monday to Wren's End. And
+this division was never arrived at without a good
+deal of argument between Jan and Meg.</p>
+
+<p>If Jan had had her way, Mrs. Mumford's heap
+would have been very small indeed, and would
+have consisted chiefly of socks and handkerchiefs.
+If Meg had had hers, nothing at all would have
+gone to Mrs. Chitt. Usually, too, Hannah was
+called in as final arbitrator, and she generally
+sided with Meg. Little Fay took the greatest
+interest in the whole ceremony, chattered continually,
+and industriously mixed up the heaps
+when no one was looking.</p>
+
+<p>At such times Tony was of the opinion that
+there were far too many women in the world.<!-- Page 277 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>
+On this particular morning, too, he felt injured
+because of something that had happened at
+breakfast.</p>
+
+<p>It was always a joy to Meg and Jan that whatever
+poor Fay might have left undone in the
+matter of disciplining her children, she had at
+least taught them to eat nicely. Little Fay's
+management of a spoon was a joy to watch. The
+dimpled baby hand was so deft, the turn of the
+plump wrist so sure and purposeful. She never
+spilled or slopped her food about. Its journey
+from bowl to little red mouth was calculated and
+assured. Both children had a horror of anything
+sticky, and would refuse jam unless it was "well
+covelled in a sangwidge."</p>
+
+<p>That very morning Jan and Meg exchanged
+congratulatory glances over their well-behaved
+charges, sitting side by side.</p>
+
+<p>Then, all at once, with a swift, sure movement,
+little Fay stretched up and deposited a spoonful
+of exceedingly hot porridge exactly on the top
+of her brother's head, with a smart tap.</p>
+
+<p>Tony's hair was always short, and had been
+cut on Saturday, and the hot mixture ran down
+into his eyes, which filled him with rage.</p>
+
+<p>He tried to get out of his high chair, exclaiming
+angrily, "Let me get at her to box her!"</p>
+
+<p>Jan held him down with one hand while she
+wiped away the offending mess with the other,
+and all the time Tony cried in <i lang="it">crescendo</i>, "Let
+me get at her!"</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay, quite unmoved, continued to eat
+her porridge with studied elegance, and in gently<!-- Page 278 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>
+reproachful tones remarked, "Tony velly closs
+littoo boy."</p>
+
+<p>Jan and Meg, who wanted desperately to
+laugh, tried hard to look shocked, and Meg
+asked, "What on earth possessed you to do
+such a thing?"</p>
+
+<p>"Tony's head so shiny and smoove."</p>
+
+<p>Tony rubbed the shiny head ruefully.</p>
+
+<p>"Can't I do nuffin to her?" he demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"No," his sister answered firmly, "loo can't,
+'cos I'm plitty littoo Fay."</p>
+
+<p>"Can't I plop some on <em>her</em> head?" he persisted.</p>
+
+<p>"It certainly seems unfair," Jan said thoughtfully,
+"but I think you'd better not."</p>
+
+<p>"It <em>is</em> unfair," Tony grumbled.</p>
+
+<p>Jan loosed his hands. "Now," she said, "you
+can do what you like."</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay leaned towards her brother, smiling
+her irresistible, dimpled, twinkling smile, and
+held out a spoonful of her porridge.</p>
+
+<p>"Deah littoo Tony," she cooed, "taste it."</p>
+
+<p>And Tony meekly accepted the peace-offering.</p>
+
+<p>"You haven't smacked her," Jan remarked.</p>
+
+<p>Tony sighed. "It's too late now&mdash;I don't
+feel like it any more."</p>
+
+<p>All the same he felt aggrieved as he set out to
+seek Earley in the kitchen garden.</p>
+
+<p>Earley was not to be found. He saw Mrs.
+Mumford already hanging kitchen cloths on a
+line in the orchard, but he felt no desire for Mrs.
+Mumford's society.</p>
+
+<p>Tony's tormented soul sought for something
+soothing.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 279 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>
+The garden was pleasant, but it wasn't enough.</p>
+
+<p>Ah! he'd got it!</p>
+
+<p>He'd go to the river; all by himself he'd go,
+and not tell anybody. He'd look over the bridge
+into that cool deep pool and perhaps that big
+fat trout would be swimming about. What was
+it he had heard Captain Middleton say last time
+he was down at Amber Guiting? "The Mayfly
+was up."</p>
+
+<p>He had seemed quite delighted about it, therefore
+it must mean something pleasant.</p>
+
+<p>After all, on a soft, not too sunny morning in
+early June, with a west wind rustling the leaves
+in the hedges, the world was not such a bad
+place; for even if there were rather too many
+women in it, there were dogs and rivers and
+country roads where adventurous boys could
+see life for themselves.</p>
+
+<p>William agreed with Tony in his dislike of
+Monday mornings. He went and lay on the
+front door mat so that he was more than ready
+to accompany anyone who happened to be going
+out.</p>
+
+<p>By the time they reached the bridge all sense
+of injury had vanished, and buoyant expectation
+had taken its place.</p>
+
+<p>Three men were fishing. One was far in the
+distance, one about three hundred yards up
+stream, and one Tony recognised as Mr.
+Dauncey, landlord of "The Full Basket," the
+square white house standing in its neat garden
+just on the other side of the bridge. The fourth
+gentleman, who had forgotten his hat, and was<!-- Page 280 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>
+clad in a holland smock, sandals, and no stockings,
+leaned over luxuriously, with his elbows
+on the low wall and his bare legs thrust out.
+He was very still, even trying not to twitch when
+William licked his bare legs, as he did at intervals
+just to show he was there on guard.</p>
+
+<p>There had been heavy rain in the night and
+the water was discoloured. Nobody noticed
+Tony, and for about an hour nothing happened.
+Then Mr. Dauncey got a rise. The rigid little
+figure on the bridge leaned further over as Mr.
+Dauncey's reel screamed and he followed his
+cast down stream.</p>
+
+<p>Presently, with a sense of irritation, Tony was
+aware of footsteps coming over the bridge. He
+felt that he simply could not bear it just then if
+anyone leaned over beside him and talked. The
+footsteps came up behind him and passed; and
+William, who was lying between Tony's legs
+and the wall, squeezed as close to him as possible,
+gave a low growl.</p>
+
+<p>"Hush, William, naughty dog!" Tony whispered
+crossly.</p>
+
+<p>William hushed, and drooped as he always
+did when rebuked.</p>
+
+<p>It occurred to Tony to look after this amazing
+person who could cross a bridge without stopping
+to look over when a reel was joyfully proclaiming
+that some fisherman was having luck.</p>
+
+<p>It was a man, and he walked as though he
+were footsore and tired. There was something
+dejected and shabby in his appearance, and his
+clothes looked odd somehow in Amber Guiting.<!-- Page 281 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>
+Tony stared after the stranger, and gradually
+he realised that there was something familiar
+in the back of the tall figure that walked so slowly
+and yet seemed trying to walk fast.</p>
+
+<p>The man had a stick and evidently leant upon
+it as he went. He wore an overcoat and carried
+nothing in his hand.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Dauncey's reel chuckled and one of the
+other anglers ran towards him with a landing-net.</p>
+
+<p>But Tony still stared after the man. Presently,
+with a deep sigh, he started to follow him.</p>
+
+<p>Just once he turned, in time to see that Mr.
+Dauncey had landed his trout.</p>
+
+<p>The sun came out from behind the clouds.
+"The Full Basket," the river, brown and rippled,
+the bridge, the two men talking eagerly on the
+bank below, the muddy road growing cream-coloured
+in patches as it dried, were all photographed
+upon Tony's mind. When he started
+to follow the stranger he was out of sight, but
+now Tony trotted steadily forward and did not
+look round again.</p>
+
+<p>William was glad. He had been lying in a
+puddle, and, like little Fay, he preferred "a dly
+place."</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, at Wren's End the washing had
+taken a long time to count and to divide. There
+seemed a positively endless number of little
+smocks and frocks and petticoats and pinafores,
+and Meg wanted to keep them all for Mrs. Mumford
+to wash, declaring that she (Meg) could
+starch and iron them beautifully. This was
+quite true. She could iron very well, as she did<!-- Page 282 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>
+everything she undertook to do. But Jan knew
+that it tired her dreadfully, that the heat and
+the wielding of the heavy iron were very bad for
+her, and after much argument and many insulting
+remarks from Meg as to Jan's obstinacy and
+extravagance generally, the things were divided.
+Meg put on little Fay's hat and swept her out
+into the garden; whereupon Jan plunged into
+Mrs. Mumford's heap, removed all the things to
+be ironed that could not be tackled by Anne
+Chitt, stuffed them into Mrs. Chitt's basket,
+fastened it firmly and rang for Anne and Hannah
+to carry the things away.</p>
+
+<p>She washed her hands and put on her gardening
+gloves preparatory to going out, humming
+a gay little snatch of song; and as she ran down
+the wide staircase she heard the bell ring, and
+saw the figure of a man standing in the open
+doorway.</p>
+
+<p>The maids were carrying the linen down the
+back stairs, and she went across the hall to see
+what he wanted.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Jan," he said, and his voice sounded
+weak and tired. "Here I am at last."</p>
+
+<p>He held out his hand, and as she took it she
+felt how hot and dry it was.</p>
+
+<p>"Come in, Hugo," she said quietly. "Why
+didn't you let me know you were coming, and
+I'd have met you."</p>
+
+<p>The man followed her as she led the way into
+the cool, fragrant drawing-room. He paused
+in the doorway and passed his hand across his
+eyes. "It does bring it all back," he said.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 283 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>
+He sat down in a deep chair and leaned his
+head against the back, closing his eyes. Jan
+saw that he was thin to emaciation, and that he
+looked very ill; shabby, too, and broken.</p>
+
+<p>The instinct of the nurse that exists in any
+woman worth her salt was roused in Jan. All
+the passionate indignation she had felt against
+her brother-in-law was merged at the moment
+in pity and anxiety.</p>
+
+<p>"Hugo," she said gently, "I fear you are ill.
+Have you had any breakfast?"</p>
+
+<p>"I came by the early train to avoid ordering
+breakfast; I couldn't have paid for it. I'd only
+enough for my fare. Jan, I haven't a single
+rupee left."</p>
+
+<p>He sat forward in the chair with his hands on
+the arms and closed his eyes again.</p>
+
+<p>Jan looked keenly at the handsome, haggard
+face. There was no pretence here. The man
+was gravely ill. His lips (Jan had always mistrusted
+his well-shaped mouth because it would
+never really shut) were dry and cracked and discoloured,
+the cheekbones sharp, and there was
+that deep hollow at the back of the neck that always
+betrays the man in ill-health.</p>
+
+<p>She went to him and pressed him back in the
+chair.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you generally do when you have
+fever?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Go to bed&mdash;if there is a bed; and take
+quinine and drink hot tea."</p>
+
+<p>"That's what you'd better do now. Where
+are your things?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 284 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>
+"There's a small bag at the station. They
+promised to send it up. I couldn't carry it and
+I had no money to pay a boy. I came the long
+way round, Jan, not through the village. No
+one recognised me."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll get you some tea at once, and I have
+quinine in the house. Will you take some now?"</p>
+
+<p>Hugo laughed. "Your quinine would be of
+no earthly use to me, but I've already taken it
+this morning. I've got some here in my pocket.
+The minute my bag comes I'll go to bed&mdash;if
+you don't mind."</p>
+
+<p>Someone fumbled at the handle of the door,
+and Tony, followed by William, appeared on
+the threshold.</p>
+
+<p>Hugo Tancred opened his eyes. "Hullo!" he
+said. "Do you remember me, young shaver?"</p>
+
+<p>Tony came into the room holding out his
+hand. "How do you do?" he said solemnly.</p>
+
+<p>Hugo took it and stared at his son with strange
+glazed eyes. "You look fit enough, anyhow," he
+said, and dropped the little hand.</p>
+
+<p>"I came as quick as I could," Tony said eagerly
+to Jan. "But Mr. Dauncey caught a trout, and
+I <em>had</em> to wait a minute."</p>
+
+<p>"Good heavens!" Hugo exclaimed irritably.
+"Do you all <em>still</em> think and talk about nothing
+but fishing?"</p>
+
+<p>"Come," said Jan, holding out her hand to
+Tony, "and we'll go and see about some breakfast
+for Daddie."</p>
+
+<p>William, who had been sniffing dubiously at
+the man in the chair, dashed after them.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 285 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span>
+As they crossed the hall Tony remarked philosophically:
+"Daddie's got fever. He'll be very
+cross, then he'll be very sad, and then he'll want
+you to give him something, and if you do&mdash;p'raps
+he'll go away."</p>
+
+<p>Jan made no answer.</p>
+
+<p>Tony followed her through the swing door
+and down the passage to speak to Hannah, who
+was much moved and excited when she heard
+Mr. Tancred had arrived. Hannah was full of
+sympathy for the "poor young widower," and
+though she could have wished that he had given
+them notice of his coming, still, she supposed
+him to be so distracted with grief that he forgot
+to do anything of the kind. She and Anne Chitt
+went there and then to make up his bed, while
+Jan boiled the kettle and got him some breakfast.</p>
+
+<p>While she was doing this Meg and little Fay
+came round to the back to look for Tony, whom
+they found making toast.</p>
+
+<p>"Who's tum?" asked little Fay, while Jan
+rapidly explained the situation to Meg.</p>
+
+<p>"Your Daddie's come."</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay looked rather vague. "What sort
+of a Daddie?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"You take her to see him, Tony, and I'll finish
+the toast," said Jan, taking the fork out of his
+hand.</p>
+
+<p>When the children had gone Meg said slowly:
+"And Mr. Ledgard comes to-morrow?"</p>
+
+<p>"He can't. I must telegraph and put him off
+for a day or two. Hugo is really ill."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 286 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span>
+"I shouldn't put him off long, if I were you."</p>
+
+<p>Jan seized the tray: "I'll send a wire now, if
+you and the children will take it down to the
+post-office for me."</p>
+
+<p>"Why send it at all?" said Meg. "Let him
+come."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 287 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIII<br />
+<span class="sub">TACTICS</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">I</span>T was a fortnight since Hugo Tancred arrived
+at Wren's End, and Jan had twice put off
+Peter's visit.</p>
+
+<p>During the first few days Hugo's temperature
+remained so high that she grew thoroughly
+alarmed; and in spite of his protestations that
+he was "quite used to it," she sent for the doctor.
+Happily the doctor in his youth had been in the
+East and was able to reassure her. His opinion,
+too, had more weight with Hugo on this account,
+and though he grumbled he consented to
+do what the doctor advised. And at the end of
+a week Hugo was able to come downstairs, looking
+very white and shaky. He lay out in the
+garden in a deck-chair for most of the day and
+managed to eat a good many of the nourishing
+dishes Hannah prepared for him.</p>
+
+<p>It had been a hard time for Jan, as Hugo was
+not an invalid who excited compassion in those
+who had to wait upon him. He took everything
+for granted, was somewhat morose and exacting,
+and made no attempt to control the extreme
+irritability that so often accompanies fever.</p>
+
+<p>When the fever left him, however, his tone
+changed, and the second stage, indicated by
+Tony as "sad," set in with severity.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 288 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span>
+His depression was positively overwhelming,
+and he seemed to think that its public manifestation
+should arouse in all beholders the most
+poignant and respectful sympathy.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Jan found it very difficult to behave in
+a manner at all calculated to satisfy her brother-in-law.
+She had not, so far, uttered one word
+of reproach to him, but she <em>would</em> shrink visibly
+when he tried to discuss his wife, and she could
+not even pretend to believe in the deep sincerity
+of a grief that seemed to find such facile solace
+in expression. The mode of expression, too, in
+hackneyed, commonplace phrases, set her teeth
+on edge.</p>
+
+<p>She knew that poor Hugo&mdash;she called him
+"poor Hugo" just then&mdash;thought her cold and
+unsympathetic because she rather discouraged
+his outpourings; but Fay's death was too lately-lived
+a tragedy to make it possible for her to
+talk of it&mdash;above all, with him; and after several
+abortive attempts Hugo gave up all direct endeavour
+to make her.</p>
+
+<p>"You are terribly Scotch, Jan," he said one
+day. "I sometimes wonder whether anything
+could make you <em>really</em> feel."</p>
+
+<p>Jan looked at him with a sort of contemptuous
+wonder that caused him to redden angrily, but
+she made no reply.</p>
+
+<p>He was her guest, he was a broken man, and
+she knew well that they had not yet even approached
+their real difference.</p>
+
+<p>Two people, however, took Hugo's attitude of
+profound dejection in the way he expected and<!-- Page 289 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span>
+liked it to be taken. These were Mr. Withells
+and Hannah.</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Withells did not bear Jan a grudge because
+of her momentary lapse from good manners. In
+less than a week from the unfortunate interview
+in the nut-walk he had decided that she could
+not properly have understood him; and that he
+had, perhaps, sprung upon her too suddenly the
+high honour he held in store for her.</p>
+
+<p>So back he came in his neat little two-seater
+car to call at Wren's End as if nothing had happened,
+and Jan, guiltily conscious that she <em>had</em>
+been very rude, was only too thankful to accept
+the olive-branch in the spirit in which it was
+offered.</p>
+
+<p>He took to coming almost as often as before,
+and was thoroughly interested and commiserating
+when he heard that poor Mrs. Tancred's
+husband had come home from India and been
+taken ill almost immediately on arrival. He
+sent some early strawberries grown in barrels
+in the houses, and with them a note conjuring
+Jan "on no account to leave them in the sickroom
+overnight, as the smell of fruit was so
+deleterious."</p>
+
+<p>Hannah considered Hugo's impenetrable gloom
+a most proper and husbandly tribute to the departed.
+She felt that had there been a Mr.
+Hannah she could not have wished him to show
+more proper feeling had Providence thought fit
+to snatch her from his side. So she expressed
+her admiration in the strongest of soups, the
+smoothest of custards, and the most succulent<!-- Page 290 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span>
+of mutton-chops. Gladly would she have commanded
+Mrs. Earley to slay her fattest cockerels
+for the nourishment of "yon poor heartbroken
+young man," but that she remembered (from
+her experience of Fay's only visit) that no one
+just home from India will give a thank-you for
+chickens.</p>
+
+<p>Jan had cause to bless kind Mr. Withells, for
+directly Hugo was able for it, he came with his
+largest and most comfortable car, driven by his
+trustworthy chauffeur, to take the invalid for a
+run right into Wiltshire. He pressed Jan to go
+too, but she pleaded "things to see to" at home.</p>
+
+<p>Hugo had seen practically nothing of Meg.
+She was fully occupied in keeping the children
+out of their father's way. Little Fay "pooah
+daddied" him when they happened to meet, and
+Tony stared at him in the weighing, measuring
+way Hugo found so trying, but Meg neither
+looked at him nor did she address any remark
+whatever to him unless she positively could not
+help it.</p>
+
+<p>Meg was thoroughly provoked that he should
+have chosen to turn up just then. She had been
+most anxious that Peter should come. Firstly,
+because, being sharply observant, she had come
+to the conclusion that his visit would be a real
+pleasure to Jan, and secondly, because she ardently
+desired to see him herself that she might
+judge whether he was "at all good enough."</p>
+
+<p>And now her well-loved Jan, instead of looking
+her best, was growing thin and haggard,
+losing her colour, and her sweet serenity, and in<!-- Page 291 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span>
+their place a patient, tired expression in her eyes
+that went to Meg's heart.</p>
+
+<p>She had hardly seen Jan alone for over a week;
+for since Hugo came downstairs Meg had taken
+all her meals with the children in the nursery,
+while Jan and Hugo had theirs in the rarely-used
+dining-room. The girls breakfasted together,
+as Hugo had his in his room, but as the
+children were always present there was small
+chance of any confidential conversation.</p>
+
+<p>The first afternoon Mr. Withells took Hugo
+for a drive, Meg left her children in Earley's
+care the minute she heard the car depart, and
+went to look for Jan in the house.</p>
+
+<p>She found her opening all the windows in the
+dining-room. Meg shut the door and sat on the
+polished table, lit a cigarette and regarded her
+own pretty swinging feet with interest.</p>
+
+<p>"How long does Mr. Tancred propose to
+stay?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"How can I tell," Jan answered wearily, as
+she sat down in one of the deep window-seats.
+"He has nowhere to go and no money to go with;
+and, so far, except for a vague allusion to some
+tea-plantation in Ceylon, he has suggested no
+plans. Oh, yes! I forgot, there was something
+about fruit-farming or vine-growing in California,
+but I fancy considerable capital would
+be needed for that."</p>
+
+<p>"And how much longer do you intend to keep
+Mr. Ledgard waiting for <em>his</em> visit?"</p>
+
+<p>"It would be small pleasure for Mr. Ledgard
+to come here with Hugo, and horrid for Hugo,<!-- Page 292 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span>
+for he knows perfectly well what Peter ...
+Mr. Ledgard thinks of him."</p>
+
+<p>"But if friend Hugo knew Mr. Ledgard was
+coming, might it not have an accelerating effect
+upon his movements? You could give him his
+fare&mdash;single, mind&mdash;to Guernsey. Let him go
+and stay with his people for a bit."</p>
+
+<p>Jan shook her head. "I can't turn him out,
+Meg; and I'm not going to let Mr. Ledgard
+waste his precious leave on an unpleasant visit.
+If I could give him a good time it would be different;
+but after all he did for us while we were
+in Bombay, it would be rank ingratitude to let
+him in for more worries at home."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps he wouldn't consider them worries.
+Perhaps he'd <em>like</em> to come."</p>
+
+<p>Jan's strained expression relaxed a little and
+she smiled with her eyes fixed on Meg's neat
+swinging feet. "He <em>says</em> he would."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, take him at his word. We can
+turn the excellent Withells on to Hugo. Let
+him instruct Hugo in the importance of daily
+free gymnastics after one's bath and the necessity
+for windows being left open at the top 'day
+and night, but <em>especially</em> at night.' Let's tell
+that Peter man to come."</p>
+
+<p>Jan shook her head.</p>
+
+<p>"No, I've explained the situation to him and
+begged him not to consider us any more for the
+present. We must think of the maids too. You
+see, Hugo makes a good deal of extra work, and
+I'm afraid Hannah might turn grumpy if there
+was yet another man to do for."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 293 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span>
+Meg thoughtfully blew beautiful rings of smoke,
+carefully poked a small finger exactly into the
+centre of each and continued to swing her feet in
+silence.</p>
+
+<p>Jan leaned her head against the casement and
+closed her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>Without so much as a rustle Meg descended
+from the table. She went over to Jan and dropped
+a light kiss on the top of the thick wavy hair
+that was so nearly white. Jan opened her tired
+eyes and smiled.</p>
+
+<p>This quaint person in the green linen frock
+and big white apron always looked so restfully
+neat and clean, so capable and strong with that
+inward shining strength that burns with a steady
+light. Jan put her arms round Meg and leaned
+her head against the admirable apron's cool,
+smooth bib.</p>
+
+<p>"You're here, anyway," she said. "You
+don't know how I thank God for that."</p>
+
+<p>Meg held her close. "Listen to me," she said.
+"You're going on quite a wrong tack with that
+brother-in-law. You are, Jan&mdash;I grieve to say
+it&mdash;standing between him and his children&mdash;you
+don't allow him to see his children, especially
+his adored daughter, nearly enough. Now that
+he is well enough to take the air with Mr.
+Withells I propose that we allow him to <em>study</em>
+his children&mdash;and how can he study them if they
+are never left with him? Let him realise what
+it would be if he had them with him constantly,
+and no interfering aunt to keep them in order&mdash;do
+you understand, Jan? Have you tumbled<!-- Page 294 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span>
+to it? You are losing a perfectly magnificent
+opportunity."</p>
+
+<p>Jan pushed Meg a little away from her and
+looked up: "I believe there's a good deal in
+what you say."</p>
+
+<p>"There's everything in what I say. As long
+as the man was ill one couldn't, of course, but
+now we can and will&mdash;eh, Jan?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not Tony," Jan said nervously. "Hugo
+doesn't care much for Tony, and I'm always
+afraid what he may say or do to the child."</p>
+
+<p>"If you let him have them both occasionally
+he may discover that Tony has his points."</p>
+
+<p>"They're <em>both</em> perfect darlings," Jan said resentfully.
+Meg laughed and danced a two-step
+to the door.</p>
+
+<p>"They're darlings that need a good deal of
+diplomatic managing, and if they don't get it
+they'll raise Cain. I'm going to take them down
+to the post-office directly with my Indian letters.
+Why not come with us for the walk?"</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Hugo quite enjoyed his run with Mr. Withells
+and Mr. Withells enjoyed being consulted about
+Hugo's plans. He felt real sympathy for a
+young man whose health, ruined by one bad
+station after another, had forced him to give up
+his career in India. He suggested various ameliorating
+treatments to Hugo, who received his
+advice with respectful gratitude, and they arranged
+to drive again together on Saturday,
+which was next day but one.</p>
+
+<p>Hugo sought the sofa in the drawing-room for<!-- Page 295 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span>
+a quiet hour before dinner and lit a cigar. He
+had hardly realised his pleasantly tired and
+rather somnolent condition when his daughter
+entered carrying a large Teddy-bear, two dolls,
+a toy trumpet and a box containing a wooden
+tea-set. She dropped several of these articles
+just inside the door. "Come and help me pick
+up my sings," she commanded. "I've come to
+play wis loo, Daddie."</p>
+
+<p>Hugo did not move. He was fond of little
+Fay; he admired her good looks and her splendid
+health, but he didn't in the least desire her society
+just then.</p>
+
+<p>"Poor Daddie's tired," he said in his "saddest"
+tone. "I think you'd better go and play in the
+nursery with Tony."</p>
+
+<p>"No," said little Fay, "Tony's not zere; <em>loo</em>
+mus' play wis me. Or"&mdash;she added as a happy
+alternative&mdash;"loo can tell me sumfin instastin."</p>
+
+<p>"Surely," said Hugo, "it's your bed-time?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," little Fay answered, and the letters
+were never formed that could express the finality
+of that "no," "Med will fesh me when it's time.
+I've come to play wis <em>loo</em>. Det up, Daddie;
+loo can't play p'oply lying zere."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, I can," Hugo protested eagerly.
+"You bring all your nice toys one by one and
+show them to me."</p>
+
+<p>"'At," she remarked with great scorn, "would
+be a velly stupid game. Det up!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why can't Meg play with you?" Hugo asked
+irritably. "What's she doing?"</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay stared at her father. She was un<!-- Page 296 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span>accustomed
+to be addressed in that tone, and
+she resented it. Earley and Mr. Burgess were
+her humble slaves. Captain Middleton did as
+he was told and became an elephant, a camel,
+or a polar bear on the shortest notice, moreover
+he threw himself into the part with real goodwill
+and enjoyment. The lazy man lying there
+on the sofa, who showed no flattering pleasure
+in her society, must be roused to a sense of his
+shortcomings. She seized the Teddy-bear, swung
+it round her head and brought it down with a
+resounding thump on Hugo's chest. "Det up,"
+she said more loudly. "Loo don't seem to know
+any stolies, so you <em>mus'</em> play wis me."</p>
+
+<p>Hugo swung his legs off the sofa and sat up
+to recover his breath, which had been knocked
+out of him by the Teddy-bear.</p>
+
+<p>"You're a very rude little girl," he said crossly.
+"You'll have to be punished if you do that sort
+of thing."</p>
+
+<p>"What sort of sing?"</p>
+
+<p>"What you did just now; it's very naughty
+indeed."</p>
+
+<p>"What nelse?"</p>
+
+<p>Little Fay stood with her head on one side
+like an inquisitive sparrow. One of the things
+she had not dropped was the tin trumpet. She
+raised it to her lips now, and blew a blast that
+went through Hugo's head like a knife.</p>
+
+<p>He snatched it from her. "You're not to do
+that," he said. "I can't stand it. Go and pick
+up those other things and show them to me."</p>
+
+<p>"Loo can see zem from here."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 297 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span>
+"Not what's in the box," he suggested diplomatically.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm tah'ed too," she said, suddenly sitting
+down on the floor. "You fesh 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you play with them if I do?"</p>
+
+<p>She shook her head. "Not if loo're closs, and
+lude and naughty and ... stupid."</p>
+
+<p>Hugo groaned and stalked over to collect the
+two dolls and the tea-things. He brought them
+back and put them down on one end of the sofa
+while he sat down at the other.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," he said, "show me how you play with
+them."</p>
+
+<p>His cigar had gone out and he struck a match
+to light it again. Little Fay scrambled to her
+feet and blew it out before he had touched his
+cigar with it.</p>
+
+<p>"Adain," she said joyously. "Make anozer
+light."</p>
+
+<p>He struck another match, but sheltered it
+with his hand till he'd got his cigar going, his
+daughter blowing vigorously all the time.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," she said, "you can be a nengine and
+I'll be the tlain."</p>
+
+<p>Round that drawing-room the unfortunate
+Hugo ran, encouraged in his efforts by blasts
+upon the trumpet. The chairs were arranged as
+carriages, the dolls as passengers, and the box of
+tea-things was luggage. None of these transformations
+were suggested by Hugo, but little
+Fay had played the game so often under Meg's
+brilliant supervision that she knew all the properties
+by heart.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 298 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span>
+At the end of fifteen minutes Hugo was thoroughly
+exhausted and audibly thanked God
+when Meg appeared to fetch her charge. But
+he hadn't finished even then, for little Fay,
+aided and abetted by Meg, insisted that every
+single thing should be tidily put back exactly
+where it was before.</p>
+
+<p>At the door, just as they were on the point of
+departure, Meg paused. "You must enjoy
+having her all to yourself for a little while," she
+said in honeyed, sympathetic tones such as
+Hugo, certainly, had never heard from her before.
+"I fear we've been rather selfish about
+it, but for the future we must not forget that
+you have the first right to her.... Did you
+kiss your dear Daddie, my darling?"</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Through the shut door Hugo heard his
+daughter's voice proclaiming in lofty, pitying
+tones, "Pooah Daddie velly stupid man, he was
+a velly bad nengine, he did it all long."</p>
+
+<p>"Damn!" said Hugo Tancred.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>During dinner that night Jan talked continually
+about the children. She consulted Hugo
+as to things in which he took not the smallest
+interest, such as what primers he considered
+the best for earliest instruction in reading, and
+whether he thought the Montessori method advantageous
+or not.</p>
+
+<p>As they sat over dessert he volunteered the remark
+that little Fay was rather an exhausting child.</p>
+
+<p>"All children are," Jan answered, "and I've<!-- Page 299 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span>
+just been thinking that while you are here to
+help me, it would be such a good chance to give
+Meg a little holiday. She has not had a day off
+since I came back from India, and it would be
+so nice for her to go to Cheltenham for a few
+days to see Major Morton."</p>
+
+<p>"But surely," Hugo said uneasily, "that's
+what she's here for, to look after the children.
+She's very highly paid; you could get a good
+nurse for half what you pay her."</p>
+
+<p>"I doubt it, and you must remember that,
+because she loved Fay, she is accepting less
+than half of what she could earn elsewhere to
+help me with Fay's children."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course, if you import sentiment into the
+matter you must pay for it."</p>
+
+<p>"But I fear that's just what I don't do."</p>
+
+<p>"My dear Jan, you must forgive me if I venture
+to think that both you and your father,
+and even Fay, were quite absurd about Meg
+Morton. She's a nice enough little girl, but
+nothing so very wonderful, and as for her needing
+a holiday after a couple of months of the
+very soft job she has with you ... that's sheer
+nonsense."</p>
+
+<p>There was silence for a minute. Hugo took
+another chocolate and said, "You know I don't
+believe in having children all over the place.
+The nursery is the proper place for them when
+they're little, and school is the proper place&mdash;most
+certainly the proper place, anyway, for a
+boy&mdash;as soon as ever any school can be found to
+take him."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 300 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span>
+"I quite agree with you as to the benefit of a
+good school," Jan said sweetly. "I am painfully
+conscious myself of how much I lost in never
+having had any regular education. Have you
+thought yet what preparatory school you'd prefer
+for Tony?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hardly yet. I've not been home long enough,
+and, as you know, at present, I've no money at
+all...."</p>
+
+<p>"I shall be most pleased to help with Tony's
+education, but in that case I should expect to
+have some voice in the school selected."</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly, certainly," Hugo agreed. "But
+what I really want to know is what you propose
+to do to help me to attain a position in which I
+<em>can</em> educate my children as we both should
+wish."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't quite see where I come in."</p>
+
+<p>"My dear Jan, that's absurd. You have
+money&mdash;and a few hundreds now will start me
+again...."</p>
+
+<p>"Start you again in what direction?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's what we've got to thresh out. I've
+several propositions to lay before you."</p>
+
+<p>"All propositions will have to be submitted
+to Mr. Davidson."</p>
+
+<p>"That's nonsense. You must remember that
+I could contest Fay's will if I liked&mdash;it was grossly
+unfair to leave that two thousand pounds away
+from me."</p>
+
+<p>"She left it to her children, Hugo, and <em>you</em>
+must remember you spent eight thousand pounds
+of her money."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 301 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span>
+"<em>I</em> didn't spend it. Do you think <em>I</em> benefited?
+The investments were unfortunate, I grant you,
+but that's not to say I had it."</p>
+
+<p>"Anyway that money is gone."</p>
+
+<p>"And the sooner I set about making some
+more to replace it the better, but I must have
+help."</p>
+
+<p>"It takes every penny of my income to run
+things here."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you know, Jan, to be quite candid, I
+think it's rather ridiculous of you to live here.
+You could let this place easily and for a good
+rent. In a smaller house you'd be equally comfortable
+and in easier circumstances. I'm not
+at all sure I approve of my children being brought
+up with the false ideas they will inevitably acquire
+if they continue to live in a big place like
+this."</p>
+
+<p>"You see, Hugo, it happens to be my house,
+and I'm fond of it."</p>
+
+<p>"No doubt, but if you make a fetish of the
+house, if the house stands in the way of your
+helping your own flesh and blood...."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think I've ever refused to help my
+<em>own</em> relations."</p>
+
+<p>"Which means, I suppose, that your sister's
+husband is nothing to you."</p>
+
+<p>Jan rose. "You are rather unjust, I think,"
+she said quietly. "I must put the children first."</p>
+
+<p>"And suppose you marry&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I certainly wouldn't marry any man who
+would object to my doing all I could for my
+sister's children."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 302 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span>
+"You think so now, but wait till a man comes
+along. You're just getting to the age, Jan, when
+a woman is most apt to make a fool of herself
+over a man. And, remember this, I'd much
+rather my children were brought up simply with
+my people in Guernsey than that they should
+grow up with all sorts of false ideas with nothing
+to back them."</p>
+
+<p>Jan clenched her teeth, and though outwardly
+she was silent, her soul was repeating, "I <em>will</em>
+not fear," over and over again.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps you are right, Hugo," she said
+quietly. "You must arrange as you think best;
+only please remember that you can hardly expect
+me to contribute to the keeping of the children
+if I am allowed no voice in their upbringing.
+Have you consulted your parents as to
+their living with them in Guernsey? Shall we
+go out? It's such a beautiful evening."</p>
+
+<p>Hugo followed her into the hall and out into
+the garden. Involuntarily he looked after her
+with considerable admiration. She held herself
+well, that quiet woman. She waited for him in
+the drive, and as she did so Tony's words came
+back to her: "I used to feel frightened inside,
+but I wouldn't let him know it, and then&mdash;it
+was funny&mdash;but quite sunnly I wasn't frightened
+any more. You try it."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Jan had tried it, and, again to quote Tony,
+"it just happened."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 303 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIV<br />
+<span class="sub">"THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID"</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">P</span>ETER began to feel annoyed. More and
+more clearly did he realise that his chief
+object in coming home was to see Jan again;
+and here was he, still in London in the third week
+of June, and never so much as a glimpse of her.</p>
+
+<p>Her last letter, too, had postponed his visit
+indefinitely, and he almost thought she was not
+treating him quite fairly. It was, of course, a
+confounded bore that Hugo Tancred should have
+turned up just now, but Peter saw no reason for
+staying away for ever on that account. He
+knew Wren's End was a good-sized house, and
+though he appreciated Jan's understanding of
+the fact that he wouldn't exactly choose to be
+a fellow-guest with such a thoroughly bad hat
+as Hugo Tancred, still he considered it was laying
+too much stress upon the finer shades of
+feeling to keep him away so long.</p>
+
+<p>His aunt was delighted to have him; London
+was very pleasant; he had dined out quite a
+number of times, attended some big parties, seen
+all the best plays, and bought or ordered all
+the new clothes he needed, and a good deal that
+he didn't need at all. He had also bought a
+motor to take out with him. It was more than
+time to get within range of the main objective
+of his leave.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 304 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span>
+Suggestions that Jan <em>must</em> have shopping to do
+and might as well come up for a day or two to
+do it only elicited the reply that she had no money
+for shopping and that it was most unlikely that
+she would be in London again for ages.</p>
+
+<p>She hadn't answered his last letter, either,
+which was another grievance.</p>
+
+<p>Then came a letter with the Amber Guiting post-mark,
+and in a handwriting he did not know&mdash;a
+funny little, clear, square handwriting with character
+in every stroke.</p>
+
+<p>He opened it and read:</p>
+
+<div class="letter">
+<p class="smcap">"Dear Mr. Ledgard,</p>
+
+<p>"It is just possible you may have heard of me
+from Mrs. Tancred or Miss Ross, but in case you
+haven't I will explain that I am nurse to the little
+Tancreds and that Miss Ross is my dearest friend.
+I think it would be a very good thing if you came
+down to see her, for her brother-in-law is here,
+and I am never quite sure what he might persuade
+her to do if he put the screw on about the
+children. There is a comfortable inn called 'The
+Green Hart,' and there's another called 'The Full
+Basket,' but I fear you'd not get a room there as
+it's very small and always chock-full at this time
+of year with fishing people.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, if you came down to 'The Green
+Hart,' Jan couldn't say anything, for you've a
+perfect right to stay there if you choose, and I
+know it would help her and strengthen her hands
+to talk things over with you. She has spoken
+much of your kindness to them all in India.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 305 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span>
+"Do you fish, I wonder? I'm sure Squire
+Walcote would be amiable to any friend of Jan's.</p>
+
+<p class="ralign"><span class="pad-r3">"Believe me, yours truly,</span><br />
+"<span class="smcap">Margaret Morton</span>."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Peter put the letter in his pocket and left the
+rest of his correspondence till after breakfast,
+and his aunt decided that he really was a most
+amusing and agreeable companion, and that she
+must have been mistaken last night in thinking
+he seemed rather depressed and worried.</p>
+
+<p>After breakfast he went out to send a reply-paid
+telegram, and then to the garage, where he
+kept his car. Among other places he drove to
+"Hardy Brothers" in Pall Mall, where he stayed
+over an hour.</p>
+
+<p>By the time he got back to Artillery Mansions
+it was lunch time. More letters awaited him, also
+a telegram.</p>
+
+<p>During lunch he mentioned casually that he
+was going down into the country for the week-end
+to fish. He was going to motor down.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," in answer to his aunt's inquiry, "I do
+know people down there, but I'm not going to
+stay with them. I'm going to the inn&mdash;one's
+freer, you know, and if the sport's good I may
+stay on a few days."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Mr. Withells came again for Hugo on Saturday
+morning and proposed a run right over to Cheltenham
+for a rose show. Hugo declined the rose
+show, but gratefully accepted the drive. He
+would potter about the town while Mr. Withells<!-- Page 306 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span>
+inspected the flowers. The Grange head-gardener
+had several exhibits, and was to be taken on the
+front seat.</p>
+
+<p>They started soon after breakfast and would
+be gone the whole day, for it was an hour and
+three-quarters run by road and two by train.</p>
+
+<p>"I wish he had offered to take you," Jan said
+to Meg when the big motor had vanished out of
+the drive. "It would have been so nice for you
+to see Major Morton."</p>
+
+<p>"And sit bodkin between Hugo and Mr. Withells
+or on one of those horrid little folding-seats&mdash;no,
+thank you! When I go to see my poor
+little papa I shall go by train by myself. I'll
+choose a day when their dear father can help you
+with the children."</p>
+
+<p>After lunch Meg began to find fault with Jan's
+appearance. "I simply won't see you in that
+old grey skirt a minute longer&mdash;go and put on a
+white frock&mdash;a nice white frock. You've got
+plenty."</p>
+
+<p>"Who is always grumbling about the washing?
+Besides, I want to garden."</p>
+
+<p>"You can't garden this afternoon. On such a
+lovely day it's your duty to dress in accordance
+with it. I'm going to clean up my children, and
+then we'll all go down to the post-office to buy
+stamps and show ourselves. <em>You</em> ought to call
+on Lady Mary&mdash;you know you ought. Go and
+change, and then come and see if I approve of
+you. You might leave a card at the vicarage,
+too. I know they're going to the rose show, so
+you'd be quite safe."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 307 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span>
+"You're a nuisance, Meg," Jan complained.
+"Let you and little Fay go swanking down the
+village if you like, but why can't you leave
+Tony and me to potter comfortably in our old
+clothes?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm tired of your old clothes; I want you to
+look decent for once. You haven't done anything
+I asked you for ages. You might as well
+do this."</p>
+
+<p>Jan sighed. "It seems rather absurd when you
+yourself say every soul we know will be at the
+flower show."</p>
+
+<p>"I never said anything of the kind. I said
+Mrs. Fream was going to the flower show. Hurry
+up, Jan."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>"Well, will I do? Will I satisfy the hedges and
+ditches, do you think?" Jan asked later, as she
+appeared in the hall clad in the white raiment
+Meg had commanded.</p>
+
+<p>Meg turned her round. "Very nice indeed,"
+she said. "I'm glad you put on the expensive
+one. It's funny why the very plain things cost
+such a lot. I like the black hat with your white
+hair. Yes, I consent to take you out; I don't
+mind owning you for my missus. Children, come
+and admire Auntie Jan."</p>
+
+<p>Jan dutifully delivered a card at the vicarage,
+and the nursery party left her to walk up the
+Manor drive alone. Lady Mary was in, and
+pleased to see her, but she only stayed a quarter
+of an hour, because Meg had made her promise
+to meet them again in the village. They were<!-- Page 308 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span>
+to have tea in the garden with the children and
+make it a little festival.</p>
+
+<p>What a funny little thing Meg was, she thought
+as she strolled down the drive under the splendid
+beeches. So determined to have her own way in
+small things, such an incarnation of self-sacrifice
+in big ones.</p>
+
+<p>A man was standing just outside the great
+gates in a patch of black shade thrown by a holly-tree
+in the lodge garden. Jan was long-sighted,
+and something in the figure and its pose caused
+her to stop suddenly. He wore the usual grey
+summer suit and a straw hat. Yet he reminded
+her of somebody, but him she had always seen in
+a topee, out of doors.</p>
+
+<p>Of course it was only a resemblance&mdash;but what
+was he waiting there for?</p>
+
+<p>He moved out from the patch of shade and
+looked up the drive through the open gates. He
+took off his hat and waved it, and came quickly
+towards her.</p>
+
+<p>"I couldn't wait any longer," he said. "I
+won't be the least bit of a nuisance. I've come
+to fish, and I'm staying at 'The Green Hart'....
+And how are you?"</p>
+
+<p>She could never make it out, when she thought
+it over afterwards, but Jan found herself standing
+with both her hands in his and her beautiful
+black parasol tumbled unheeded in the dust.</p>
+
+<p>"I happened to meet the children and Miss
+Morton, and they asked me to tell you they've
+gone home. They also invited me to tea."</p>
+
+<p>"So do I," said Jan.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 309 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span>
+"I should hardly have known Tony," he continued;
+"he looks capital. And as for little Fay&mdash;she's
+a picture, but she always was."</p>
+
+<p>"Did they know you?"</p>
+
+<p>"<em>Did</em> they know me!"</p>
+
+<p>"Were they awfully pleased?"</p>
+
+<p>"They were ever so jolly; even Tony shouted."</p>
+
+<p>At the lodge they met the Squire. Jan introduced
+Peter and explained that he had just come
+down for a few days' fishing and was staying at
+"The Green Hart." The Squire proffered advice
+as to the best flies and a warning that he must
+not hope for much sport. The Amber was a
+difficult river, very; and variable; and it had
+been a particularly dry June.</p>
+
+<p>Peter bore up under this depressing intelligence
+and he and Jan walked on through warm,
+scented lanes to Wren's End; and Peter looked
+at Jan a good deal.</p>
+
+<p>Those who happened to be in London during
+the season of 1914 will remember that it was a
+period of powder and paint and frankest touching-up
+of complexions. The young and pretty
+were blackened and whitened and reddened quite
+as crudely as the old and ugly. There was no
+attempt at concealment. The faces of many
+Mayfair ladies filled Peter with disrespectful astonishment.
+He had not been home for four
+years, and then nice girls didn't do that sort of
+thing&mdash;much.</p>
+
+<p>Now one of Jan's best points was her complexion;
+it was so fair and fresh. The touch of sunburn,
+too, was becoming, for she didn't freckle.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 310 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span>
+Peter found himself positively thankful to behold
+a really clean face; a face, too, that just
+then positively beamed with warm welcome and
+frank pleasure.</p>
+
+<p>A clean face; a cool, clean frock; kind, candid
+eyes and a gentle, sincere voice&mdash;yes, they were
+all there just as he remembered them, just as he
+had so often dreamt of them. Moreover, he decided
+there and then that the Georgian ladies
+knew what they were about when they powdered
+their hair&mdash;white hair, he thought, was extraordinarily
+becoming to a woman.</p>
+
+<p>"You are looking better than when I was in
+Bombay. I think your leave must have done
+you good already," said the kind, friendly voice.</p>
+
+<p>"I need a spell of country air, really to set me
+up," said Peter.</p>
+
+<p>They had an hilarious tea with the children on
+the Wren's lawn, and the tamest of the robins
+hopped about on the step just to show that he
+didn't care a fig for any of them.</p>
+
+<p>Meg was just going to take the children to bed
+when Mr. Withells brought Hugo back. It was
+an awkward moment. Peter knew far too much
+about Hugo to simulate the smallest cordiality;
+and Hugo was too well aware of some of the things
+Peter knew to feel at all comfortable in his presence.
+But he had no intention of giving way an
+inch. He took the chair Meg had just vacated
+and sat down. Mr. Withells, too, sat down for
+a few minutes, and no sooner had he done so than
+William dashed out from amongst them, and, returning,
+was accompanied by Captain Middleton.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 311 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span>
+"No tea, thank you. Just got down from town,
+came with a message from my uncle&mdash;would Miss
+Ross's friend care for a rod on the Manor water
+on Monday? A brother officer who had been
+coming had failed at the last minute&mdash;there was
+room for four rods, but there wasn't a chance of
+much sport."</p>
+
+<p>Miles was introduced to Peter and sat down
+by him. The children rushed at Miles and, ably
+impeded by William, swarmed over him in riotous
+welcome, wholly regardless of their nurse's voice
+which summoned them to bed.</p>
+
+<p>Meg stood waiting.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Morton's father lives in Cheltenham,"
+Jan said to Mr. Withells, who seemed rather left
+out. "She's going to see him on Tuesday&mdash;to
+spend the day."</p>
+
+<p>"Then," said Mr. Withells in his clear staccato,
+"she must take the 9.15&mdash;it's much the
+best train in the day. And the 4.55 back. No
+other trains are at all suitable. I hope you will
+be guided by me in this matter, Miss Morton.
+I've made the journey many times."</p>
+
+<p>So had Meg; but Mr. Withells always irritated
+her to such an extent that had it been possible,
+she would have declared her intention to go and
+return by quite different trains. As it was, she
+nodded pleasantly and said those were the very
+trains she had selected.</p>
+
+<p>Miles thrust his head out from among the encompassing
+three and respectfully implored Mr.
+Withells' advice about trains to Cricklade, which
+lay off the Cheltenham route, even going so far<!-- Page 312 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span>
+as to note the hours of departure and arrival carefully
+in a little book.</p>
+
+<p>Finally Meg came and disencumbered Miles of
+the children and bore them away.</p>
+
+<p>When her voice took on a certain tone it was
+as useless to cope with Meg as with Auntie Jan.
+They knew this, and like wise children gave in
+gracefully.</p>
+
+<p>Elaborate farewells had to be said to everybody,
+and with a final warm embrace for Miles,
+little Fay called to him "Tum and see me in my
+baff."</p>
+
+<p>"Captain Middleton will have gone long before
+you are ready for that," Meg said inhospitably,
+and trying to look very tall and dignified she
+walked up the three steps leading to the nursery.
+But it is almost impossible to look imposing with
+a lagging child dragging at each hand, and poor
+Meg felt that her exit was far from effective.</p>
+
+<p>William settled himself comfortably across his
+master's knees and in two minutes was snoring
+softly.</p>
+
+<p>Miles manifested so keen an interest in Mr.
+Withells' exhibits (he had got a second prize and
+a highly commended) that the kindly little man
+was quite attracted; and when Miles inquired
+about trains to Cheltenham he gave him precisely
+the same advice that he had given Meg.</p>
+
+<hr class="wide" />
+
+<p>The station at Amber Guiting is seldom
+crowded; it's on a shuttle line, and except on
+market-day there is but little passenger traffic.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 313 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span>
+Therefore a small young lady with rather conspicuously
+red hair, a neat grey coat and skirt, a
+shady grey straw hat trimmed with white clover
+and green leaves, and a green parasol, was noticeable
+upon the platform out of all proportion to
+her size.</p>
+
+<p>The train was waiting. The lady entered an
+empty third-class carriage, and sitting in the corner
+with her back to the engine, shut herself in.
+The train departed punctually, and she took out
+from her bag a note-book which she studied with
+frowning concentration.</p>
+
+<p>Ten minutes further down the line the train
+stops again at Guiting Green, and here the young
+lady looked out of the window to see whether
+anyone was travelling that she recognised.</p>
+
+<p>There was. But it was impossible to judge
+from the young lady's expression whether the
+recognition gave her pleasure or not.</p>
+
+<p>She drew in her head very quickly, but not
+before she had been seen.</p>
+
+<p>"Hullo, Miss Morton! Where are you going?
+May I get in here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Aren't you travelling first?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a bit of it. Sure you don't mind? How
+jolly to have met you!"</p>
+
+<p>Miles looked so smiling, so big and well turned
+out, and pleased with life, that Meg's severe expression
+relaxed somewhat.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," she said, "you're just going to the
+junction. But why come to Guiting Green?"</p>
+
+<p>"I came to Guiting Green because it's exactly
+four miles from the Manor House. And I've<!-- Page 314 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span>
+walked those four miles, Miss Morton, walked
+'em for the good of my health. Wish it wasn't
+so dusty, though&mdash;look at my boots! <em>I'm</em> going
+to Cheltenham. Where are you going?"</p>
+
+<p>"Cheltenham?" Meg repeated suspiciously.
+"What are you going to do there?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to see about a horse&mdash;not a dog
+this time&mdash;I hear that Smith's have got a horse
+that may suit me; really up to my weight they
+say it is, so I took the chance of going over while
+I'm with my uncle&mdash;it's a lot nearer than town,
+you know. But where are <em>you</em> going?"</p>
+
+<p>"I," said Meg, "am going to Cheltenham&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"To Cheltenham!" Miles exclaimed in rather
+overdone astonishment. "What an extraordinary
+coincidence! And what are <em>you</em> going to buy in
+Cheltenham?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to see my father. I thought I had
+told you he lives there."</p>
+
+<p>"So you did, of course. How stupid of me to
+forget! Well, it's very jolly we should happen
+to be going down together, isn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>They looked at one another, and Miles laughed.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not at all sure that we ought to travel
+together after we reach the junction, and I don't
+believe you've got a third-class ticket." Meg
+looked very prim.</p>
+
+<p>Miles produced his ticket&mdash;it <em>was</em> third-class.</p>
+
+<p>"There!" he said triumphantly.</p>
+
+<p>"You would be much more comfortable in a
+smoker."</p>
+
+<p>"So would you. We'll take a smoker; I've
+got the sort of cigarette you like."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 315 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span>
+At the junction they got a smoker, and Miles
+saw to it that they had it to themselves; he also
+persuaded the guard to give Meg a square wooden
+box to put her feet on, because he thought the
+seats were too high for her.</p>
+
+<p>It seemed a very short journey.</p>
+
+<p>Major Morton was awaiting Meg when they
+arrived; a little gentleman immaculately neat (it
+was quite clear whence Meg got her love of detail
+and finish)&mdash;who looked both washed-out and
+dried-up. He embraced her with considerable
+solemnity, exclaiming, "God bless you, my dear
+child! You look better than I expected."</p>
+
+<p>"Papa, dear, here is Captain Middleton, a
+friend from Amber Guiting. We happened to
+travel together."</p>
+
+<p>"Pleased to meet you, sir," said the little Major
+graciously; and somehow Miles contrived in two
+minutes so to ingratiate himself with Meg's "poor
+little papa" that they all walked out of the station
+together as a matter of course.</p>
+
+<p>Then came the question of plans.</p>
+
+<p>Meg had shopping to do, declared she had a
+list as long as her arm, but was entirely at her
+father's disposal as to whether she should do it
+before or after lunch.</p>
+
+<p>Miles boldly suggested she should do it now, at
+once, while it was still fairly cool, and then she
+could have all her parcels sent to the station to
+meet her. He seemed quite eager to get rid of
+Meg. The little Major agreed that this would
+be the best course. He would stroll round to his
+club while Meg was shopping, and meet her<!-- Page 316 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[316]</a></span>
+when she thought she would have finished. They
+walked to the promenade and dropped her at
+Cavendish House. Miles, explaining that he had
+to go to Smith's to look at a horse, asked for directions
+from the Major. Their way was the same,
+and without so much as bidding her farewell,
+Miles strolled up one of the prettiest promenades
+in England in company with her father. Meg
+felt rather dazed.</p>
+
+<p>She prided herself on having reduced shopping
+to a fine art, but to-day, somehow, she didn't get
+through as quickly as usual, and there was a
+number of items on her list still unticked when
+it was time to meet her father just outside his
+club at the top of the promenade.</p>
+
+<p>Major Morton was the essence of punctuality.
+Meg flew to meet him, and found he had waited
+five minutes. He was not, however, upset, as
+might have been expected. He took her to his
+rooms in a quiet terrace behind the promenade
+and comfortably near his club. The sun-blinds
+were down outside his sitting-room windows, and
+the room seemed cool and pleasant.</p>
+
+<p>Then it was that Meg discovered that her
+father was looking at her in quite a new way.
+Almost, in fact, as though he had never seen her
+before.</p>
+
+<p>Was it her short hair? she wondered.</p>
+
+<p>Yet that was not very noticeable under such a
+shady hat.</p>
+
+<p>Major Morton had vigorously opposed the
+nursemaid scheme. To the sympathetic ladies
+who attended the same strictly evangelical church<!-- Page 317 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[317]</a></span>
+of which he was a pillar, he confided that his only
+daughter did not care for "a quiet domestic life."
+It was a grief to him&mdash;but, after all, parents are
+shelved nowadays; every girl wants to "live her
+own life," and he would be the last man to stand
+in the way of his child's happiness. The ladies
+felt very sorry for Major Morton and indignant
+with the hard-hearted, unfilial Meg. They did
+not realise that had Meg lived with her father&mdash;in
+rooms&mdash;and earned nothing, the Major's delicate
+digestion might occasionally have suffered,
+and Meg would undoubtedly have been half-starved.</p>
+
+<p>To-day, however, he was more hopeful about
+Meg than he had been for a long time. Since
+the Trent episode he had ceased even to imagine
+her possible marriage. By her own headstrong
+folly she had ruined all her chances. "The weariful
+rich" who had got her the post did not spare
+him this aspect of her deplorable conduct. To-day,
+however, there was a rift in these dark clouds
+of consequence.</p>
+
+<p>Captain Middleton&mdash;he only knows how&mdash;had
+persuaded Major Morton to go with him to see
+the horse, had asked his quite useless advice, and
+had subtly and insidiously conveyed to the Major,
+without one single incriminating sentence, a very
+clear idea as to his own feelings for the Major's
+daughter.</p>
+
+<p>Major Morton felt cheered.</p>
+
+<p>He had no idea who Miles really was, but he
+had remarked the gunner tie, and, asking to what
+part of the Royal Regiment Miles belonged, de<!-- Page 318 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[318]</a></span>cided
+that no mere pauper could be a Horse-Gunner.</p>
+
+<p>He regarded his daughter with new eyes.</p>
+
+<p>She was undoubtedly attractive. He discovered
+certain resemblances to himself that he had
+never noticed before.</p>
+
+<p>Then he informed her that he had promised
+they would both lunch with her agreeable friend
+at the Queen's Hotel: "He made such a point of
+it," said Major Morton, "I could hardly refuse;
+begged us to take pity on his loneliness, and so
+on&mdash;and I'm feeling rather better to-day."</p>
+
+<p>Meg decided that the tide of fate was too strong
+for her, she must just drift with it.</p>
+
+<p>It was a most pleasant lunch, save for one incident.
+Lady Penelope Pottinger and her husband,
+accompanied by Lottie Trent and a man,
+were lunching at another table.</p>
+
+<p>Lady Penelope's party came in late. Miles and
+his guests had already arrived at coffee when they
+appeared.</p>
+
+<p>They had to pass Miles' table, and Lady Penelope
+stopped; so did her husband. She shook
+hands with Meg. Miss Trent passed by with
+her nose in the air.</p>
+
+<p>Miles presented his relations to the Major and
+they passed on.</p>
+
+<p>The Major was quite pleased and rather flattered.
+He had no idea that the tall young
+woman with Lady Penelope had deliberately cut
+his host. But Meg knew just why she had done
+it.</p>
+
+<p>After lunch Miles very properly effaced him<!-- Page 319 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[319]</a></span>self,
+but made a point of asking the Major if he
+might act as Miss Morton's escort on the journey
+back to Amber Guiting.</p>
+
+<p>The Major graciously accompanied Meg while
+she did the rest of her shopping, and in the promenade
+they met the Pottinger party again.</p>
+
+<p>The 4.55 was crowded. Miles collected Meg's
+parcels and suggested to the Major that it would
+be less tiring for his daughter if they returned
+first-class. Should he change the tickets?</p>
+
+<p>The Major thought it a sensible proposition,
+especially with all those parcels. Meg would pay
+Captain Middleton the difference.</p>
+
+<p>Again an amiable porter secured them an empty
+carriage. The parcels spread themselves luxuriously
+upon the unoccupied seats. The Major
+kissed his daughter and gave her his benediction,
+shaking hands quite warmly with her "pleasant
+young friend."</p>
+
+<p>The 4.55 runs right up to the junction without
+a stop. Meg took off her best hat and placed it
+carefully in the rack. She leaned her bewildered
+head against the cushions and closed her eyes.
+She would drift with the tide just a few minutes
+more, and then&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>Miles put a box of groceries for Lady Mary
+under her feet. She smiled faintly, but did not
+speak.</p>
+
+<p>Presently she opened her eyes to find him regarding
+her with that expression she had surprised
+once or twice before, and never understood.</p>
+
+<p>"Tired?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Only pleasantly. I think I've only travelled<!-- Page 320 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[320]</a></span>
+first-class about five times in my life before&mdash;and
+then it was with Mr. Ross."</p>
+
+<p>"And now it's with me, and I hope it's the first
+of many."</p>
+
+<p>"You say very odd things."</p>
+
+<p>"What I mean isn't in the least odd&mdash;it's the
+most natural thing in the world."</p>
+
+<p>"What is?"</p>
+
+<p>"To want to go on travelling with you."</p>
+
+<p>"If you're going to talk nonsense, I shall go to
+sleep again."</p>
+
+<p>"No, I don't think I can allow you to go to
+sleep. I want you to wake up and face facts."</p>
+
+<p>"Facts?"</p>
+
+<p>"A fact."</p>
+
+<p>"Facts are sometimes very unpleasant."</p>
+
+<p>"I hope the fact I want you to face isn't exactly
+that&mdash;if it is ... then I'm ... a jolly miserable
+chap. Miss Morton&mdash;Meg&mdash;you must see
+how it is with me&mdash;you must know that you're
+dearer to me than anything on earth. I think
+your father tumbled to it&mdash;and I don't think he
+minded ... that I should want you for my wife."</p>
+
+<p>"My poor little papa would be relieved to think
+that anyone could...."</p>
+
+<p>"Could what?"</p>
+
+<p>"Care for me ... in that way."</p>
+
+<p>"Nonsense! But I'm exceedingly glad to have
+met your father."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because I wanted to meet him."</p>
+
+<p>"Again, why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because he's your father."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 321 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span>
+"Did you observe that Miss Lotty Trent cut
+you dead at the Queen's to-day?"</p>
+
+<p>"I did notice it, and, like you, I wonder why."</p>
+
+<p>"I can tell you."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think you'd better bother. Miss
+Trent's opinion of me really doesn't matter&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"It was because you were with me."</p>
+
+<p>"But what a silly reason&mdash;if it is a reason."</p>
+
+<p>"Captain Middleton, will you answer a question
+quite truthfully?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll try."</p>
+
+<p>"What have you heard about me in connection
+with the Trents?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not much, and that I don't believe."</p>
+
+<p>"But you must believe it, some of it. It may
+not be so bad&mdash;as it might have been&mdash;but I put
+myself entirely in the wrong. I deceived Mrs.
+Trent and I did a thing no girl in her senses ought
+to have done."</p>
+
+<p>"Look here, Meg," said Miles, leaning forward.
+"I don't want to know anything you don't choose
+to tell me; but since you <em>are</em> on the subject&mdash;what
+did happen between you and that ... and
+Walter Brooke?"</p>
+
+<p>Meg, too, leant forward; the express swayed
+and lurched. Their faces were very near; their
+eyes met and held each other in a long, searching
+gaze on the one side and an answering look of
+absolute candour on the other.</p>
+
+<p>"I promised to go away with him, and I went
+away a few miles, and something came over me
+that I couldn't go any further, and I broke my
+promise and ran away. Jan knows it's true, for<!-- Page 322 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[322]</a></span>
+it was to them I went. But the Trents would
+never believe it, though Mr. Ross saw Mrs. Trent
+herself, and told her exactly what had happened.
+And I daresay ... they are quite justified."</p>
+
+<p>"And how many times have you seen him
+since?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never till the other day, when he nearly ran
+over William."</p>
+
+<p>"And how long ago is it since all this happened?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nearly six years."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you think it's about time you put it
+all out of your mind?"</p>
+
+<p>"I had put it out of my mind ... till ...
+you came."</p>
+
+<p>"It didn't make any difference to me."</p>
+
+<p>"I shall never forget that," Meg said, so low
+that the rattle of the train wholly drowned her
+remark, but it couldn't conceal her smile.</p>
+
+<p>Miles lost his head. He kneeled down plump
+on the floor of that compartment and took her
+in his arms and kissed her.</p>
+
+<hr class="wide" />
+
+<p>"All the same, I don't believe I can marry
+you," she said later.</p>
+
+<p>"Why on earth not?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because I don't think I'm a suitable wife for
+you."</p>
+
+<p>"Surely I'm the best judge of that."</p>
+
+<p>"No, you're not a judge at all. You think
+you're in love with me...."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm hanged if I do&mdash;I <em>know</em>."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 323 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[323]</a></span>
+"Because you're sorry for me&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"On the contrary, I'm sorry for myself. I
+think you're a hard-hearted ... obstinate ...
+little...."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Withells would have been scandalised at
+the conduct of Miles. He would undoubtedly
+have described it as both "insanitary and improper."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, please listen!" Meg gasped. "Perhaps a
+long time hence ... if you're still of the same
+mind...."</p>
+
+<p>"Anyway, may I tell people?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a soul. I won't have my Jan worried
+just now. I've undertaken those children ...
+and she's having a bad time with that brother-in-law&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I say, Meg, what is it about that chap Tancred?
+I can't stick him.... Is he a bad egg,
+or what?"</p>
+
+<p>"He is...."</p>
+
+<p>"Poor Miss Ross! But why does she have
+him there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it's a long story&mdash;and here we are at the
+junction, and I'm not going on first to Amber
+Guiting&mdash;so there!"</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Jan in the pony-cart was waiting outside when
+Meg came from the little station. Captain Middleton
+followed in her train, laden with parcels
+like a Father Christmas.</p>
+
+<p>He packed her and the parcels in, covered both
+the ladies with the dust-holland, announced that
+he had bought a charger, and waited to get into<!-- Page 324 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span>
+the Manor motor till they had driven out of the
+station.</p>
+
+<p>They neither of them spoke till they had turned
+into the road. Then Jan quoted softly: "When
+I go to see my poor little papa, I shall go by
+train <em>by myself</em>."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 325 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[325]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XXV<br />
+<span class="sub">A DEMONSTRATION IN FORCE</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="dropcap">H</span>UGO was dissatisfied. So far, beyond a
+miserable ten pounds to buy some clothes,
+he had got no money out of Jan; and he was getting
+bored.</p>
+
+<p>To be sure, he still had most of the ten pounds,
+for he had gone and ordered everything in the
+market-town, where the name of Ross was considered
+safe as the Bank of England. So he
+hadn't paid for anything.</p>
+
+<p>Then there was that fellow Ledgard&mdash;what did
+he want hanging about, pretending to fish? He
+was after Jan and her money, that was his game.</p>
+
+<p>But however clear Peter Ledgard's nefarious
+intentions might be, Hugo confessed his sister-in-law
+puzzled him. She wasn't nearly as much
+afraid of him as he had expected. She was always
+gentle and courteous, but under the soft
+exterior he had occasionally felt a rock of determination,
+that was disconcerting.</p>
+
+<p>He had ceased to harp upon the string of his
+desolation. Somehow Jan contrived to show him
+that she didn't believe in it, and yet she never
+said one word to which he could take exception.</p>
+
+<p>It was awkward that his own people were all of
+them so unsympathetic about the children. His
+father and mother declared themselves to be too<!-- Page 326 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[326]</a></span>
+old to undertake them unless Hugo could pay
+liberally for their board and for a thoroughly
+capable nurse. Neither of his sisters would entertain
+the idea at all; and both wrote pointing
+out that until Hugo was able to make a home for
+them himself, he would be most foolish to interfere
+with the arrangements of a devoted aunt who
+appeared not only willing but anxious to assume
+their entire maintenance.</p>
+
+<p>He had told his people that his health forced
+him to relinquish his work in India. His brothers-in-law,
+although they had no idea of the real
+cause, thought there was something fishy about
+this, and were unsympathetic.</p>
+
+<p>Peter got at the doctor, and the doctor declared
+sea-air to be the one thing necessary to insure
+Hugo's complete restoration to health. Jan happened
+to mention that her brother-in-law's people
+lived in Guernsey, close to the shore. The doctor
+said he couldn't do better than go and stay with
+them, and that the journey wouldn't hurt him a
+bit.</p>
+
+<p>Still Hugo appeared reluctant to leave Wren's
+End.</p>
+
+<p>Peter came one day and demanded a business
+talk with him. It was a most unpleasant conversation.
+Peter declared on Jan's behalf that she
+was quite ready to help him to some new start in
+life, but that if it meant a partnership in any
+rubber plantation, fruit-farm, or business of any
+sort whatsoever, the money required must be
+paid through her lawyer directly into the hands
+of the planter, farmer, or merchant concerned.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 327 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[327]</a></span>
+Hugo declared such an offer to be an insult.
+Peter replied that it was a great deal better than
+he deserved or could expect; and that he, personally,
+thought Miss Ross very silly to make it;
+but she did make it, and attached to its acceptance
+was a clause to the effect that until he could
+show he was in a position to maintain his family
+in comfort, he was to give their aunt an undertaking
+that he would not interfere with her arrangements
+for the welfare of the children.</p>
+
+<p>"I see no reason," said Hugo, "why you should
+interfere between my sister-in-law and me, but,
+of course, any fool could see what you're after.
+<em>You</em> want her money, and when you've married
+her, I suppose my poor children are to be thrown
+out into the street, and me too far off to see after
+them."</p>
+
+<p>"Up to now," Peter retorted, "you have shown
+no particular desire to 'see after' your children.
+Why are you such a fool, Tancred? Why don't
+you thankfully accept Miss Ross's generous offer,
+and try to make a fresh start?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's no business of yours what I do."</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly not, but your sister-in-law's peace
+and happiness is my business, because I have the
+greatest admiration, respect and liking for her."</p>
+
+<p>"<i lang="fr">Les beaux yeux de sa cassette</i>," growled Hugo.</p>
+
+<p>"You <em>are</em> an ass," Peter said wearily. "And
+you know very little of Miss Ross if you haven't
+seen by this time ..." Peter stopped.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, go on."</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Peter, "I won't go on, for it's running
+my horses on a rock. Think it over, that's<!-- Page 328 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[328]</a></span>
+all. But remember the offer does not remain
+open indefinitely."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, and if I choose to refuse it and go to
+law and <em>take</em> my children&mdash;what then?"</p>
+
+<p>"No court in England would give you their
+custody."</p>
+
+<p>"Why not?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because you couldn't show means to support
+them, and we could produce witnesses to prove
+that you are not a fit person to have the custody
+of children."</p>
+
+<p>"We should see about that."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, think it over. It's your affair, you
+know." And Peter went away, leaving Hugo to
+curse and bite his nails in impotent rage. Peter
+really was far from conciliatory.</p>
+
+<p>Jan needed a fright, Hugo decided; that's what
+she wanted to bring her to heel. And before
+very long he'd see that she got it. She shouldn't
+shelter herself for ever behind that supercilious
+beast, Ledgard. Hugo was quite ready to have
+been pleasant to Jan and to have met her more
+than half-way if she was reasonable, but since she
+had chosen to bring Ledgard into it, she should
+pay. After all, she was only a woman, and you
+can always frighten a woman if you go the right
+way about it. It was damned bad luck that
+Ledgard should have turned up just now. It
+was Ledgard he'd got to thank that Fay had
+made that infamously unjust will by which she
+left the remnant of her money to her children
+and not to her husband. Oh yes! he'd a lot to
+thank Ledgard for. Well, he wouldn't like it<!-- Page 329 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span>
+when Jan got hurt. Ledgard was odd about
+women. He couldn't bear to see them worried;
+he couldn't bear to see Fay worried, interfered
+then. A blank, blank, blank interfering chap,
+Ledgard was. <em>What Jan needed was a real good
+scare.</em></p>
+
+<p>They suggested Guernsey. Well, he'd go to
+Guernsey, and he wouldn't go alone. Hugo thoroughly
+enjoyed a plot. The twilight world that
+had been so difficult and perplexing to poor Fay
+had for him a sort of exciting charm. Wren's
+End had become dreadfully dull. For the first
+week or two, while he felt so ill, it had been restful.
+Now its regular hours and ordered tranquillity
+were getting on his nerves. All those
+portraits of his wife, too, worried him. He could
+go into no room where the lovely face, with youth's
+wistful wonder as to what life held, did not confront
+him with a reminder that the wife he had
+left to die in Bombay did not look in the least
+like that.</p>
+
+<p>There were few things in his life save miscalculation
+that he regretted. But he did feel uncomfortable
+when he remembered Fay&mdash;so trustful
+always, so ready to help him in any difficulty.
+People liked her; even women liked her in spite
+of her good looks, and Hugo had found the world
+a hard, unfriendly place since her death.</p>
+
+<p>The whole thing was getting on his nerves. It
+was time to shuffle the cards and have a new deal.</p>
+
+<p>He packed his suit-case which had been so
+empty when he arrived, and waited for a day
+when Peter had taken Jan, Meg and the children<!-- Page 330 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[330]</a></span>
+for a motor run to a neighbouring town. He took
+care to see that Earley was duly busy in the
+kitchen garden, and the maids safely at the back
+of the house. Then he carried it to the lodge
+gate himself and waited for a passing tradesman's
+cart. Fortune favoured him; the butcher came
+up with (had Hugo known it) veal cutlets for
+Hugo's own dinner. Hugo tipped the butcher
+and asked him to leave the suit-case at the station
+to be sent on as carted luggage to its address.</p>
+
+<p>Next morning he learned that Tony was to go
+with Earley to fetch extra cream from Mr. Burgess'
+farm.</p>
+
+<p>It was unfortunate that he couldn't get any of
+Tony's clothes without causing comment. He
+had tried the day before, but beyond a jersey and
+two little vests (which happened to be little Fay's),
+he had been unable to find anything. Well, Jan
+would be glad enough to send Tony's clothes when
+he let her know where they were to be sent.
+Tony had changed a good deal from the silent,
+solemn child he had disliked in India. He was
+franker and more talkative. Sometimes Hugo
+felt that the child wasn't such a bad little chap,
+after all. But the very evident understanding
+between Jan and Tony filled Hugo with a dull
+sort of jealousy. He had never tried to win the
+child, but nevertheless he resented the fact that
+Tony's attitude to Jan and Meg was one of perfect
+trust and friendliness. He never looked at
+them with the strange judging, weighing look
+that Hugo hated so heartily.</p>
+
+<p>He strolled into the drive and waited. Meg<!-- Page 331 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[331]</a></span>
+and Jan were busy in the day-nursery, making
+the little garments that were outgrown so fast.
+Little Fay was playing on the Wren's lawn and
+singing to herself:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">The fox went out one moonlight night,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And he played to the moon to give him light,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">For he had a long way to tlot that night<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Before he could leach his den-oh.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Hugo listened for a minute. What a clear
+voice the child had. He would like to have taken
+little Fay, but already he stood in wholesome
+awe of his daughter. She could use her thoroughly
+sound lungs for other purposes than song,
+and she hadn't the smallest scruple about drawing
+universal attention to any grievance. Now Tony
+would never make a scene. Hugo recognised and
+admired that quality in his queer little son. He
+did not know that Tony already ruled his little
+life by a categorical imperative of things a sahib
+must not do.</p>
+
+<p>At the drive gate he met Earley carrying the
+can of cream, with Tony trotting by his side.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going into the village, Tony, and Auntie
+Jan says you may as well come with me for company.
+Will you come?"</p>
+
+<p>Tony looked dubious. Still, he remembered
+that Auntie Jan had said he must try and be kind
+to poor Daddie, who had been so ill and was so
+sad.</p>
+
+<p>"All right," he said with a little sigh, and took
+the hand Hugo held out.</p>
+
+<p>"He'll be quite safe with me, Earley," Hugo<!-- Page 332 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[332]</a></span>
+said with a pleasant smile. "Miss Ross knows
+I'm going to take him."</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless Earley went to the back door
+and asked Hannah to inform her mistress that
+"Mr. Tancred had taken Mazter Tony along of
+'im."</p>
+
+<p>Hannah was busy, and serene in her conception
+of Hugo as the sorrowing widower, did not
+think the fact that Tony had gone for a walk
+with his own father was worth a journey to the
+day-nursery.</p>
+
+<p>"How would you like a ride down to the junction?"
+Hugo said. "I believe we could just
+catch a train if we take the omnibus at 'The
+Green Hart.' I want to make inquiries about
+something for Auntie Jan."</p>
+
+<p>Tony loved trains; he had only been twice to
+the junction since he came to Wren's End; it
+was a fascinating place. Daddie seemed in an
+agreeable mood this morning. Auntie Jan would
+be pleased that he should be nice to him.</p>
+
+<p>It all fell out as if the fates had arranged things
+for Hugo. They saw very few people in the village;
+only one old woman accompanied them in
+the bus; he heard his father ask for a ticket to
+the junction, and they arrived without incident
+of any kind.</p>
+
+<p>The junction, however, was busy. There were
+quite a lot of people, and when Hugo went to the
+ticket-office he had to stand in a queue of others
+while Tony waited outside the long row.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly Tony began to wonder why his father
+should go to the ticket-office at all to inquire for<!-- Page 333 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[333]</a></span>
+a parcel. Tony was observant, and just because
+everything was so different from things in India
+small incidents were impressed upon his mind. If
+his father was going on anywhere else, he wasn't
+going; for Peter had promised to take them out
+in his car again that afternoon. When Hugo
+reached the window of the ticket-office Tony
+heard something about Paddington.</p>
+
+<p>That decided him. Nothing would induce him
+to go to Paddington.</p>
+
+<p>He pushed his way among the crowd and ran
+for dear life up the stairs, and over the bridge to
+the other platform where the train for Amber
+Guiting was still waiting, lonely and deserted.
+He knew that train. It went up and down all
+day, for Amber Guiting was the terminus. No
+one was on the platform as he ran along. With
+the sure instinct of the hunted he passed the carriages
+with their shut doors. Right at the end
+was a van with empty milk-cans. He had seen
+a porter putting them in the moment the train
+stopped. Tony darted into the van and crouched
+down between the milk-cans and the wall. He
+thought of getting into one of them. The story
+of Morgiana and the Forty Thieves was clear in
+his mind, for Meg had told it to them the night
+before. But the cans were so high and narrow
+he decided that it was impossible. Someone
+slammed the door of the van. There came a
+bump and a jar, and the train moved out onto
+a siding till it should go back to Amber Guiting
+when the 1.30 from London came in. Tony sat
+quite still in the dark, stuffy van. His little heart<!-- Page 334 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[334]</a></span>
+was beating with hammer strokes against his ribs,
+but his face expressed nothing but scorn.</p>
+
+<p>Again his father had lied to him. Again he
+had said he was going to do one thing when he
+fully intended to do another. The pleasantness,
+the kindliness, the apparent desire for Tony's
+society were a cheat. Tony spoke rapidly to himself
+in Hindustani, and by the time he had finished
+expressing his views Hugo Tancred hadn't
+a shred of character left.</p>
+
+<p>He didn't know when the train would go back
+to Amber Guiting. It might not be till evening.
+Tony could wait. Some time it would go back,
+and once in that dear, safe place all would be well.</p>
+
+<p>He disliked the sound of Paddington; it had
+to do with London, he knew. He didn't mind
+London, but he wasn't going there with his father,
+and no Meg and no Jan and no little Fay and no
+kind sahibs who were <em>real</em> sahibs.</p>
+
+<p>He was very hungry, and his eyes grew a bit
+misty as he thought of little Fay consuming scones
+and milk at the "elevens" Meg was always so
+careful they should have.</p>
+
+<p>A new and troubling thought perturbed him.
+Did Auntie Jan know he had gone at all? Would
+she be frightened? Would she get that look on
+her dear face that he couldn't bear to see? That
+Auntie Jan loved them both with her whole heart
+was now one of the fixed stars in Tony's firmament
+of beliefs. He began to think that perhaps
+it would be better for Auntie Jan to give his
+father some of her twinkly things and let him go
+away and leave them in peace; but he dismissed<!-- Page 335 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[335]</a></span>
+that thought as cowardly and unworthy of a
+sahib.</p>
+
+<p>Oh, dear! it was very long sitting in the dark,
+scrunched up behind those cans. He must tell
+himself stories to pass the time; and he started
+to relate the interminable legend of Cocky-locky
+and Henny-Penny who by their superior subtlety
+evaded the snares set for them by Toddy-Loddy
+the fox. He felt a sort of kinship with those
+harried fowls. Gradually the constant repetition
+of the various other birds involved, "Juckie-Puckie,
+Goosie-Loosie, Turkey-lurkey and Swannie-Lonnie,"
+had a soothing effect, and Tony fell
+asleep.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Meanwhile Hugo had hunted through every
+corner of the four platforms; he had even gone to
+look for the Amber Guiting train, but was told it
+always was moved on to a siding directly it had
+discharged its passengers.</p>
+
+<p>It was mysterious, it was profoundly annoying,
+but it was not, to Hugo, alarming. He suspected
+that Peter Ledgard was in some way
+mixed up in it; that he, himself, had been shadowed
+and that Peter had stolen Tony in the
+crowd. In his mistrustful wrath he endowed
+Peter with such abnormal foresight and acumen
+as he certainly did not possess.</p>
+
+<p>It really was an impossible situation. Hugo
+could not go about asking porters and people for
+a lost child, or the neighbourhood would be
+roused. He couldn't go back to Wren's End
+without Tony, or there would be the devil to pay.<!-- Page 336 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[336]</a></span>
+He even got a porter to look in every carriage of
+the side-tracked train for a mythical despatch-case,
+and accompanied him in his search. Naturally
+they didn't seek a despatch-case in the van.</p>
+
+<p>He had lost his train, but there was another,
+very slow, about three-quarters of an hour later,
+and this he decided to take. He would telegraph
+to Jan from London. Somehow he was not in
+the least concerned about the fate of Tony.
+Peter and Peter's car had something to do with
+this mysterious disappearance. He was sure of
+that.</p>
+
+<p>Well, if this particular deal had failed, he must
+shuffle the cards and deal again. In any case
+Jan should see that where his children were concerned
+he was not to be trifled with.</p>
+
+<p>He was sorry, though, he had bought the half-ticket
+for Tony, and to ask them to take it back
+might cause comment.</p>
+
+<p>As the slow train steamed out from the junction
+Hugo felt a very ill-used man.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>At eleven o'clock Anne Chitt brought in the
+tray with two cups of milk and a plate of Hannah's
+excellent scones.</p>
+
+<p>"Please go into the kitchen garden and ask
+Master Tony to come for his lunch," Jan said.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Anne returned. "Master Tony ain't
+in the garden, miss; and 'Annah says as 'e most
+likely ain't back yet, miss."</p>
+
+<p>"Back! Back from where?"</p>
+
+<p>"Please, miss, 'Annah says as 'is pa've took
+him with him down the village."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 337 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[337]</a></span>
+Jan laid her sewing on the table and got up.</p>
+
+<p>"Is Earley in the garden?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, miss. I ast Earley an' 'e says the same
+as 'Annah. Mr. Tancred 'ave took Master Tony
+with 'im."</p>
+
+<p>Anne went away, and Jan and Meg, who had
+stopped her machining to listen, stared at each
+other across the table.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose they'll be back directly," Jan said
+uneasily. "I'll go and ask Earley when Hugo
+took Tony."</p>
+
+<p>"He got up to breakfast to-day for the first
+time," Meg remarked irrelevantly.</p>
+
+<p>Jan went out into the Wrens' garden and
+through Anthony's gate. She fumbled at the
+catch, for her hands trembled.</p>
+
+<p>Earley was picking peas.</p>
+
+<p>"What time did Mr. Tancred take Master
+Tony?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Just as we got back from fetchin' the cream,
+miss. I should say as it was about 'alf-past nine.
+He did meet us at the lodge, and took the young
+gentleman with 'im for company&mdash;'e said so."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, Earley," Jan said quietly.</p>
+
+<p>Earley looked at her and over his broad, good-natured
+face there passed a shade of misgiving.
+"I did tell Hannah to let you know the minute I
+cum in, miss."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," Jan said again; "that's quite
+right."</p>
+
+<p>"Be you feelin' the 'eat, miss?" Earley asked
+anxiously. "I don't think as you ought to be
+out without an 'at."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 338 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[338]</a></span>
+"No, I expect not. I'll go and get one."</p>
+
+<p>By lunch time there was still no sign of Hugo
+and Tony; and Jan was certainly as much scared
+as even Hugo could have wished.</p>
+
+<p>Meg had been down to the village and discovered
+that Hugo and Tony had gone by bus to the
+junction in time for the 10.23.</p>
+
+<p>Peter was playing golf with Squire Walcote on
+a little course he had made in some of his fields.
+It was impossible to go and hunt for Peter without
+giving away the whole situation, and Jan was
+loth to do that.</p>
+
+<p>She and Meg stared at one another in dismayed
+impotence.</p>
+
+<p>Jan ordered the pony-carriage; she would drive
+to the junction, leaving a note for Peter at "The
+Green Hart," but it was only too likely he would
+lunch with the Walcotes.</p>
+
+<p>"You must eat something," said Meg. "There's
+a train in at a quarter to two; you'd better meet
+that before you go to the junction; the guard
+might be able to tell you something."</p>
+
+<p>At lunch little Fay wept because there was no
+Tony.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 339 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[339]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVI<br />
+<span class="sub">IN WHICH SEVERAL PEOPLE SPEAK THEIR MINDS</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="undrop">"</span><span class="dropcap">A</span>FTER all, you know," Meg said, with intent
+to comfort, "no great harm can happen
+to Tony. Hugo will only take the child a
+little way off, to see what he can get out of you."</p>
+
+<p>"It's the moral harm to Tony that I mind,"
+Jan answered sadly. "He was getting so happy
+and trustful, so much more like other children.
+I know his father has got him to go away by
+some ruse, and he will be miserable and embittered
+because he has been cheated again."</p>
+
+<p>"Shall you drive to the junction if you hear
+nothing at the station?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I think so, though I've little hope of
+learning anything there. You see, people come
+there from three directions. They couldn't possibly
+notice everybody as they do at a little station
+like this."</p>
+
+<p>"Wait," said Meg, "don't go to the junction.
+Have you forgotten Mr. Ledgard was to fetch us
+all at half-past two? He'll run you over in his
+car in a quarter the time you'd take to go with
+Placid, and be some use as well. You'd better
+come straight back here if you get no news, and
+I'll keep him till you get back if he turns up first."</p>
+
+<p>By this time the pony-cart was at the door.
+Meg helped Jan in, kissed her, and whispered,
+"Cheer up; I feel somehow you'll hear something,"<!-- Page 340 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[340]</a></span>
+and Jan drove off. She found a boy to hold the
+pony when she reached the station, and went in.
+The old porter was waiting for the train, and she
+asked if he happened to notice her little nephew
+that morning.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, miss, I did see 'un along with a holder
+gentleman unbeknownst to me."</p>
+
+<p>Jan walked up and down in an agony of doubt
+and apprehension.</p>
+
+<p>The train came in. There were but few passengers,
+and among them was Miles, come down
+again for the week-end.</p>
+
+<p>He greeted Jan with effusion. Had she come
+to meet anyone, or was it a parcel?</p>
+
+<p>To his astonishment Miss Ross broke from him
+and rushed at the guard right up at the far end
+of the train.</p>
+
+<p>The guard evidently disclaimed all knowledge
+of the parcel, for Miles saw him shaking his head
+vigorously.</p>
+
+<p>"Any other luggage, sir?" asked the old porter,
+lifting out Miles' suit-case.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, a box of rods in the van."</p>
+
+<p>The old porter went to the end of the train
+near where Jan had been to the guard three minutes
+before.</p>
+
+<p>He opened the van door and nearly tumbled
+backward in astonishment, for right in the doorway,
+blinking at the light, stood "Miss Rass'
+young gen'leman."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I am blessed!" exclaimed the porter,
+and lifted him out.</p>
+
+<p>Tony was dreadfully dirty. The heat, the<!-- Page 341 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[341]</a></span>
+dust, the tears he had shed when he woke up with
+the putting in of luggage at the junction and
+couldn't understand what had happened to him,
+all combined to make him about the most miserable-looking
+and disreputable small boy you could
+imagine. He had left his hat behind the milk-cans.</p>
+
+<p>Jan had gone out of the station. She had
+passed Miles blindly, and her face caused that
+young man to whistle softly, just once. Then he
+dashed after her.</p>
+
+<p>"Your haunt bin askin' for you," the old porter
+said to Tony. "'Peared to me she was a bit
+worried-like."</p>
+
+<p>Tony moved stiffly down the little station, the
+old porter following with Miles' luggage on a
+truck.</p>
+
+<p>The ticket-collector stood in the doorway.
+Tony, of course, had none. "Don't you say
+nothin'," whispered the old porter. "'Is haunt'll
+make it good; there's some sort of a misteree."</p>
+
+<p>Tony felt queer and giddy. Jan, already in
+her little pony-trap, had started to drive away.
+Miles, waiting for his baggage beside his uncle's
+car, saw the dejected little figure appear in the
+station entrance.</p>
+
+<p>He let fly a real barrack-square bellow after
+Jan, and she pulled up.</p>
+
+<p>She looked back and saw the reason for Captain
+Middleton's amazing roar.</p>
+
+<p>She swung the indignant Placid round, and in
+two minutes she was out of the pony-trap and
+had Tony in her strong arms.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 342 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[342]</a></span>
+Miles tipped the porter and drove off. He,
+too, realised that there was some sort of a "misteree,"
+something painful and unpleasant for
+Miss Ross, and that she would probably prefer
+that no questions were asked.</p>
+
+<p>Whatever mischief could that young Tony have
+been after? And dared Miles call at Wren's End
+that evening, in the hope of a glimpse of Meg, or
+would it look inquisitive and ill-bred?</p>
+
+<p>Placid turned a mild, inquiring head to discover
+the reason for this new delay.</p>
+
+<p>When Jan, after paying Tony's fare back from
+the junction, had driven away, the old porter, the
+ticket-collector, and the station-master sat in
+conclave on the situation. And their unanimous
+conclusion was summed up by the old porter:
+"Byes be a mishtiful set of young varmints, an'
+it warn't no job for a lone 'ooman to 'ave to bring
+'em up."</p>
+
+<p>The lone woman in question held her reins in
+one hand and her other arm very tightly round
+the dirty little boy on the seat beside her.</p>
+
+<p>As they drove through the village neither of
+them spoke, but when they reached the Wren's
+End Road, Tony burst into tears.</p>
+
+<p>"I <em>am</em> so hungry," he wailed, "and I feel so
+nasty in my inside."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>As Meg was putting him to bed that night she
+inquired if he had done anything with his green
+jersey, for she couldn't find it.</p>
+
+<p>"No," Tony answered. "I haven't had it for
+a long time&mdash;it's been too warm."</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 343 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[343]</a></span>
+"It's very odd," said Meg. "It has disappeared,
+and so have two vests of little Fay's that
+I put in the nursery ottoman to mend. Where
+can they be? I hate to lose things; it seems so
+untidy."</p>
+
+<p>"I 'spect," said Tony, thoughtfully, "my
+Daddie took them. He'd never leave without
+takin somefin."</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>There was a dinner-party at the Manor House.
+Peter had come down from town for it, and this
+time he was staying at Wren's End. Lady Penelope
+and her husband were to dine and sleep at
+the Manor, likewise Miles, who had come down
+with Peter; and Lady Pen contrived thoroughly
+to upset her aunt before dinner, by relating how
+she had met Miles with Miss Morton and her
+father in Cheltenham. And poor Lady Mary had
+been hoping that the unfortunate affair would die
+a natural death. She had asked the prettiest
+girl in the neighbourhood for Miles to take in,
+and now, looking down the table at him, she
+would have said he was as well-pleased with his
+neighbour as any young man could be. The
+Freams were there and Mr. Withells, the pretty
+girl's mamma and a bride and bridegroom&mdash;fourteen
+in all. A dangerous number to ask, the
+Squire had declared; one might so easily have
+fallen through. No one did, however, and Peter
+found himself allotted to Lady Penelope, while
+Jan's fate was the bridegroom. "His wife won't
+be jealous of Miss Ross, you know," Lady Mary
+had said while arranging her couples.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 344 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[344]</a></span>
+It happened that Peter sat opposite to Jan,
+and he surveyed her across the sweet-peas with
+considerable satisfaction. He had never seen Jan
+in what her niece bluntly called "a nekked dless"
+before. To-night she wore black, in some soft,
+filmy stuff from which her fine arms and shoulders
+and beautiful neck stood out in challenging whiteness.
+Her hair, too, had "pretty twinkly things"
+in it, and she wore a long chain of small but
+well-matched pearls, her father's last gift to her.
+Yes, Jan was undoubtedly distinguished, and oh,
+thank heaven! she <em>had</em> a clean face.</p>
+
+<p>Beautiful Lady Pen was painted to the eyes,
+and her maid was not quite skilful in blending
+her complexion rightly with her vivid hair; beautiful
+hair it was, with a large ripple that was most
+attractive, but Mr. Withells, sitting on the other
+side of Lady Pen, decided that he didn't approve
+of her. She was flamboyant and daring of speech.
+She made him nervous. He felt sincerely sorry
+for Pottinger.</p>
+
+<p>Peter found Lady Pen very amusing, and
+perhaps she rather neglected her other neighbour.</p>
+
+<p>The dinner was excellent and long; and after
+it the ladies, when they left the men to smoke,
+strolled about on the terrace, and Jan found herself
+side by side with Lady Penelope.</p>
+
+<p>"How's your little friend?" she asked abruptly.
+"I suppose you know my cousin's playin' round?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan was a little taller than Lady Pen, and
+turned her head slowly to look at her: "I'm
+afraid I don't quite understand," she said.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 345 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[345]</a></span>
+"Surely," Lady Pen retorted, "you must have
+seen."</p>
+
+<p>"If you mean that Captain Middleton admires
+Miss Morton, I believe he does. But you see, to
+say that anyone is 'playing round' rather reflects
+on me, because she is in my charge."</p>
+
+<p>"I should say you've got a pretty good handful,"
+Lady Pen said sympathetically.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think you quite understand Miss Morton.
+I've known her, as it happens, known her
+well, for close upon nine years."</p>
+
+<p>"And you think well of her?"</p>
+
+<p>"It would be difficult to express how well."</p>
+
+<p>"You're a good friend, Miss Ross. I had occasion
+to think so once before&mdash;now I'm pretty
+sure of it. What's the sayin'&mdash;'Time tryeth
+thingummy'?"</p>
+
+<p>"Troth?" Jan suggested.</p>
+
+<p>"That's it. 'Time tryeth troth.' I never was
+any good at quotations and things. But now,
+look here, I'd like to ask you somethin' rather
+particular ..." Lady Pen took Jan's arm and
+propelled her gently down a side-walk out of earshot
+of the others. "Suppose you knew folks&mdash;and
+they weren't exactly friends, but pleasant,
+you know, and all that, and you were aware that
+they went about sayin' things about a third person
+who also wasn't exactly a friend, but ...
+well, likeable; and you believed that what the
+first lot said gave a wrong impression ... in
+short, was very damaging&mdash;none of it any business
+of yours, mind&mdash;would you feel called upon to do
+anything?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 346 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[346]</a></span>
+The two tall women stopped and faced one
+another.</p>
+
+<p>The moon shone full on Lady Pen's beautiful
+painted face, and Jan saw, for the first time, that
+the eyes under the delicately darkened eyebrows
+were curiously like Miles'.</p>
+
+<p>"It's always tiresome to interfere in other
+people's business," said Jan, "but it's not quite
+fair, is it, not to stand up for people if you believe
+an accusation to be untrue&mdash;whether you like
+them or not. You see, it may be such a serious
+thing for the person implicated."</p>
+
+<p>"I believe you're right," said Lady Pen, "but
+oh, lord! what a worry it will be."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary called to them to come, for the
+bride was going to sing.</p>
+
+<p>The bride's singing was not particularly pleasing,
+and she was followed by Miles, who performed
+"Drake's Drum," to his aunt's rather uncertain
+accompaniment, in a voice that shook the
+walls. Poor Mr. Withells fled out by the window,
+and sat on the step on his carefully-folded handkerchief,
+but even so the cold stones penetrated,
+and he came in again.</p>
+
+<p>And after "Drake's Drum" it was time to go
+home.</p>
+
+<p>Jan and Peter walked back through the scented
+night, Peter carrying her slippers in a silk bag, for
+the sternly economical Meg wouldn't hear of
+wasting good suède slippers at 22s. 6d. a pair by
+walking half a mile in them, no matter how dry
+it was.</p>
+
+<p>When all the guests had gone, Lady Pen seized<!-- Page 347 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[347]</a></span>
+Miles by the arm and implored him to take her
+outside for a cigarette. "That little Withells had
+given her the hump."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary said it was bed-time and the servants
+wanted to lock up. The Squire and Mr.
+Pottinger melted away imperceptibly to smoke
+in peace elsewhere.</p>
+
+<p>Lady Pen, still holding Miles in an iron grip,
+pulled him over to the door, which she shut, led
+him back, and stood in front of Lady Mary, who
+was just going to ring for the servants to shut the
+windows.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait a minute, Aunt Mary. I've got somethin'
+to say, and I want to say it before Miles."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, don't let us go into all that to-night,"
+Lady Mary implored, "if what you have to say
+has anything to do with what you told me before
+dinner."</p>
+
+<p>"It has and it hasn't. One thing I've decided
+is that I've got to tell the Trents they are liars;
+and the other thing is that, though I disapprove
+with all my strength of the game Miles is playing,
+I believe that little girl is square...."</p>
+
+<p>"You see," Lady Pen went on, turning to
+Miles, "I've repeated things to Aunt Mary that
+I heard from the Trents lately&mdash;but I heard a
+different story at the time&mdash;and though I think
+you, Miles, are throwing yourself away, I won't
+be a party to spreadin' lies. Somethin' that <i lang="fr">poudrée</i>
+woman with the good skin said to-night
+made me feel a swab&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad you've spoken up like this, Pen,"
+Miles said slowly, "for if you hadn't, we couldn't<!-- Page 348 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[348]</a></span>
+have been friends any more. I promised Meg I
+wouldn't tell anybody&mdash;but I've asked her to
+marry me ... and though she isn't over keen,
+I believe I'll get her to do it some day."</p>
+
+<p>"Isn't over keen?" Lady Mary repeated indignantly.
+"Why, she ought to be down on her
+knees with joy!"</p>
+
+<p>Miles laughed. "She's not a kneeling sort,
+Aunt Mary. It's I who'll have to do the kneeling,
+I can tell you."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Pen was looking straight at her cousin
+with the beautiful candid eyes that were so like
+his own. "Just for curiosity," she said slowly,
+"I'd dearly like to know if Meg Morton ever said
+anything to you about me&mdash;anything rather confidential&mdash;I
+won't be offended, I'd just like to
+know."</p>
+
+<p>"About you?" Miles echoed in a puzzled
+voice.</p>
+
+<p>"About my appearance, you know&mdash;my looks."</p>
+
+<p>"I think she called you good-looking, like
+everybody else, but I don't remember that she
+was specially enthusiastic. To tell you the honest
+truth, Pen, we've had other things to talk
+about than you."</p>
+
+<p>"Now listen, you two," said Lady Pen. "That
+little girl is straight. You won't understand,
+Miles, but Aunt Mary will. Meg Morton knew
+I was against her&mdash;about you, Miles&mdash;women
+always know these things. And yet she held her
+tongue when she could have said something true
+that I'd rather not have talked about. You'll
+hold your tongue, old chap, and so will Aunt<!-- Page 349 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[349]</a></span>
+Mary. I've got her hair; got it on this minute.
+That's why she's such a croppy."</p>
+
+<p>Lady Mary sat down on the nearest chair and
+sighed deeply.</p>
+
+<p>"It's been a real satisfaction to me, this transformation,
+because I know where it came from."</p>
+
+<p>Miles took his cousin's hand and kissed it.
+"If somebody had to have it, I'm glad it's you,"
+he said.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, she's straight," Lady Pen repeated. "I
+don't believe there's many girls who would have
+kept quiet&mdash;not when the man they cared about
+was being got at. You may ring now, Aunt
+Mary. I'm through. Good night."</p>
+
+<hr class="wide" />
+
+<p>"Do you realise," said Peter as they turned out
+of the dark Manor drive into the moonlit road,
+"that I've been here on and off over a month,
+and that we are now nearly at the end of July?"</p>
+
+<p>"You've only just come to <em>us</em>," said Jan.
+"You can't count the time you stayed at 'The
+Green Hart' as a visit."</p>
+
+<p>"And now I have come ... I'm not quite sure
+I've done wisely, unless...."</p>
+
+<p>"Unless what?"</p>
+
+<p>"Unless I can put something through that I
+came back from India to do."</p>
+
+<p>Jan did not answer. They walked on in silence,
+and Peter looked at the moon.</p>
+
+<p>"I think," he said, "you've always had a pretty
+clear idea why I came home from India ...
+haven't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was time for your leave," Jan said ner<!-- Page 350 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[350]</a></span>vously.
+"It isn't good to stay out there too
+long."</p>
+
+<p>"I shouldn't have taken leave this year,
+though, if it hadn't been for you."</p>
+
+<p>"You've always been kind and helpful to me ... I
+hope it hasn't been very ... inconvenient."</p>
+
+<p>Peter laughed, and stopped in the middle of
+the road.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm fond of fencing," he said lightly, "and
+free play's all very well and pretty; but I've
+always thought that the real thing, with the
+buttons off the foils, must have been a lot more
+sport than anything we get now."</p>
+
+<p>Again Jan was silent.</p>
+
+<p>"You've fenced with me, Jan," he said slowly,
+"ever since I turned up that day unexpectedly.
+Now, I want a straight answer. Do you care at
+all, or have you only friendship for me? Look
+at me; tell me the truth."</p>
+
+<p>"It's all so complicated and difficult," she faltered,
+and her eyes fell beneath Peter's.</p>
+
+<p>"What is?"</p>
+
+<p>"This caring&mdash;when you aren't a free agent."</p>
+
+<p>"Free fiddlestick! You either care or you
+don't&mdash;which is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I care a great deal too much for my own
+peace of mind," said Jan.</p>
+
+<p>"I am quite satisfied," said Peter. And if Mr.
+Withells had seen what happened to the "sensible"
+Miss Ross just then, his neatly-brushed
+hair would have stood straight on end.</p>
+
+<p>In the road, too!</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 351 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[351]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVII<br />
+<span class="sub">AUGUST, 1914</span></h2>
+
+<p><span class="undrop">"</span><span class="dropcap">N</span>O," said Jan, "it would be like marrying
+a widow ... with encumbrances."</p>
+
+<p>"But you don't happen to be a widow&mdash;besides,
+if you were, and had a dozen encumbrances,
+if we want to get married it's nobody's business
+but our own."</p>
+
+<p>Peter spoke testily. He wanted Jan to marry
+him before he went back to India in October,
+and if he got the billet he hoped for, to follow him,
+taking the two children out, early in November.</p>
+
+<p>But Jan saw a thousand lions in the way. She
+was pulled in this direction and that, and though
+she knew she had got to depend on Peter to&mdash;as
+she put it&mdash;"a dreadful extent," yet she hesitated
+to saddle him with her decidedly explosive affairs,
+without a great deal more consideration than he
+seemed disposed to allow her.</p>
+
+<p>Hugo, for the present, was quiet. He was in
+Guernsey with his people, and beyond a letter in
+which he directly accused Peter Ledgard of abducting
+Tony when his father was taking him to
+visit his grandparents, Jan had heard nothing.</p>
+
+<p>By Peter's advice she did not answer this letter.
+But they both knew that Hugo was only waiting
+to make some other and more unpleasant demonstration
+than the last.</p>
+
+<p>"You see," Jan began again, "I've got so many<!-- Page 352 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[352]</a></span>
+people to think of. The children and Meg and
+the house and all the old servants.... You
+mustn't hustle me, dear."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I see all that; but I've got <em>you</em> to think
+of, and if we're married and anything happens to
+me you'll get your pension, and I want you to
+have that."</p>
+
+<p>"And if anything happened to me, you'd be
+saddled with the care of two little children who've
+got a thoroughly unsatisfactory father, who can
+always make life hateful for them and for you.
+No, Peter, it wouldn't be fair&mdash;we must wait and
+see how things work out."</p>
+
+<p>"At present," Peter said gloomily, "it looks as
+if things were working out to a fair bust-up all
+round."</p>
+
+<p>This was on the 30th of July.</p>
+
+<p>Peter went up to London, intending to return
+on the first to stay over the Bank Holiday, but he
+did not come. He wanted to be within easy
+reach of recalling cablegram.</p>
+
+<p>Meg got a wire from Miles on Saturday: "Try
+to come up for to-morrow and Monday I can't
+leave town must see you."</p>
+
+<p>And half an hour after it, came a note from
+Squire Walcote, asking her to accept his escort,
+as he and Lady Mary were going up to the Grosvenor,
+and hoped Meg would be their guest.</p>
+
+<p>It was during their stay in London that Lady
+Mary and the Squire got the greatest surprise of
+their whole lives.</p>
+
+<p>Miles, looking bigger than ever in uniform,
+rushed in and demanded an interview with Meg<!-- Page 353 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[353]</a></span>
+alone in their private room. He showed her a
+special licence, and ordered, rather than requested,
+that she should marry him at once.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't," she said, "it's no use asking me ...
+I <em>can't</em>."</p>
+
+<p>"Listen; have you any objection to me?"</p>
+
+<p>Meg pulled a little away from him and pretended
+to look him up and down. "No ... in
+fact ... I love every bit of you&mdash;especially your
+boots."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you thought how likely it is that I may
+not come back ... if there's war?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't!" said Meg. "Don't put it into
+words."</p>
+
+<p>"Then why won't you marry me, and let me
+feel that, whether I'm killed or not, I've had the
+thing I wanted most in this world?"</p>
+
+<p>"Dear, I can't help it, but I feel if I married
+you now ... you would never come back ...
+but if I wait ... if I don't try to grasp this
+wonderful thing too greedily ... it will come to
+us both. I <em>daren't</em> marry you, Miles."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose I'm all smashed up ... I couldn't
+ask you then ... suppose I come back minus an
+arm or a leg, or blind or something?"</p>
+
+<p>"If the least little bit of you comes back, I'll
+marry that; not you or anyone else could stop me
+then."</p>
+
+<p>"You'd make it easier all round if you'd marry
+me now...."</p>
+
+<p>"That's it ... I don't want it to be easier. If
+I was your wife, how could I go on being nurse to
+those children?"</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 354 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[354]</a></span>
+"I wouldn't stop you&mdash;you could go back to
+Miss Ross and do just exactly what you're doing.
+I agree with you&mdash;the children are cheery&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>Meg shook her head. "No; if I was your wife,
+it wouldn't do. As it is ... the nursemaid has
+got her soldier, and that's as it should be."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you marry me the first leave I get, if I
+live to get any?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll think about that."</p>
+
+<p>He gave her the ring she had refused before.
+Such an absurd little ring, with its one big sapphire
+set with diamonds, and "no backing to it,"
+Miles said.</p>
+
+<p>And he gave her a very heavy brass-studded
+collar for William, and on the plate was engraved
+her name and address.</p>
+
+<p>"You see," he explained, "Miss Ross would
+never really have him, and I'd like to think he was
+your dog. And here's his licence."</p>
+
+<p>Then Miles took her right up in his arms and
+hugged her close, and set her gently down and
+left her.</p>
+
+<p>That night he asked his uncle and a brother-officer
+to witness his will. He had left most of
+his money among his relations, but twenty thousand
+pounds he had left to Meg absolutely, in
+the event of his being killed before they were
+married.</p>
+
+<p>His uncle pointed out that there was nothing
+said about her possible marriage. "She'll be all
+the better for a little money of her own if she does
+marry," Miles said simply. "I don't want her
+to go mourning all her days, but I do want the<!-- Page 355 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[355]</a></span>
+capital tied up on her so that he couldn't waste
+it ... if he was an unfortunate sort of chap
+over money."</p>
+
+<p>The Squire blew his nose.</p>
+
+<p>"You see," Miles went on, "she's a queer little
+thing. If I left her too much, she'd refuse it altogether.
+Now I trust to you, Uncle Edward, to
+see that she takes this."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll do my best, my boy, I'll do my best," said
+the Squire; "but I hope with all my soul you'll
+make settlements on her yourself before long."</p>
+
+<p>"So do I, but you never can tell in war, you
+know. And we must always remember," Miles
+added with his broad, cheerful smile, "there's a
+good deal of target about me."</p>
+
+<p>Miles wrote to the little Major, a very manly,
+straightforward letter, telling him what he had
+done, but swearing him to secrecy as regarded
+Meg.</p>
+
+<p>He also wrote to Jan, and at the end, he said,
+"I am glad she is to be with you, because you
+really apreciate her."</p>
+
+<p>The one "p" in "appreciate" fairly broke Jan
+down. It was so like Miles.</p>
+
+<p>Meg, white-faced and taciturn, went back to
+Wren's End on Tuesday night. The Squire and
+Lady Mary remained in town.</p>
+
+<p>In answer to Jan's affectionate inquiries, Meg
+was brief and business-like. Yes; she had seen
+Miles several times. He was very busy. No,
+she did not expect to see him again before ... he
+left. Yes; he was going with the First Army.</p>
+
+<p>Jan asked no more questions, but was quietly,<!-- Page 356 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[356]</a></span>
+consistently kind. Meg was adorable with her
+children and surpassed herself in the telling of
+stories.</p>
+
+<p>The First Army left England for Flanders with
+the silence of a shadow.</p>
+
+<p>But Meg knew when it left.</p>
+
+<p>That night, Jan woke about one o'clock, conscious
+of a queer sound that she could neither
+define nor locate.</p>
+
+<p>She sat up in bed to listen, and arrived at the
+conclusion that it came from the day-nursery,
+which was below her room.</p>
+
+<p>Tony was sleeping peacefully. Jan put on her
+dressing-gown and went downstairs. The nursery
+door was not shut, and a shaft of light shone
+through it into the dark hall. She pushed it
+open a little way and looked in.</p>
+
+<p>Meg was sitting at the table, making muslin
+curtains as if her life depended on it. She wore
+her nightgown, and over it a queer little Japanese
+kimono of the green she loved. Her bare feet were
+pillowed upon William, who lay snoring peacefully
+under the table.</p>
+
+<p>Her face was set and absorbed. A grave, almost
+stern, little face. And her rumpled hair,
+pushed back from her forehead, gave her the look
+of a Botticelli boy angel. It seemed to merge
+into tongues of flame where the lamplight caught
+it.</p>
+
+<p>The window was wide open and the sudden
+opening of the door caused a draught, though the
+night was singularly still.</p>
+
+<p>The lamp flickered.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 357 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[357]</a></span>
+Meg rested her hand on the handle of the sewing-machine,
+and the whirring noise stopped.
+She saw Jan in the doorway.</p>
+
+<p>"Dear," said Jan gently, standing where she
+was, half in and half out of the door, "are you
+obliged to do this?"</p>
+
+<p>Meg looked at her, and the dumb pain in that
+look went to Jan's heart.</p>
+
+<p>Jan came towards her and drew the flaming
+head against her breast.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm sorry I disturbed you," Meg murmured,
+"but I was <em>obliged</em> to do something."</p>
+
+<p>William stirred at the voices, and turning his
+head tried to lick the little bare feet resting on his
+back.</p>
+
+<p>"Dearest, I really think you should go back to
+bed."</p>
+
+<p>"Very well," said Meg meekly. "I'll go now."</p>
+
+<p>"He," Jan continued, "would be very angry if
+he thought you were making curtains in the middle
+of the night."</p>
+
+<p>"He," Meg retorted, "is absurd&mdash;and dear beyond
+all human belief."</p>
+
+<p>"You see, he left you in my charge ... what
+will he say if&mdash;when he comes back&mdash;he finds a
+haggard Meg with a face like a threepenny-bit that
+has seen much service?"</p>
+
+<p>"All right, I'm coming."</p>
+
+<p>When Meg got back to her room, she went and
+leaned over little Fay sleeping in the cot beside her
+bed. Rosy and beautiful, warm and fragrant, the
+healthy baby brought comfort to Meg's stricken
+heart.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 358 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[358]</a></span>
+Perhaps&mdash;who knows&mdash;the tramp of that silent
+army sounded in little Fay's ears, for she stretched
+out her dimpled arms and caught Meg round the
+neck.</p>
+
+<p>"Deah Med!" she sighed, and was still.</p>
+
+<p>William stood at attention.</p>
+
+<p>Presently Meg knelt down by her bed, and
+according to the established ritual he thrust his
+head into her encircling arm.</p>
+
+<p>"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered.
+"Oh, William, pray for your master as
+you never prayed before."</p>
+
+<hr class="wide" />
+
+<p>The strange tense days went on in August
+weather serene and lovely as had not been seen
+for years. Young men vanished from the country-side
+and older men wistfully wondered what
+they could do to help.</p>
+
+<p>Peter came down from Saturday to Monday,
+telling them that every officer and every civilian
+serving in India was recalled, but he had not yet
+learned when he was to sail.</p>
+
+<p>They were sitting in the wrens' garden with the
+children.</p>
+
+<p>"Earley's going," Tony said importantly.</p>
+
+<p>"Earley!" Jan exclaimed. "Going where?"</p>
+
+<p>"To fight, of course," little Fay chimed in.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, poor dear Earley!" Jan sighed.</p>
+
+<p>"Happy, fortunate Earley," said Peter. "I
+wish I stood in his shoes."</p>
+
+<p>Earley joined the Gloucesters because, he said,
+"he couldn't abear to think of them there Ger<!-- Page 359 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[359]</a></span>mans
+comin' anigh Mother and them childring
+and the ladies; and he'd better go and see as they
+didn't."</p>
+
+<p>Mr. Withells called the men on his place together
+and told them that every man who joined would
+have his wages paid to his wife, and his wife or his
+mother, as the case might be, could stop on in her
+cottage. And Mr. Withells became a special constable,
+with a badge and a truncheon. But he
+worried every soldier that he knew with inquiries
+as to whether there wasn't a chance for him in
+<em>some</em> battalion: "I've taken great care of my
+health," he said. "I do exercises every day after
+my bath; I'm young-looking for my age, don't you
+think? And anyway, a bullet might find me instead
+of a more useful man."</p>
+
+<p>No one laughed then at Mr. Withells and his
+exercises.</p>
+
+<p>Five days after the declaration of war Jan got a
+letter from Hugo Tancred. He was in London
+and was already a private in a rather famous
+cavalry regiment.</p>
+
+<p>"They didn't ask many questions," he wrote,
+"so I hadn't to tell many lies. You see, I can ride
+well and understand horses. If I get knocked
+out, it won't be much loss, and I know you'll
+look after Fay's kiddies. If I come through, perhaps
+I can make a fresh start somewhere. I've
+always been fond of a gamble, and this is the
+biggest gamble I've ever struck."</p>
+
+<p>Jan showed the letter to Peter, who gave it
+back to her with something like a groan: "Even
+the wrong 'uns get their chance, and yet I have to<!-- Page 360 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[360]</a></span>
+go back and do a deadly dull job, just because it
+<em>is</em> my job."</p>
+
+<p>Peter went up to town and two days after came
+down again to "The Green Hart" to say good-bye.
+He had got his marching orders and was to sail
+in the <i>Somali</i> from Southampton. Some fifteen
+hundred civilians and officers serving in India
+were sailing by that boat and the <i>Dongola</i>.</p>
+
+<p>By every argument he could bring forward he
+tried to get Jan to marry him before he sailed.
+Yet just because she wanted to do it so much,
+she held back. She, too, she kept telling herself,
+had her job, and she knew that if she was Peter's
+wife, nothing, not even her dear Fay's children,
+could be of equal importance with Peter.</p>
+
+<p>The children and Meg and the household had
+by much thinking grown into a sort of Frankenstein's
+monster of duty.</p>
+
+<p>Her attitude was incomprehensible to Peter.
+It seemed to him to be wrong-headed and absurd,
+and he began to lose patience with her.</p>
+
+<p>On his last morning he sought and found her
+beside the sun-dial in the wrens' garden.</p>
+
+<p>Meg had taken little Fay to see Lady Mary's
+Persian kittens, but Tony preferred to potter
+about the garden with the aged man who was
+trying to replace Earley. William was not allowed
+to call upon the kittens, as Fatima, their
+mother, objected to him vehemently, and Tony
+cared to go nowhere if William might not be of
+the party.</p>
+
+<p>Peter came to Jan and took both her hands
+and held them.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 361 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[361]</a></span>
+"It's the last time I shall ask you, my dear.
+If you care enough, we can have these last days
+together. If you don't I must go, for I can't bear
+any more of this. Either you love me enough to
+marry me before I sail or you don't love me at
+all. Which is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I do love you, you know I do."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, which is it to be?"</p>
+
+<p>"Peter, dear, you must give me more time. I
+haven't really faced it all. I can't do anything
+in such a hurry as that."</p>
+
+<p>Peter looked at her and shook his head.</p>
+
+<p>"You don't know what caring is," he said.
+"I can't stand any more of this. Do you see that
+motto on the sun-dial: 'I bide my time'&mdash;I've
+read it and read it, and I've said it over to myself
+and waited and hoped to move you. Now I
+can't wait any more."</p>
+
+<p>He kissed her, dropped her hand, and turning
+from her went out through the iron gate and down
+the drive. For a moment Jan stood by the sun-dial
+as though she, too, were stone.</p>
+
+<p>Then blindly she went up the steps into the
+empty nursery and sat down on an old sofa far
+back in the room. She leaned face-downward
+against the cushions, and great, tearing sobs broke
+from her.</p>
+
+<p>Peter was gone. He would never come back.
+She had driven him from her. And having done
+so she realised that he was the one person in the
+world she could not possibly do without.</p>
+
+<p>Tony's own hen had laid an egg. Carrying it
+very carefully in a cabbage-leaf, he went, accom<!-- Page 362 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[362]</a></span>panied
+by the faithful William, to show it to
+Auntie Jan, and was just in time to see Peter
+going down the drive.</p>
+
+<p>He went through the wrens' garden and in by
+the window. For a moment he didn't see his
+aunt; and was turning to go again when a strange
+sound arrested him, and he saw her all huddled
+up at the head of the sofa, with hidden face and
+heaving shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>He laid his egg on the table and went and
+pulled at her arm.</p>
+
+<p>"What is the matter?" he asked anxiously.
+"And why has Peter gone?"</p>
+
+<p>Jan raised her head; pride and shame and self-consciousness
+were dead in her: "He's gone," she
+sobbed. "He won't come back, and I shall never
+be happy any more," and down went her head
+again on her locked arms.</p>
+
+<p>Tony did not attempt to console her. He ran
+from the room, and Jan felt that this was only an
+added pang of abandonment.</p>
+
+<p>Down the drive ran Tony, with William galumphing
+beside him. But William was not happy,
+and squealed softly from time to time. He felt
+it unkind to leave a poor lady crying like that, and
+yet was constrained to go with Tony because Meg
+had left him in William's charge.</p>
+
+<p>Tony turned out of the gate and into the road.</p>
+
+<p>Far away in the distance was a man's figure
+striding along with incredible swiftness. Tony
+started to run all he knew. Now, seldom as William
+barked, he barked when people ran, and
+William's bark was so deep and sonorous and dis<!-- Page 363 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[363]</a></span>tinctive
+that it caused the swiftly striding man
+to turn his head. He turned his body, too, and
+came back to meet Tony and William.</p>
+
+<p>Tony was puffed and almost breathless, but he
+managed to jerk out: "You must go back; she's
+... crying dreadful. You <em>must</em> go back. Go
+quick; don't wait for us."</p>
+
+<p>Peter went.</p>
+
+<hr class="space" />
+
+<p>Jan very rarely cried. When she did it hurt
+fiercely and absorbed all her attention. She was
+crying now as if she would never stop. If people
+seldom cry it has a devastating effect on their
+appearance when they do. Jan's eyelids were
+swollen, her nose scarlet and shiny, her features
+all bleared and blurred and almost scarred by
+tears.</p>
+
+<p>Someone touched her gently on the shoulder,
+and she looked up.</p>
+
+<p>"My dear," said Peter, "you must not cry like
+this. I was losing my temper&mdash;that's why I went
+off."</p>
+
+<p>Jan sprang to her feet and flung her arms round
+his neck. She pressed her ravaged face against
+his: "I'll do anything you like," she whispered,
+"if you'll only like it. I can't stand by myself
+any more."</p>
+
+<p>This was true, for as she spoke her knees gave
+under her.</p>
+
+<p>Peter held her close. Never had Jan looked
+less attractive and never had Peter loved her
+more, or realised so clearly how dear and foolish
+and wise and womanly she was.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 364 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[364]</a></span>
+"You see," she sobbed, "you said yourself
+everyone <em>must</em> do his job, and I thought&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But surely," said Peter, "I <em>am</em> your job&mdash;part
+of it, anyway."</p>
+
+<p>Jan sobbed now more quietly, with her head
+against his shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>Tony and William came and looked in at the
+window.</p>
+
+<p>His aunt was still crying, crying hard, though
+Peter was there close beside her, very close indeed.</p>
+
+<p>Surely this was most unreasonable.</p>
+
+<p>"She said," Tony remarked accusingly to Peter,
+"she was crying because you had gone, so I ran
+to fetch you back. And now I <em>have</em> fetched you,
+she's crying worse nor ever."</p>
+
+<p>But William Bloomsbury knew better. William
+had cause to know the solitary bitter tears
+that hurt. These tears were different.</p>
+
+<p>So William wagged his tail and ran into the
+room, jumping joyously on Peter and Jan.</p>
+
+<div class="tn">
+<h3 class="u">Transcriber's Note:</h3>
+
+<p>The following corrections were made:</p>
+
+<ul>
+<li><a href="#Page_44">p. 44</a>: Daddy to Daddie, to match all other occurrences (Daddie was very
+daylight.)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_113">p. 113</a>: log to long (long grey dust-cloak)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_113">p. 113</a>: froward to forward (Anthony came forward)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_118">p. 118</a>: bread-an-butter to bread-and-butter (several pieces of
+bread-and-butter)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_152">p. 152</a>: minunte to minute (pondered this for a minute)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_284">p. 284</a>: quit to quick ("I came as quick as I could,")</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_318">p. 318</a>: fluttered to flattered (rather flattered)</li>
+</ul>
+
+<p>Inconsistencies in hyphenation (e.g. country-side vs. countryside) have
+not been changed. All dialect and "baby talk" has been left as in the
+original. Two different types of thought breaks were used in the
+original: extra whitespace between paragraphs (which appears here as in
+the original) and a line of 8 spaced asterisks (rendered here as a wide
+horizontal rule). Ellipses match the original, even when inconsistent.
+The exception is when they occur at the end of a paragraph, where they
+are always accompanied by a period.</p>
+
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
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+</body>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Jan and Her Job
+
+Author: L. Allen Harker
+
+Release Date: September 9, 2009 [EBook #29945]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JAN AND HER JOB ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Robert Cicconetti, S.D., and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it,
+anyway."]
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+BY
+
+L. ALLEN HARKER
+
+AUTHOR OF "A ROMANCE OF THE NURSERY"; "MISS ESPERANCE AND MR. WYCHERLY";
+"MR. WYCHERLY'S WARDS"; "THE FFOLLIOTS OF REDMARLEY," ETC.
+
+ILLUSTRATED
+
+NEW YORK
+
+CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
+
+1917
+
+
+Copyright, 1917, by
+Charles Scribner's Sons
+
+***
+
+Published March, 1917
+
+
+                       TO
+
+                    F. R. P.
+
+  "_Chary of praise and prodigal of counsel--
+    Who but thou?_"
+                                R. L. S.
+
+
+
+
+_CONTENTS_
+
+
+  CHAPTER                                               PAGE
+
+      I. JAN                                               1
+
+     II. JAN'S MAIL                                       13
+
+    III. BOMBAY                                           19
+
+     IV. THE BEGINNING OF THE JOB                         39
+
+      V. THE CHILDREN                                     52
+
+     VI. THE SHADOW BEFORE                                62
+
+    VII. THE HUMAN TOUCH                                  78
+
+   VIII. THE END OF THE DREAM                             91
+
+     IX. MEG                                              97
+
+      X. PLANS                                           124
+
+     XI. THE STATE OF PETER                              139
+
+    XII. "THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES"                         149
+
+   XIII. THE WHEELS OF CHANCE                            162
+
+    XIV. PERPLEXITIES                                    173
+
+     XV. WREN'S END                                      184
+
+    XVI. "THE BLUDGEONINGS OF CHANCE"                    201
+
+   XVII. "THOUGH AN HOST SHOULD ENCAMP AGAINST
+           ME"                                           212
+
+  XVIII. MEG AND CAPTAIN MIDDLETON                       220
+
+    XIX. THE YOUNG IDEA                                  240
+
+     XX. "ONE WAY OF LOVE"                               252
+
+    XXI. ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE                             261
+
+   XXII. THE ENCAMPMENT                                  276
+
+  XXIII. TACTICS                                         287
+
+   XXIV. "THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID"                  303
+
+    XXV. A DEMONSTRATION IN FORCE                        325
+
+   XXVI. IN WHICH SEVERAL PEOPLE SPEAK THEIR MINDS       339
+
+  XXVII. AUGUST, 1914                                    351
+
+
+
+
+_ILLUSTRATIONS_
+
+
+  "But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it,
+      anyway"                                 _Frontispiece_
+
+                                                      FACING
+                                                       PAGE
+
+  "It would make it easier for both of us if you'd face it,
+      my dear"                                            66
+
+  He washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+      pointing out ... that he "went into all the
+      corners"                                           156
+
+  William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ...
+      nice children                                      188
+
+
+
+
+JAN AND HER JOB
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+JAN
+
+
+She was something of a puzzle to the other passengers. They couldn't
+quite place her. She came on board the P. and O. at Marseilles. Being
+Christmas week the boat was not crowded, and she had a cabin to herself
+on the spar deck, so there was no "stable-companion" to find out
+anything about her.
+
+The sharp-eyed Australian lady, who sat opposite her at the Purser's
+table, decided that she was not married, or even engaged, as she wore no
+rings of any kind. Besides, her name, "Miss Janet Ross," figured in the
+dinner-list and was plainly painted on her deck-chair. At meals she sat
+beside the Purser, and seemed more or less under his wing. People at her
+table decided that she couldn't be going out as a governess or she would
+hardly be travelling first class, and yet she did not look of the sort
+who globe-trot all by themselves.
+
+Rather tall, slender without being thin, she moved well. Her ringless
+hands were smooth and prettily shaped, so were her slim feet, and always
+singularly well-shod.
+
+Perhaps her chief outward characteristic was that she looked
+delightfully fresh and clean. Her fair skin helped to this effect, and
+the trim suitability of her clothes accentuated it. And yet there was
+nothing challenging or particularly noticeable in her personality.
+
+Her face, fresh-coloured and unlined, was rather round. Her eyes
+well-opened and blue-grey, long-sighted and extremely honest. Her hair,
+thick and naturally wavy, had been what hairdressers call "mid-brown,"
+but was now frankly grey, especially round the temples; and the grey
+hair puzzled people, so that opinions differed widely regarding her age.
+
+The five box-wallahs (gentlemen engaged in commercial pursuits are so
+named in the East to distinguish them from the Heaven-Born in the
+various services that govern India), who, with the Australian lady, sat
+opposite to her at table, decided that she was really young and
+prematurely grey. Between the courses they diligently took stock of her.
+The Australian lady disagreed with them. She declared Miss Ross to be
+middle-aged, to look younger than she was. In this the Australian lady
+was quite sincere. She could not conceive of any _young_ woman
+neglecting the many legitimate means that existed of combating this most
+distressing semblance--if semblance it was--of age.
+
+The Australian lady set her down as a well-preserved forty at least.
+
+Mr. Frewellen, the oldest and crossest and greediest of the five
+box-wallahs, declared that he would lay fifteen rupees to five annas
+that she was under thirty; that her eyes were sad, and it was probably
+trouble that had turned her hair. At his time of life, he could tell a
+young woman when he saw one. No painted old harridan could deceive
+_him_. After all, if Miss Ross _had_ grey hair, she had plenty of it,
+and it was her own. But Mr. Frewellen, who sat directly opposite her,
+was prejudiced in her favour, for she always let him take her roll if it
+was browner than his own. He also took her knife if it happened to be
+sharper than the one he had, and he insisted on her listening to his
+incessant grumbling as to the food, the service, the temperature, and
+the general imbecility and baseness of his fellow-creatures.
+
+Like the Ancient Mariner, he held her with his glittering spectacles.
+Miss Ross trembled before his diatribes. He spoke in a loud and rumbling
+voice, and made derogatory remarks about the other passengers as they
+passed to their respective tables. She would thankfully have changed
+hers, but that it might have seemed ungrateful to the Purser, into whose
+charge she had been given by friends; and the Purser had been most kind
+and attentive.
+
+The Australian lady was sure that the Purser knew more about Miss Ross
+than he would acknowledge--which he did. But when tackled by one
+passenger about another, he was discreet or otherwise in direct ratio to
+what he considered was the discretion of the questioner. And he was a
+pretty shrewd judge of character. He had infinite opportunities of so
+judging. A sea-voyage lays bare many secrets and shows up human nature
+at its starkest.
+
+Janet Ross did not seek to make friends, but kindly people who spoke to
+her found her pleasant and not in the least disposed to be mysterious
+when questioned, though she never volunteered any information about
+herself. She was a good listener, and about the middle of any voyage
+that is a quality supplying a felt want. Mankind in general finds his
+own doings very interesting, and takes great pleasure in recounting the
+same. Even the most energetic young passenger cannot play deck-quoits
+all day, and mixed cricket matches are too heating to last long once
+Aden is left behind. A great many people found it pleasant to drop into
+a chair beside the quiet lady, who was always politely interested in
+their remarks. She looked so cool and restful in her white frock and
+shady hat. She did _not_ buy a solar topee at Port Said, for though this
+was her first voyage she had not, it seemed, started quite unwarned.
+
+In the middle of the Indian Ocean she suddenly found favour in the eyes
+of Sir Langham Sykes, and when that was the case Sir Langham proclaimed
+his preference to the whole ship. No one who attracted his notice could
+remain in obscurity. When he was not eating he was talking, generally
+about himself, though he was also fond of asking questions.
+
+A short, stout man with a red face, little fierce blue eyes, a booming
+voice, noisy laugh and a truculent, domineering manner, Sir Langham
+made his presence felt wherever he was.
+
+It was "her shape," as he called it, that first attracted his attention
+to Miss Ross, as he watched her walking briskly round and round the
+hurricane-deck for her morning constitutional.
+
+"That woman moves well," he remarked to his neighbour; "wonder if she's
+goin' out to be married. Nice-looking woman and pleasant, no frills
+about her--sort that would be kind in illness."
+
+And Sir Langham sighed. He couldn't take any exercise just then, for his
+last attack of gout had been very severe, and his left foot was still
+swathed and slippered.
+
+There was a dance that night on the hurricane-deck, and Sir Langham,
+while watching the dancers, talked at the top of his voice with the more
+important lady passengers. On such occasions he claimed close intimacy
+with the Reigning House, and at all times of day one heard such
+sentences as, "And _I_ said to the Princess Henrietta," with a full
+account of what he did say. And the things he declared he said, and the
+stories he told, certainly suggested a doubt as to whether the ladies of
+our Royal Family are quite as strait-laced as the ordinary public is led
+to believe. But then one had only Sir Langham's word for it. There was
+no possibility of questioning the Princess.
+
+Presently Sir Langham got tired of trying to drown the band--it was such
+a noisy band--and he hobbled down the companion on to the almost
+deserted deck. Right up in the stern he spied Miss Ross, quite alone,
+sitting under an electric light absorbed in a book. Beside her was an
+empty chair with a comfortable leg-rest. Sir Langham never made any
+bones about interrupting people. It would not, to him, have seemed
+possible that a woman could prefer any form of literature to the charm
+of his conversation. So with a series of grunts he lowered himself into
+it, arranged his foot upon the rest, and, without asking permission, lit
+a cigar.
+
+"Don't you care for dancin'?" he asked.
+
+She closed her book. "Oh, yes," she said, "but I don't know many men on
+board, and there are such a lot of young people who do know one another.
+It's pretty to watch them; but the night is pretty, too, don't you
+think? The stars all seem so near compared to what they do at home."
+
+"I've seen too many Eastern nights to take much stock in 'em now," he
+said in a disparaging voice. "I take it this is all new to you--first
+voyage, eh?"
+
+"Yes, I've never been a long voyage before."
+
+"Goin' to India, I suppose. You'd have started sooner if you'd been
+goin' for the winter to Australia. Now what are you goin' to India
+_for_?"
+
+"To stay with my sister."
+
+"Married sister?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Older than you, then, of course."
+
+"No, younger."
+
+"Much younger?"
+
+"Three years."
+
+"Is she like you?"
+
+"Not in the least. She is a beautiful person."
+
+"Been married long?"
+
+"Between five and six years. I'm to take her home at the end of the cold
+weather."
+
+"Any kids?"
+
+"Two."
+
+"And you haven't been out before?"
+
+"No; this is my first visit."
+
+"She's been home, I suppose?"
+
+"Yes, once."
+
+"Is her husband in the Army?"
+
+"No."
+
+Had Sir Langham been an observant person he would have noted that her
+very brief replies did not exactly encourage further questions. But his
+idea of conversation was either a monologue or a means of obtaining
+information, so he instantly demanded, "What does her husband do?"
+
+The impulse of the moment urged her to reply, "What possible business is
+it of yours _what_ he does?" But well-bred people do not yield to these
+impulses, so she answered quietly, "He's in the P.W.D."
+
+"Not a bad service, not a bad service, though not equal to the I.C.S.
+They've had rather a scandal in it lately. Didn't you see about it in
+the papers just before we left?"
+
+At that moment Sir Langham was very carefully flicking the ash from the
+end of his cigar, otherwise he might have observed that as he spoke his
+companion flushed. A wave of warm colour surged over her face and bare
+neck and receded again, leaving her very pale. Her hands closed over the
+book lying in her lap, as if glad to hold on to something, and their
+knuckles were white against the tan.
+
+"Didn't you see it?" he repeated. "Some chap been found to have taken
+bribes over contracts in a native state. Regular rumpus there's been.
+Quite right, too; we sahibs must have clean hands. No dealing with brown
+people if you haven't clean hands--can't have rupees sticking to 'em in
+any Government transactions. Expect you'll hear all about it when you
+get out there--makes a great sensation in any service does that sort of
+thing. I don't remember the name of the chap--perhaps they didn't give
+it--do you?"
+
+"I didn't see anything about it," she said quietly. "I was very busy
+just before I left, and hardly looked at a paper."
+
+"Where is your sister?"
+
+"In Bombay."
+
+"Oh, got a billet there, has he? Expect you'll like Bombay; cheery
+place, in the cold weather, but not a patch on Calcutta, to my mind. I
+hear the Governor and his wife do the thing in style--hospitable, you
+know; got private means, as people in that position always ought to
+have."
+
+"I don't suppose I shall go out at all," she said. "My sister is ill,
+and I've got to look after her. Directly she is strong enough to travel
+I shall bring her home."
+
+"Oh, you _must_ see something of the social life of the place while
+you're there. D'you know what I thought? I thought you were goin' out to
+get married, and"--he continued gallantly--"I thought he was a deuced
+lucky chap."
+
+She smiled and shook her head. She was not looking at Sir Langham, but
+at the long, white, moonlit pathway of foam left in the wake of the
+ship.
+
+"I say," he went on confidentially, "what's your Christian name? I'm
+certain they don't call you Janet. Is it Nettie, now? I bet it's
+Nettie!"
+
+"My _family_," said Miss Ross somewhat coldly, "call me Jan."
+
+"Nice little name," he exclaimed, "but more like a boy's. Now, I never
+got a pet name. I started Langham, and Langham I've stopped, and I
+flatter myself I've made the name known and respected."
+
+He wanted her to look at him, and leaned towards her: "Look here, Miss
+Ross, I'm goin' to ask you a funny question, and it's not one you can
+ask most women--but you're a puzzle. You've got a face like a child, and
+yet you're as grey as a badger. What _is_ your age?"
+
+"I shall be twenty-eight in March."
+
+She looked at him then, and her grey eyes were so full of amusement
+that, incredulous as he usually was as to other people's statements, he
+knew that she was speaking the truth.
+
+"Then why the devil don't you _do_ something _to_ it?" he demanded.
+
+She laughed. "I couldn't be bothered. And it might turn green, or
+something. I don't mind it. It began when I was twenty-three."
+
+"_I_ don't mind it either," Sir Langham declared magnanimously; "but
+it's misleading."
+
+"I'm sorry," she said demurely. "I wouldn't mislead anyone for the
+world."
+
+"Now, what age should you think _I_ am? But I suppose you know--that's
+the worst of being a public character; when one gets nearly a column in
+_Who's Who_, everybody knows all about one. That's the penalty of
+celebrity."
+
+"Do you mind people knowing your age?"
+
+"Not I! Nor anything else about me. _I've_ never done anything to be
+ashamed of. Quite the other way, I can assure you."
+
+"How pleasant that must be," she said quietly.
+
+Sir Langham turned and looked suspiciously at her; but her face was
+guileless and calm, with no trace of raillery, her eyes still fixed on
+the long bright track of foam.
+
+"I suppose you, now," he muttered hoarsely, "always sleep well, go off
+directly you turn in--eh?"
+
+Her quiet eyes met his; little and fierce and truculent, but behind
+their rather bloodshot boldness there lurked something else, and with a
+sudden pang of pity she knew that it was fear, and that Sir Langham
+dreaded the night.
+
+"As a rule I do," she said gently; "but of course I've known what it is
+to be sleepless, and it's horrid."
+
+"It's hell," said Sir Langham, "and I'm in it every night this voyage,
+for I've knocked off morphia and opiates--they were playing the deuce
+with my constitution, and I've strength of mind for anything when I
+fairly take hold. But it's awful. When d'you suppose natural sleep will
+come back?"
+
+She knew that he did not lack physical courage, that he had fearlessly
+faced great dangers in many outposts of the world; but the demon of
+insomnia had got a hold of Sir Langham, and he dreaded the night
+unspeakably. At that moment there was something pathetic about the
+little, boastful, filibustering man.
+
+"I think you will sleep to-night," she said confidently, "especially if
+you go to bed early."
+
+She half rose as she spoke, but he put his hand on her arm and pressed
+her down in her chair again.
+
+"Don't go yet," he cried. "Keep on tellin' me I'll sleep, and then
+perhaps I shall. You look as if you could will people to do things.
+You're that quiet sort. Will me, there's a good girl. Tell me again I'll
+sleep to-night."
+
+It was getting late; the music had stopped and the dancers had
+disappeared. Miss Ross did not feel over comfortable alone with Sir
+Langham so far away from everybody else. Especially as she saw he was
+excited and nervous. Had he been drinking? she wondered. But she
+remembered that he had proclaimed far and wide that, because of his
+gout, he'd made a vow to touch no form of "alcoholic liquor" on the
+voyage, except on Christmas and New Year's Day. It was six days since
+Christmas, and already Aden was left behind. No, it was just sheer
+nervous excitement, and if she could do him any good....
+
+"I feel sure you will sleep to-night," she said soothingly, "if you will
+do as I tell you."
+
+"I'll do any mortal thing. I've got a deck-cabin to myself. Will you
+keep willin' me when you turn in?"
+
+"Go to bed now," she said firmly. "Undress quickly, and then think about
+nothing ... and I'll do the rest."
+
+"You will, you promise?"
+
+"Yes, but you must keep your mind a perfect blank, or I can't do
+anything."
+
+She stood up tall and straight. The moonlight caught her grey hair and
+burnished it to an aureole of silver.
+
+With many grunts Sir Langham pulled himself out of his chair. "No
+smokin'-room, eh?"
+
+"Good night," Miss Ross said firmly, and left him.
+
+"Don't forget to ask your sister's husband about that chap in the
+P.W.D.," he called after her. "He's sure to know all about it. What's
+his name?--your brother-in-law, I mean."
+
+But Miss Ross had disappeared.
+
+"Now how the devil," he muttered, "am I to make my mind, _my_ mind, a
+perfect blank?"
+
+Two hours later Sir Langham's snores grievously disturbed the occupants
+of adjacent cabins.
+
+In hers, Miss Ross sat by the open porthole reading and re-reading the
+mail that had reached her at Aden.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+JAN'S MAIL
+
+
+                                   _Bombay, December 13th._
+
+      My Dear Jan,
+
+      It was a great relief to get your cable saying definitely
+      that you were sailing by the _Carnduff_. Misfortunes seem
+      to have come upon us in such numbers of late that I dreaded
+      lest your departure might be unavoidably delayed or
+      prevented. I will not now enter into the painful question
+      of my shameful treatment by Government, but you can well
+      understand that I shall leave no stone unturned to reverse
+      their most unfair and unjust decision, and to bring my
+      traducers to book. Important business having reference to
+      these matters calls me away at once, as I feel it is most
+      essential not to lose a moment, my reputation and my whole
+      future being at stake. I shall therefore, to my great
+      regret, be unable to meet you on your arrival in Bombay,
+      and, as my movements for the next few months will be rather
+      uncertain, I may find it difficult to let you have regular
+      news of me. I would therefore advise you to take Fay and
+      the children home as soon as all is safely over and she is
+      able to travel, and I will join you in England if and when
+      I find I can get away. I know, dear Jan, that you will not
+      mind financing Fay to this extent at present; as, owing to
+      these wholly unexpected departmental complications, I am
+      uncommonly hard up. I will, of course, repay you at the
+      earliest possible opportunity.
+
+      Poor Fay is not at all well; all these worries have been
+      very bad for her, and I have been distracted by anxiety on
+      her behalf, as well as about my own most distressing
+      position, and a severe attack of fever has left me weak and
+      ailing. I thought it better to bring Fay down to Bombay,
+      where she can get the best medical advice, and her being
+      there will save you the long, tiresome journey to
+      Dariawarpur. It is also most convenient for going home. She
+      is installed in a most comfortable flat, and we brought our
+      own servants, so I hope you will feel that I have done my
+      best for her.
+
+      Fay will explain the whole miserable business to you, and
+      although appearances may be against me, I trust that you
+      will realise how misleading these may be. I cannot thank
+      you enough for responding so promptly to our ardently
+      expressed desire for your presence at this difficult time.
+      It will make all the difference in the world to Fay; and,
+      on her account, to me also.
+
+      Believe me, always yours affectionately,
+
+                                             HUGO TANCRED.
+
+                                          _Bombay, Friday._
+
+      Jan my dear, my dear, are you really on your way? And shall
+      I see your face and hear your kind voice, and be able to
+      cry against your shoulder?
+
+      I can't meet you, my precious, because I don't go out. I'm
+      afraid. Afraid lest I should see anyone who knew us at
+      Dariawarpur. India is so large and so small, and people
+      from everywhere are always in Bombay, and I couldn't bear
+      it.
+
+      Do you know, Jan, that when the very worst has happened,
+      you get kind of numbed. You can't suffer any more. You
+      can't be sorry or angry or shocked or indignant, or
+      anything but just broken, and that's what I am.
+
+      After all, I've one good friend here who knew us at
+      Dariawarpur. He's got a job at the secretariat, and he
+      tries to help me all he can. I don't mind him somehow. He
+      understands. He will meet you and bring you to the
+      bungalow, so look out for him when the boat gets in. He's
+      tall and thin and clean-shaven and yellow, with a grave,
+      stern face and beautiful kind eyes. Peter is an angel, so
+      be nice to him, Jan dear. It has been awful; it will go on
+      being awful; but it will be a little more bearable when you
+      come--for me, I mean--for you it will be horrid. All of us
+      on your hands, and no money, and me such a crock, and
+      presently a new baby. The children are well. It's so queer
+      to think you haven't seen "little Fay." Come soon, Jan,
+      come soon, to your miserable                    FAY.
+
+Jan sat on her bunk under the open porthole. One after the other she
+held the letters open in her hand and stared at them, but she did not
+read. The sentences were burnt into her brain already.
+
+Hugo Tancred's letter was dated. Fay's was not, and neither letter bore
+any address in Bombay. Now, Jan knew that Bombay is a large town; and
+that people like the Tancreds, who, if not actually in hiding, certainly
+did not seek to draw attention to their movements, would be hard to
+find. Fay had wholly omitted to mention the surname of the tall, thin,
+yellow man with the "grave, stern face and beautiful kind eyes." Even in
+the midst of her poignant anxiety Jan found herself smiling at this. It
+was so like Fay--so like her to give no address. And should the tall,
+thin gentleman fail to appear, what was Jan to do? She could hardly go
+about the ship asking if one "Peter" had come to fetch her.
+
+How would she find Fay?
+
+Would they allow her to wait at the landing-place till someone came, or
+were there stringent regulations compelling passengers to leave the
+docks with the utmost speed, as most of them would assuredly desire to
+do?
+
+She knitted her brows and worried a good deal about this; then suddenly
+put the question from her as too trivial when there were such infinitely
+greater problems to solve.
+
+Only one thing was clear. One central fact shone out, a beacon amidst
+the gloom of the "departmental complications" enshrouding the conduct of
+Hugo Tancred, the certainty that he had, for the present anyway, shifted
+the responsibility of his family from his own shoulders to hers. As she
+sat square and upright under the porthole, with the cool air from an
+inserted "wind-sail" ruffling her hair, she looked as though she braced
+herself to the burden.
+
+She wished she knew exactly what had happened, what Hugo Tancred had
+actually done. For some years she had known that he was by no means
+scrupulous in money matters, and that very evening Sir Langham had made
+it clear to her that this crookedness had not stopped short at his
+official work. There had been a scandal, so far-reaching a scandal that
+it had got into the home papers.
+
+This struck Jan as rather extraordinary, for Hugo Tancred was by no
+means a stupid man.
+
+It is one thing to be pleasantly oblivious of private debts, to omit
+cheques in repayment of various necessaries got at the Stores by an
+obliging sister-in-law. One thing to muddle away in wild-cat
+speculations a wife's money that, but for the procrastination of an
+easy-going father, would have been tightly tied up--quite another to
+bring himself so nearly within the clutches of the law as to make it
+possible for the Government of India to dismiss him.
+
+And what was he to do? What did the future hold for him?
+
+Who would give employment to however able a man with such a career
+behind him?
+
+Jan's imagination refused to take such flights. Resolutely she put the
+subject from her and began to consider what her own best course would be
+with Fay, her nephew and niece, and, very shortly, a new baby on her
+hands.
+
+Jan was not a young woman to let things drift. She had kept house for a
+whimsical, happy-go-lucky father since she was fourteen; mothered her
+beautiful young sister; and, at her father's death, two years before,
+had with quiet decision arranged her own life, wholly avoiding the
+discussion and the friction which generally are the lot of an unmarried
+woman of five-and-twenty left without natural guardians and with a large
+circle of friends and relations.
+
+It was nearly two o'clock when she undressed and went to bed, and before
+that she had drafted two cablegrams--one to a house-agent, the other to
+her bankers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+BOMBAY
+
+
+For Jan the next two days passed as in a more or less disagreeable
+dream. She could never afterwards recall very clearly what happened,
+except that Sir Langham Sykes seemed absolutely omnipresent, and made
+her, she felt, ridiculous before the whole ship, by proclaiming far and
+wide that she had bestowed upon him the healing gift of sleep.
+
+He was so effusive, so palpably grateful, that she simply could not
+undeceive him by telling him that after they parted the night before she
+had never given him another thought.
+
+When he was not doing this he was pursuing, with fulminations against
+the whole tribe of missionaries, two kindly, quiet members of the
+Society of Friends.
+
+In an evil moment they had gratified his insatiable curiosity as to the
+object of their voyage to India, which was to visit and report upon the
+missionary work of their community. Once he discovered this he never let
+them alone, and the deck resounded with his denunciations of all
+Protestant missionaries as "self-seeking, oily humbugs."
+
+They bore it with well-mannered resignation, and a common dislike for
+Sir Langham formed quite a bond of union between them and Jan.
+
+There was the usual dance on New Year's Eve, the usual singing of "Auld
+Lang Syne" in two huge circles; and Jan would have enjoyed it all but
+for the heavy foreboding in her heart; for she was a simple person who
+responded easily to the emotions of others. Before she could slip away
+to bed Sir Langham cornered her again, conjuring her to "will" him to
+sleep and "to go on doin' it" after they parted in Bombay. He became
+rather maudlin, and she seized the opportunity of telling him that her
+best efforts would be wholly unavailing if he at all relaxed the
+temperate habits, so necessary for the cure of his gout, that he had
+acquired during the voyage. She was stern with Sir Langham, and her
+admonitions had considerable effect. He sought his cabin chastened and
+thoughtful.
+
+The boat was due early in the morning. Jan finished most of her packing
+before she undressed; then, tired and excited, she could not sleep. A
+large cockroach scuttling about her cabin did not tend to calm her
+nerves. She plentifully besprinkled the floor with powdered borax, kept
+the electric light turned on and the fan whirring, and lay down
+wide-awake to wait for the dawn.
+
+The ship was unusually noisy, but just about four o'clock came a new
+sound right outside her porthole--the rush alongside of the boat bearing
+the pilot and strange loud voices calling directions in an unknown
+tongue. She turned out her light (first peering fearfully under her
+berth to make sure no borax-braving cockroach was in ambush) and knelt
+on her bed to look out and watch the boat with its turbaned occupants:
+big brown men, who shouted to one another in a liquid language full of
+mystery.
+
+For a brief space the little boat was towed alongside the great liner,
+then cast off, and presently--far away on the horizon--Jan saw a streak
+of pearly pinkish light, as though the soft blue curtain of the night
+had been lifted just a little; and against that luminous streak were
+hills.
+
+In spite of her anxiety, in spite of her fears as to the future, Jan's
+heart beat fast with pleasurable excitement. She was young and strong
+and eager, and here at last was the real East. A little soft wind
+caressed her tired forehead and she drank in the blessed coolness of the
+early morning.
+
+Both day and night come quickly in the East. Jan got up, had her bath,
+dressed, and by half-past six she was on deck. The dark-blue curtain was
+rolled up, and the scene set was the harbour of Bombay.
+
+Such a gracious haven of strange multi-coloured craft, with its double
+coast-line of misty hills on one side, and clear-cut, high-piled
+buildings, domes and trees upon the other.
+
+A gay white-and-gold launch, with its attendants in scarlet and white,
+came for certain passengers, who were guests of the Governor. The police
+launch, trim and business-like with its cheerful yellow-hatted sepoys,
+came for others. Jan watched these favoured persons depart in stately
+comfort, and went downstairs to get some breakfast. Then came the rush
+of departure by the tender. So many had friends to meet them, and all
+seemed full of pleasure in arrival. Jan was just beginning to feel
+rather forlorn and anxious when the Purser, fussed and over-driven as he
+always is at such times, came towards her, followed by a tall man
+wearing a pith helmet and an overcoat.
+
+"Mr. Ledgard has come to meet you, Miss Ross, so you'll be all right."
+
+It was amazing how easy everything became. Mr. Ledgard's servants
+collected Jan's cabin baggage and took it with them in the tender and,
+on arrival, in a tikka-gharri--the little pony-carriage which is the
+gondola of Bombay--and almost before she quite realised that the voyage
+was over she found herself seated beside Peter in a comfortable
+motor-car, with a cheerful little Hindu chauffeur at the steering-wheel,
+sliding through wide, well-watered streets, still comparatively empty
+because it was so early.
+
+By mutual consent they turned to look at one another, and Jan noted that
+Peter Ledgard _was_ thin and extremely yellow. That his eyes (hollow and
+tired-looking as are the eyes of so many officials in the East) _were_
+kind, and she thought she had never before beheld a firmer mouth or more
+masterful jaw.
+
+What Peter saw evidently satisfied him as to her common sense, for he
+plunged _in medias res_ at once: "How much do you know of this
+unfortunate affair?" he asked.
+
+"Very little," she answered, "and that little extremely vague. Will you
+tell me has Hugo come to total grief or not?"
+
+"Officially, yes. He is finished, done for--may thank his lucky stars
+he's not in gaol. It's well you should know this at the very beginning,
+for of course he won't allow it, and poor Fay--Mrs. Tancred (I'm afraid
+we're rather free-and-easy about Christian names in India)--doesn't know
+the whole facts by a very long way. From what she tells me, I fear he
+has made away with most of her money, too. Was any of it tied up?"
+
+Jan shook her head. "We both got what money there was absolutely on my
+father's death."
+
+"Then," said Peter, "I fear you've got the whole of them on your hands,
+Miss Ross."
+
+"That's what I've come for," Jan said simply, "to take care of Fay and
+the children."
+
+Peter Ledgard looked straight in front of him.
+
+"It's a lot to put on you," he said slowly, "and I'm afraid you'll find
+it a bit more complicated than you expect. Will you remember that I'd
+like to help you all I can?"
+
+Jan looked at the stern profile beside her and felt vaguely comforted.
+"I shall be most grateful for your advice," she said humbly. "I know I
+shall need it."
+
+The motor stopped, and as she stepped from it in front of the tall block
+of buildings, Jan knew that the old easy, straightforward life was over.
+Unconsciously she stiffened her back and squared her shoulders, and
+looked very tall and straight as she stood beside Peter Ledgard in the
+entrance. The pretty colour he had admired when he met her had faded
+from her cheeks, and the face under the shady hat looked grave and
+older.
+
+Peter said something to the smiling lift-man in an extremely dirty dhoti
+who stood salaaming in the entrance.
+
+"I won't come up now," he said to Jan. "Please tell Mrs. Tancred I'll
+look in about tea-time."
+
+As Jan entered the lift and vanished from his sight, Peter reflected,
+"So that's the much-talked-of Jan! Well, I'm not surprised Fay wanted
+her."
+
+The lift stopped. An elderly white-clad butler stood salaaming at an
+open door, and Jan followed him.
+
+A few steps through a rather narrow passage and she was in a large light
+room opening on to a verandah, and in the centre stood her sister Fay,
+with outstretched arms.
+
+A pathetic, inarticulate, worn and faded Fay: her pretty freshness
+dimmed. A Fay with dark circles round her hollow eyes and all the living
+light gone from her abundant fair hair. It was as though her face was
+covered by an impalpable grey mask.
+
+There was no doubt about it. Fay looked desperately ill. Ill in a way
+not to be accounted for by her condition.
+
+Clinging together they sat down on an immense sofa, exchanging trivial
+question and answer as to the matters ordinary happy folk discuss when
+they first meet after a long absence. Jan asked for the children, who
+had not yet returned from their early morning walk with the ayah. Fay
+asked about the voyage and friends at home, and told Jan she had got
+dreadfully grey; then kissed her and leant against her just as she used
+to do when they were both children and she needed comfort.
+
+Jan said nothing to Fay about _her_ looks, and neither of them so much
+as mentioned Hugo Tancred. But Jan felt a wild desire to get away by
+herself and cry and cry over this sad wraith of the young sister whose
+serene and happy beauty had been the family pride.
+
+And yet she was so essentially the same Fay, tender and loving and
+inconsequent, and full of pretty cares for Jan's comfort.
+
+The dining-room was behind the sitting-room, with only a curtain
+between, and as they sat at breakfast Fay was so eager Jan should
+eat--she ate nothing herself--so anxious lest she should not like the
+Indian food, that poor Jan, with a lump in her throat that choked her at
+every morsel, forced down the carefully thought-out breakfast and meekly
+accepted everything presented by the grey-haired turbaned butler who
+bent over her paternally and offered every dish much as one would tempt
+a shy child with some amusing toy.
+
+Presently Fay took her to see her room, large, bare and airy, with
+little furniture save the bed with its clean white mosquito curtains
+placed under the electric fan in the centre of the ceiling. Outside the
+window was a narrow balcony, and Jan went there at once to look out; and
+though her heart was so heavy she was fain to exclaim joyfully at the
+beauty of the view.
+
+Right opposite, across Back Bay, lay the wooded villa-crowned slopes of
+Malabar Hill, flung like a garland on the bosom of a sea deeply blue and
+smiling, smooth as a lake, while below her lay the pageant of the
+street, with its ever-changing panorama of vivid life. The whole so
+brilliant, so various, so wholly unlike any beautiful place she had ever
+seen before that, artist's daughter she was, she cried eagerly to Fay,
+"Oh, come and look! Did you ever see anything so lovely? How Dad would
+have rejoiced in this!"
+
+Fay followed slowly: "I thought you'd like it," she said, evidently
+pleased by Jan's enthusiasm, "that's why I gave you this room. Look,
+Jan! There are the children coming, those two over by the band-stand.
+They see us. _Do_ wave to them."
+
+The children were still a long way off. Jan could only see an ayah in
+her white draperies pushing a little go-cart with a child in it, and a
+small boy trotting by her side, but she waved as she was bidden.
+
+The room had evidently at one time been used as a nursery, for inside
+the stone balustrade was a high trellis of wood. Jan and Fay were both
+tall women, but even on them the guarding trellis came right up to their
+shoulders. Neither of them could really lean over, though Fay tried, in
+her eagerness to attract the attention of the little group. Jan watched
+her sister's face and again felt that cruel constriction of the throat
+that holds back tears. Fay's tired eyes were so sad, so out of keeping
+with the cheerful movement of her hand, so shadowed by some knowledge
+she could not share.
+
+"You mustn't stand here without a hat," she said, turning to go in. "The
+sun is getting hot. You must get a topee this afternoon. Peter will take
+you and help to choose it."
+
+"Couldn't you come, if we took a little carriage? Does driving tire you
+when it's cool?" Jan asked as she followed her sister back into the
+room.
+
+"I never go out," Fay said decidedly. "I never shall again ... I mean,"
+she added, "till it's all over. I couldn't bear it just now--I might
+meet someone I know."
+
+"But, Fay, it's very bad for you to be always indoors. Surely, in the
+early morning or the evening--you'll come out then?"
+
+Fay shook her head. "Peter has taken me out in the motor once or twice
+at night--but I don't really like it. It makes me so dreadfully tired.
+Don't worry me about that, Jan. I get plenty of air in the verandah.
+It's just as pretty there as in your balcony, and we can have
+comfortable chairs. Let's go there now. _You_ shall go out as much as
+you like. I'll send Lalkhan with you, or Ayah and the children; and
+Peter will take you about all he can--he promised he would. Don't think
+I want to be selfish and keep you here with me all the time."
+
+The flat, weak voice, so nervous, so terrified lest her stronger sister
+should force her to some course of action she dreaded, went to Jan's
+heart.
+
+"My dear," she said gently, "I haven't come here to rush about. I've
+come to be with you. We'll do exactly what you like best."
+
+Fay clung to her again and whispered, "Later on you'll understand
+better--I'll be able to tell you things, and perhaps you'll understand
+... though I'm not sure--you're not weak like me, you'd never go under
+... you'd always fight...."
+
+There was a pattering of small feet in the passage. Little high voices
+called for "Mummy," and the children came in.
+
+Tony, a grave-eyed, pale-faced child of five, came forward instantly,
+with his hand held out far in front of him. Jan, who loved little
+children, knew in a minute that he was afraid she would kiss him; so she
+shook hands with gentlemanly stiffness. Little Fay, on the contrary, ran
+forward, held up her arms "to be taken" and her adorably pretty little
+face to be kissed. She was startlingly like her mother at the same age,
+with bobbing curls of feathery gold, beseeching blue eyes and a
+complexion delicately coloured as the pearly pink lining of certain
+shells. She was, moreover, chubby, sturdy and robust--quite unlike Tony,
+who looked nervous, bleached and delicate.
+
+Tony went and leant against his mother, regarding Jan and his small
+sister with dubious, questioning eyes.
+
+Presently he remarked, "I wish she hadn't come."
+
+"Oh, Tony," Fay exclaimed reproachfully, "you must both love Auntie Jan
+very dearly. She has come such a long way to be good to us all."
+
+"I wish she hadn't," Tony persisted.
+
+"_I_ sall love Auntie Dzan," Fay remarked, virtuously.
+
+It was pleasant to be cuddled by this friendly baby, and Jan laid her
+cheek against the fluffy golden head; but all the time she was watching
+Tony. He reminded her of someone, and she couldn't think who. He
+maintained his aloof and unfriendly attitude till Ayah came to take the
+children to their second breakfast. Little Fay, however, refused to
+budge, and when the meekly salaaming ayah attempted to take her, made
+her strong little body stiff, and screamed vigorously, clinging so
+firmly to her aunt that Jan had herself to carry the obstreperous baby
+to the nursery, where she left her lying on the floor, still yelling
+with all the strength of her evidently healthy lungs.
+
+When Jan returned, rather dishevelled--for her niece had seized a
+handful of her hair in the final struggle not to be put down--Fay said
+almost complacently, "You see, the dear little soul took a fancy to you
+at once. Tony is much more reserved and not nearly so friendly. He's
+very Scotch, is Tony."
+
+"He does what he's told, anyway."
+
+"Oh, not always," Fay said reassuringly, "only when he doesn't mind
+doing it. They've both got very strong wills."
+
+"So have I," said Jan.
+
+Fay sighed. "It was time you came to keep them in order. I can't."
+
+This was evident, for Fay had not attempted to interfere with her
+daughter beyond saying, "I expect she's hungry, that's why she's so
+fretty, poor dear."
+
+That afternoon Peter went to the flat and was shown as usual into the
+sitting-room.
+
+Jan and the children were in the verandah, all with their backs to the
+room, and did not notice his entrance as Jan was singing nursery-rhymes.
+Fay sat on her knee, cuddled close as though there were no such thing as
+tempers in the world. Tony sat on a little chair at her side, not very
+near, but still near enough to manifest a more friendly spirit than in
+the morning. Peter waited in the background while the song went on.
+
+    I saw a ship a-sailing, a-sailing on the sea,
+    And it was full of pretty things for Tony, Fay and me.
+    There was sugar in the cabin and kisses in the hold----
+
+"Whose kisses?" Tony asked suspiciously.
+
+"Mummy's kisses, of course," said Jan.
+
+"Why doesn't it _say_ so, then?" Tony demanded.
+
+"Mummy's kisses in the hold," Jan sang obediently--
+
+    The sails were made of silk and the masts were made of gold.
+    Gold, gold, the masts were made of gold.
+
+"What nelse?" Fay asked before Jan could start the second verse.
+
+    There were four-and-twenty sailors a-skipping on the deck,
+    And they were little white mice with rings about their neck.
+    The captain was a duck, with a jacket on his back,
+    And when the ship began to sail, the captain cried, "Quack! Quack!
+    Quack! Quack!" The captain cried, "Quack! Quack!"
+
+"What nelse?" Fay asked again.
+
+"There isn't any nelse, that's all."
+
+"Adain," said Fay.
+
+"Praps," Tony said thoughtfully, "there was _some_ auntie's kisses in
+that hold ... just a few...."
+
+"I'm sure there were," said a new voice, and Peter appeared on the
+verandah.
+
+The children greeted him with effusion, and when he sat down Tony sat on
+his knee. He was never assailed by fears lest Peter should want to kiss
+him. Peter was not that sort.
+
+"Sing nunner song," little Fay commanded.
+
+"Not now," Jan said; "we've got a visitor and must talk to him."
+
+"Sing nunner song," little Fay repeated firmly, just as though she had
+not heard.
+
+"Not now; some other time," Jan said with equal firmness.
+
+"Mack!" said the baby, and suited the action to the word by dealing her
+aunt a good hard smack on the arm.
+
+"You mustn't do that," said Jan; "it's not kind."
+
+"Mack, mack, mack," in _crescendo_ with accompanying blows.
+
+Jan caught the little hand, while Peter and Tony, interested spectators,
+said nothing. She held it firmly. "Listen, little Fay," she said, very
+gently. "If you do that again I shall take you to Ayah in the nursery.
+Just once again, and you go."
+
+Jan loosed the little hand, and instantly it dealt her a resounding slap
+on the cheek.
+
+It is of no avail to kick and scream and wriggle in the arms of a
+strong, decided young aunt. For the second time that day, a vociferously
+struggling baby was borne back to the nursery.
+
+As the yells died away in the distance, Tony turned right round on
+Peter's knee and faced him: "She does what she says," he remarked in an
+awestruck whisper.
+
+"And a jolly good thing too," answered Peter.
+
+When Jan came back she brought her sister with her. Lalkhan brought tea,
+and Tony went with him quite meekly to the nursery. They heard him
+chattering to Lalkhan in Hindustani as they went along the passage.
+
+Fay looked a thought less haggard than in the morning. She had slept
+after tiffin; the fact that her sister was actually in the bungalow had
+a calming effect upon her. She was quite cheerful and full of plans for
+Jan's amusement; plans in which, of course, she proposed to take no part
+herself. Jan listened in considerable dismay to arrangements which
+appeared to her to make enormous inroads into Peter Ledgard's leisure
+hours. He and his motor seemed to be quite at Fay's disposal, and Jan
+found the situation both bewildering and embarrassing.
+
+"What a nuisance for him," she reflected, "to have a young woman thrust
+upon him in this fashion. It won't do to upset Fay, but I must tell him
+at the first opportunity that none of these projects hold good."
+
+Directly tea was over Fay almost hustled them out to go and buy a topee
+for Jan, and suggested that, having accomplished this, they should look
+in at the Yacht Club for an hour, "because it was band-night," and Jan
+would like the Yacht Club lawn, with the sea and the boats and all the
+cheerful people.
+
+As the car slid into the crowded traffic of the Esplanade Road, Peter
+pointed to a large building on the left, saying, "There's the Army and
+Navy Stores, quite close to you, you see. You can always get anything
+you want there. I'll give you my number ... not that it matters."
+
+"I've belonged for years to the one at home," said Jan, "and I
+understand the same number will do."
+
+She felt she really could not be beholden to this strange young man for
+everything, even a Stores number; and that she had better make the
+situation clear at once that she had come to take care of Fay and not to
+be an additional anxiety to him. At that moment she felt almost jealous
+of Peter. Fay seemed to turn to him for everything.
+
+When they reached the shop where topees were to be got, she heard a
+familiar, booming voice. Had she been alone she would certainly have
+turned and fled, deferring her purchase till Sir Langham Sykes had
+concluded his, but she could hardly explain her rather complicated
+reasons to Peter, who told the Eurasian assistant to bring topees for
+her inspection.
+
+Jan tried vainly to efface herself behind a tailor's dummy, but her back
+was reflected in the very mirror which also reproduced Sir Langham in
+the act of trying on a khaki-coloured topee. He saw her and at once
+hurried in her direction, exclaiming:
+
+"Ah, Miss Ross, run to earth! You slipped off this morning without
+bidding me good-bye, and I've been wonderin' all day where we should
+meet. Now let me advise you about your topee. _I'll_ choose it for you,
+then you can't go wrong. Get a large one, mind, or the back of your nice
+little neck will be burnt the colour of the toast they gave us on the
+_Carnduff_--shockin' toast, wasn't it? No, not that shape, idiot ...
+unless you're goin' to ride, are you? If so, you must have one of
+each--a large one, I said--what the devil's the use of that? You must
+wear it _well_ on your head, mind; you can't show much of that pretty
+grey hair that puzzled us all so--eh, w'at?"
+
+Jan had been white enough as she entered the shop, for she was beginning
+to feel quite amazingly tired; but now the face under the overshadowing
+topee was crimson and she was hopelessly confused and helpless in the
+overpowering of Sir Langham, who, when he could for a moment detach his
+mind from Jan, looked with considerable curiosity at Peter.
+
+Peter stood there silent, aloof, detached; and he appeared quite cool.
+Jan felt the atmosphere to be almost insufferably close, and heaved a
+sigh of gratitude when he suddenly turned on an electric fan above her
+head.
+
+"I think this will do," she said, in a faint voice to the assistant,
+though the crinkly green lining round the crown seemed searing her very
+brain.
+
+Peter intervened, asking: "Is it comfortable? No ..." as she took it
+off. "I can see it isn't. It has marked your forehead already. Don't be
+in a hurry. They'll probably need to alter the lining. Some women have
+it taken out altogether. Pins keep it on all right."
+
+Thus encouraged, she tried on others, and all the time Sir Langham held
+forth at the top of his voice, interrupting his announcement that he was
+dining at Government House that very night to swear at the assistant
+when he brought topees that did not fit, and giving his opinion of her
+appearance with the utmost frankness, till Jan found one that seemed
+rather less uncomfortable than the rest. Then in desperation she
+introduced Sir Langham to Peter.
+
+"Your sister-in-law looks a bit tucked up," he remarked affably. "We'd
+better take her to the Yacht Club and give her a peg--she seems to feel
+the heat."
+
+Jan cast one despairing, imploring glance at Peter, who rose to the
+occasion nobly.
+
+"You're quite right," he said. "This place is infernally stuffy. Come
+on. They know where to send it. Good afternoon sir," and before she
+realised what had happened Peter seized her by the arm and swept her out
+of the shop and into the front seat of the car, stepped over her and
+himself took the steering-wheel.
+
+While Sir Langham's voice bayed forth a mixture of expostulation and
+assignation at the Yacht Club later on.
+
+"Now where shall we go?" asked Peter.
+
+"Not the Yacht Club," Jan besought him. "He's coming there; he said so.
+Isn't he dreadful? Did you mind very much being taken for my
+brother-in-law? He has no idea who he really is, or I wouldn't have let
+it pass ... but I felt I could never explain ... I'm so sorry...."
+
+Her face was white enough now.
+
+"It would have been absurd to explain, and it's I who should apologise
+for the free-and-easy way I carried you off, but it was clearly a case
+for strong measures, or he'd have insisted on coming with us. What an
+awful little man! Did you have him all the voyage? No wonder you look
+tired.... I hope he didn't sit at your table...."
+
+Once out of doors, the delicious breeze from the sea that springs up
+every evening in Bombay revived her. She forgot Sir Langham, for a few
+minutes she even forgot Fay and her anxieties in sheer pleasure in the
+prospect, as the car fell into its place in the crowded traffic of the
+Queen's Road.
+
+Jan never forgot that drive. He ran her out to Chowpatty, where the
+road lies along the shore and the carriages of Mohammedan, Hindu and
+Parsee gentlemen stand in serried rows while their picturesque occupants
+"eat the air" in passive and contented Eastern fashion; then up to Ridge
+Road on Malabar Hill, where he stopped that she might get out and walk
+to the edge of the wooded cliff and look down at the sea and the great
+city lying bathed in that clear golden light only to be found at sunset
+in the East.
+
+Peter enjoyed her evident appreciation of it all. She said very little,
+but she looked fresh and rested again, and he was conscious of a quite
+unusual pleasure in her mere presence as they stood together in the
+green garden, got and kept by such infinite pains and care, that borders
+the road running along the top of Malabar Hill.
+
+Suddenly she turned. "We mustn't wait another minute," she said. "You,
+doubtless, want to go to the club. It has been very good of you to spend
+so much time with me. What makes it all so beautiful is that everywhere
+one sees the sea. I will tell Fay how much I have enjoyed it."
+
+Peter's eyes met hers and held them: "Try to think of me as a friend,
+Miss Ross. I can see you are thoroughly capable and independent; but,
+believe me, India is not like England, and a white woman needs a good
+many things done for her here if she's to be at all comfortable. I don't
+want to butt in and be a nuisance; but just remember I'm there when the
+bell rings----"
+
+"I am not likely to forget," said Jan.
+
+Lights began to twinkle in the city below. The soft monotonous throb of
+tom-toms came beating through the ambient air like a pulse of teeming
+life; and when he left her at her sister's door the purple darkness of
+an Eastern night had curtained off the sea.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE BEGINNING OF THE JOB
+
+
+Fay was still lying on her long chair in the verandah when Jan got in.
+She had turned on the electric light above her head and had, seemingly,
+been working at some diminutive garment of nainsook and lace. She looked
+up at Jan's step, asking eagerly, "Well, did you like it? Did you see
+many people? Was the band good?"
+
+Jan sat down beside her and explained that Peter had taken her for a
+drive instead. She made her laugh over her encounter with Sir Langham,
+and was enthusiastic about the view from Malabar Hill. Then Fay sent her
+to say good night to the children, who were just getting ready for bed.
+
+As she went down the long passage towards the nursery, she heard small
+voices chattering in Hindustani, and as she opened the door little Fay
+was in the act of stepping out of all her clothes.
+
+Tony was already clad in pink pyjamas, which made him look paler than
+ever.
+
+Little Fay, naked as any shameless cherub on a Renaissance festoon,
+danced across the tiled floor, and, pausing directly in front of her
+aunt, announced:
+
+"I sall mack Ayah as muts as I like."
+
+The good-natured Goanese ayah salaamed and, beaming upon her charge,
+murmured entire acquiescence.
+
+Jan looked down at the absurd round atom who defied her, and, trying
+hard not to laugh, said:
+
+"Oh, no, you won't."
+
+"I sall!" the baby declared even more emphatically, and, lifting up her
+adorable, obstinate little face to look at Jan, nodded her curly head
+vigorously.
+
+"I think not," Jan remarked rather unsteadily, "because if you do,
+people won't like you. We can none of us go about smacking innocent
+folks just for the fun of it. Everybody would be shocked and horrified."
+
+"Socked and hollified," echoed little Fay, delighted with the new words,
+"socked and hollified!... What nelse?"
+
+"What usually follows is that the disagreeable little girl gets smacked
+herself."
+
+"No," said Fay, but a thought doubtfully. "No," more firmly. Then with a
+smile that was subtly compounded of pathos and confidence, "Nobody would
+mack plitty little Fay ... 'cept ... plapse ... Auntie Dzan."
+
+The stern aunt in question snatched up her niece to cover her with
+kisses. Ayah escaped chastisement that evening, for, arrayed in a white
+nighty, "plitty little Fay" sat good as gold on Jan's knee, absorbed in
+the interest of "This little pig went to market," told on her own toes.
+Even Tony, the aloof and unfriendly, consented to unbend to the extent
+of being interested in the dialogue of "John Smith and Minnie Bowl, can
+you shoe a little foal?" and actually thrust out his own bare feet that
+Jan might make them take part in the drama of the "twa wee doggies who
+went to the market," and came back "louper-scamper, louper-scamper."
+
+At the end of every song or legend came the inevitable "What nelse?"
+from little Fay--and Jan only escaped after the most solemn promises had
+been exacted for a triple bill on the morrow.
+
+When she had changed and went back to the sitting-room, dinner was
+ready. Lalkhan again bent over her with fatherly solicitude as he
+offered each course, and this time Jan, being really hungry, rather
+enjoyed his ministrations. A boy assisted at the sideboard, and another
+minion appeared to bring the dishes from the kitchen, for the butler and
+the boy never left the room for an instant.
+
+Fay looked like a tired ghost, and Jan could see that it was a great
+effort to her to talk cheerfully and seem interested in the home news.
+
+After dinner they went back to the sitting-room. Lalkhan brought coffee
+and Fay lit a cigarette. Jan wandered round, looking at the photographs
+and engravings on the walls.
+
+"How is it," she asked, "that Mr. Ledgard seems to come in so many of
+these groups? Did you rent the flat from a friend of his?"
+
+"I didn't 'rent' the flat from anybody," Fay answered. "It's Peter's own
+flat. He lent it to us."
+
+Jan turned and stared at her sister. "Mr. Ledgard's flat!" she
+repeated. "And what is he doing?"
+
+"He's living at the club just now. He turned out when we came. Don't
+look at me like that, Jan.... There was nothing else to be done."
+
+Jan came back and sat on the edge of the big sofa. "But I understood
+Hugo's letter to say...."
+
+"Whatever Hugo said in his letter was probably lies. If Peter hadn't
+lent us his flat, I should have had nowhere to lay my head. Who do you
+suppose would let us a flat here, after all that has happened, unless we
+paid in advance, and how could we do that without any ready money? Why,
+a flat like this unfurnished costs over three hundred rupees a month. I
+don't know what a furnished flat would be."
+
+"But--isn't it ... taking a great deal from Mr. Ledgard?" Jan asked
+timidly.
+
+Fay stretched out her hand and suddenly switched off the lights, so that
+they were left together on the big sofa in the soft darkness.
+
+"Give me your hand, Jan. I shall be less afraid of you when I just feel
+you and can't see you."
+
+"Why should you be afraid of me?... Dear, dear Fay, you must remember
+how little I really know. How can I understand?"
+
+Fay leant against her sister and held her close. "Sometimes I feel as if
+I couldn't understand it all myself. But you mustn't worry about Peter's
+flat. We'll all go home the minute I can be moved. He doesn't mind,
+really ... and there was nothing else to be done."
+
+"Does Hugo know you are here?"
+
+Fay laughed, a sad, bitter little laugh. "It was Hugo who asked Peter to
+lend his flat."
+
+"Then what about his servants? What has he done with them while you are
+here?"
+
+"These are his servants."
+
+"But Hugo said...."
+
+"Jan, dear, it is no use quoting Hugo to me. I can tell you the sort of
+thing he would say.... Did he mention Peter at all?"
+
+"Certainly not. He said you were 'installed in a most comfortable flat'
+and had brought your own servants."
+
+"I brought Ayah--naturally, Peter hadn't an ayah. But why do you object
+to his servants? They're very good."
+
+"But don't they think it ... a little odd?"
+
+"Oh, you can't bother about what servants think in India. They think us
+all mad anyway."
+
+There was silence for a few minutes while Jan realised the fact that,
+dislike it as she might, she seemed fated to be laid under considerable
+obligation to Mr. Peter Ledgard.
+
+"Where is Hugo?" she asked at last.
+
+"My dear, you appear to have heard from Hugo since I have. As to his
+whereabouts I haven't the remotest idea."
+
+"Do you mean to say, Fay, that he hasn't let you know where he is?"
+
+"He didn't come with us to the flat because he was afraid he'd be seized
+for debts and things. We've only been here a fortnight. He's probably
+on board ship somewhere--there hasn't been much time for him to let me
+know...."
+
+Fay spoke plaintively, as though Jan were rather hard on Hugo in
+expecting him to give his wife any account of his movements.
+
+Jan was glad it was dark. She felt bewildered and oppressed and very,
+very angry with her brother-in-law, who seemed to have left his entire
+household in the care of Peter Ledgard. Was Peter paying for their very
+food, she wondered? She'd put a stop to that, anyhow.
+
+"Jan"--she felt Fay lean a little closer--"don't be down on me. You've
+no idea how hard it has all been. You're such a daylight person
+yourself."
+
+"Hard on you, my precious! I could never feel the least little bit hard.
+Only it's all so puzzling. And what do you mean by a 'daylight person'?"
+
+"You know, Jan, for three months now I've been a lot alone, and I've
+done a deal of thinking--more than ever in all my life before; and it
+seems to me that the world is divided into three kinds of people--the
+daylight people, and the twilight people and the night people."
+
+Fay paused. Jan stroked her hot, thin hand, but did not speak, and the
+tired, whispering voice went on: "_We_ were daylight people--Daddie was
+very daylight. There were never any mysteries; we all of us knew always
+where each of us was, and there were no secrets and no queer people
+coming for interviews, and it wouldn't have mattered very much if
+anyone _had_ opened one of our letters. Oh, it's such an _easy_ life in
+the daylight country...."
+
+"And in the twilight country?" asked Jan.
+
+"Ah, there it's very different. Everything is mysterious. You never know
+where anyone has gone, and if he's away queer people--quite horrid
+people--come and ask for him and won't go away, and sit in the verandah
+and cheek the butler and the boy and insist on seeing the 'memsahib,'
+and when she screws up her courage and goes to them, they ask for money,
+and show dirty bits of paper and threaten, and it's all awful--till
+somebody like Peter comes and kicks them out, and then they simply fly."
+
+In spite of her irritation at being beholden to him, Jan began to feel
+grateful to Peter.
+
+"Sometimes," Fay continued, "I think it would be easier to be a night
+person. They've no appearances to keep up. You see, what makes it so
+difficult for the twilight people is that they _want_ to live in the
+daylight, and it's too strong for them. All the night people whom they
+know--and if you're twilight you know lots of 'em--come and drag them
+back. _They_ don't care. They rather like to go right in among the
+daylight folk and scare and shock them, and make them uncomfortable. You
+_can't_ suffer in the same way when you've gone under altogether."
+
+"But, Fay dear," Jan interposed, "you talk as though the twilight people
+couldn't help it...."
+
+"They can't--they truly can't."
+
+"But surely there's right and wrong, straightness and crookedness, and
+no one _need_ be crooked."
+
+"People like you needn't--but everybody isn't strong like that. Hugo
+says every man has his price, and every woman too--Peter says so, too."
+
+"Then Peter ought to be ashamed of himself. Do you suppose _he_ has his
+price?"
+
+"No, not in that way. He'd think it silly to be pettifogging and
+dishonest about money, or to go in for mad speculations run by shady
+companies; but he wouldn't think it _extraordinary_ like you."
+
+"I'm afraid my education has been neglected. A great many things seem
+extraordinary to me."
+
+"You think it funny I should be living in Peter's flat, waited on by
+Peter's servants--but what else could I do?"
+
+Jan smiled in the darkness. She saw where her niece had got "what
+nelse?"
+
+"Isn't it just a little--unusual?" she asked gently. "Is there no money
+at all, Fay? What has become of all your own?"
+
+"It's not all gone," Fay said eagerly. "I think there's nearly two
+thousand pounds left, but Peter made me write home--that was at
+Dariawarpur, before he came down here--and say no more was to be sent
+out, not even if I wrote myself to ask for it--and _he_ wrote to Mr.
+Davidson too----"
+
+"I know somebody wrote. Mr. Davidson was very worried ... but what _can_
+Hugo have done with eight thousand pounds in two years? Besides his
+pay...."
+
+"Eight thousand pounds doesn't go far when you've dealings with
+money-lenders and mines in Peru--but _I_ don't understand it--don't ask
+me. I believe he left me a little money--I don't know how much--at a
+bank in Elphinstone Circle--but I haven't liked to write and find out,
+lest it should be very little ... or none...."
+
+"Mercy!" exclaimed Jan. "It surely would be better to know for certain."
+
+"When you've lived in the twilight country as long as I have you'll not
+want to know anything for certain. It's only when things are wrapped up
+in a merciful haze of obscurity that life is tolerable at all. Do you
+suppose I _wanted_ to find out that my husband was a rascal? I shut my
+eyes to it as long as I could, and then Truth came with all her cruel
+tools and pried them open. Oh, Jan, it did hurt so!"
+
+If Fay had cried, if her voice had even broken or she had seemed deeply
+moved, it would have been more bearable. It was the poor thing's
+calm--almost indifference--that frightened Jan. For it proved that her
+perceptions were numbed.
+
+Fay had been tortured till she could feel nothing acutely any more. Jan
+had the feeling that in some dreadful, inscrutable way her sister was
+shut away from her in some prison-house of the mind.
+
+And who shall break through those strange, intangible, impenetrable
+walls of unshared experience?
+
+Jan swallowed her tears and said cheerfully: "Well, it's all going to be
+different now. You needn't worry about anything any more. If Hugo has
+left no money we'll manage without. Mr. Davidson will let me have what I
+want ... but we must be careful, because of the children."
+
+"And you'll try not to mind living in Peter's flat?" Fay said, rubbing
+her head against Jan's shoulder. "It's India, you know, and men are very
+kind out here--much friendlier than they are at home."
+
+"So it seems."
+
+"You needn't think there's anything wrong, Jan. Peter isn't in love with
+me now."
+
+"Was he ever in love with you?"
+
+"Oh, yes, a bit, once; when he first came to Dariawarpur ... lots of
+them were then. I really was very pretty, and I had quite a little court
+... but when the bad times came and people began to look shy at
+Hugo--everybody was nice to me always--then Peter seemed different.
+There was no more philandering, he was just ... Oh, Jan, he was just
+such a daylight person, and might have been Daddie. I should have died
+without him."
+
+"Fay, tell me--I'll never ask again--was Hugo unkind to you?"
+
+"No, Jan, truly not unkind. He shut me away from the greater part of his
+life ... and there were other people ... not ladies"--Fay felt the
+shoulder she leant against stiffen--"but I didn't know that for quite a
+long time ... and he wasn't ever surly or cross or grudging. He always
+wanted me to have everything very nice, and I really believe he always
+hoped the mines and things would make lots of money.... You know, Jan,
+I'd _rather_ believe in people. I daresay you think I'm weak and stupid
+... but I can never understand wives who set detectives on their
+husbands."
+
+"It isn't done by the best people," Jan said with a laugh that was half
+a sob. "Let's hope it isn't often necessary...."
+
+Fay drew a little closer: "Oh, you are dear not to be stern and
+scolding...."
+
+"It's not you I feel like scolding."
+
+"If you scolded him, he'd agree with every word, so that you simply
+couldn't go on ... and then he'd go away and do just the same things
+over again, and fondly hope you'd never hear of it. But he _was_ kind in
+lots of ways. He didn't drink----"
+
+"I don't see anything so very creditable in that," Jan interrupted.
+
+"Well, it's one of the things he didn't do--and we had the nicest
+bungalow in the station and by far the best motor--a much smarter motor
+than the Resident. And it was only when I discovered that Hugo had made
+out I was an heiress that I began to feel uncomfortable."
+
+"Was he good to the children?"
+
+"He hardly saw them. Children don't interest him much. He liked little
+Fay because she's so pretty, but I don't think he cared a great deal for
+Tony. Tony is queer and judging. Don't take a dislike to Tony, Jan; he
+needs a long time, but once you've got him he stays for ever--will you
+remember that?"
+
+Again, Jan felt that cold hand laid on her heart, the hand of chill
+foreboding. She had noticed many times already that when Fay was off her
+guard she always talked as though, for her, everything were ended, and
+she was only waiting for something. There seemed no permanence in her
+relations with them all.
+
+A shadowy white figure lifted the curtain between the two rooms and
+stood salaaming.
+
+Jan started violently. She was not yet accustomed to the soundless naked
+feet of the servants whose presence might be betrayed by a rustle, never
+by a step.
+
+It was Ayah waiting to know if Fay would like to go to bed.
+
+"Shall I go, Jan? Are you tired?"
+
+Jan was, desperately tired, for she had had no sleep the night before,
+but Fay's voice had in it a little tremor of fear that showed she
+dreaded the night.
+
+"Send her to bed, poor thing. I'll look after you, brush your hair and
+tuck you up and all.... Fay, oughtn't you to have somebody in your room?
+Couldn't my cot be put in there, just to sleep?"
+
+"Oh, Jan, would you? Don't you mind?"
+
+"Shall I help her to move it?" Jan said, getting up.
+
+Fay pulled her down again. "You funny Jan, you can't do that sort of
+thing here. The servants will do it."
+
+She sat up, gave a rapid, eager order to Ayah, and in a few minutes Jan
+heard her bed being wheeled down the passage. Every room had wide
+double doors--like French rooms--and there was no difficulty.
+
+Fay sank down again among her cushions with a great sigh of relief: "I
+don't mind now how soon I go to bed. I shan't be frightened in the long
+dark night any more. Oh, Jan, you _are_ a dear daylight person!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE CHILDREN
+
+
+Jan made headway with Tony and little Fay. An aunt who carried one
+pick-a-back; who trotted, galloped, or curvetted to command as an
+animated steed; who provided spades and buckets, and herself, getting up
+very early, took them and the children to an adorable sandy beach,
+deserted save for two or three solitary horsemen; an aunt who dug holes
+and built castles and was indirectly the means of thrilling rides upon a
+real horse, when Peter was encountered as one of the mounted few taking
+exercise before breakfast; such an aunt could not be regarded otherwise
+than as an acquisition, even though she did at times exert authority and
+insist upon obedience.
+
+She got it, too; especially from little Fay, who, hitherto, had obeyed
+nobody. Tony, less wilful and not so prone to be destructive, was
+secretly still unwon, though outwardly quite friendly. He waited and
+watched and weighed Jan in the balance of his small judgment. Tony was
+never in any hurry to make up his mind.
+
+One great hold Jan had was a seemingly inexhaustible supply of rhymes,
+songs, and stories, and she was, moreover, of a telling disposition.
+
+Both children had a quite unusual passion for new words. Little Fay
+would stop short in the midst of the angriest yells if anyone called her
+conduct in question by some new term of opprobrium. Ayah's vocabulary
+was limited, even in the vernacular, and nothing would have induced her
+to return railing for railing to the children, however sorely they
+abused her. But Jan occasionally freed her mind, and at such times her
+speech was terse and incisive. Moreover, she quickly perceived her power
+over her niece in this respect, and traded on the baby's quick ear and
+interest.
+
+One day there was a tremendous uproar in the nursery just after tiffin,
+when poor Fay usually tried to get the sleep that would partially atone
+for her restless night. Jan swept down the passage and into the room, to
+find her niece netted in her cot, and bouncing up and down like a
+newly-landed trout, while Ayah wrestled with a struggling Tony, who
+tried to drown his sister's screams with angry cries of "Let me get at
+her to box her," and, failing that, vigorously boxing Ayah.
+
+Jan closed the door behind her and stood where she was, saying in the
+quiet, compelling voice they had both already learned to respect: "It's
+time for Mummy's sleep, and how can Mummy sleep in such a pandemonium?"
+
+Little Fay paused in the very middle of a yell and her face twinkled
+through the restraining net.
+
+"Pandemolium," she echoed, joyously rolling it over on her tongue with
+obvious gusto.
+
+"Pandemolium."
+
+"She kickened and fit with me," Tony cried angrily. "I _must_ box her."
+
+"Pandemolium?" little Fay repeated inquiringly. "What nelse?"
+
+"Yes," said Jan, trying hard not to laugh; "that's exactly what it was
+... disgraceful."
+
+"What nelse?" little Fay persisted. She had heard disgraceful before. It
+lacked novelty.
+
+"All sorts of horrid things," said Jan. "Selfish and odious and
+ill-bred----"
+
+"White bled, blown bled, ill-bled," the person under the net chanted.
+"What nother bled?"
+
+"There's well-bred," said Jan severely, "and that's what neither you nor
+Tony are at the present moment."
+
+"There's toas' too," said the voice from under the net, ignoring the
+personal application. "Sall we have some?"
+
+"Certainly not," Jan answered with great sternness. "People who riot and
+brawl----"
+
+"Don't like zose words," the netted one interrupted distastefully (R's
+always stumped her), "naughty words."
+
+"Not so naughty as the people who do it. Has Ayah had her dinner? No?
+Then poor Ayah must go and have it, and I shall stay here and tell a
+very soft, whispery story to people who are quiet and good, who lie in
+their cots and don't quarrel----"
+
+"Or blawl" came from the net in a small determined voice. She could not
+let the new word pass after all.
+
+"Exactly ... or brawl," Jan repeated in tones nothing like so firm.
+
+"She kickened and fit me, she did," Tony mumbled moodily as he climbed
+into his cot: "Can't I box her nor nothing?"
+
+"Not now," Jan said, soothingly. Ayah salaamed and hurried away. She, at
+all events, had cause to bless Jan, for now she got her meals with fair
+regularity and in peace.
+
+In a few minutes the room was as quiet as an empty church, save for a
+low voice that related an interminable story about "Cockie-Lockie and
+Henny-Penny going to tell the King the lift's fallen," till one, at all
+events, of the "blawlers" was sound asleep.
+
+The voice ceased and Tony's head appeared over the rail of his cot.
+
+"Hush!" Jan whispered. "Sister's asleep. Just wait a few minutes till
+Ayah comes, then I'll take you away with me."
+
+Faithful Ayah didn't dawdle over her food. She returned, sat down on the
+floor beside little Fay's cot and started her endless mending.
+
+Jan carried Tony away with her along the passage and into the
+drawing-room. The verandah was too hot in the early afternoon.
+
+"Now what shall we do?" she asked, with a sigh, as she sat down on the
+big sofa. "_I'd_ like to sleep, but I suppose you won't let me."
+
+Tony got off her knee and looked at her gravely.
+
+"You can," he said, magnanimously, "because you brought me. I hate bed.
+I'll build a temple with my bricks and I won't knock it down. Not
+loud."
+
+And like his aunt he did what he said.
+
+Jan put her feet up and lay very still. For a week now she had risen
+early every morning to take the children out in the freshest part of the
+day. She seldom got any rest in the afternoon, as she saw to it that
+they should be quiet to let Fay sleep, and she went late to bed because
+the cool nights in the verandah were the pleasant time for Fay.
+
+Tony murmured to himself, but he made little noise with his stone
+bricks. And presently Jan was sleeping almost as soundly as her
+obstreperous niece.
+
+Tony did not repeat new words aloud as did his sister. He turned them
+over in his mind and treasured some simply because he liked the sound of
+them.
+
+There were two that he had carried in his memory for nearly half his
+life; two that had for him a mysterious fascination, a vaguely agreeable
+significance that he couldn't at all explain. One was "Piccadilly" and
+the other "Coln St. Aldwyn's." He didn't even know that they were the
+names of places at first, but he thought they had a most beautiful
+sound. Gradually the fact that they were places filtered into his mind,
+and for Tony Piccadilly seemed particularly rural. He connected it in
+some way with the duck-slaying Mrs. Bond of the Baby's Opera, a book he
+and Mummy used to sing from before she grew too tired and sad to sing.
+Before she lay so many hours in her long chair, before the big man he
+called Daddie became so furtive and disturbing. Then Mummy used to tell
+him things about a place called Home, and though she never actually
+mentioned Piccadilly he had heard the word very often in a song that
+somebody sang in the drawing-room at Dariawarpur.
+
+Theatricals had been towards and Mummy was acting, and people came to
+practise their songs with her, for not only did she sing herself
+delightfully, but she played accompaniments well for other people. The
+play was a singing play, and the Assistant Superintendent of Police, a
+small, fair young man with next to no voice and a very clear
+enunciation, continually practised a song that described someone as
+walking "down Piccadilly with a tulip or a lily in his mediaeval hand."
+
+Tony rather liked "mediaeval" too, but not so much as Piccadilly. A
+flowery way, he was sure, with real grass in it like the Resident's
+garden. Besides, the "dilly" suggested "daffy-down dilly come up to town
+in a yellow petticoat and a green gown."
+
+But not even Piccadilly could compete with Coln St. Aldwyn's in Tony's
+affections. There was something about that suggestive of exquisite peace
+and loveliness, no mosquitoes and many friendly beasts. He had only
+heard the word once by chance in connection with the mysterious place
+called Home, in some casual conversation when no one thought he was
+listening. He seized upon it instantly and it became a priceless
+possession, comforting in times of stress, soothing at all times, a sort
+of refuge from a real world that had lately been very puzzling for a
+little boy.
+
+He was certain that at Coln St. Aldwyn's there was a mighty forest
+peopled by all the nicest animals. Dogs that were ever ready to extend a
+welcoming paw, elephants and mild clumsy buffaloes that gave good milk
+to the thirsty. Little grey squirrels frolicked in the branches of the
+trees, and the tiny birds Mummy told him about that lived in the yew
+hedge at Wren's End. Tony had himself been to Wren's End he was told,
+but he was only one at the time, and beyond a feeling that he liked the
+name and that it was a very green place his ideas about it were hazy.
+
+Sometimes he wished it had been called "Wren St. Endwyn's," but after
+mature reflection he decided it was but a poor imitation of the real
+thing, so he kept the two names separate in his mind.
+
+He had added two more names to his collection since he came to Bombay.
+"Mahaluxmi," the road running beside the sea, where Peter sometimes took
+them and Auntie Jan for a drive after tea when it was high tide; and
+"Taraporevala," who owned a famous book-shop in Medow Street where he
+had once been in a tikka-gharri with Auntie Jan to get some books for
+Mummy. Peter had recommended the shop, and the name instantly seized
+upon Tony's imagination and will remain with it evermore. He never for
+one moment connected it with the urbane gentleman in eyeglasses and a
+funny little round hat who owned the shop. For Tony "Taraporevala" will
+always suggest endless vistas of halls, fitted with books, shelves, and
+tall stacks of books, and counters laden with piles of books. It seemed
+amazing to find anything so vast in such a narrow street. There was
+something magic about it, like the name. Tony was sure that some day
+when he should explore the forest of Coln St. Aldwyn he would come upon
+a little solid door in a great rock. A little solid door studded with
+heavy nails and leading to a magic cave full of unimaginable treasure.
+This door should only open to the incantation of "Taraporevala." None of
+your "abracadabras" for him.
+
+And just as Mummy had talked much of "Wren's End" in happier days, so
+now Auntie Jan told them endless stories about it and what they would
+all do there when they went home. Some day, when he knew her better, he
+would ask her about Coln St. Aldwyn's. He felt he didn't know her
+intimately enough to do so yet, but he was gradually beginning to have
+some faith in her. She was a well-instructed person, too, on the whole,
+and she answered a straight question in a straight way.
+
+It was one of the things Tony could never condone in the big man called
+Daddie, that he could never answer the simplest question. He always
+asked another in return, and there was derision of some sort concealed
+in this circuitous answer. Doubtless he meant to be pleasant and
+amusing--Tony was just enough to admit that--but he was, so Tony felt,
+profoundly mistaken in the means he sought. He took liberties, too;
+punching liberties that knocked the breath out of a small boy's body
+without actually hurting much; and he never, never talked sense. Tony
+resented this. Like the Preacher, he felt there was a time to jest and a
+time to refrain from jesting, and it didn't amuse him a bit to be
+punched and rumpled and told he was a surly little devil if he attempted
+to punch back. In some vague way Tony felt that it wasn't playing the
+game--if it was a game. Often, too, for the past year and more, he
+connected the frequent disappearances of the big man with trouble for
+Mummy. Tony understood Hindustani as well as and better than English.
+His extensive vocabulary in the former would have astonished his
+mother's friends had they been able to translate, and he understood a
+good deal of the servants' talk. He felt no real affection for the big,
+tiresome man, though he admired him, his size, his good looks, and a way
+he had with grown-up people; but he decided quite dispassionately, on
+evidence and without any rancour, that the big man was a "budmash," for
+he, unlike Auntie Jan, never did anything he said he'd do. And when,
+before they left Dariawarpur, the big man entirely disappeared, Tony
+felt no sorrow, only some surprise that having said he was going he
+actually had gone. Auntie Jan never mentioned him, Mummy had reminded
+them both always to include him when they said their prayers, but
+latterly Mummy had been too tired to come to hear prayers. Auntie Jan
+came instead, and Tony, watching her face out of half-shut eyes, tried
+leaving out "bless Daddie" to see if anything happened. Sure enough
+something did; Auntie Jan looked startled. "Say 'Bless Daddie,' Tony,
+'and please help him.'"
+
+"To do what?" Tony asked. "Not to come back here?"
+
+"I don't think he'll come back here just now," Auntie Jan said in a
+frightened sort of whisper, "but he needs help badly."
+
+Tony folded his hands devoutly and said, "Bless Daddie and please help
+him--to stay away just now."
+
+And low down under her breath Jan said, "Amen."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE SHADOW BEFORE
+
+
+Jan had been a week in Bombay, and her grave anxiety about Fay was in no
+way lessened. Rather did it increase and intensify, for not only did her
+bodily strength seem to ebb from her almost visibly day by day, but her
+mind seemed so detached and aloof from both present and future.
+
+It was only when Jan talked about the past, about their happy girlhood
+and their lovable comrade-father, that Fay seemed to take hold and
+understand. All that had happened before his death seemed real and vital
+to her. But when Jan tried to interest her in plans for the future, the
+voyage home, the children, the baby that was due so soon, Fay looked at
+her with tired, lack-lustre eyes and seemed at once to become
+absent-minded and irrelevant.
+
+She was ready enough to discuss the characters of the children, to
+impress upon Jan the fact that Tony was not unloving, only cautious and
+slow before he really gave his affection. That little Fay was exactly
+what she appeared on the surface--affectionate, quick, wilful, and
+already conscious of her own power through her charm.
+
+"I defy anybody to quarrel with Fay when she is willing to make it up,"
+her mother said. "Tony melts like wax before the warmth of her
+advances. She may have behaved atrociously to him five minutes
+before--Ayah lets her, and I am far too weak with her--but if _she_
+wants to be friends Tony forgets and condones everything. Was I very
+naughty to you, Jan, as a baby?"
+
+"Not that I can remember. I think you were very biddable and good."
+
+"And you?"
+
+Jan laughed--"There you have me. I believe I was most naughty and
+obstreperous, and have vivid recollections of being sent to bed for
+various offences. You see, Mother was far too strong and wise to spoil
+me as little Fay is spoilt. Father tried his best, but you remember
+Hannah? Could you imagine Hannah submitting for one moment to the sort
+of treatment that baby metes out to poor, patient Ayah every single
+day?"
+
+"By the way, how is Hannah?"
+
+"Hannah is in her hardy usual. She is going strong, and has developed
+all sorts of latent talent as a cook. She was with me in the furnished
+flat I rented till the day I left (I only took it by the month), and
+she'll be with us again when we all get back to Wren's End."
+
+"But I thought Wren's End was let?"
+
+"Only till March quarter-day, and I've cabled to the agent not to
+entertain any other offer, as we want it ourselves."
+
+"I like to think of the children at Wren's End," Fay said dreamily.
+
+"Don't you like to think of yourself there, too? Would you like any
+other place better?"
+
+Jan's voice sounded constrained and a little hard. People sometimes
+speak crossly when they are frightened, and just then Jan felt the cold,
+skinny hands of some unnameable terror clutching her heart. Why did Fay
+always exclude herself from all plans?
+
+They were, as usual, sitting in the verandah after dinner, and Fay's
+eyes were fixed on the deeply blue expanse of sky. She hardly seemed to
+hear Jan, for she continued: "Do you remember the sketch Daddie did of
+me against the yew hedge? I'd like Tony to have that some day if you'd
+let him."
+
+"Of course that picture is yours," Jan said, hastily. "We never divided
+the pictures when he died. Some were sold and we shared the money, but
+our pictures are at Wren's End."
+
+"I remember that money," Fay interrupted. "Hugo was so pleased about it,
+and gave me a diamond chain."
+
+"Fay, where do you keep your jewellery?"
+
+"There isn't any to keep now. He 'realised' it all long before we left
+Dariawarpur."
+
+"What do you mean, Fay? Has Hugo pawned it? All Mother's things, too?"
+
+"I don't know what he did with it," Fay said, wearily. "He told me it
+wasn't safe in Dariawarpur, as there were so many robbers about that hot
+weather, and he took all the things in their cases to send to the bank.
+And I never saw them again."
+
+Jan said nothing, but she reflected rather ruefully that when Fay
+married she had let her have nearly all their mother's ornaments, partly
+because Fay loved jewels as jewels, and Jan cared little for them
+except as associations. "If I'd kept more," Jan thought, "they'd have
+come in for little Fay. Now there's nothing except what Daddie gave me."
+
+"Are you sorry, Jan?" Fay asked, presently. "I suppose there again you
+think I ought to have stood out, to have made inquiries and insisted on
+getting a receipt from the bank. But I knew very well they were not
+going to the bank. I don't think they fetched much, but Hugo looked a
+little less harassed after he'd got them. I've nothing left now but my
+wedding ring and the little enamel chain like yours, that Daddie gave us
+the year he had that portrait of Meg in the Salon and took us over to
+see it. Where is Meg? Has she come back yet?"
+
+"Meg is still in Bremen with an odious German family, but she leaves at
+the end of the Christmas holidays, as the girl is going to school, and
+Meg will be utilised to bring her over. Then she's to have a rest for a
+month or two, and I daresay she'd come to Wren's End and help us with
+the babies when we get back."
+
+Fay leant forward and said eagerly, "Try to get her, Jan. I'd love to
+think she was there to help you."
+
+"To help us," Jan repeated firmly.
+
+Fay sighed. "I can never think of myself as of much use any more;
+besides ... Oh, Jan, won't you face it? You who are so brave about
+facing things ... I don't believe I shall come through--this time."
+
+Jan got up and walked restlessly about the verandah. She tried to make
+herself say, heard her own voice saying without any conviction, that it
+was nonsense; that Fay was run down and depressed and no wonder; and
+that she would feel quite different in a month or two. And all the time,
+though her voice said these preposterously banal things, her brain
+repeated the doctor's words after his last visit: "I wish there was a
+little more stamina, Miss Ross. I don't like this complete inertia. It's
+not natural. Can't you rouse her at all?"
+
+"My sister has had a very trying time, you know. She seems thoroughly
+worn out."
+
+"I know, I know," the doctor had said. "A bad business and cruelly hard
+on her; but I wish we could get her strength up a bit somehow. I don't
+like it--this lack of interest in everything--I don't like it." And the
+doctor's thin, clever face looked lined and worried as he left.
+
+His words rang in Jan's ears, drowning her own spoken words that seemed
+such a hollow sham.
+
+She went and knelt by Fay's long chair. Fay touched her cheek very
+gently (little Fay had the same adorable tender gestures). "It would
+make it easier for both of us if you'd face it, my dear," she said. "I
+could talk much more sensibly then and make plans, and perhaps really be
+of some use. But I feel a wretched hypocrite to talk of sharing in
+things when I know perfectly well I shan't be there."
+
+"Don't you want to be there?" Jan asked, hoarsely.
+
+[Illustration: "It would make it easier for both of us if you'd face it,
+my dear."]
+
+Fay shook her head. "I know it's mean to shuffle out of it all, but I
+_am_ so tired. Do you think it very horrid of me, Jan?"
+
+In silence Jan held her close; and in that moment she faced it.
+
+The days went on, strange, quiet days of brilliant sunshine. Their daily
+life shrouded from the outside world even as the verandah was shrouded
+from the sun when Lalkhan let down the chicks every day after tiffin.
+
+Peter was their only visitor besides the doctor, and Peter came
+practically every day. He generally took Jan out after tea, sometimes
+with the children, sometimes alone. He even went with her to the bank in
+Elphinstone Circle, so like a bit of Edinburgh, with its solid stone
+houses, and found that Hugo actually had lodged fifty pounds there in
+Fay's name. The clerks looked curiously at Jan, for they thought she was
+Mrs. Tancred. Every one in business or official circles in Bombay knew
+about Hugo Tancred. His conduct had, for a while, even ousted the usual
+topics of conversation--money, food, and woman--from the bazaars; and an
+exhaustive discussion of it was only kept out of the Native Press by the
+combined efforts of the Police and his own Department. Jan gained from
+Peter a fairly clear idea of the _debacle_ that had occurred in Hugo
+Tancred's life. She no longer wondered that Fay refused to leave the
+bungalow. She began to feel branded herself.
+
+For Jan, Peter's visits had come to have something of the relief the
+loosening of a too-tight bandage gives to a wounded man. He generally
+came at tea-time when Fay was at her best, and he brought her news of
+her little world at Dariawarpur. To her sister he seemed the one link
+with reality. Without him the heavy dream would have gone on unbroken.
+Fay was always most eager he should take Jan out, and, though at first
+Jan had been unwilling, she gradually came to look upon such times as a
+blessed break in the monotonous restraint of her day. With him she was
+natural, said what she felt, expressed her fears, and never failed to
+return comforted and more hopeful.
+
+One night he took her to the Yacht Club, and Jan was glad she had gone,
+because it gave her so much to tell Fay when she got back.
+
+It was a very odd experience for Jan, this tea on the crowded lawn of
+the Yacht Club. She turned hot when people looked at her, and Jan had
+always felt so sure of herself before, so proud to be a daughter of
+brilliant, lovable Anthony Ross.
+
+Here, she knew that her sole claim to notice was that she had the
+misfortune to be Hugo Tancred's sister-in-law. Fay, too, had once been
+joyfully proud and confident--and now!
+
+Sometimes in the long, still days Jan wondered whether their father had
+brought them up to expect too much from life, to take their happiness
+too absolutely as a matter of course. Anthony Ross had fully subscribed
+to the R.L.S. doctrine that happiness is a duty. When they were both
+quite little girls he had loved to hear them repeat:
+
+    If I have faltered more or less
+    In my great task of happiness;
+    If I have moved among my race
+    And shown no glorious morning face;
+    If beams from happy human eyes
+    Have moved me not; if morning skies,
+    Books, and my food and summer rain
+    Knocked on my sullen heart in vain;
+    Lord, Thy most pointed pleasure take,
+    And stab my spirit broad awake.
+
+Surely as young girls they had both shown a "glorious morning face." Who
+more so than poor Fay? So gay and beautiful and kind. Why had this come
+upon her, this cruel, numbing disgrace and sorrow? Jan was thoroughly
+rebellious. Again she went over that time in Scotland six years before,
+when, at a big shooting-box up in Sutherland, they met, among other
+guests, handsome Hugo Tancred, home on leave. How he had, almost at
+first sight, fallen violently in love with Fay. How he had singled her
+out for every deferent and delicate attention; how she, young,
+enthusiastic, happy and flattered, had fallen quite equally in love with
+him. Jan recalled her father's rather comical dismay and astonishment.
+His horror when they pressed an immediate marriage, so that Fay might go
+out with Hugo in November. And his final giving-in to everything Fay
+wanted because Fay wanted it.
+
+Did her father really like Hugo Tancred? she wondered. And then came the
+certainty that he wouldn't ever have liked anybody much who wanted to
+marry either of them; but he was far too just and too imaginative to
+stand in the way where, what seemed, the happiness of his daughter was
+concerned.
+
+"What a gamble it all is," thought Jan, and felt inclined to thank
+heaven that she was neither so fascinating nor as susceptible as Fay.
+
+How were they to help to set Hugo Tancred on his legs again, and
+reconstruct something of a future for Fay? And then there always
+sounded, like a knell, Fay's tired, pathetic voice: "Don't bother to
+make plans for me, Jan. For the children, yes, as much as you like. You
+are so clever and constructive--but leave me out, dear, for it's just a
+waste of time."
+
+And the dreadful part of it was that Jan felt a growing conviction that
+Fay was right. And what was more, that Peter felt about it exactly as
+Fay did, in spite of his matter-of-fact optimism at all such times as
+Jan dared to express her dread.
+
+Peter learned a good deal about the Ross family in those talks with Jan.
+She was very frank about her affairs, told him what money she had and
+how it was invested. That the old house in Gloucestershire was hers,
+left directly to her and not to her father, by a curious freak on the
+part of his aunt, one Janet Ross, who disapproved of Anthony's habit of
+living up to whatever he made each year by his pictures, and saving
+nothing that he earned.
+
+"My little girls are safe, anyway," he always said. "Their mother's
+money is tied up on them, though they don't get it except with my
+sanction till my death. I can't touch the capital. Why, then, shouldn't
+we have an occasional flutter when I have a good year, while we are all
+young and can enjoy things?"
+
+They had a great many flutters--for Anthony's pictures sold well among a
+rather eclectic set. His portraits had a certain _cachet_ that gave them
+a vogue. They were delicate, distinguished, and unlike other work. The
+beauties without brains never succeeded in getting Anthony Ross to paint
+them, bribed they never so. But the clever beauties were well satisfied,
+and the clever who were not at all beautiful felt that Anthony Ross
+painted their souls, so they were satisfied, too. Besides, he made their
+sittings so delightful and flirted with them with such absolute
+discretion always. The year that Hugo Tancred met Fay was a particularly
+good year, and Anthony had bought a touring-car, and they all went up to
+Scotland in it. The girls were always well dressed and went out a good
+deal. Young as she was, Jan was already an excellent manager and a
+pleasant hostess. She had been taking care of her father from the time
+she was twelve years old, and knew exactly how to manage him. When there
+was plenty of money she let him launch out; when it was spent she made
+him draw in again, and he was always quite ready to do so. Money as
+money had no charms for Anthony Ross, but the pleasures it could
+provide, the kindnesses it enabled him to do, the easy travel and the
+gracious life were precious to him. He abhorred debt in any form and
+paid his way as he went; lavishly when he had it, justly and exactly
+always.
+
+On hearing all this Peter came to the conclusion that Hugo Tancred was
+not altogether to blame if he had expected a good deal more financial
+assistance from his father-in-law than he got. Anthony made no marriage
+settlement on Fay. He allowed her two hundred a year for her personal
+expenses and considered that Hugo Tancred should manage the running of
+his own house out of his quite comfortable salary. He had, of course, no
+smallest inkling of Hugo's debts or gambling propensities. And all might
+have gone well if only Anthony Ross had made a new will when Fay
+married; a will which tied up her mother's money and anything he might
+leave her, so that she couldn't touch the capital. But nothing of the
+kind was done.
+
+It never occurred to Jan to think of wills.
+
+Anthony Ross was strong and cheerful and so exceedingly young at
+fifty-two that it seemed absurd that he should have grown-up daughters,
+quite ludicrous that he should be a grandfather.
+
+Many charming ladies would greatly like to have occupied the position of
+stepmother to "those nice girls," but Anthony, universal lover as he was
+within strictly platonic limits, showed no desire to give his girls
+anything of the sort. Jan satisfied his craving for a gracious and
+well-ordered comfort in all his surroundings. Fay gratified his aesthetic
+appreciation of beauty and gentleness. What would he do with a third
+woman who might introduce discord into these harmonies?
+
+Fay came home for a short visit when Tony was six months old, as Hugo
+had not got a very good station just then. She was prettier than ever,
+seemed perfectly happy, and both Anthony and Jan rejoiced in her.
+
+After she went out the Tancreds moved to Dariawarpur, which was
+considered one of the best stations in their province, and there little
+Fay was born, and it was arranged that Jan and her father were to visit
+India and Fay during the next cold weather.
+
+But early in the following November Anthony Ross got influenza,
+recovered, went out too soon, got a fresh chill, and in two days
+developed double pneumonia.
+
+His heart gave out, and before his many friends had realised he was at
+all seriously ill, he died.
+
+Jan, stunned, bewildered, and heart-broken, yet contrived to keep her
+head. She got rid of the big house in St. George's Square and most of
+the servants, finally keeping only Hannah, her old Scottish nurse. She
+paid everybody, rendered a full account of her stewardship to Fay and
+Hugo, and then prepared to go out to India as had been arranged. Her
+heart cried out for her only sister.
+
+To her surprise this proposition met with but scant enthusiasm. It
+seemed the Tancreds' plans were uncertain; perhaps it might be better
+for Fay and the children to come home in spring instead of Jan going out
+to them. Hugo's letters were ambiguous and rather cold; Fay's a curious
+mixture of abandonment and restraint; but the prevailing note of both
+was "would she please do nothing in a hurry, but wait."
+
+So, of course, Jan waited.
+
+She waited two years, growing more anxious and puzzled as time went on.
+Her lawyer protested unavailingly at Hugo's perpetual demands (of
+course, backed up by Fay) for more and more capital that he might
+"re-invest" it. Fay's letters grew shorter and balder and more
+constrained. At last, quite suddenly, came the imperative summons to go
+out at once to be with Fay when the new baby should arrive.
+
+And now after three weeks in Bombay Jan felt that she had never known
+any other life, that she never would know any other life than this
+curious dream-like existence, this silent, hopeless waiting for
+something as afflicting as it was inevitable.
+
+There had been a great fire in the cotton green towards Colaba. It had
+blazed all night, and, in spite of the efforts of the Bombay firemen and
+their engines, was still blazing at six o'clock the following evening.
+
+Peter took Jan in his car out to see it. There was an immense crowd, so
+they left the car on its outskirts and plunged into the throng on foot.
+On either side of the road were tall, flimsy houses with a wooden
+staircase outside; those curious tenements so characteristic of the
+poorer parts of Bombay, and in such marked contrast to the "Fort," the
+European quarter of the town. They were occupied chiefly by Eurasians
+and very poor Europeans. That the road was a sea of mud, varied by quite
+deep pools of water, seemed the only possible reason why such houses
+were not also burning.
+
+Jan splashed bravely through the mud, interested and excited by the
+people and the leaping flames so dangerously near. It was growing dusk;
+the air was full of the acrid smell of burnt cotton, and the red glow
+from the sky was reflected on the grave brown faces watching the fire.
+
+Any crowd in Bombay is always extremely varied, and Jan almost forgot
+her anxieties in her enjoyment of the picturesque scene.
+
+"I don't think the people ought to be allowed to throng on the top of
+that staircase," Peter said suddenly. "They aren't built to hold a
+number at once; there'll be an accident," and he left her side for a
+moment to speak to an inspector of police.
+
+Jan looked up at a tall house on her left, where sightseers were
+collecting on the staircase to get a better view. Every window was
+crowded with gazers, all but one. From one, quite at the top, a solitary
+watcher looked out.
+
+There was a sudden shout from the crowd below, a redder glow as more
+piled cotton fell into the general furnace and blazed up, and in that
+moment Jan saw that the solitary watcher was Hugo Tancred, and that he
+recognised her. She gave a little gasp of horror, which Peter heard as
+he joined her again. "What is it?" he said. "What has frightened you?"
+
+Jan pointed upwards. "I've just seen Hugo," she whispered. "There, in
+one of those windows--the empty one. Oh, what can he be doing in those
+dreadful houses, and why is he in Bombay all this time and never a word
+to Fay?"
+
+Jan was trembling. Peter put his hand under her arm and walked on with
+her.
+
+"I knew he was in Bombay," he said, "but I didn't think the poor devil
+was reduced to this."
+
+"What is to be done?" Jan exclaimed. "If he comes and worries Fay for
+money now, it will kill her. She thinks he is safely out of India. What
+_is_ to be done?"
+
+"Nothing," said Peter. "He'll go the very minute he can, and you may be
+sure he'll raise the wind somehow. He's got all sorts of queer irons in
+the fire. He daren't appear at the flat, or some of his creditors would
+cop him for debt--it's watched day and night, I know. Just let it alone.
+I'd no idea he was hiding in this region or I wouldn't have brought you.
+We all want him to get clear. He might file his petition, but it would
+only rake up all the old scandals, and they know pretty well there's
+nothing to be got out of him."
+
+"He looked so dreadful, so savage and miserable," Jan said with a
+half-sob.
+
+"Well--naturally," said Peter. "You'd feel savage and miserable if you
+were in his shoes."
+
+"But oughtn't I to help him? Send him money, I mean."
+
+"Not one single anna. It'll take you all your time to get his family
+home and keep them when you get there. Have you seen enough? Shall we go
+back?"
+
+"You don't think he'll molest Fay?"
+
+"I'm certain of it."
+
+"Please take me home. I shall never feel it safe to leave Fay again for
+a minute."
+
+"That's nonsense, you know," said Peter.
+
+"It's what I feel," said Jan.
+
+It was that night Tony's extempore prayer was echoed so earnestly by his
+aunt.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE HUMAN TOUCH
+
+
+Three days later Jan got a note from Peter telling her that Hugo Tancred
+had left Bombay and was probably leaving India at once from one of the
+smaller ports.
+
+He had not attempted to communicate in person or by letter with either
+Jan or his wife.
+
+Early in the morning, just a week from the time Jan had seen Hugo
+Tancred at the window of that tall house near the cotton green, Fay's
+third child, a girl, was still-born; and Fay, herself, never recovered
+consciousness all day. A most competent nurse had been in the house
+nearly a week, the doctor had done all that human skill could do, but
+Fay continued to sink rapidly.
+
+About midnight the nurse, who had been standing by the bed with her
+finger on Fay's pulse, moved suddenly and gently laid down the weak hand
+she had been holding. She looked warningly across at Jan, who knelt at
+the other side, her eyes fixed on the pale, beautiful face that looked
+so wonderfully young and peaceful.
+
+Suddenly Fay opened her eyes and smiled. She looked right past Jan,
+exclaiming joyfully, "There you are at last, Daddie, and it's broad
+daylight."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For Jan it was still the middle of the Indian night and very dark
+indeed.
+
+The servants were all asleep; the little motherless children safely
+wrapped in happy unconsciousness in their nursery with Ayah.
+
+The last sad offices had been done for Fay, and the nurse, tired out,
+was also sleeping--on Jan's bed.
+
+Jan, alone of all the household, kept watch, standing in the verandah, a
+ghostly figure, still in the tumbled white muslin frock she had had no
+time all day to change.
+
+It was nearly one o'clock. Motors and carriages were beginning to come
+back from Government House, where there was a reception. The motor-horns
+and horses' hoofs sounded loud in the wide silent street, and the head
+lights swept down the Queen's Road like fireflies in flight.
+
+Jan turned on the light in the verandah. Peter would perhaps look up and
+see her standing there, and realise why she kept watch. Perhaps he would
+stop and come up.
+
+She wanted Peter desperately.
+
+Compassed about with many relatives and innumerable friends at home, out
+here Jan was singularly alone. In all that great city she knew no one
+save Peter, the doctor and the nurse. Some few women, knowing all the
+circumstances, had called and were ready to be kind and helpful and
+friendly, as women are all over India, but Fay would admit none but
+Peter--even to see Jan; and always begged her not to return the calls
+"till it was all over."
+
+Well, it was all over now. Fay would never be timid and ashamed any
+more.
+
+Jan had not shed a tear. The longing to cry that had assailed her so
+continuously in her first week had entirely left her. She felt
+clear-headed and cold and bitterly resentful. She would like to have
+made Hugo Tancred go in front of her into that quiet room and forced him
+to look at the girlish figure on the bed--his handiwork. She wanted to
+hurt him, to make him more wretched than he was already.
+
+A car stopped in the street below. Jan went very quietly to the door of
+the flat and listened at the top of the staircase.
+
+Steps were on the stairs, but they stopped at one of the flats below.
+
+Presently another car stopped. Again she went out and listened. The
+steps came up and up and she switched on the light in the passage.
+
+This time it was Peter.
+
+He looked very tired.
+
+"I thought you would come," Jan said. "She died at midnight."
+
+Peter closed the outer door, and taking Jan by the arm led her back into
+the sitting-room, where he put her in a corner of the big sofa and sat
+down beside her.
+
+He could not speak, and Jan saw that the tears she could not shed were
+in his eyes, those large dark eyes that could appear so sombre and then
+again so kind.
+
+Jan watched him enviously. She was acutely conscious of trifling things.
+She even noticed what very black eyebrows he had and how--as always,
+when he was either angry or deeply moved--the veins in his forehead
+stood out in a strongly-marked V.
+
+"It was best, I think," Jan said, and even to herself her voice sounded
+like the voice of a stranger. "She would have been very unhappy if she
+had lived."
+
+Peter started at the cool, hard tones, and looked at her. Then, simply
+and naturally, like a child, he took her hand and held it; and there was
+that in the human contact, in the firm, comfortable clasp, that seemed
+to break something down in Jan, and all at once she felt weak and faint
+and trembling. She leaned her head against the pillows piled high in the
+corner where Fay had always rested. The electric light in the verandah
+seemed suddenly to recede to an immense distance and became a tiny
+luminous pin-head, like a far lone star.
+
+She heard Peter moving about in the dining-room behind and clinking
+things, but she felt quite incapable of going to see what he was doing
+or of trying to be hospitable--besides, it was his house, he knew where
+things were, and she was so tired.
+
+And then he was standing over her, holding a tumbler against her
+chattering teeth.
+
+"Drink it," he said, and, though his voice sounded far away, it was firm
+and authoritative. "Quick; don't pretend you can't swallow, for you
+can."
+
+He tipped the glass, and something wet and cold ran over her chin:
+anything was better than that, and she tried to drink. As she did so
+she realised she was thirsty, drank it all eagerly and gasped.
+
+"Have you had anything to eat all day?" the dominating voice went on; it
+sounded much nearer now.
+
+"I can't remember," she said, feebly. "Oh, why did you give me all that
+brandy, it's made me so muzzy and confused, and there's so much I ought
+to see to."
+
+"You rest a bit first--you'll be all right presently."
+
+Someone lifted her by the knees and put the whole of her on the sofa. It
+was very comfortable; she was not so cold now. She lay quite still and
+closed her eyes. She had not had a real night's sleep since she reached
+Bombay. Fay was always restless and nervous, and Jan had not had her
+clothes off for forty-eight hours. The long strain was over, there was
+nothing to watch and wait for now. She would do as that voice said, rest
+for a few minutes.
+
+There was a white chuddah shawl folded on the end of the sofa. Fay had
+liked it spread over her knees, for she was nearly always chilly.
+
+Peter opened it and laid it very lightly over Jan, who never stirred.
+
+Then he sat down in a comfortable chair some distance off, where she
+would see him if she woke, and reviewed the situation, which was
+unconventional, certainly.
+
+He had sent his car away when he arrived, as it was but a step to the
+Yacht Club where he slept. Now, he felt he couldn't leave, for if Jan
+woke suddenly she would feel confused and probably frightened.
+
+"I never thought so little brandy could have had such an effect," Peter
+reflected half ruefully. "I suppose it's because she'd had nothing to
+eat. It's about the best thing that could have happened, but I never
+meant to hocus her like this."
+
+There she lay, a long white mound under the shawl. She had slipped her
+hand under her cheek and looked pathetically young and helpless.
+
+"I wonder what I'd better do," thought Peter.
+
+Mrs. Grundy commanded him to go at once. Common humanity bade him stay.
+
+Peter was very human, and he stayed.
+
+About half-past five Jan woke. She was certainly confused, but not in
+the least frightened. It was light, not brilliantly light as it would be
+a little later on, but clear and opalescent, as though the sun were
+shining through fold upon fold of grey-blue gauze.
+
+The electric light in the verandah and the one over Peter's head were
+still burning and looked garish and wan, and Jan's first coherent
+thought was, "How dreadfully wasteful to have had them on all
+night--Peter's electric light, too"--and then she saw him.
+
+His body was crumpled up in the big chair; his legs were thrust out
+stiffly in front of him. He looked a heartrending interpretation of
+discomfort in his evening clothes, for he hadn't even loosened the
+collar. He had thought of it, but felt it might be disrespectful to Jan.
+Besides, there was something of the chaperon about that collar.
+
+Jan's tears that had refused to soften sorrow during the anguish of the
+night came now, hot and springing, to blur that absurd, pathetic figure
+looped sideways in the big chair.
+
+It was so plain why he was there.
+
+She sniffed helplessly (of course, she had lost her handkerchief), and
+thrust her knuckles into her eyes like any schoolboy.
+
+When she could see again she noticed how thin was the queer, irregular
+face, with dark hollows round the eyes.
+
+"I wonder if they feed him properly at that Yacht Club," thought Jan.
+"And here are we using his house and his cook and everything."
+
+She swung her feet off the sofa and disentangled them from the shawl,
+folded it neatly and sat looking at Peter, who opened his eyes.
+
+For a full minute they stared at each other in silence, then he
+stretched himself and rose.
+
+"I say, have you slept?" he asked.
+
+"Till a minute ago ... Mr. Ledgard ... why did you stay? It was angelic
+of you, but you must be so dreadfully tired. I feel absolutely rested
+and, oh, so grateful--but so ashamed...."
+
+"Then you must have some tea," said Peter, inconsequently. "I'll go and
+rouse up Lalkhan and the cook. We can't get any ourselves, for he locks
+up the whole show every blessed night."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the East burial follows death with the greatest possible speed. Peter
+and the doctor and the nurse arranged everything. A friend of Peter's
+who had little children sent for Ayah and Tony and little Fay to spend
+the day, and Jan was grateful.
+
+Fay and her baby were laid in the English cemetery, and Jan was left to
+face the children as best she could.
+
+They had been happy, Ayah said, with the kind lady and her children.
+Tony went straight to his mother's room, the room that had been closed
+to him for three whole days.
+
+He came back to Jan and stood in front of her, searching her face with
+his grave, judging gaze.
+
+"What have you done with my Mummy?" he asked. "Have you carried her away
+and put her somewhere like you do Fay when she's naughty? You're strong
+enough."
+
+"Oh, Tony!" Jan whispered piteously. "I would have kept her if I could,
+but I wasn't strong enough for that."
+
+"Who has taken her, then?" Tony persisted. "Where is she? I've been
+everywhere, and she isn't in the bungalow."
+
+"God has taken her, Tony."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"I think," Jan said, timidly, "it was because she was very tired and ill
+and unhappy----"
+
+"But is she happier now and better?"
+
+"I hope so, I believe she is ... quite happy and well."
+
+"You're sure?" And Tony's eyes searched Jan's face. "You're sure _you_
+haven't put her somewhere?"
+
+"Tony, I want Mummy every bit as much as you do. Be a little good to
+me, sonny, for I'm dreadfully sad."
+
+Jan held out her hand and Tony took it doubtfully. She drew him nearer.
+
+"Try to be good to me, Tony, and love me a little ... it's all so hard."
+
+"I'll be good," he said, gravely, "because I promised Mummy ... but I
+can't love you yet--because--" here Tony sighed deeply, "I don't seem to
+feel like it."
+
+"Never mind," said Jan, lifting him on to her knee. "Never mind. I'll
+love you an extra lot to make up."
+
+"And Fay?" he asked.
+
+"And Fay--we must both love Fay more than ever now."
+
+"I do love Fay," Tony said, "because I'm used to her. She's been here a
+long time...."
+
+Suddenly his mouth went down at the corners and he leant against Jan's
+shoulder to hide his face. "I do want Mummy so," he whispered, as the
+slow, difficult tears welled over and fell. "I like so much to look at
+her."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was early afternoon, the hot part of the day. The children were
+asleep and Jan sat on the big sofa, finishing a warm jersey for little
+Fay to wear towards the end of the voyage. Peter, by means of every
+scrap of interest he possessed, had managed to secure her a three-berth
+cabin in a mail boat due to leave within the next fortnight. He insisted
+that she must take Ayah, who was more than eager to go, and that Ayah
+could easily get a passage back almost directly with people he knew who
+were coming out soon after Jan got home. He had written to them, and
+they would write to meet the boat at Aden.
+
+There was nothing Peter did not seem able to arrange.
+
+In the flat below a lady was singing the "Indian Love Lyrics" from the
+"Garden of Khama." She had a powerful voice and sang with considerable
+passion.
+
+    Less than the dust beneath thy chariot wheel,
+    Less than the rust that never stained thy sword.
+
+Jan frowned and fidgeted.
+
+The song went on, finished, and then the lady sang it all over again.
+Jan turned on the electric fan, for it was extremely hot, and the strong
+contralto voice made her feel even hotter. The whirr of the fan in no
+way drowned the voice, which now went on to proclaim with much _brio_
+that the temple bells were ringing and the month of marriages was
+drawing near. And then, very slowly and solemnly, but quite as loudly as
+before, came "When I am dying, lean over me tenderly----"
+
+Jan got up and stamped. Then she went swiftly for her topee and gloves
+and parasol, and fled from the bungalow.
+
+Lalkhan rushed after her to ask if she wanted a "tikka-gharri." He
+strongly disapproved of her walking in the streets alone, but Jan shook
+her head. The lift-man was equally eager to procure one, but again Jan
+defeated his desire and walked out into the hot street. Somehow she
+couldn't bear "The Garden of Khama" just then. It was Hugo Tancred's
+favourite verse, and was among the few books Fay appeared to possess,
+Fay who was lying in the English cemetery, and so glad to be there ...
+at twenty-five.
+
+What was the good of life and love, if that was all it led to? In spite
+of the heat Jan walked feverishly and fast, down the shady side of the
+Mayo Road into Esplanade Road, where the big shops were, and, just then,
+no shade at all.
+
+The hot dust seemed to rise straight out of the pavement and strike her
+in the face, and all the air was full of the fat yellow smell that
+prevails in India when its own inhabitants have taken their mid-day
+meal.
+
+Each bare-legged gharri-man slumbered on the little box of his carriage,
+hanging on in that amazingly precarious fashion in which natives of the
+East seem able to sleep anywhere.
+
+On Jan went, anywhere, anywhere away from the garden of Khama and that
+travesty of love, as she conceived it. She remembered the day when she
+thought them such charming songs and thrilled in sympathy with Fay when
+Hugo sang them. Oh, why did that woman sing them to-day? Would she ever
+get the sound out of her ears?
+
+She had reached Churchgate Street, which was deserted and deep in shade.
+She turned down and presently came to the Cathedral standing in its trim
+garden bright with English flowers. The main door was open and Jan went
+in.
+
+Here the haunting love-lyrics were hushed. It was so still, not even a
+sweeper to break the blessed peace.
+
+Restlessly, Jan walked round the outer aisles, reading the inscriptions
+on marble tablets and brasses, many of them dating back to the later
+eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Men died young out in India
+in those days; hardly any seemed to live beyond forty-two, many died in
+the twenties. On nearly all the tablets the words "zeal" or "zealous"
+regularly appeared. With regard to their performance of their duties
+these dead and gone men who had helped to make the India of to-day had
+evidently had a very definite notion as to their own purpose in life.
+The remarks were guarded and remarkably free from exaggerated tributes
+to the virtues they celebrated. One Major-General Bellasis was described
+as "that very respectable Officer--who departed this life while he was
+in the meritorious discharge of his duty presiding at the Military
+Board." Others died "from exposure to the sun"; nearly all seemed to
+have displayed "unremitting" or "characteristic zeal" in the discharge
+of their duties.
+
+Jan sat down, and gradually it seemed as though the spirits and souls of
+those departed men, those ordinary everyday men--whose descendants might
+probably be met any day in the Yacht Club now--seemed to surround her in
+a great company, all pointing in one direction and with one voice
+declaring, "This is the WAY."
+
+Jan fell on her knees and prayed that her stumbling feet might be
+guided upon it, that she should in no wise turn aside, however steep and
+stony it might prove.
+
+And as she knelt there came upon her the conviction that here was the
+true meaning of life as lived upon the earth; just this, that each
+should do his job.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE END OF THE DREAM
+
+
+She walked back rather slowly. It was a little cooler, but dusty, and
+the hot pavements made her feet ache. She was just wondering whether she
+would take a gharri when a motor stopped at the curb and Peter got out.
+
+"What are you doing?" he asked crossly. "Why are you walking in all this
+heat? You can't play these games in India. Get in."
+
+He held the door open for her.
+
+"Good afternoon, Mr. Ledgard," Jan said, sweetly. "Is it worth while for
+such a little way?"
+
+"Get in," Peter said again, and Jan meekly got in.
+
+"I was just coming to see you, and I could have taken you anywhere you
+wanted to go, if only you'd waited. Why didn't you take a gharri?"
+
+"Since you must know," Jan said, smiling at the angry Peter, "I went out
+because I wanted to go out. And I walked because I wanted to walk."
+
+"You can't do things just because you want to do 'em in this infernal
+country--you must consider whether it's a suitable time."
+
+Jan made no answer, and silence reigned till they reached the bungalow.
+
+Peter followed her in.
+
+"Where did you go?" he asked. "And why?"
+
+"I went to the Cathedral, and my reason was that I simply couldn't stay
+in the bungalow because the lady below was singing 'Less than the
+dust.'"
+
+"I know," Peter said grimly. "Just the sort of thing she would sing."
+
+"She sang very well," Jan owned honestly, "but when Fay was first
+engaged she and Hugo used to sing those songs to each other--it seemed
+all day long--and this afternoon I couldn't bear it. It seemed such a
+sham somehow--so false and unreal, if it only led--to this."
+
+"It's real enough while it lasts, you know," Peter remarked in the
+detached, elderly tone he sometimes adopted. "That sort of thing's all
+right for an episode, but it's a bit too thin for marriage."
+
+"But surely episodes often end in marriage?"
+
+"Not that sort, and if they do it's generally pretty disastrous. A woman
+who felt she was less than the dust and rust and weeds and all that rot
+wouldn't be much good to a man who had to do his job, for she wouldn't
+do hers, you know."
+
+"Then you, too, think that's the main thing--to do your job?"
+
+"It seems to me it's the only thing that justifies one's existence.
+Anyway, to try to do it decently."
+
+"And you don't think one ought to expect to be happy and have things go
+smoothly?"
+
+"Well, they won't always, you know, whether you expect it or not; but
+the job remains, so it's just as well to make up your mind to it."
+
+"I suppose," Jan said thoughtfully, "that's a religion."
+
+"It pans out as well as most," said Peter.
+
+The days that had gone so slowly went quickly enough now. Jan had much
+to arrange and no word came from Hugo. She succeeded in getting the
+monthly bills from the cook, and paid them, and very timidly she asked
+Peter if she might pay the wages for the time his servants had waited
+upon them; but Peter was so huffy and cross she never dared to mention
+it again.
+
+The night before they all sailed Peter dined with her, and, after
+dinner, took her for one last drive over Malabar Hill. The moon was
+full, and when they reached Ridge Road he stopped the car and they got
+out and stood on the cliff, looking over the city just as they had done
+on her first evening in Bombay.
+
+Some scented tree was in bloom and the air was full of its soft
+fragrance.
+
+For some minutes they stood in silence, then Jan broke it by asking:
+"Mr. Ledgard, could Hugo take the children from me?"
+
+"He could, of course, legally--but I don't for a minute imagine he will,
+for he couldn't keep them. What about his people? Will they want to
+interfere?"
+
+"I don't think so; from the little he told us they are not very well
+off. They live in Guernsey. His father was something in salt, I think,
+out here. We've none of us seen them. They didn't come to Fay's
+wedding. I gather they are very strict in their views--both his father
+and mother--and there are two sisters. But Fay said Hugo hardly ever
+wrote--or heard from them."
+
+"There's just one thing you must face, Miss Ross," and Peter felt a
+brute as he looked at Jan pale and startled in the bright moonlight.
+"Hugo Tancred might marry again."
+
+"Oh, surely no one would marry him after all this!"
+
+"Whoever did would probably know nothing of 'all this.' Remember Hugo
+Tancred has a way with women; he's a fascinating chap when he likes,
+he's good-looking and plausible, and always has an excellent reason for
+all his misfortunes. If he does marry again he'll marry money, and
+_then_ he might demand the children."
+
+"Perhaps she wouldn't want them."
+
+"We'll hope not."
+
+"And I can do nothing--nothing to make them safe?"
+
+"I fear--nothing--only your best for them."
+
+"I'll do that," said Jan.
+
+They stood shoulder to shoulder in the scented stillness of the night.
+The shadows were black and sharp in the bright moonlight and the
+tom-toms throbbed in the city below.
+
+"I wonder," Jan said presently, "if I shall ever be able to do anything
+for you, Mr. Ledgard. You have done everything for us out here."
+
+"Would you really like to do something?" Peter asked eagerly. "I
+wouldn't have mentioned it if you hadn't said that just now. Would you
+write pretty often? You see, I've no people of my very own. Aunts and
+uncles and cousins don't keep in touch with one out here. They're kind,
+awfully kind when I go home on leave, but it takes a man's own folk to
+remember to write every mail."
+
+"I'll write every mail," Jan promised eagerly, "and when you take your
+next leave, remember we expect you at Wren's End."
+
+"I'll remember," said Peter, "and it may be sooner than you think."
+
+They sailed next day. Jan had spent six weeks in Bombay, and the whole
+thing seemed a dream.
+
+The voyage back was very different from the voyage out. The boat was
+crowded, and nearly all were Service people going home on leave. Jan
+found them very kind and friendly, and the children, with plenty of
+others to play with, were for the most part happy and good.
+
+The journey across France was rather horrid. Little Fay was as
+obstreperous as Tony was disagreeably silent and aloof. Jan thanked
+heaven when the crowded train steamed into Charing Cross.
+
+There, at the very door of their compartment, a girl was waiting. A girl
+so small, she might have been a child except for a certain decision and
+capability about everything she did. She seized Jan, kissed her
+hurriedly and announced that she had got a nice little furnished flat
+for them till they should go to the country, and that Hannah had tea
+ready; this young person, herself, helped to carry their smaller
+baggage to a taxi, packed them in, demanded Jan's keys and announced
+that she would bring the luggage in another taxi. She gave the address
+to the man, and a written slip to Jan, and vanished to collect their
+cabin baggage.
+
+It was all done so briskly and efficiently that it left Ayah and the
+children quite breathless, accustomed as they were to the leisurely
+methods of the East.
+
+"Who is vat mem?" asked little Fay, as the taxi door was slammed by this
+energetic young person.
+
+"Is she quite a mem?" suggested the accurate Tony. "Is she old enough or
+big enough?"
+
+"Who is vat mem?" little Fay repeated.
+
+"That," said Jan with considerable satisfaction in her voice, "is Meg."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+MEG
+
+
+It was inevitable as the refrain of a _rondeau_ that when Jan said
+"that's Meg" little Fay should demand "What nelse?"
+
+Now there was a good deal of "nelse" about Meg, and she requires some
+explanation, going back several years.
+
+Like most Scots, Anthony Ross had been faithful to his relations whether
+he felt affection for them or not; sometimes even when they had not a
+thought in common with him and he rather disliked them than otherwise.
+
+And this was so in the case of one Amelia Ross, his first cousin, who
+was head-mistress of a flourishing and well-established school for
+"young ladies," in the Regent's Park district.
+
+She had been a head-mistress for many years, and was well over fifty
+when she married a meek, small, nothingly man who had what Thackeray
+calls "a little patent place." And it appeared that she added the
+husband to the school in much the same spirit as she would have
+increased the number of chairs in her dining-room, and with no more
+appreciable result in her life. On her marriage she became Mrs.
+Ross-Morton, and Mr. Morton went in and out of the front door,
+breakfasted and dined at Ribston Hall, caught his bus at the North Gate
+and went daily to his meek little work. It is presumed that he lived on
+terms of affectionate intimacy with his wife, but no one who saw them
+together could have gathered this.
+
+Now Anthony Ross disliked his cousin Amelia. He detested her school,
+which he considered was one of the worst examples of a bad old period.
+He suspected her of being hard and grasping, he knew she was dull, and
+her husband bored him--not to tears, but to profanity. Yet since she was
+his cousin and a hard-working, upright woman, and since they had played
+together as children in Scotland and her father and mother had been kind
+to him then, he could never bring himself to drop Amelia. Not for worlds
+would he have allowed Jan or Fay to go to her school, but he did allow
+them, or rather he humbly entreated them, to visit it occasionally when
+invited to some function or other. Jan's education after her mother's
+death had been the thinnest scrape sandwiched between many household
+cares and much attendance upon her father's whims. Fay was allowed
+classes and visiting governesses, but their father could never bring
+himself to spare either of them to the regular discipline of school, and
+Cousin Amelia bewailed the desultory training of Anthony's children.
+
+In 1905, Jan and Fay had been to a party at Ribston Hall: tea in the
+garden followed by a pastoral play. Anthony was sitting in the balcony,
+smoking, when the girls came back. He saw their hansom and ran
+downstairs to meet them, as he always did. They were a family who went
+in for affectionate greetings.
+
+"Daddie," cried Fay, seizing her father by the arm, "one of the seven
+wonders of the world has happened. We have found an interesting person
+at Ribston Hall."
+
+Jan took the other arm. "We can't possibly tell you all about it under
+an hour, so we'd better go and sit in the balcony." And they gently
+propelled him towards the staircase.
+
+"Not if you're going to discuss Cousin Amelia," Anthony protested. "You
+have carrying voices, both of you."
+
+"Cousin Amelia is only incidental," Jan said, when they were all three
+seated in the balcony. "The main theme is concerned with a queer little
+pixie creature called Meg Morton. She's a pupil-governess, and she's
+sixteen and a half--just the same age as Fay."
+
+"She doesn't reach up to Jan's elbow," Fay added, "and she chaperons the
+girls for music and singing, and sits in the drawing-class because the
+master can't be quite seventy yet."
+
+"She's the wee-est thing you ever saw, and they dress her in Cousin
+Amelia's discarded Sunday frocks."
+
+"That's impossible," Anthony interrupted. "Amelia is so massive and
+square; if the girl's so small she'd look like 'the Marchioness.'"
+
+"She does, she does!" Jan cried delightedly. "Of course the garments are
+'made down,' but in the most elderly way possible. Daddie, can you
+picture a Botticelli angel of sixteen, with masses of Titian-red hair,
+clad in a queer plush garment once worn by Cousin Amelia, that retains
+all its ancient frumpiness of line. And it's not only her appearance
+that's so quaint, _she_ is quaint inside."
+
+"We were attracted by her hair," Fay went on "(You'll go down like a
+ninepin before that hair), and we got her in a corner and hemmed her in
+and declared it was her duty to attend to us because we were strangers
+and shy, and in three minutes we were friends. Sixteen, Daddie! And a
+governess-pupil in Cousin Amelia's school. She's a niece of the little
+husband, and Cousin Amelia is preening herself like anything because she
+takes her for nothing and makes her work like ten people."
+
+"Did the little girl say so?"
+
+"Of course not," Jan answered indignantly, "but Cousin Amelia did. Oh,
+how thankful I am she is _your_ cousin, dear, and once-removed from us!"
+
+"How many generations will it take to remove her altogether?" Fay asked.
+"However," she added, "if we can have the pixie out and give her a good
+time I shan't mind the relationship so much. We _must_ do something,
+Daddie. What shall it be?"
+
+Anthony Ross smoked thoughtfully and said very little. Perhaps he did
+not even listen with marked attention, because he was enjoying his
+girls. Just to see them healthy and happy; to know that they were
+naturally kind and gay; to hear them frank and eager and
+loquacious--sometimes gave him a sensation of almost physical pleasure.
+He was like an idler basking in the sun, conscious of nothing but just
+the warmth and comfort of it.
+
+Whatever those girls wanted they always got. Anthony's diplomacy was
+requisitioned and was, as usual, successful; for, in spite of her
+disapproval, Mrs. Ross-Morton could never resist her cousin's charm.
+This time the result was that one Saturday afternoon in the middle of
+June little Meg Morton, bearing a battered leather portmanteau and clad
+in the most-recently-converted plush abomination, appeared at the tall
+house in St. George's Square to stay over the week-end.
+
+It was the mid-term holiday, and from the first moment to the last the
+visit was one almost delirious orgy of pleasure to the little
+pupil-governess.
+
+It was also a revelation.
+
+It would be hard to conceive of anything odder than the appearance of
+Meg Morton at this time. She just touched five feet in height, and was
+very slenderly and delicately made, with absurd, tiny hands and feet.
+Yet there was a finish about the thin little body that proclaimed her
+fully grown. Her eyes, with their thick, dark lashes, looked overlarge
+in the pale little pointed face; strange eyes and sombre, with big,
+bright pupil, and curious dark-blue iris flecked with brown. Her
+features were regular, and her mouth would have been pretty had the lips
+not lacked colour. As it was, all the colour about Meg seemed
+concentrated in her hair; red as a flame and rippled as a river under a
+fresh breeze. There was so much of it, too, the little head seemed bowed
+in apology beneath its weight.
+
+Yet for the time being Meg forgot to be apologetic about her hair, for
+Anthony and his girls frankly admired it.
+
+These adorable, kind, amusing people actually admired it, and said so.
+Hitherto Meg's experience had been that it was a thing to be slurred
+over, like a deformity. If mentioned, it was to be deprecated. In the
+strictly Evangelical circles where hitherto her lot had been cast, they
+even tried vainly to explain it away.
+
+She had, of course, heard of artists, but she never expected to meet
+any. That sort of thing lay outside the lives of those who had to make
+their living as quickly as possible in beaten tracks; tracks so
+well-beaten, in fact, that all the flowers had been trodden underfoot
+and exterminated.
+
+Meg, at sixteen, had received so little from life that her expectations
+were of the humblest. And as she stood before the glass in a pretty
+bedroom, fastening her one evening dress (of shiny black silk that
+crackled, made with the narrow V in front affected by Mrs. Ross-Morton),
+preparatory to going to the play for the first time in her life, she
+could have exclaimed, like the little old woman of the story, "This be
+never I!"
+
+Anthony Ross was wholly surprising to Meg.
+
+This handsome, merry gentleman with thick, brown hair as crinkly as her
+own; who was domineered over and palpably adored by these two, to her,
+equally amazing girls--seemed so very, very young to be anybody's
+father.
+
+He frankly owned to enjoying things.
+
+Now, according to Meg's experience, grown-up people--elderly
+people--seldom enjoyed anything; above all, never alluded to their
+enjoyment.
+
+Life was a thing to be endured with fortitude, its sorrows borne with
+Christian resignation; its joys, if there were any joys, discreetly
+slurred over. Joys were insidious, dangerous things that might lead to
+the leaving undone of obvious duties. To seek joy and insure its being
+shared by others, bravely and honestly believing it to be an excellent
+thing, was to Meg an entirely unknown frame of mind.
+
+After the play, in Meg's room the three girls were brushing their hair
+together; to be accurate, Jan was brushing Fay's and Meg admiring the
+process.
+
+"Have you any sisters?" Jan asked. She was always interested in people's
+relations.
+
+"No," said Meg. "There are, mercifully, only three of us, my two
+brothers and me. If there had been any more I don't know what my poor
+little Papa would have done."
+
+"Why do you call him your 'poor little papa'?" Fay asked curiously.
+
+"Because he is poor--dreadfully--and little, and very melancholy. He
+suffers so from depression."
+
+"Why?" asked the downright Jan.
+
+"Partly because he has indigestion, _constant_ indigestion, and then
+there's us, and boys are so expensive, they will grow so. It upsets him
+dreadfully."
+
+"But they can't help growing," Fay objected.
+
+"It wouldn't matter so much if they didn't both do it at once. But you
+see, there's only a year between them, and they're just about the same
+size. If only one had been smaller, he could have worn the outgrown
+things. As it is, it's always new clothes for both of them. Papa's are
+no sort of use, and even the cheapest suits cost a lot, and boots are
+perfectly awful."
+
+Meg looked so serious that Fay and Jan, who were like the lilies of the
+field, and expected new and pretty frocks at reasonable intervals as a
+matter of course, looked serious too; for the first time confronted by a
+problem whose possibility they had never even considered before.
+
+"He must be pleased with you," Jan said, encouragingly. "_You're_ not
+too big."
+
+"Yes, but then I'm not a boy. Papa's clothes would have made down for me
+beautifully if I'd been a boy; as it is, they're no use." Meg sighed,
+then added more cheerfully. "But I cost less in other ways, and several
+relations send old clothes to me. They are never too small."
+
+"Do you like the relations' clothes?" Fay asked.
+
+"Of course not," said Meg, simply. "They are generally hideous; but,
+after all, they cover me and save expense."
+
+The spoiled daughters of Anthony Ross gazed at Meg with horror-stricken
+eyes. To them this seemed a most tragic state of things.
+
+"Do they all," Fay asked timidly, "wear such ... rich materials--like
+Cousin Amelia?"
+
+"They're fond of plush, as a rule, but there's velveteen as well, and
+sometimes a cloth dress. One was mustard-coloured, and embittered my
+life for a whole year."
+
+Jan suddenly ceased to brush Fay's hair and went and sat on the bed
+beside Meg and put her arm round her. Fay's pretty face, framed in
+fluffy masses of fair hair, was solemn in excess of sympathy.
+
+"I shouldn't care a bit if only the boys were through Sandhurst and
+safely into the Indian Army--but I do hate them having to go without
+nearly everything. Trevor's a King's Cadet, but they wouldn't give us
+two cadetships ... Still," she added, more cheerfully, "it's cheaper
+than anything else for a soldier's son."
+
+"Is your father a soldier?" asked Jan.
+
+"Oh, yes, a major in the Westshires; but he had to leave the Army
+because of his health, and his pension is very small, and mother had so
+little money. I sometimes think it killed her trying to do everything on
+nothing."
+
+"Were you quite small when she died?" Fay asked in a sympathetic
+whisper.
+
+"Oh, no; I was nearly twelve, and quite as big as I am now. Then I kept
+house while the boys were at Bedford, but when they went to Sandhurst
+poor little Papa thought I'd better get some education, too, and Uncle
+John's wife offered to take me for nothing, so here I am. HERE, it's too
+wonderful. Who could have dreamed that Ribston Hall would lead to this?"
+And Meg snuggled down in Jan's kind embrace, her red hair spread around
+her like a veil.
+
+"Are some of the richly-dressed relations nice?" Jan asked hopefully.
+
+"I don't know if you'd think them nice--you seem to expect such a lot
+from people--but they're quite kind--only it's a different sort of
+kindness from yours here. They don't laugh and expect you to enjoy
+yourself, like _your_ father. My brothers say they are dull ... they
+call them--I'm afraid it's very ungrateful--the weariful rich. But I
+expect we're weariful to them too. I suppose poor relations _are_ boring
+if you're well-off yourself. But we get pretty tired, too, when they
+talk us over."
+
+"But do you mean to say they talk you over _to_ you?"
+
+"Always," Meg said firmly. "How badly we manage, how improvident we are,
+how Papa ought to rouse himself and I ought to manage better, and how
+foolish it is to let the boys go into the Army instead of banks and
+things ... And yet, you know, it hasn't cost much for Trevor, and once
+he's in he'll be able to manage, and Jo said he'd enlist if there was
+any more talk of banks, and poor little Papa had to give in--so there it
+is."
+
+"How much older are they than you?" Jan asked.
+
+"Trevor's nineteen and Jo's eighteen, and they are the greatest darlings
+in the world. They always lifted the heavy saucepans for me at Bedford,
+and filled the buckets and did the outsides of the windows, and carried
+up the coals to Papa's sitting-room before they went to school in the
+morning, and they very seldom grumbled at my cooking...."
+
+"But where were the servants?" Fay asked innocently.
+
+Meg laughed. "Oh, we couldn't have any servants. A woman came in the
+morning. Papa dined at his club, and I managed for the boys and me. But,
+oh dear, they do eat a lot, and joints are so dear. Sheep's heads and
+things pall if you have them more than once a week. They're such a mixty
+sort of meat, so gummy."
+
+"_I_ can cook," Jan announced, then added humbly, "at least, I've been
+to classes, but I don't get much practice. Cook isn't at all fond of
+having me messing in her kitchen."
+
+"It isn't the cooking that's so difficult," said Meg; "it's getting
+things to cook. It's all very well for the books to say 'Take' this and
+that. My experience is that you can never 'take' anything. You have to
+buy every single ingredient, and there's never anything like enough. We
+tried being fruitarians and living on dates and figs and nuts all
+squashed together, but it didn't seem to come a bit cheaper, for the
+boys were hungry again directly and said it was hog-wash."
+
+"Was your papa a fruitarian too?" Fay asked.
+
+"Oh, no, he can't play those tricks; he has to be most careful. He never
+had his meals with us. Our meals would have been too rough for him. I
+got him breakfast and afternoon tea. He generally went out for the
+others."
+
+Jan and Fay looked thoughtful.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Amelia Ross-Morton was a fair judge of character. When she consented to
+take her husband's niece as a governess-pupil she had been dubious as to
+the result. She very soon discovered, however, that the small red-haired
+girl was absolutely trustworthy, that she had a power of keeping order
+quite disproportionate to her size, that she got through a perfectly
+amazing amount of work, and did whatever she was asked as a matter of
+course. Thus she became a valuable factor in the school, receiving
+nothing in return save her food and such clothes as Mrs. Ross-Morton
+considered too shabby for her own wear.
+
+At the end of the first year Meg ceased to receive any lessons. Her day
+was fully occupied in teaching the younger and chaperoning the elder
+girls. Only one stipulation did she make at the beginning of each
+term--that she should be allowed to accept, on all reasonable occasions,
+the invitations of Anthony Ross and his daughters, and she made this
+condition with so much firmness that Anthony's cousin knew better than
+to be unreasonably domineering, as was her usual habit. Moreover, though
+it was against her principles to do anything to further the enjoyment
+of persons in a subordinate position, she was, in a way, flattered that
+Anthony and his girls should thus single out her "niece by marriage" and
+appear to enjoy her society.
+
+Thus it came about that Meg went a good deal to St. George's Square and
+nearly always spent part of each holiday with Fay and Jan wherever they
+happened to be.
+
+The queer clothes were kept for wear at Ribston Hall, and by
+degrees--although she never had any money--she became possessed of
+garments more suitable to her age and colouring.
+
+Again and again Anthony painted her. She sat for him with untiring
+patience and devotion. She was always entirely at her ease with him, and
+prattled away quite simply of the life that seemed to him so
+inexpressibly hard and dreary.
+
+Only once had he interfered on her behalf at Ribston Hall, and then
+sorely against Meg's will. She was sitting for him one day, with her
+veil of flaming hair spread round her, when she said, suddenly, "I
+wonder why it is incorrect to send invitations by post to people living
+in the same town?"
+
+"But it isn't," Anthony objected. "Everybody does it."
+
+"Not in schools," Meg said firmly. "Mrs. Ross-Morton will never send
+invitations to people living in London through the post--she says it
+isn't polite. They must go by hand."
+
+"I never heard such nonsense," Anthony exclaimed crossly. "If she
+doesn't send 'em by post, how _does_ she send them?"
+
+"I take them generally, in the evening, after school, and deliver them
+at all the houses. Some are fairly near, of course--a lot of her friends
+live in Regent's Park--but sometimes I have to go quite a long way by
+bus. I don't mind that in summer, when it's light, but in winter it's
+horrid going about the lonely roads ... People speak to one...."
+
+Anthony Ross stepped from behind his easel.
+
+"And what do you do?" he asked.
+
+"I run," Meg said simply, "and I can generally run much faster than they
+do ... but it's a little bit frightening."
+
+"It's infernal," Anthony said furiously. "I shall speak to Amelia at
+once. You are never to do it again."
+
+In vain did Meg plead, almost with tears, that he would do nothing of
+the kind. He was roused and firm.
+
+He did "speak to Amelia." He astonished that good lady as much as he
+annoyed her. Nevertheless Mrs. Ross-Morton used the penny post for her
+invitations as long as Meg remained at Ribston Hall.
+
+At the end of two years Major Morton, who had removed from Bedford to
+Cheltenham, wrote a long, querulous letter to his sister-in-law to the
+effect that if--like the majority of girls nowadays--his daughter chose
+to spend her life far from his sheltering care, it was time she earned
+something.
+
+Mrs. Ross-Morton replied that only now was Meg beginning to repay all
+the expense incurred on her behalf in the way of board, clothing and
+tuition; and it was most unreasonable to expect any salary for quite
+another year.
+
+Major Morton decided to remove Meg from Ribston Hall.
+
+Many acrimonious letters passed between her aunt and her father before
+this was finally accomplished, and Meg left "under a cloud."
+
+To her great astonishment, her meek little uncle appeared at Paddington
+to see her off. Just as the train was starting he thrust an envelope
+into her hand.
+
+"It hasn't been fair," he almost shouted--for the train was already
+beginning to move. "You worked hard, you deserved some pay ... a little
+present ... but please don't mention it to your aunt ... She is so
+decided in her views...."
+
+When Meg opened the envelope she found three ten-pound notes. She had
+never seen so much money before, and burst into tears; but it was not
+because of the magnitude of the gift. She felt she had never properly
+appreciated her poor little uncle, and her conscience smote her.
+
+This was at Christmas.
+
+The weariful rich sat in conclave over Meg, and it was decided that she
+should in March go as companion and secretary to a certain Mrs. Trent
+slightly known to one of them.
+
+Mrs. Trent was kindly, careless, and quite generous as regards money.
+She had grown-up daughters, and they lived in one of the Home Counties
+where there are many country-houses and plenty of sport. Meg proved to
+be exceedingly useful, did whatever she was asked to do, and a great
+many things no one had ever done before. She shared in the fun, and for
+the first time since her mother died was not overworked.
+
+Her employer was as keen on every form of pleasure as her own daughters.
+She exercised the very smallest supervision over them and none at all
+over the "quite useful" little companion.
+
+Many men came to the easy-going, lavish house, and Meg, with pretty
+frocks, abundant leisure and deliriously prim Ribston-Hallish manners,
+came in for her full share of admiration.
+
+It happened that at the end of July Anthony Ross came up to London in
+the afternoon to attend and speak at a dinner in aid of some artists'
+charity. He and Jan were staying with friends at Teddington; Fay, an
+aunt and the servants were already at Wren's End--all but Hannah, the
+severe Scottish housemaid, who remained in charge. She was grim and
+gaunt and plain, with a thick, black moustache, and Anthony liked her
+less than he could have wished. But she had been Jan's nurse, and was
+faithful and trustworthy beyond words. He would never let Jan go to the
+country ahead of him, for without her he always left behind everything
+most vital to his happiness, so she was to join him next day and see
+that his painting-tackle was all packed.
+
+The house in St. George's Square was nominally shut up and shrouded in
+dust-sheets, but Hannah had "opened up" the dining-room on Anthony's
+behalf, and there he sat and slumbered till she should choose to bring
+him some tea.
+
+He was awakened by an opening door and Hannah's voice announcing, not
+tea, but:
+
+"Miss Morton to see you, sir."
+
+There seemed a thousand "r's" in both the Morton and the sir, and
+Anthony, who felt that there was something ominous and arresting in
+Hannah's voice, was wide-awake before she could shut the door again.
+
+Sure enough it was Meg, clad in a long grey dust-cloak and motor bonnet,
+the grey veil flung back from a very pale face.
+
+Meg, looking a wispy little shadow of woe.
+
+Anthony came forward with outstretched hands.
+
+"Meg, my child, what good wind has blown you here this afternoon? I
+thought you were having ever such a gay time down in the country."
+
+But Meg made no effort to grasp the greeting hands. On the contrary, she
+moved so that the whole width of the dining-room table was between them.
+
+"Wait," she said, "you mustn't shake hands with me till I tell you what
+I've done ... perhaps you won't want to then."
+
+And Anthony saw that she was trembling.
+
+"Come and sit down," he said. "Something's wrong, I can see. What is
+it?"
+
+But she stood where she was, looking at him with large, tragic eyes;
+laid down a leather despatch-case she was carrying, and seized the edge
+of the table as if for support.
+
+"I'd rather not sit down yet," she said. "Perhaps when you've heard what
+I've got to tell you, you'll never want me to sit down in your house
+again ... and yet ... I did pray so you'd be here ... I knew it was most
+unlikely ... but I did pray so ... And you _are_ here."
+
+Anthony was puzzled. Meg was not given to making scenes or going into
+heroics.
+
+It was evident that something had happened to shake her out of her usual
+almost cynical calm.
+
+"You'd be much better to sit down," he said, soothingly. "You see, if
+you stand, so must I, and it's such an uncomfortable way of talking."
+
+She pulled out a chair and sat down at the table, took off her gloves,
+and two absurd small thumbs appeared above its edge, the knuckles white
+and tense with the strength of her grip.
+
+Anthony seated himself in a deep chair beside the fireplace. He was in
+shadow. Meg faced the light, and he was shocked at the appearance of the
+little smitten face.
+
+"Now tell me," he said gently, "just as little or as much as you like."
+
+"This morning," she said hoarsely, "I ran away with a man ... in a
+motor-car."
+
+Anthony was certainly startled, but all he said was, "That being the
+case, why are you here, my dear, and what have you done with him?"
+
+"He was married...."
+
+"Have you only just found that out?"
+
+"No, I knew it all along. His wife is hard and disagreeable and older
+than he is ... and he's thirty-five ... and they can't live together,
+and she won't divorce him and he can't divorce her ... and I loved him
+so much and thought how beautiful it would be to give up everything and
+make it up to him."
+
+"Yes?" said Anthony, for Meg paused as though unable to go on.
+
+"And it seemed very wonderful and noble to do this, and I forgot my poor
+little Papa and those boys in India, and you and Jan and Fay and ... I
+was very mad and very happy ... till this morning, when we actually went
+off in his car."
+
+"But where," Anthony asked in a voice studiously even and quiet, "_are_
+he and his car?"
+
+"I don't know," Meg said hopelessly, "unless they're still at the place
+where we had lunch ... and I don't suppose he'd stay there all this
+time...."
+
+Anthony felt a great desire to laugh, but Meg looked so woebegone and
+desperately serious that he restrained the impulse and said very kindly:
+"I don't yet understand how, having embarked upon such an enterprise,
+you happen to be here ... alone. Did you quarrel at lunch, or what?"
+
+"We didn't _have_ lunch," Meg exclaimed with a sob. "At least, I didn't
+... it was the lunch that did it."
+
+"Did what?"
+
+"Made me realise what I had done, and go away."
+
+"Meg dear," said Anthony, striving desperately to keep his voice steady,
+"was it a very bad lunch?"
+
+"I don't know," she answered with the utmost seriousness. "We hadn't
+begun; we were just going to, when I noticed his hands, and his nails
+were dirty, and they looked horrid, and suddenly it came over me that if
+I stayed ... those hands...."
+
+She let go of the table, put her elbows upon it and hid her face in her
+hands.
+
+Anthony made no sound, and presently, still with hidden face, she went
+on again:
+
+"And in that minute I saw what I was doing, and that I could never be
+the same again, and I remembered my poor little dyspeptic Papa, and my
+dear, dear brothers so far away in India ... and you and Jan and
+Fay--_all_ the special people I pray for every single night and
+morning--and I felt that if I didn't get away that minute I should
+die...."
+
+"And how did you get away?"
+
+"It was quite simple. There was something wrong with the car (that's how
+he got his hands so dirty), and he'd sent for a mechanic, and just as we
+were sitting down to lunch, the waiter said the motor-man had come ...
+and he went out to the garage to speak to him...."
+
+"Yes?" Anthony remarked, for again Meg paused.
+
+"So I just walked out of the front door. No one saw me, and the station
+was across the road, and I went right in and asked when there was a
+train to London, and there _was_ one going in five minutes; so I took a
+ticket and came straight here, for I knew somehow, even if you were all
+away, Hannah would let me stay ... just to-night. I knew she would ..."
+and Meg began to sob feebly.
+
+And, as if in response to the mention of her name, Hannah appeared,
+bearing a tray with tea upon it. Hannah was short and square; she
+stumped as she walked, and she carried a tray very high and stately, as
+though it were a sacrifice. As she came in Meg rose and hastily moved to
+the window, standing there with her back to the room.
+
+"I thocht," said Hannah, as though challenging somebody to contradict
+her, "that Miss Morton would be the better for an egg to her tea. She
+looks just like a bit soap after a hard day's washing."
+
+"I had no lunch," said a muffled, apologetic voice from the window.
+
+"Come away, then, and take yer tea," Hannah said sharply. "Young leddies
+should have more sense than go fasting so many hours."
+
+As it was evident that Hannah had no intention of leaving the room till
+she saw Meg sitting at the table, the girl came back and sat down.
+
+"See that she gets her tea, sir," she said in a low, admonitory voice to
+Anthony. "She's pretty far through."
+
+The tray was set at the end of the table. Anthony came and sat down
+behind it.
+
+"I'll pour out," he said, "and until you've drunk one cup of tea, eaten
+one piece of bread-and-butter and one egg, you're not to speak one word.
+_I_ will talk."
+
+He tried to, disjointedly and for the most part nonsense. Meg drank her
+tea, and to her own amazement ate up her egg and several pieces of
+bread-and-butter with the utmost relish.
+
+As the meal proceeded, Anthony noted that she grew less haggard. The
+tears still hung on her eyelashes, but the eyes themselves were a
+thought less tragic.
+
+When Hannah came for the tray she gave a grunt of satisfaction at the
+sight of the egg-shell and the empty plates.
+
+"Now," said Anthony, "we must thresh this subject out and settle what's
+to be done. I suppose you left a message for the Trents. What did you
+tell them?"
+
+"Lies," said Meg. "He said we must have a good start. His yacht was at
+Southampton. And I left a note that I'd been suddenly summoned to Papa,
+and would write from there. They'd all gone for a picnic, you know--and
+it was arranged I was to have a headache that morning ... I've got it
+now with a vengeance ... It seemed rather fun when we were planning it.
+Now it all looks so mean and horrid ... Besides, lots of people saw us
+in his motor ... and people always know me again because of my hair.
+Everyone knew him ... the whole county made a fuss of him, and it seemed
+so wonderful ... that he should care like that for me...."
+
+"Doubtless it did," said Anthony drily. "But we must consider what is to
+be done now. If you said you were going to your father, perhaps the best
+thing you can do is to go to him, and write to the Trents from there. I
+hope you didn't inform _him_ of your intention?"
+
+"No," she faltered. "I was to write to him just before we sailed ... But
+you may be perfectly sure the Trents will find out ... He will probably
+go back there to look for me ... I expect he is awfully puzzled."
+
+"I expect he is, and I hope," Anthony added vindictively, "the fellow is
+terrified out of his life as well. He ought to be horsewhipped, and I'd
+like to do it. A babe like you!"
+
+"No," said Meg, firmly; "there you're wrong. I'm not a babe ... I knew
+what I was doing; but up to to-day it seemed worth it ... I never seemed
+to see till to-day how it would hurt other people. Even if he grew tired
+of me--and I had faced that--there would have been some awfully happy
+months ... and so long as it was only me, it didn't seem to matter. And
+when you've had rather a mouldy life...."
+
+"It can never be a case of 'only me.' As society is constituted, other
+people are always involved."
+
+"Yet there was Marian Evans ... he told me about her ... she did it, and
+everyone came round to think it was very fine of her really. She wrote,
+or something, didn't she?"
+
+"She did," said Anthony, "and in several other respects her case was
+not at all analogous to yours. She was a middle-aged woman--you are a
+child...."
+
+"Perhaps, but I'm not an ignorant child...."
+
+"Oh, Meg!" Anthony protested.
+
+"I daresay about books and things I am, but I mean I haven't been
+wrapped in cotton-wool, and taken care of all my life, like Jan and Fay
+... I know about things. Oh dear, oh dear, will you forbid Jan ever to
+speak to me again?"
+
+"Jan!" Anthony repeated. "Jan! Why, she's the person of all others we
+want. We'll do nothing till she's here. Let's get her." And he pushed
+back his chair and rushed to the bell.
+
+Meg rushed after him: "You'll let her see me? You'll let her talk to me?
+Oh, are you sure?"
+
+The little hands clutched his arm, her ravaged, wistful face was raised
+imploringly to his.
+
+Anthony stooped and kissed the little face.
+
+"It's just people like Jan who are put into the world to straighten
+things out for the rest of us. We've wasted three-quarters of an hour
+already. Now we'll get her."
+
+"Is she on the telephone?" asked the practical Meg. "Not far off?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan was quite used to being summoned to her father in a tremendous
+hurry. She was back in St. George's Square before he started for the
+dinner. Meg was lying down in one of the dismantled bedrooms, and when
+Jan arrived she went straight to her father in his dressing-room.
+
+She found him on his knees, pursuing a refractory collar-stud under the
+wash-stand.
+
+"It's well you've come," he said as he got up. "I can't fasten my collar
+or my tie. I've had a devil of a time. My fingers are all thumbs and I'm
+most detestably sticky."
+
+He told Jan about Meg. She fastened his collar and arranged his tie in
+the neatest of bows. Then she kissed him on both cheeks and told him not
+to worry.
+
+"How can one refrain from worrying when the works of the devil and the
+selfishness of man are made manifest as they have been to-day? But for
+the infinite mercy of God, where would that poor silly child have been?"
+
+"It's just because the infinite mercy of God is so much stronger than
+the works of the devil or the selfishness of man, that you needn't
+worry," said Jan.
+
+Anthony put his hands on Jan's shoulders and held her away from him.
+
+"Do you know," he said, "I shall always like Hannah better after this.
+In spite of her moustache and her grimness, that child was sure Hannah
+would take her in, whether any of us were here or not. Now, how did she
+know?"
+
+"Because," said Jan, "things are revealed to babes like Meg that are
+hidden from men of the world like you. Hannah is all right--you don't
+appreciate Hannah, and you are rather jealous of her moustache."
+
+Anthony leant forward and kissed his tall young daughter: "You are a
+great comfort, Jan," he said. "How do you do it?"
+
+Jan nodded at him. "It will all straighten out--don't you worry," she
+said.
+
+All the same, there was plenty of worry for everybody. The man, after
+his fashion, was very much in love with Meg. He was horribly alarmed by
+her sudden and mysterious disappearance. No one had seen her go, no one
+had noticed her.
+
+He got into a panic, and motored back to the Trents', arriving there
+just before dinner. Mrs. Trent, tired and cross after a wet picnic, had,
+of course, read Meg's note, thought it very casual of the girl and was
+justly incensed.
+
+On finding they knew no more of Meg's movements than he did himself, the
+man--one Walter Brooke--lost his head and confessed the truth to Mrs.
+Trent, who was much shocked and not a little frightened.
+
+Later in the evening she received a telegram from Jan announcing Meg's
+whereabouts.
+
+Jan had insisted on this, lest the Trents should suspect anything and
+wire to Major Morton.
+
+Mrs. Trent, quite naturally, refused to have anything further to do with
+Meg. She talked of serpents, and was very much upset. She wrote a
+dignified letter to Major Morton, explaining her reasons for Meg's
+dismissal. She also wrote to their relative among the weariful rich,
+through whom she had heard of Meg.
+
+Meg was more under a cloud than when she left Ribston Hall.
+
+But for Jan and Anthony she might have gone under altogether; but they
+took her down to Wren's End and kept guard over her. Anthony Ross dealt
+faithfully with the man, who went yachting at once.
+
+Meg recovered her poise, searched the advertisements of the scholastic
+papers industriously, and secured a post in a school for little boys, as
+Anthony forced his cousin Amelia to give her a testimonial.
+
+Here she worked hard and was a great success, for she could keep order,
+and that quality, where small boys are concerned, is much more valuable
+than learning. She stayed there for some years, and then her frail
+little ill-nourished body gave out, and she was gravely ill.
+
+When she recovered, she went as English governess to a rich German
+family in Bremen. The arrangement was only for one year, and at its
+termination she was free to offer to meet Jan and her charges.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+PLANS
+
+
+"Now, chicks, this is London, the friendly town," Jan announced, as the
+taxi drove away from Charing Cross station.
+
+"Flendly little London, dirty little London," her niece rejoined, as she
+bounced up and down on Jan's knee. She had slept during the very good
+crossing and was full of conversation and ready to be pleased with all
+she saw.
+
+Tony was very quiet. He had suffered far more in the swift journey
+across France than during the whole of the voyage, and it was difficult
+to decide whether he or Ayah were the more extraordinary colour.
+Greenish-white and miserable he sat beside his aunt, silent and
+observing.
+
+"Here's dear old Piccadilly," Jan exclaimed, as the taxi turned out of
+St. James's Street. "Doesn't it look jolly in the sunshine?"
+
+Tony turned even greener than before, and gasped:
+
+"This! Piccadilly!"
+
+This not very wide street with shops and great houses towering above
+them, the endless streams of traffic in the road and on the crowded
+pavements!
+
+"Did Mrs. Bond live in one of those houses?" he wondered, "and if so,
+where did she keep her ducks? And where, oh, where, were the tulips and
+the lilies of his dream?"
+
+He uttered no sound, but his mind kept exclaiming, "This! Piccadilly?"
+
+"See," said Jan, oblivious of Tony and intent on keeping her lively
+niece upon her knee. "There's the Green Park."
+
+Tony breathed more freely.
+
+After all, there _were_ trees and grass; good grass, and more of it than
+in the Resident's garden. He took heart a little and summoned up courage
+to inquire: "But where are the tulips?"
+
+"It's too early for tulips yet," Jan answered. "By and by there will be
+quantities. How did you know about them? Did dear Mummy tell you? But
+they're in Hyde Park, not here."
+
+Tony made no answer. He was, as usual, weighing and considering and
+making up his mind.
+
+Presently he spoke. "It's different," he said, slowly, "but I rather
+like to look at it."
+
+Tony never said whether he thought things were pretty or ugly. All he
+knew was that certain people and places, pictures and words, sometimes
+filled him with an exquisite sense of pleasure, while others merely
+bored or exasperated or were positively painful.
+
+His highest praise was "I like to look at it." When he didn't like to
+look at it, he had found it wiser to express no opinion at all, except
+in moments of confidential expansion, and these were rare with Tony.
+
+Meg had found them a nice little furnished flat on the fifth floor in
+one of the blocks behind Kensington High Street, and Hannah must surely
+have been waiting behind the door, so instantaneously was it opened,
+when Jan and her party left the lift.
+
+There were tears in Hannah's eyes and her nose was red as she welcomed
+"Miss Fay's motherless bairns." She was rather shocked that there was no
+sign of mourning about any of them except Jan, who wore--mainly as a
+concession to Hannah's prejudices--a thin black coat and skirt she had
+got just before she left Bombay.
+
+Tony stared stonily at Hannah and decided he did not like to look at
+her. She was as surprising as the newly-found Piccadilly, but she
+gratified no sensuous perception whatsoever.
+
+Ayah might not be exactly beautiful, but she was harmonious. Her body
+was well proportioned, her sari fell in gracious flowing lines, and she
+moved with dignity. Without knowing why, Tony felt that there was
+something pleasing to the eye in Ayah. Hannah, on the contrary, was the
+reverse of graceful; stumpy and heavy-footed, she gave an impression of
+abrupt terminations. Everything about her seemed too short except her
+caps, which were unusually tall and white and starchy. Her afternoon
+aprons, too, were stiffer and whiter and more voluminous than those of
+other folk. She did not regard these things as vain adornings of her
+person, rather were they the outward and visible sign of her office as
+housekeeper to Miss Ross. They were a partial expression of the dignity
+of that office, just as a minister's gown is the badge of his.
+
+By the time everyone was washed and brushed Meg returned with the
+luggage and Hannah brought in tea.
+
+"I thought you'd like to give the bairns their tea yourself the first
+day, Miss Jan. Will that Hindu body have hers in the nursery?"
+
+"That would be best," Jan said hastily. "And Hannah, you mustn't be
+surprised if she sits on the floor. Indian servants always do."
+
+"_Nothing_ she can do will surprise me," Hannah announced loftily. "I've
+not forgotten the body that came back with Mrs. Tancred, with a ring
+through her nose and a red wafer on her forehead."
+
+Jan, herself, went with Ayah to the nursery, where she found that in
+spite of her disparaging sniffs, Hannah had put out everything poor Ayah
+could possibly want.
+
+The children were hungry and tea was a lengthy meal. It was not until
+they had departed with Ayah for more washings that Jan found time to
+say: "Why don't you take off your hat, Meg dear? I can't see you
+properly in that extinguisher. Is it the latest fashion?"
+
+"The very latest."
+
+Meg looked queerly at Jan as she slowly took off her hat.
+
+"There!" she said.
+
+Her hair was cropped as short as a boy's, except for the soft, tawny
+rings that framed her face.
+
+"Meg!" Jan cried. "Why on earth have you cut off your hair?"
+
+"Chill penury's the cause. I've turned it into good hard cash. It
+happens to be the fashionable colour just now."
+
+"Did you really need to? I thought you were getting quite a good salary
+with those Hoffmeyers."
+
+"No English governess gets a _good_ salary in Bremen, and mine was but a
+modest remuneration, so I wanted more. Do you remember Lady Penelope
+Pottinger?"
+
+"Hazily. She was pretty, wasn't she ... and very smart?"
+
+"She was and is ... smarter than ever now--mind, I put you on your
+honour never to mention it--_she's_ got my hair."
+
+"Do you mean she asked you to sell it?"
+
+"No, my child. I offered it for sale and she was all over me with
+eagerness to purchase. Hair's the defective wire in her lighting
+apparatus. Her own, at the best, is skimpy and straight, though very
+much my colour, and what with permanent waving and instantaneous hair
+colouring it was positively dwindling away."
+
+"I wish you had let it dwindle."
+
+"No, I rather like her--so I suggested she should give her own poor
+locks a rest and have an artistic _postiche_ made with mine; it made
+two, one to come and one to go--to the hairdresser. She looks perfectly
+charming. I'd no idea my hair was so decent till I saw it on her head."
+
+"I hope _I_ never shall," Jan said gloomily. "I think it was silly of
+you, for it makes you look younger and more irresponsible than ever; and
+what about posts?"
+
+"I've got a post in view where it won't matter if only I can run things
+my own way."
+
+"Will you have to go at once? I thought, perhaps----"
+
+"I wish to take this post at once," Meg interposed quickly, "but it
+depends on you whether I get it."
+
+"On me?"
+
+"On no one else. Look here, Jan, will you take me on as nurse to Fay's
+children? A real nurse, mind, none of your fine lady arrangements; only
+you must pay me forty pounds a year. I can't manage with less if I'm to
+give my poor little Papa any chirps ... I suppose that's a frightful lot
+for a nurse?"
+
+"Not for a good nurse ... But, Meg, you got eighty when you taught the
+little boys, and I know they'd jump at you again in that school, hair or
+no hair."
+
+"Listen, Jan." Meg put her elbows on the table and leaned her sharp
+little chin on her two hands while she held Jan's eyes with hers. "For
+nine long years, except that time with the Trents, I've been teaching,
+teaching, teaching, and I'm sick of teaching. I'd rather sweep a
+crossing."
+
+"Yet you teach so well; you know the little boys adored you."
+
+"I love children and they usually like me. If you take me to look after
+Tony and little Fay, I'll do it thoroughly, I can promise you. I won't
+teach them, mind, not a thing--I'll make them happy and well-mannered;
+and, Jan, listen, do you suppose there's anybody, even the most
+superior of elderly nurses, who would take the trouble for Fay's
+children that I should? If you let me come you won't regret it, I
+promise you."
+
+Meg's eyes, those curious eyes with the large pupil and blue iris
+flecked with brown, were very bright, her voice was earnest, and when it
+ceased it left a sense of tension in the very air.
+
+Jan put out her hand across the table, and Meg, releasing her sharp
+little chin, clasped it with hers.
+
+"So that's settled," Meg announced triumphantly.
+
+"No." Jan's voice was husky but firm. "It's not settled. I don't think
+you're strong enough; but, even so, if I could pay you the salary you
+ought to have, I'd jump at you ... but, my dear, I can't at present. I
+haven't the least idea what it will all cost, but the fares and things
+have made such a hole in this year's money I'll need to be awfully
+careful."
+
+"That's exactly why I want to come; you've no idea of being careful and
+doing things in a small way. I've done it all my life. You'll be far
+more economical with me than without me."
+
+"Don't tempt me," Jan besought her. "I see all that, but why should I be
+comfortable at your expense? I want you more than I can say. Fay wanted
+it too--she said so."
+
+"Did Fay actually say so? Did she?"
+
+"Yes, she did--not that you should be their nurse, we neither of us ever
+thought of that; but she did want you to be there to help me with the
+children. We used to talk about it."
+
+"Then I'm coming. I must. Don't you see how it is, Jan? Don't you
+realise that nearly all the happiness in my life--_all_ the happiness
+since the boys left--has come to me through Mr. Ross and Fay and you?
+And now when there's a chance for me to do perhaps a little something in
+return ... If you don't let me, it's you who are mean and grudging. I
+shall be perfectly strong, if I haven't got to teach--mind, I won't do
+that, not so much as A.B.C."
+
+"I know it's wrong," Jan sighed, "just because it would be so heavenly
+to have you."
+
+Meg loosed the hand she held and stood up. She lifted her thin arms
+above her head, as though invoking some invisible power, stretched
+herself, and ran round the table to kiss Jan.
+
+"And do you never think, you dear, slow-witted thing, that it will be
+rather lovely for _me_ to be with you? To be with somebody who is kind
+without being patronising, who treats one as a human being and not a
+machine, who sees the funny side of things and isn't condescending or
+improving if she doesn't happen to be cross?"
+
+"I'm often cross," Jan said.
+
+"Well, and what if you are? Can't I be cross back? I'm not afraid of
+your crossness. You never hit below the belt. Now, promise me you'll
+give me a trial. Promise!"
+
+Meg's arms were round her neck, Meg's absurd cropped head was rubbing
+against hers. Jan was very lonely and hungry for affection just then,
+timid and anxious about the future. Even in that moment of time it
+flashed upon her what a tower of strength this small, determined
+creature would be, and how infinitely hard it was to turn Meg from any
+course she had determined on.
+
+"For a little while, then," so Jan salved her conscience. "Just till we
+all shake down ... and your hair begins to grow."
+
+Meg stood up very straight and shook her finger at Jan. "Remember, I'm
+to be a real, proper nurse with authority, and a clinical thermometer
+... and a uniform."
+
+"If you like, and it's a pretty uniform."
+
+Meg danced gleefully round the table.
+
+"It will be lovely, it is lovely. I've got it all ready; green linen
+frocks, big _well_-fitting aprons, and such beautiful caps."
+
+"Not caps, Meg!" Jan expostulated. "Please not caps."
+
+"Certainly caps. How otherwise am I to cover up my head? I can't wear
+hats all the time. And how could I ever inspire those children with
+respect with a head like this? When I get into my uniform you'll see
+what a very superior nurse I look."
+
+"You'll look much more like musical comedy than sober service."
+
+"You mistake the situation altogether," Meg said loftily. "I take my
+position very seriously."
+
+"But you can't go about Wren's End in caps. Everybody knows you down
+there."
+
+"They'll find out they don't know me as well as they thought, that's
+all."
+
+"Meg, tell me, what did Hannah say when she saw your poor shorn head?"
+
+"Hannah, as usual, referred to my Maker, and said that had He intended
+me to have short hair He would either have caused it not to grow or
+afflicted me with some disease which necessitated shearing; and she
+added that such havers are just flying in the face of Providence."
+
+"So they are."
+
+"All the more reason to cover them up, and I wish to impress the
+children."
+
+"Those children will be sadly browbeaten, I can see, and as for their
+poor aunt, she won't be able to call her soul her own."
+
+"That," Meg said, triumphantly, "is precisely why I'm so eager to come.
+When you've been an underling all your life you can't imagine what a joy
+it is to be top dog occasionally."
+
+"In that respect," Jan said firmly, "it must be turn and turn about. I
+won't let you come unless you promise--swear, here and now--that when I
+consider you are looking fagged--'a wispy wraith,' as Daddie used to
+say--if I command you to take a day in bed, in bed you will stay till I
+give you leave to get up. Unless you promise me this, the contract is
+off."
+
+"I'll promise anything you like. The idea of being _pressed_ to remain
+in bed strikes me as merely comic. You have evidently no notion how
+persons in a subordinate position ought to be treated. Bed, indeed!"
+
+"I think you might have waited till I got back before you parted with
+your hair." Jan's tone was decidedly huffy.
+
+"Now don't nag. That subject is closed. What about _your_ hair. Do you
+know it is almost white?"
+
+"And what more suitable for a maiden aunt? As that is to be my _role_
+for the future I may as well look the part."
+
+"But you don't--that's what I complain of. The whiter your hair grows
+the younger your face gets. You're a contradiction, a paradox, you
+provoke conjecture, you're indecently noticeable. Mr. Ross would have
+loved to paint you."
+
+Jan shook her head. "No, Daddie never wanted to paint anything about me
+except my arms."
+
+"He'd want to paint you now," Meg insisted obstinately. "_I_ know the
+sort of person he liked to paint."
+
+"He never would paint people unless he _did_ like them," Jan said,
+smiling as at some recollection. "Do you remember how he utterly refused
+to paint that rich Mr. Withells down at Amber Guiting?"
+
+"I remember," and Meg laughed. "He said Mr. Withells was puffy and
+stippled."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tony had been cold ever since he reached the Gulf of Lyons, and he
+wondered what could be the matter with him, for he never remembered to
+have felt like this before. He wondered miserably what could be the
+reason why he felt so torpid and shivery, disinclined to move, and yet
+so uncomfortable when he sat still.
+
+After his bath, on that first night in London, tucked into a little bed
+with a nice warm eiderdown over him, he still felt that horrid little
+trickle of ice-cold water down his spine and could not sleep.
+
+His cot was in Auntie Jan's room with a tall screen round it. The rooms
+in the flat were small, tiny they seemed to Tony, after the lofty
+spaciousness of the bungalow in Bombay, but that didn't seem to make it
+any warmer, because Auntie Jan's window was wide open as it would
+go--top and bottom--and chilly gusts seemed to blow round his head in
+spite of the screen. Ayah and little Fay were in the nursery across the
+passage, where there was a fire. There was no fire in this wind-swept
+chamber of Auntie Jan's.
+
+Tony dozed and woke and woke and dozed, getting colder and more forlorn
+and miserable with each change of position. The sheets seemed made of
+ice, so slippery were they, so unkind and unyielding and unembracing.
+
+Presently he saw a dim light. Auntie Jan had come to bed, carrying a
+candle. He heard her say good night to the little mem who had met them
+at the station, and the door was shut.
+
+In spite of her passion for fresh air, Jan shivered herself as she
+undressed. She made a somewhat hasty toilet, said her prayers, peeped
+round the screen to see that Tony was all right, and hopped into bed,
+where a hot-water bottle put in by the thoughtful Hannah was most
+comforting.
+
+Presently she heard a faint, attenuated sniff. Again it came, this time
+accompanied by the ghost of something like a groan.
+
+Jan sat up in bed and listened. Immediately all was perfectly still.
+
+She lay down again, and again came that sad little sniff, and
+undoubtedly it was from behind the screen that it came.
+
+Had Tony got cold?
+
+Jan leapt out of bed, switched on the light and tore away the screen
+from around his bed.
+
+Yes; his doleful little face was tear-stained.
+
+"Tony, Tony darling, what is the matter?"
+
+"I don't know," he sobbed. "I feel so funny."
+
+Jan put her hand on his forehead--far from being hot, the little face
+was stone-cold. In a moment she had him out of bed and in her warm arms.
+As she took him she felt the chill of the stiff, unyielding small body.
+
+"My precious boy, you're cold as charity! Why didn't you call me long
+ago? Why didn't you tell Auntie Jan?"
+
+"I didn't ... know ... what it was," he sobbed.
+
+In no time Tony was put into the big bed, the bed so warm from Auntie
+Jan's body, with a lovely podgy magic something at his feet that
+radiated heat. Auntie Jan slammed down the window at the bottom, and
+then more fairness! She struck a match, there was a curious sort of
+"plop," and a little fire started in the grate, an amazing little fire
+that grew redder and redder every minute. Auntie Jan put on a blue
+dressing-gown over the long white garment that she wore, and bustled
+about. Tony decided that he "liked to look at her" in this blue robe,
+with her hair in a great rope hanging down. She was very quick; she
+fetched a little saucepan and he heard talking in the passage outside,
+but no one else came in, only Auntie Jan.
+
+Presently she gave him milk, warm and sweet, in a blue cup. He drank it
+and began to feel much happier, drowsy too, and contented. Presently
+there was no light save the red glow of the fairy fire, and Auntie Jan
+got into bed beside him.
+
+She put her arm about him and drew him so that his head rested against
+her warm shoulder. He did not repulse her, he did not speak, but lay
+stiff and straight with his feet glued against that genial podgy
+something that was so infinitely comforting.
+
+"You are kind," Tony said suddenly. "I believe you."
+
+The stiff little body relaxed and lay against hers in confiding
+abandonment, and soon he was sound asleep.
+
+What a curious thing to say! Jan lay awake puzzling. Tragedy lay behind
+it. Only five years old, and yet, to Tony, belief was a more important
+thing than love. She thought of Fay, hectic and haggard, and again she
+seemed to hear her say in her tired voice, trying to explain Tony: "He's
+not a cuddly child; he's queer and reserved and silent, but if he once
+trusts you it's for always; he'll love you then and never change."
+
+Jan could just see, in the red glow from the fire, the little head that
+lay so confidingly against her shoulder, the wide forehead, the
+peacefully closed eyes. And suddenly she realised that the elusive
+resemblance to somebody that had always evaded her was a likeness to
+that face she saw in the glass every time she did her hair. She kissed
+him very softly, praying the while that she might never fail him; that
+he might always have reason to trust her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE STATE OF PETER
+
+
+Meanwhile Peter was making discoveries about himself. He went back to
+his flat on the evening of the day Jan and the children sailed. Swept
+and garnished and exceedingly tidy, it appeared to have grown larger
+during his absence and seemed rather empty. There was a sense of
+unfilled spaces that caused him to feel lonely.
+
+That very evening he decided he must get a friend to chum with him. The
+bungalow was much too big for one person.
+
+This had never struck him before.
+
+In spite of their excessive neatness there remained traces of Jan and
+the children in the rooms. The flowers on the dinner-table proclaimed
+that they had been arranged by another hand than Lalkhan's. He was
+certain of that without Lalkhan's assurance that the Miss-Sahib had done
+them herself before she sailed that very morning.
+
+When he went to his desk after dinner--never before or after did Peter
+possess such an orderly bureau--he found a letter lying on the
+blotting-pad, and on each side of the heavy brass inkstand were placed a
+leaden member of a camel-corps and an India-rubber ball with a face
+painted upon it, which, when squeezed, expressed every variety of
+emotion. These, Lalkhan explained, were parting gifts from the young
+sahib and little Fay respectively, and had been so arranged by them just
+before they sailed.
+
+The day before Jan had told the children that all this time they had
+been living in Peter's house and that she was sure Mummy would want them
+to be very grateful (she was careful to talk a great deal about Mummy to
+the children lest they should forget her); that he had been very kind to
+them all, and she asked if there was anything of their very own they
+would like to leave for Peter as a remembrance.
+
+Tony instantly fetched the camel-corps soldier that kept guard on a
+chair by his cot every night; that Ayah had not been permitted to pack
+because it must accompany him on the voyage. It was, Jan knew, his most
+precious possession, and she assured him that Peter would be
+particularly gratified by such a gift.
+
+Not to be outdone by her brother, little Fay demanded her beloved ball,
+which was already packed for the voyage in Jan's suit-case.
+
+Peter sat at his desk staring at the absurd little toys with very kind
+eyes. He understood. Then he opened Jan's letter and read it through
+quite a number of times.
+
+"Dear Mr. Ledgard," it ran.
+
+"Whatever Mr. Kipling may say of the Celt, the lowland Scot finds it
+very difficult to express strong feeling in words. If I had tried to
+tell you, face to face, how sensible I am of your kindness and
+consideration for us during the last sad weeks--I should have cried. You
+would have been desperately uncomfortable and I--miserably ashamed of
+myself. So I can only try to write something of my gratitude.
+
+"We have been your guests so long and your hospitality has been so
+untiring in circumstances sad and strange enough to try the patience of
+the kindest host, that I simply cannot express my sense of obligation;
+an obligation in no wise burdensome because you have always contrived to
+make me feel that you took pleasure in doing all you have done.
+
+"I wish there had been something belonging to my sister that I could
+have begged you to accept as a remembrance of her; but everything she
+had of the smallest value has disappeared--even her books. When I get
+home I hope to give you one of my father's many portraits of her, but I
+will not send it till I know whether you are coming home this summer.
+Please remember, should you do so, as I sincerely hope you will, that
+nowhere can there be a warmer welcome for you than at Wren's End. It
+would be the greatest possible pleasure for the children and me to see
+you there, and it is a good place to slack in and get strong. And there
+I hope to challenge you to the round of golf we never managed during my
+time in India.
+
+"Please try to realise, dear Mr. Ledgard, that my sense of your kindness
+is deep and abiding, and, believe me, yours, in most true gratitude,
+
+                                             "JANET ROSS."
+
+For a long time Peter sat very still, staring at the cheerful,
+highly-coloured face painted on Fay's ball. Cigarette after cigarette
+did he smoke as he reviewed the experience of the last six weeks.
+
+For the first time since he became a man he had been constantly in the
+society of a woman younger than himself who appeared too busy and too
+absorbed in other things to remember that she was a woman and he a man.
+
+Peter was ordinarily susceptible, and he was rather a favourite with
+women because of his good manners; and his real good-nature made him
+ready to help either in any social project that happened to be towards
+or in times of domestic stress. Yet never until lately had he seen so
+much of any woman not frankly middle-aged without being conscious that
+he _was_ a man and she a woman, and this added, at all events, a certain
+piquancy to the situation.
+
+Yet he had never felt this with Jan.
+
+Quite a number of times in the course of his thirty years he had fallen
+in love in an agreeably surface sort of way without ever being deeply
+stirred. Love-making was the pleasantest game in the world, but he had
+not yet felt the smallest desire to marry. He was a shrewd young man,
+and knew that marriage, even in the twentieth century, at all events
+starts with the idea of permanence; and, like many others who show no
+inclination to judge the matrimonial complications of their
+acquaintance, he would greatly have disliked any sort of scandal that
+involved himself or his belongings.
+
+He was quite as sensitive to criticism as other men in his service, and
+he knew that he challenged it in lending his flat to Mrs. Tancred. But
+here he felt that the necessities of the case far outweighed the
+possibilities of misconception, and after Jan came he thought no more
+about it.
+
+Yet in a young man with his somewhat cynical knowledge of the world, it
+was surprising that the thought of his name being coupled with Jan's
+never crossed his mind. He forgot that none of his friends knew Jan at
+all, but that almost every evening they did see her with him in the
+car--sometimes, it is true, accompanied by the children, but quite as
+often alone--and that during her visit his spare time was so much
+occupied in looking after the Tancred household that his friends saw
+comparatively little of him, and Peter was, as a rule, a very sociable
+person.
+
+Therefore it came upon him as a real shock when people began to ask him
+point-blank whether he was engaged to Jan, and if so, what they were
+going to do about Tancred's children. Rightly or wrongly, he discerned
+in the question some veiled reflection upon Jan, some implied slur upon
+her conduct. He was consequently very short and huffy with these
+inquisitive ones, and when he was no longer present they would shake
+their heads and declare that "poor old Peter had got it in the neck."
+
+If so, poor old Peter was, as yet, quite unconscious of anything of the
+kind.
+
+Nevertheless he found himself constantly thinking about her. Everything,
+even the familiar streets and roads, served to remind him of her, and
+when he went to bed he nearly always dreamed about her. Absurd,
+inconsequent, unsatisfactory dreams they were; for in them she was
+always too busy to pay any attention to him at all; she was wholly
+absorbed by what it is to be feared Peter sometimes called "those
+confounded children." Though even in his dream world he was careful to
+keep his opinion to himself.
+
+Why on earth should he always dream of Jan during the first part of the
+night?
+
+Lalkhan could have thrown some light upon the subject. But naturally
+Peter did not confide his obsession to Lalkhan.
+
+Just before she left Jan asked Lalkhan where the sahib's linen was kept,
+and on being shown the cupboard which contained the rather untidy little
+piles of sheets, pillow-cases, and towels that formed Peter's modest
+store of house linen, she rearranged it and brought sundry flat, square
+muslin bags filled with dried lavender. Lace-edged bags with
+lavender-coloured ribbon run through insertion and tied in bows at the
+two corners. These bags she placed among the sheets, much to the wonder
+of Lalkhan, who, however, decided that it was kindly meant and therefore
+did not interfere.
+
+The odour was not one that commended itself to him. It was far too faint
+and elusive. He could understand a liking for attar of roses, of
+jessamine, of musk, or of any of the strong scents beloved by the native
+of India. Yet had she proposed to sprinkle the sheets with any of these
+essences he would have felt obliged to interfere, as the sahib swore
+violently and became exceedingly hot and angry did any member of his
+household venture into his presence thus perfumed. Even as it was he
+fully expected that his master would irritably demand the cause of the
+infernal smell that pervaded his bed; so keen are the noses of the
+sahibs. Whereupon Lalkhan, strong in rectitude, would relate exactly
+what had happened, produce one of the Jan-incriminating muslin bags,
+escape further censure, and doubtless be commanded to burn it and its
+fellows in the kitchen stove. But nothing of the kind occurred, and, as
+it is always easier to leave a thing where it has been placed than to
+remove it, the lavender remained among the sheets in humble obscurity.
+
+The old garden at Wren's End abounded in great lavender bushes, and
+every year since it became her property Jan made lavender sachets which
+she kept in every possible place. Her own clothes always held a faint
+savour of lavender, and she had packed these bags as much as a matter of
+course as she packed her stockings. It seemed a shame, though, to take
+them home again when she could get plenty more next summer, so she left
+them in the bungalow linen cupboard. They reproduced her atmosphere;
+therefore did Peter dream of Jan.
+
+A fortnight passed, and on their way to catch the homeward mail came
+Thomas Crosbie and his wife from Dariawarpur to stay the night. Next
+morning at breakfast Mrs. Crosbie, young, pretty and enthusiastic,
+expatiated on the comfort of her room, finally exclaiming: "And how,
+Mr. Ledgard, do you manage to have your sheets so deliciously scented
+with lavender--d'you get it sent out from home every year?"
+
+"Lavender?" Peter repeated. "I've got no lavender. My people never sent
+me any, and I've certainly never come across any in India."
+
+"But I'm convinced everything smelt of lavender. It made me think of
+home so. If I hadn't been just going I'd have been too homesick for
+words. I'm certain of it. Think! You must have got some from somewhere
+and forgotten it."
+
+Peter shook his head. "I've never noticed it myself--you really must be
+mistaken. What would I be doing with lavender?"
+
+"It was there all the same," Mrs. Crosbie continued. "I'm certain of it.
+You must have got some from somewhere. Do find out--I'm sure I'm not
+wrong. Ask your boy."
+
+Peter said something to Lalkhan, who explained volubly. Tom Crosbie
+grinned; he understood even fluent Hindustani. His wife did not. Peter
+looked a little uncomfortable. Lalkhan salaamed and left the room.
+
+"Well?" Mrs. Crosbie asked.
+
+"It seems," Peter said slowly, "there _is_ something among the sheets.
+I've sent Lalkhan to get it."
+
+Lalkhan returned, bearing a salver, and laid on the salver was one of
+Jan's lavender bags. He presented it solemnly to his master, who with
+almost equal solemnity handed it to Mrs. Crosbie.
+
+"There!" she said. "Of course I knew I couldn't be mistaken. Now where
+did you get it?"
+
+"It was, I suppose, put among the things when poor Mrs. Tancred had the
+flat. I never noticed, of course--it's such an unobtrusive sort of
+smell...."
+
+"Hadn't she a sister?" Mrs. Crosbie asked, curiously, holding the little
+sachet against her soft cheek and looking very hard at Peter.
+
+"She had. It was she who took the children home, you know."
+
+"Older or younger than Mrs. Tancred?"
+
+"Older."
+
+"How much older?"
+
+"I really don't know," said the mendacious Peter.
+
+"Was she awfully pretty, too?"
+
+"Again, I really don't know. I never thought about her looks ... she had
+grey hair...."
+
+"Oh!" Mrs. Crosbie exclaimed--a deeply disappointed "Oh." "Probably much
+older, then. That explains the lavender bags."
+
+Silent Thomas Crosbie looked from his wife to Peter with considerable
+amusement. He realised, if she didn't, that Peter was most successfully
+putting her off the scent of more than lavender; but men are generally
+loyal to each other in these matters, and he suddenly took his part in
+the conversation and changed the subject.
+
+Among Peter's orders to his butler that morning was one to the effect
+that nothing the Miss-Sahib had arranged in the bungalow was to be
+disturbed, and the lavender bag was returned to rejoin its fellows in
+the cupboard.
+
+It was four years since Peter had had any leave, and it appeared that
+the lavender had the same effect upon him as upon Mrs. Crosbie. He felt
+homesick--and applied for leave in May.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"THE BEST-LAID SCHEMES"
+
+
+Peter had been as good as his word, and had found a family returning to
+India who were glad to take Ayah back to Bombay. And she, though sorry
+to leave Jan and the children, acquiesced in all arrangements made for
+her with the philosophic patience of the East. March was a cold month,
+and she was often rather miserable, in spite of her pride in her shoes
+and stockings and the warm clothes Jan had provided for her.
+
+Before she left Jan interviewed her new mistress and found her kind and
+sensible, and an old campaigner who had made the voyage innumerable
+times.
+
+It certainly occurred to Jan that Peter had been extraordinarily quick
+in making this arrangement, but she concluded that he had written on the
+subject before they left India. She had no idea that he had sent a long
+and costly cable on the subject. His friend thought him very solicitous
+for her comfort, but set it down entirely to her own merits and Peter's
+discriminating good sense.
+
+When the day came Jan took Ayah to her new quarters in a taxi. Of course
+Ayah wept, and Jan felt like weeping herself, as she would like to have
+kept her on for the summer months. But she knew it wouldn't do; that
+apart from the question of expense, Hannah could never overcome her
+prejudices against "that heathen buddy," and that to have explained that
+poor Ayah was a Roman Catholic would only have made matters worse.
+Hannah was too valuable in every way to upset her with impunity, and the
+chance of sending Ayah back to India in such kind custody was too good
+to lose.
+
+Meg had deferred the adoption of the musical-comedy costume until such
+time as she took over Ayah's duties. She in no way interfered, but was
+helpful in so many unobtrusive ways that Jan, while she still felt
+guilty in allowing her to stay at all, acknowledged she could never have
+got through this time without her.
+
+Fortunately the day of Ayah's departure was fine, so that while Jan took
+her to her destination Meg took the children to spend the afternoon at
+the Zoo. To escort little Fay about London was always rather an ordeal
+to anyone of a retiring disposition. She was so fearless, so interested
+in her fellow-creatures, and so ready at all times and in all places to
+enter into conversation with absolute strangers, preferably men, that
+embarrassing situations were almost inevitable; and her speech, high and
+clear and carrying--in spite of the missing "r"--rendered it rarely
+possible to hope people did not understand what she said.
+
+They went by the Metropolitan to Baker Street and sat on one of the
+small seats at right angles to the windows, and a gentleman wearing a
+very shiny top-hat sat down opposite to them.
+
+He looked at little Fay; little Fay looked at him and, smiling her
+adorable, confident smile, leant forward, remarking: "Sahib, you wear a
+very high hat."
+
+Instantly the eyes of all the neighbouring passengers were fixed upon
+the hat and its owner. His, however, were only for the very small lady
+that faced him; the small lady in a close white bonnet and bewitching
+curls that bobbed and fluttered in the swaying of the train.
+
+He took off the immaculate topper and held it out towards her. "There,"
+he said, "would you like to look at it?"
+
+Fay carefully rubbed it the wrong way with a tentative woolly-gloved
+finger. "Plitty, high hat," she cooed. "Can plitty little Fay have it to
+keep?"
+
+But the gentleman's admiration did not carry him as far as this.
+Somewhat hastily he withdrew his hat, smoothed it (it had just been
+ironed) and placed it on his head again. Then he became aware of the
+smiling faces and concentrated gaze of his neighbours; also, that the
+attractive round face that had given him so much pleasure had exchanged
+its captivating smile for a pathetic melancholy that even promised
+tears. He turned extremely red and escaped at the next station.
+Whereupon ungrateful little Fay, who had never had the slightest
+intention of crying, remarked loftily: "Tahsome man dawn."
+
+When at last they reached the Zoo Meg took it upon herself to
+remonstrate with her younger charge.
+
+"You mustn't ask strangers for things, dear; you really mustn't--not in
+the street or in the train."
+
+"What for?" asked Fay. She nearly always said, "What for" when she meant
+"Why"; and it was as hard-worked a phrase as "What nelse?"
+
+"Because people don't do it, you know."
+
+"They do--I've heard 'em."
+
+"Well, beggars perhaps, but not nice little girls."
+
+"Do nasty little girls?"
+
+"_Only_ nasty little girls would do it, I think."
+
+Fay pondered this for a minute, then in a regretfully reflective voice
+she said sadly: "Vat was a nasty, gleedy sahib in a tlain."
+
+"Not at all," Meg argued, struggling with her mirth. "How would you have
+liked it if he'd asked you to give him your bonnet 'to keep'?"
+
+Little Fay hastily put up her hands to her head to be sure her bonnet
+was in its place, then she inquired with great interest: "What's 'is
+place, deah Med?"
+
+"Deah Med" soon found herself followed round by a small crowd of other
+sight-seers who waited for and greeted little Fay's unceasing comments
+with joyful appreciation. Such popular publicity was not at all to Meg's
+taste, and although the afternoon was extremely cold her cheeks never
+ceased to burn till she got the children safely back to the flat again.
+Tony was gloomy and taciturn. Nobody took the slightest notice of him.
+Weather that seemed to brace his sister to the most energetic gaiety
+only made him feel torpid and miserable. He was not naughty, merely
+apathetic, uninterested, and consequently uninteresting. Meg thought he
+might be homesick and sad about Ayah, and was very kind and gentle, but
+her advances met with no response.
+
+By this time Tony was sure of his aunt, but he had by no means made up
+his mind about Meg.
+
+When they got back to Kensington Meg joyously handed over the children
+to Jan while she retired to her room to array herself in her uniform.
+She was to "take over" from that moment, and approached her new sphere
+with high seriousness and an intense desire to be, as she put it, "a
+wild success."
+
+For weeks she had been reading the publications of the P. N. E. U. and
+the "Child-Study Society," to say nothing of Manuals upon "Infant
+Hygiene," "The Montessori Method" and "The Formation of Character."
+Sympathy and Insight, Duty and Discipline, Self-Control and Obedience,
+Regularity and Concentration of Effort--all with the largest
+capitals--were to be her watchwords. And she buttoned on her
+well-fitting white linen apron (newest and most approved hospital
+pattern, which she had been obliged to make herself, for she could buy
+nothing small enough) in a spirit of dedication as sincere as that
+imbuing any candidate for Holy Orders. Then, almost breathlessly, she
+put her cap upon her flaming head and surveyed the general effect in the
+long glass.
+
+Yes, it was all very satisfactory. Well-hung, short, green linen
+frock--was it a trifle short? Yet the little feet in the low-heeled
+shoes were neat as the ankles above them were slim, and one needed a
+short skirt for "working about."
+
+Perhaps there _was_ a touch of musical comedy about her appearance, but
+that was merely because she was so small and the cap, a muslin cap of a
+Quakerish shape, distinctly becoming. Well, there was no reason why she
+should want to look hideous. She would not be less capable because she
+was pleasing to the eye.
+
+She seized her flannel apron from the bed where she had placed it ready
+before she went out, and with one last lingering look at herself went
+swiftly to her new duties.
+
+Tea passed peacefully enough, though Fay asked embarrassing questions,
+such as "Why you wear suts a funny hat?"
+
+"Because I'm an ayah," Meg answered quickly.
+
+"Ayahs don't wear zose kind of hats."
+
+"English ayahs do, and I'm going to be your ayah, you know."
+
+Fay considered Meg for a minute. "No," she said, shaking her head.
+"_No._"
+
+"Have another sponge-finger," Jan suggested diplomatically, handing the
+dish to her niece, and the danger was averted.
+
+They played games with the children after tea and all went well till
+bed-time. Meg had begged Jan to leave them entirely to her, and with
+considerable misgiving she had seen Meg marshal the children to the
+bathroom and shut the door. Tony was asked as a favour to go too this
+first evening without Ayah, lest little Fay should feel lonely. It was
+queer, Jan reflected when left alone in the drawing-room, how she seemed
+to turn to the taciturn Tony for help where her obstreperous niece was
+concerned. Over and over again Tony had intervened and successfully
+prevented a storm.
+
+Meg turned on the bath and began to undress little Fay. She bore this
+with comparative meekness, but when all her garments had been removed
+she slipped from Meg's knees and, standing squarely on the floor,
+announced:
+
+"I want my own Ayah. Engliss Ayah not wass me. Own Ayah muss come bat."
+
+"She can't, my darling; she's gone to other little girls, you know--we
+told you many days ago."
+
+"She muss come bat--'_jaldi_,'" shouted Fay--"jaldi" being Hindustani
+for "quickly."
+
+Meg sighed. "I'm afraid she can't do that. Come, my precious, and let me
+bathe you; you'll get cold standing there."
+
+With a quick movement Meg seized the plump, round body. She was muscular
+though so small, and in spite of little Fay's opposition she lifted her
+into the bath. She felt Tony pull at her skirts and say something, but
+was too busy to pay attention.
+
+Little Fay was in the bath sure enough, but to wash her was quite
+another matter. You may lead a sturdy infant of three to the water in a
+fixed bath, but no power on earth can wash that infant if it doesn't
+choose. Fay screamed and struggled and wriggled and kicked, finally
+slipping right under the water, which frightened her dreadfully; she
+lost her breath for one second, only to give forth ear-splitting yells
+the next. She was slippery as a trout and strong as a leaping salmon.
+
+Jan could bear it no longer and came in. Meg had succeeded in lifting
+the terrified baby out of the bath, and she stood on the square of cork
+defying the "Engliss Ayah," wet from her topmost curl to her pink toes,
+but wholly unwashed.
+
+Tony ran to Jan and under all the din contrived to say: "It's the big
+bath; she's frightened. Ayah never put her in the big bath."
+
+Meg had forgotten this. The little tin bath they had brought from India
+for the voyage stood in a corner.
+
+It was filled, while Fay, wrapped in a Turkish towel, sobbed more
+quietly, ejaculating between the gurgles: "Nasty hat, nasty Engliss
+Ayah. I want my own deah Ayah!"
+
+When the bath was ready poor Meg again approached little Fay, but Fay
+would have none of her.
+
+"No," she wailed, "Engliss Ayah in nasty hat _not_ wass me. Tony wass
+me, _deah_ Tony."
+
+She held out her arms to her brother, who promptly received her in his.
+
+"You'd better let me," he said to the anxious young women. "We'll never
+get her finished else."
+
+So it ended in Tony's being arrayed in the flannel apron which, tied
+under his arm-pits, was not so greatly too long. With his sleeves
+turned up he washed his small sister with thoroughness and despatch,
+pointing out somewhat proudly that he "went into all the corners."
+
+[Illustration: He washed his small sister with thoroughness and
+despatch, pointing out ... that he "went into all the corners."]
+
+The washing-glove was very large on Tony's little hand, and he used a
+tremendous lot of soap--but Fay became all smiles and amiability during
+the process. Meg and Jan had tears in their eyes as they watched the
+quaint spectacle. There was something poignantly pathetic in the
+clinging together of these two small wayfarers in a strange country, so
+far from all they had known and shared in their short experience.
+
+Meg's "nasty hat" was rakishly askew upon her red curls, for Fay had
+frequently grabbed at it in her rage, and the beautiful green linen gown
+was sopping wet.
+
+"Engliss Ayah clying!" Fay remarked surprisedly. "What for?"
+
+"Because you wouldn't let me bathe you," said Meg dismally. Her voice
+broke. She really was most upset. As it happened, she did the only thing
+that would have appealed to little Fay.
+
+"Don't cly, deah Med," she said sweetly. "You sall dly me."
+
+And Meg, student of so many manuals, humbly and gratefully accepted the
+task.
+
+It had taken exactly an hour and a quarter to get Fay ready for bed.
+Indian Ayah used to do it in fifteen minutes.
+
+Consistently and cheerfully gracious, Fay permitted Meg to carry her to
+her cot and tuck her in.
+
+Meg lit the night-light and switched off the light, when a melancholy
+voice began to chant:
+
+"_My_ Ayah always dave me a choccly."
+
+Now there was no infant in London less deserving of a choccly at that
+moment than troublesome little Fay. "Nursery Hygiene" proclaimed the
+undeniable fact that sweetmeats last thing at night are most injurious.
+Duty and Discipline and Self-Control should all have pointed out the
+evil of any indulgence of the sort. Yet Meg, with all her theories quite
+fresh and new, and with this excellent opportunity of putting them into
+practice, extracted a choccly from a box on the chest of drawers; and
+when the voice, "like broken music," announced for the third time, "_My_
+Ayah always dave me a choccly," "So will this Ayah," said Meg, and
+popped it into the mouth whence the voice issued.
+
+There was a satisfied smacking and munching for a space, when the voice
+took up the tale:
+
+"Once Tony had thlee----"
+
+But what it was Tony once had "thlee" of Meg was not to know that night,
+for naughty little Fay fell fast asleep.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For a week Tony bathed his sister every night. Neither Jan nor Meg felt
+equal to facing and going through again the terrors of that first night
+without Ayah. Little Fay was quite good--she permitted Meg to undress
+her and even to put her in the little bath, but once there she always
+said firmly, "Tony wass me," and Tony did.
+
+Then he burned his hand.
+
+He was never openly and obstreperously disobedient like little Fay. On
+the whole he preferred a quiet life free from contention. But very early
+in their acquaintance Jan had discovered that what Tony determined upon
+that he did, and in this he resembled her so strongly that she felt a
+secret sympathy with him, even when such tenacity of purpose was most
+inconvenient.
+
+He liked to find things out for himself, and no amount of warning or
+prohibition could prevent his investigations. Thus it came about that,
+carefully guarded as the children were from any contact with the fires,
+Tony simply didn't believe what was told him of their dangers.
+
+Fires were new to him. They were so pretty, with their dancing flames,
+it seemed a pity to shut them in behind those latticed guards Auntie Jan
+was so fond of. Never did Tony see the fires without those tiresome
+guards and he wanted to very much.
+
+One afternoon just before tea, while Meg was changing little Fay's
+frock, he slipped across to the drawing-room where Auntie Jan was busy
+writing a letter. Joy! the guard was off the fire; he could sit on the
+rug and watch it undisturbed. He made no noise, but knelt down softly in
+front of it and stretched out his hands to the pleasant warmth. It was
+the sort of fire Tony liked to watch, red at the heart, with little
+curling flames that were mirrored in the tiled hearth.
+
+Jan looked up from her writing and saw him there, saw also that there
+was no guard, but, as little Fay had not yet come, thought Tony far too
+sensible to interfere with the fire in any way. She went on with her
+writing; then when she looked again something in the intentness of his
+attitude caused her to say: "Be sure you don't get too near the fire,
+Tony; it hurts badly to be burned."
+
+"Yes, Auntie Jan," Tony said meekly.
+
+She wrote a few lines more, looked up, and held her breath. It would
+have been an easy matter even then to dash across and put on the guard;
+but in a flash Jan realised that to let Tony burn himself a little at
+that moment might save a very bad accident later on. There was nothing
+in his clothes to catch alight. His woollen jersey fitted closely.
+
+Exactly as though he were going to pick a flower, with curved hand
+outstretched Tony tried to capture and hold one of the dancing flames.
+He drew his hand back very quickly, and Jan expected a loud outcry, but
+none came. He sat back on the hearth-rug and rocked his body to and fro,
+holding the burnt right hand with his left, but he did not utter a
+sound.
+
+"It does hurt, doesn't it?" said Jan.
+
+He started at the quiet voice and turned a little puckered face towards
+her. "Yes," he said, with a big sigh; "but I know now."
+
+"Come with me and I'll put something on it to make it hurt less," said
+Jan, and crossed to the door.
+
+"Hadn't we better," he said, rather breathlessly, "put that thing on for
+fear of Fay?"
+
+Jan carefully replaced the "thing" and took him to her room, where she
+bandaged the poor little hand with carron-oil and cotton-wool. The outer
+edge was scorched from little finger to wrist. She made no remark while
+she did it, and Tony leaned confidingly against her the while.
+
+"Is that better?" she asked, when she had fastened the final safety-pin
+in the bandage. There was one big tear on Tony's cheek.
+
+"It's nice and cool, that stuff. _Why_ does it hurt so, Auntie Jan? It
+looks so kind and pretty."
+
+"It is kind and pretty, only we mustn't go too near. Will you be sure
+and tell Fay how it can hurt?"
+
+"I'll _tell_ her," he promised, but he didn't seem to have much hope of
+the news acting as a deterrent.
+
+When at bed-time Jan announced that Tony could not possibly bathe Fay
+because he mustn't get his hand wet or disturb the dressing, she and Meg
+tremblingly awaited the awful fuss that seemed bound to follow.
+
+But Fay was always unexpected. "Then Med muss wass me," she remarked
+calmly. The good custom was established and Meg began to perk up again.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE WHEELS OF CHANCE
+
+
+Meg was out walking with the children in Kensington Gardens, and Hannah
+was paying the tradesmen's books. It was the only way to make Hannah
+take the air, to send her, as she put it, "to do the messages." She
+liked paying the books herself, for she always suspected Jan of not
+counting the change.
+
+Jan was alone in the flat and was laying tea for the children in the
+dining-room when "ting" went the electric bell. She opened the door to
+find upon the threshold an exceedingly tall young man; a well-set-up,
+smart young man with square shoulders, who held out his hand to her,
+saying in a friendly voice: "You may just happen to remember me, Miss
+Ross, but probably not. Colonel Walcote's my uncle, and he's living in
+your house, you know. My name's Middleton ... I _hope_ you remember me,
+for I've come to ask a favour."
+
+As he spoke he gave Jan his card, and on it was "Captain Miles
+Middleton, R. H. A.," and the addresses of two clubs.
+
+She led him to the little drawing-room, bracing herself the while to be
+firm in her refusal if the Walcotes wanted the house any longer, good
+tenants though they were.
+
+She was hopelessly vague about her guest, but felt she had met him
+somewhere. She didn't like to confess how slight her recollection was,
+for he looked so big and brown and friendly it seemed unkind.
+
+He sat down, smoothed his hat, and then with an engaging smile that
+showed his excellent teeth, began: "I've come--it sounds rather
+farcical, doesn't it--about a dog?"
+
+"A dog?" Jan repeated vaguely. "What dog?"
+
+"Well, he's my dog at present, but I want him to be your dog--if you'll
+have him."
+
+"You want to give me a dog--but why? Or do you only want me to keep him
+a bit for you?"
+
+"Well, it's like this, Miss Ross; it would be cheek to ask you to keep a
+young dog, and when you'd had all the trouble of him and got fond of
+him--and you'll get awfully fond of him, if you have him--to take him
+away again. It wouldn't be fair, it really wouldn't ... so...."
+
+"Wait a bit," said the cautious Jan. "What sort of a dog is he ... if it
+is a he...."
+
+"He's a bull-terrier...."
+
+"Oh, but I don't think I'm very fond of bull-terriers ... aren't they
+fierce and doesn't one always associate them with public-houses? I
+couldn't have a fierce dog, you know, because of the two children."
+
+"They're always nice with children," Captain Middleton said firmly. "And
+as for the pothouse idea--that's quite played out. I suppose it was that
+picture with the mug and the clay pipe. He'd _love_ the children; he's
+only a child himself, you know."
+
+"A puppy! Oh, Captain Middleton, wouldn't he eat all our shoes and
+things and tear up all the rugs?"
+
+"I think he's past that, I do really--he'll be a year old on Monday.
+He'll be a splendid watchdog, and he's not a bit deaf--lots of 'em are,
+you know--and he's frightfully well-bred. Just you look at the
+pedigree ..." and Captain Middleton produced from his breast-pocket a
+folded foolscap document which he handed to Jan.
+
+She gazed at it with polite interest, though it conveyed but little to
+her mind. The name "Bloomsbury" seemed to come over and over again.
+There were many dates and other names, but "Bloomsbury" certainly
+prevailed, and it was evident that Captain Middleton's dog had a long
+pedigree; it was all quite clearly set down, and, to Jan, very
+bewildering.
+
+"His points are on the back page," Captain Middleton said proudly, "and
+there isn't a single one a perfect bull-terrier ought to have that
+William Bloomsbury hasn't got."
+
+"Is that his name?"
+
+"Yes, but I call him William, only he is of the famous Bloomsbury
+strain, you know, and one can't help being a bit proud of it."
+
+"But," Jan objected, "if he's so well-bred and perfect, he must be
+valuable--so why should you want to give him to me?"
+
+"I'll explain," said Captain Middleton. "You see, ever since they've
+been down at Wren's End, my aunt kept him for me. He's been so happy
+there, Miss Ross, and grown like anything. We're stationed in St. John's
+Wood just now, you know, and he'd be certain to be stolen if I took him
+back there. And now my aunt's coming to London to a flat in Buckingham
+Gate. Now London's no life for a dog--a young dog, anyway--he'd be
+miserable. I've been down to Wren's End very often for a few days'
+hunting, and I can see he's happy as a king there, and we may be ordered
+anywhere any day ... and I don't want to sell him ... You see, I know if
+you take him you'll be good to him ... and he _is_ such a nice beast."
+
+"How do you know I'd be good to him? You know nothing about me."
+
+"Don't I just! Besides, I've seen you, I'm seeing you now this
+minute ... I don't want to force him on you, only ... a lady living
+alone in the country ought to have a dog, and if you take William you
+won't be sorry--I can promise you that. He's got the biggest heart, and
+he's the nicest beast ... and the most faithful...."
+
+"Are you sure he'll be quite gentle with the children?"
+
+"He's gentle with everybody, and they're well known to be particularly
+good with children ... you ask anyone who knows about dogs. He was given
+me when he was three weeks old, and I could put him in my pocket."
+
+Captain Middleton was rather appealing just then, so earnest and big and
+boyish. His face was broad though lean, the features rather blunt, the
+eyes set wide apart; clear, trustworthy, light-blue eyes. He looked just
+what he was--a healthy, happy, prosperous young Englishman without a
+real care in the world. After all, Jan reflected, there was plenty of
+room at Wren's End, and it was good for the children to grow up with
+animals.
+
+"I had thought of an Airedale," she said thoughtfully, "but----"
+
+"They're good dogs, but quarrelsome--fight all the other dogs round
+about. Now William isn't a fighter unless he's unbearably provoked,
+then, of course, he fights to kill."
+
+"Oh dear!" sighed Jan, "that's an awful prospect. Think of the trouble
+with one's neighbours----"
+
+"But I assure you, it doesn't happen once in a blue moon. I've never
+known him fight yet."
+
+"I'll tell you what, Captain Middleton; let me keep him for the present,
+till you know where you're going to be stationed, and then, if you find
+you can have him, he's there for you to take. I'll do my best for him,
+but I want you to feel he's still your dog...."
+
+"It's simply no end good of you, Miss Ross. I'd like you to have him
+though ... May I put it this way? If you don't like him, find him a
+nuisance or want to get rid of him, you send for me and I'll fetch him
+away directly. But if you like him, he's your dog. There--may I leave it
+at that?"
+
+"We'll try to make him happy, but I expect he'll miss you dreadfully....
+I know nothing about bull-terriers; do they need any special
+treatment?"
+
+"Oh dear, no. William's as strong as a young calf. Just a bone
+occasionally and any scraps there are. There's tons of his biscuits down
+there ... only two meals a day and no snacks between, and as much
+exercise as is convenient--though, mind you, they're easy dogs in that
+way--they don't need you to be racing about all day like some."
+
+The present fate of William Bloomsbury with the lengthy and exalted
+pedigree being settled, Jan asked politely for her tenants, Colonel and
+Mrs. Walcote, heard that it had been an excellent and open season, and
+enjoyed her guest's real enthusiasm about Wren's End.
+
+After a few minutes of general conversation he got up to go. She saw him
+out and rang up the lift, but no lift came. She rang again and again.
+Nothing happened. Evidently something had gone wrong, and she saw people
+walking upstairs to the flats below. Just as she was explaining the
+mishap to her guest, the telephone bell sounded loudly and persistently.
+
+"Oh dear!" she cried. "Would you mind very much stopping a young lady
+with two little children, if you meet them at the bottom of the stairs,
+and tell her she is on no account to carry up little Fay. It's my
+friend, Miss Morton; she's out with them, and she's not at all strong;
+tell her to wait for me. I'll come the minute I've answered this
+wretched 'phone."
+
+"Don't you worry, Miss Ross, I'll stop 'em and carry up the kiddies
+myself," Captain Middleton called as he started to run down, and Jan
+went back to answer the telephone.
+
+He ran fast, for Jan's voice had been anxious and distressed. Five long
+flights did he descend, and at the bottom he met Meg and the children
+just arrived to hear the melancholy news from the hall porter.
+
+Meg always wheeled little Fay to and from the gardens in the funny
+little folding "pram" they had brought from India. The plump baby was a
+tight fit, but the queer little carriage was light and easily managed.
+The big policeman outside the gate often held up the traffic to let Meg
+and her charges get across the road safely, and she would sail serenely
+through the avenue of fiercely panting monsters with Tony holding on to
+her coat, while little Fay waved delightedly to the drivers. That
+afternoon she was very tired, for it had started to rain, cold, gusty
+March rain. She had hurried home in dread lest Tony should take cold. It
+seemed the last straw, somehow, that the lift should have gone wrong.
+She left the pram with the porter and was just bracing herself to carry
+heavy little Fay when this very tall young man came dashing down the
+staircase, saw them and raised his hat. "Miss Morton? Miss Ross has just
+entrusted me with a message ... that I'm to carry her niece upstairs,"
+and he took little Fay out of Meg's arms.
+
+Meg looked up at him. She had to look up a long way--and he looked down
+into a very small white face.
+
+The buffeting wind that had given little Fay the loveliest colour, and
+Tony a very pink nose, only left Meg pallid with fatigue; but she smiled
+at Captain Middleton, and it was a smile of such radiant happiness as
+wholly transfigured her face. It came from the exquisite knowledge that
+Jan had thought of her, had known she would be tired.
+
+To be loved, to be remembered, to be taken care of was to Meg the most
+wonderful thing in the world. It went to her head like wine.
+
+Therefore did she smile at Captain Middleton in this distracting
+fashion. It started tremblingly at the corners of her mouth, and
+then--quite suddenly--her wan little face became dimpled and beseeching
+and triumphant all at once.
+
+It had no connection whatsoever with Captain Middleton, but how was he
+to know that?
+
+It fairly bowled him, middle stump, first ball.
+
+No one had ever smiled at him like that before. It turned him hot and
+cold, and gave him a lump in his throat with the sheer heartrending
+pathos of it. And he felt an insane desire to lie down and ask this
+tiny, tired girl to walk upon him if it would give her the smallest
+satisfaction.
+
+The whole thing passed in a flash, but for him it was one of those
+illuminating beams that discovers a hitherto undreamed-of panorama.
+
+He caught up little Fay, who made no objection, and ran up all five
+flights about as fast as he had run down. Jan was just coming out of the
+flat.
+
+"Here's one!" he cried breathlessly, depositing little Fay. "And now
+I'll go down and give the little chap a ride as well."
+
+He met them half-way up. "Now it's your turn," he said to Tony. "Would
+you like to come on my back?"
+
+Tony, though taciturn, was not unobservant. "I think," he said solemnly,
+"Meg's more tired nor me. P'raps you'd better take her."
+
+Meg laughed, and what the rain and wind could not do, Tony managed. Her
+cheeks grew rosy.
+
+"I'm afraid I should be rather heavy, Tony dear, but it's kind of you to
+think of it."
+
+She looked up at Captain Middleton and smiled again. What a kind world
+it was! And really that tall young man was rather a pleasant person. So
+it fell out that Tony was carried the rest of the way, and he had a
+longer ride than little Fay; for his steed mounted the staircase
+soberly, keeping pace with Meg; they even paused to take breath on the
+landings. And it came about that Captain Middleton went back into the
+flat with the children, showing no disposition to go away, and Jan could
+hardly do less than ask him to share the tea she had laid in the
+dining-room.
+
+There he got a shock, for Meg came to tea in her cap and apron.
+
+Out of doors she wore a long, warm coat that entirely covered the green
+linen frock, and a little round fur hat. This last was a concession to
+Jan, who hated the extinguisher. So Meg looked very much like any other
+girl. A little younger, perhaps, than any young woman of twenty-five
+has any business to look, but pretty in her queer, compelling way.
+
+That she looked even prettier in her uniform Captain Middleton would
+have been the first to allow; but he hated it nevertheless. There seemed
+to him something incongruous and wrong for a girl with a smile like that
+to be anybody's nursemaid.
+
+To be sure, Miss Ross was a brick, and this queer little servant of hers
+called her by her Christian name and contradicted her flatly twice in
+the course of tea. Miss Morton certainly did not seem to be downtrodden
+... but she wore a cap and an apron--a very becoming Quakerish cap ...
+without any strings ... and--"it's a d----d shame," was the outcome of
+all Captain Middleton's reflections.
+
+"Would the man never go?" Jan wondered, when after a prolonged and
+hilarious tea he followed the enraptured children back to the
+drawing-room and did tricks with the fire-irons.
+
+Meg had departed in order to get things ready for the night, and he hung
+on in the hope that she would return. Vain hope; there was no sign of
+her.
+
+He told the children all about William Bloomsbury and exacted promises
+that they would love him very much. He discussed, with many
+interruptions from Fay, who wanted all his attention, the entire
+countryside round about Wren's End; and, at last, as there seemed really
+no chance of that extraordinary girl's return, he heaved his great
+length out of his chair and bade his hostess a reluctant farewell
+several times over.
+
+In the passage he caught sight of Meg going from one room to another
+with her arms full of little garments.
+
+"Ah," he cried, striding towards her. "Good night, Miss Morton. I hope
+we shall meet again soon," and he held out his hand.
+
+Meg ignored the hand, her own arms were so full of clothes: "I'm afraid
+that's not likely," she said, with unfeeling cheerfulness. "We all go
+down to the country on Monday."
+
+"Yes, yes, I know. Jolly part of the world it is, too. I expect I shall
+be thereabouts a good deal this summer, my relations positively swarm in
+that county."
+
+"Good-bye," said Meg, and turned to go. Jan stood at the end of the
+passage, holding the door open.
+
+"I say, Miss Morton, you'll try and like my William, won't you?"
+
+"I like all sensible animals," was Meg's response, and she vanished into
+a bedroom.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+PERPLEXITIES
+
+
+"Don't you think it is very extraordinary that I have never had one line
+from Hugo since the letter I got at Aden?" asked Jan.
+
+It was Friday evening, the Indian mail was in, and there was a letter
+from Peter--the fourth since her return.
+
+"But you've heard of him from Mr. Ledgard," Meg pointed out.
+
+"Only that he had gone to Karachi from Bombay just before Fay
+died--surely he would see papers there. It seems so heartless never to
+have written me a line--I can't believe it, somehow, even of Hugo--he
+must be ill or something."
+
+"Perhaps he was ashamed to write. Perhaps he felt you would simply
+loathe him for being the cause of it all."
+
+"I did, I do," Jan exclaimed; "but all the same he is the children's
+father, and he was her husband--I don't want anything very bad to happen
+to him."
+
+"It would simplify things very much," Meg said dreamily.
+
+Jan held up her hand as if to ward off a blow.
+
+"Don't, Meg; sometimes I find myself wishing something of the kind, and
+I know it's wrong and horrible. I want as far as I can to keep in the
+right with regard to Hugo, to give him no grievance against me. I've
+written to that bank where he left the money, and asked them to forward
+the letters if he has left any address. I've told him exactly where we
+are and what we propose to do. Beyond the bare facts of Fay's death--I
+told him all about her illness as dispassionately as I could--I've never
+reproached him or said anything cruel. You see, the man is down and out;
+though Mr. Ledgard always declared he had any amount of mysterious wires
+to pull. Yet, I can't help wondering whether he is ill somewhere, with
+no money and no friends, in some dreadful native quarter."
+
+"What about the money in the bank, then? Did you use it?"
+
+Jan blushed. "No, I couldn't bear to touch his money ... Mr. Ledgard
+said it was idiotic...."
+
+"So it was; it was Fay's money, not his. For all your good sense, Jan,
+sometimes you're sentimental as a schoolgirl."
+
+"I daresay it was stupid, and I didn't dare to tell Mr. Ledgard I'd left
+it," Jan said humbly; "but I felt that perhaps that money might help him
+if things got very desperate; I left it in his name and a letter telling
+him I had done so ... I didn't _give_ him any money...."
+
+"It was precisely the same thing."
+
+"And he may never have got the letter."
+
+"I hope he hasn't."
+
+"Oh, Meg, I do so hate uncertainty. I'd rather know the worst. I always
+have the foreboding that he will suddenly turn up at Wren's End and
+threaten to take the children away ... and get money out of me that way
+... and there's none to spare...."
+
+"Jan, you've got into a thoroughly nervous, pessimistic state about
+Hugo. Why in the world should he _want_ the children? They'd be terribly
+in his way, and wherever he put them he'd have to pay _something_. You
+know very well his people wouldn't keep them for nothing, even if he
+were fool enough (for the sake of blackmailing you) to threaten to place
+them there. His sisters wouldn't--not for nothing. What did Fay say
+about his sisters? I remember one came to the wedding, but she has left
+no impression on my mind. He has two, hasn't he?"
+
+"Yes, but only one came, the Blackpool one. But Fay met both of them,
+for she spent a week-end with each, with Hugo, after she was married."
+
+"Well, and what did she say?"
+
+Jan laughed and sighed: "She said--you remember how Fay could say the
+severest things in the softest, gentlest voice--that 'for social
+purposes they were impossible, but they were doubtless excellent and
+worthy of all esteem and that they were exactly suited to the _milieu_
+in which they lived.'"
+
+"And where do they live?"
+
+"One lives at Blackpool--she's married to ... I forget exactly what he
+is--but it's something to do with letting houses. They're quite well off
+and all her towels had crochet lace at the ends. Fay was much impressed
+by this, as it scratched her nose. They also gave you 'doylies' at
+afternoon tea and no servant ever came into the room without knocking."
+
+"Any children?"
+
+"Yes, three."
+
+"And the other sister?"
+
+"She lives at Poulton-le-Fylde, and her husband had to do with a
+newspaper syndicate. Quite amusing he was, Fay says, but very shaky as
+to the letter 'H.'"
+
+"Would they like the children?"
+
+"They might, for they've none of their own, but they certainly wouldn't
+take them unless they were paid for, as they were not well off. They
+were rather down on the Blackpool sister, Fay said, for extravagance and
+general swank."
+
+"What about the grandparents?"
+
+"In Guernsey? They're quite nice old people, I believe, but
+curiously--of course I'm quoting Fay--comatose and uninterested in
+things, 'behindhand with the world,' she said. They thought Hugo very
+wonderful, and seemed rather afraid of him. What he has told them lately
+I don't know. He wrote very seldom, they said; but _I've_ written to
+them, saying I've got the children and where we shall be. If they
+express a wish to see the children I'll ask them to Wren's End. If, as
+would be quite reasonable, they say it's too far to come--they're old
+people, you know--I suppose one of us would need to take them over to
+Guernsey for a visit. I do so want to do the right thing all round, and
+then they can't say I've kept the children away from their father's
+relations."
+
+"Scotch people always think such a lot about relations," Meg grumbled.
+"I should leave them to stew in their own juice. Why should you bother
+about them if he doesn't?"
+
+"They're all quite respectable, decent folk, you know, though they
+mayn't be our kind. The father, I fancy, failed in business after he
+came back from India. Fay said he was very meek and depressed always. I
+think she was glad none of them came to the wedding except the Blackpool
+sister, for she didn't want Daddie to see them. He thought the Blackpool
+sister dreadful (he told me afterwards that she 'exacerbated his mind
+and offended his eye'), but he was charming to her and never said a word
+to Fay."
+
+"I don't see much sign of Hugo and his people in the children."
+
+"We can't tell, they're so little. One thing does comfort me, they show
+no disposition to tell lies; but that, I think, is because they have
+never been frightened. You see, everyone bowed down before them; and
+whatever Indian servants may be in other respects, they seem to me
+extraordinarily kind and patient with children."
+
+"Jan, what are your views about the bringing up of children?... You've
+never said ... and I should like to know. You see, we're both"--here Meg
+sighed deeply and looked portentously grave--"in a position of awful
+responsibility."
+
+They were sitting on each side of the hearth, with their toes on the
+fender. Meg had been sewing at an overall for little Fay, but at that
+moment she laid it on her knee and ran her hands through her cropped
+hair, then about two inches long all over her head, so that it stood on
+end in broken spirals and feathery curls above her bright eyes. In the
+evening the uniform was discarded "by request."
+
+Jan looked across at her and laughed.
+
+So funny and so earnest; so small, and yet so great with purpose.
+
+"I don't think I've any views. R. L. S. summed up the whole duty of
+children ages ago, and it's our business to see that they do it--that's
+all. Don't you remember:
+
+    A child should always say what's true,
+    And speak when he is spoken to,
+    And behave mannerly at table:
+    At least as far as he is able.
+
+It's no use to expect too much, is it?"
+
+"If you expect to get the second injunction carried out in the case of
+your niece you're a most optimistic person. For three weeks now I've
+been perambulating Kensington Gardens with those children, and I have
+never in the whole course of my life entered into conversation with so
+many strangers, and it's always she who begins it. Then complications
+arise and I have to intervene. I don't mind policemen and park-keepers
+and roadmen, but I rather draw the line at idly benevolent old gentlemen
+who join our party and seem to spend the whole morning with us...."
+
+"But, Meg, that never happens when I'm with you. I confess I've left
+you to it this last week...."
+
+"And what am I here for except to be left to it--I don't mean that
+anyone's rude or pushing--but Miss Tancred _is_ so friendly, and I'm not
+dignified and awe-inspiring like you, you great big Jan; and the poor
+men are encouraged, directly and deliberately encouraged, by your niece.
+I never knew a child with such a continual flow of conversation."
+
+"Poor Meg," said Jan, "you won't have much more of it. Little Fay _is_ a
+handful, I confess; but I always feel it must be a bit hard to be hushed
+continually--and just when one feels particularly bright and sparkling,
+to have all one's remarks cut short...."
+
+"You needn't pity that child. No amount of hushing has any effect; you
+might just as well hush a blackbird or a thrush. Don't look so worried,
+Jan. Did Mr. Ledgard say anything about Hugo in that letter to-night?"
+
+"Only that he was known to have left Karachi in a small steamer going
+round the coast, but after that nothing more. Mr. Ledgard has a friend
+in the Police, and even there they've heard nothing lately. I think
+myself the Indian Government _wants_ to lose sight of Hugo. He's
+inconvenient and disgraceful, and they'd like him blotted out as soon as
+possible."
+
+"What else does Mr. Ledgard say? He seems to write good long letters."
+
+"He is coming home at the end of April for six months."
+
+"Oh ... then we shall see him, I suppose?"
+
+"I hope so."
+
+Meg looked keenly at Jan, who was staring into the fire, her eyes soft
+and dreamy; and almost as if she was unconsciously thinking aloud, she
+said: "I do hope, if Hugo chooses to turn up, he'll wait till Mr.
+Ledgard is back in England."
+
+"You think he could manage him?"
+
+"I know he could."
+
+"Then let us pray for his return," said Meg.
+
+The clock on the mantelpiece struck eleven.
+
+"Bed-time," said Meg, "but I must have just one cigarette first. That's
+what's so lovely about being with you, Jan--you don't mind. Of course
+I'd never do it before the children."
+
+"You wouldn't shock them if you did. Fay smoked constantly."
+
+Meg lit her cigarette and clearly showed her real enjoyment. She had
+taken to it first when she was about fifteen, as she found it helped her
+to feel less hungry. Now it had become as much a necessity to her as to
+many men, and the long abstinence of term-time had always been a
+penance.
+
+She made some good rings, and, leaning forward to look through them at
+Jan, said: "By the way, I must just tell you that for the last three
+afternoons we've met that Captain Middleton in the Gardens."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"And he talks everlastingly about his dog--that William Bloomsbury
+creature. I know _all_ the points of a bull-terrier now--'Well-set head
+gradually tapering to muzzle, which is very powerful and well-filled up
+in front of the eyes. Nose large and black. Teeth dead-level and big'
+... oh! and reams more, every bit of him accurately described."
+
+"I'm a little afraid of those teeth so 'dead-level and big'--I foresee
+trouble."
+
+"Oh, no," said Meg easily. "He's evidently a most affectionate brute.
+That young man puzzles me. He's manifestly devoted to the dog, but he's
+so sure he'd be stolen he'd rather have him away from him down at Wren's
+End than here with him, to run that risk."
+
+"Surely," said Jan, "Kensington Gardens are some distance from St.
+John's Wood."
+
+"So one would think, but the rich and idle take taxis, and he seems to
+think he can in some way insure the welfare of his dog through the
+children and me."
+
+"And what about the old gentlemen? Do they join the party as well?"
+
+"Oh, dear no; no old gentlemen would dare to come within miles of us
+with that young man in charge of little Fay. He's like your Mr.
+Ledgard--very protective."
+
+"I like him for being anxious about his dog, but I'm not quite so sure
+that I approve of the means he takes to insure its happiness."
+
+"I didn't encourage him in the least, I assure you. I pointed out that
+he most certainly ought not to be walking about with a nurse and two
+children. That the children without the nurse would be all right, but
+that my being there made the whole thing highly inexpedient, and _infra
+dig_."
+
+"Meg!... you didn't!"
+
+"I did, indeed. There was no use mincing matters."
+
+"And what did he say?"
+
+"He said, 'Oh, that's all bindles'--whatever that may mean."
+
+"You mustn't go to the Gardens alone any more. I'll come with you
+to-morrow, or, better still, we'll all go to Kew if it's fine."
+
+"I _should_ be glad, though I grudge the fares; but you needn't come. I
+know how busy you are, with Hannah away and so much to see to--and what
+earthly use am I if I can't look after the children without you?"
+
+"You do look after the children without me for hours and hours on end. I
+could never trust anyone else as I do you."
+
+"I _am_ getting to manage them," Meg said proudly; "but just to-day I
+must tell you--it was rather horrid--we came face to face with the
+Trents in the Baby's Walk. Mrs. Trent and Lotty, the second girl, the
+big, handsome one--and he evidently knows them...."
+
+"Who evidently knows them?"
+
+"Captain Middleton, silly! (I told you he was with us, talking about his
+everlasting dog)--and they greeted him with effusion, so he had to stop.
+But you can imagine how they glared at me. Of course I walked on with
+Tony, but little Fay had his hand--I was wheeling the go-cart thing and
+she stuck firmly to him, and I heard her interrupting the conversation
+all the time. He followed us directly, I'll say that for him, but it was
+a bad moment ... You see, they had a right to glare...."
+
+"They had nothing of the kind. I wish I got the chance of glaring at
+them. Daddie _saw_ Mrs. Trent; he explained everything, and she said she
+quite understood."
+
+"She would, to him, he was so nice always; but you see, Jan, I know what
+she believes and what she has said, and what she will probably say to
+Captain Middleton if she gets the chance."
+
+Meg's voice broke. "Of course I don't care----"
+
+She held her tousled head very high and stuck out her sharp little chin.
+
+"My dear," said Jan, "what with my gregarious niece and my
+too-attractive nurse, I think it's a good thing we're all going down to
+Wren's End, where the garden-walls are high and the garden fairly large.
+Besides all that, there will be that dog with the teeth 'dead-level and
+big.'"
+
+"Remember," said Meg. "He treated me like a princess always."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+WREN'S END
+
+
+It stands just beyond the village of Amber Guiting, on the side furthest
+from the station, which is a mile from the village.
+
+"C. C. S. 1819" is carved above the front door, but the house was built
+a good fifty years previous to that date.
+
+One Charles Considine Smith, who had been a shipper of sherry in
+Billiter Street, in the City of London, bought it in that year from a
+Quaker called Solomon Page, who planted the yew hedge that surrounds the
+smooth green lawn seen from the windows of the morning-room. There was a
+curious clause attached to the title-deeds, which stipulated that no
+cats should be kept by the owner of Wren's End, lest they should
+interfere with the golden-crested wrens that built in the said yew
+hedge, or the brown wrens building at the foot of the hedges in the
+orchard. Appended to this injunction were the following verses:
+
+    If aught disturb the wrens that build,
+    If ever little wren be killed
+    By dweller in Wren's End--
+
+    Misfortunes--whence he shall not know--
+    Shall fall on him like noiseless snow,
+    And all his steps attend.
+
+    Peace be upon this house; and all
+    That dwell therein good luck befall,
+    That do the wrens befriend.
+
+Charles Considine Smith faithfully kept to his agreement regarding the
+protection of the wrens, and much later wrote a series of articles upon
+their habits, which appeared in the _North Cotswold Herald_. He seems to
+have been on friendly terms with Solomon Page, who, having inherited a
+larger property in the next county, removed thence when he sold Wren's
+End.
+
+In 1824 Smith married Tranquil Page, daughter of Solomon. She was then
+thirty-seven years old, and, according to one of her husband's diaries,
+"a staid person like myself." She was twenty years younger than her
+husband and bore him one child, a daughter also named Tranquil.
+
+She, however, appears to have been less staid than her parents, for she
+ran away before she was twenty with a Scottish advocate called James
+Ross.
+
+The Smiths evidently forgave the wilful Tranquil, for, on the death of
+Charles, she and her husband left Scotland and settled with her mother
+at Wren's End. She had two children, Janet, the great-aunt who left Jan
+Wren's End, and James, Jan's grandfather, who was sent to Edinburgh for
+his education, and afterwards became a Writer to the Signet. He married
+and settled in Edinburgh, preferring Scotland to England, and it was
+with his knowledge and consent that Wren's End was left to his sister
+Janet.
+
+Janet never married. She was energetic, prudent, and masterful, having
+an excellent head for business. She was kind to her nephews and nieces
+in a domineering sort of way, and had always a soft place in her heart
+for Anthony, though she regarded him as more or less of a scatter-brain.
+When she was nearly eighty she commanded his little girls to visit her.
+Jan was then fourteen and Fay eleven. She liked them because they had
+good manners and were neither of them in the least afraid of her. And at
+her death, six years later, she left Wren's End to Jan absolutely--as it
+stood; but she left her money to Anthony's elder brother, who had a
+large family and was not particularly well off.
+
+That year was a good artistic year for Anthony, and he spent over five
+hundred pounds in--as he put it--"making Jan's house habitable."
+
+This proved not a bad investment, for they had let it every winter since
+to Colonel Walcote for the hunting season, as three packs of hounds met
+within easy reach of it; and although the stabling accommodation at
+Wren's End was but small, plenty of loose boxes were always obtainable
+from Farmer Burgess quite near.
+
+Amber Guiting is a big village, almost a little town. It possesses an
+imposing main street wherein are several shops, among them a stationer's
+with a lending library in connection with Mudie's; a really beautiful
+old inn with a courtyard; and grave-looking, dignified houses occupied
+by the doctor, a solicitor, and several other persons of acknowledged
+gentility.
+
+There were many "nice places" round about, and altogether the
+inhabitants of Amber Guiting prided themselves, with some reason, on the
+social and aesthetic advantages of their neighbourhood. Moreover, it is
+not quite three hours from Paddington. You catch the express from the
+junction.
+
+Notwithstanding all these agreeable circumstances, William Bloomsbury
+was very lonely and miserable.
+
+All the friends he knew and loved had gone, leaving him in the somewhat
+stepmotherly charge of a caretaker from the village, who was supposed to
+be getting the house ready for its owner. To join her came
+Hannah--having left her young ladies with an "orra-buddy" in the flat.
+And after Hannah came the caretaker-lady did not stop long, for their
+ideas on the subject of cleanliness were diametrically opposed. Hannah
+was faithful and punctual as regarded William's meals; but though his
+body was more comfortable than during the caretaker's reign, his heart
+was empty and hungry, and he longed ardently for social intercourse and
+an occasional friendly pat.
+
+Presently in Hannah's train came Anne Chitt, a meek young assistant from
+the village, who did occasionally gratify William's longing for a little
+attention; but so soon as she began to pat him and say he was a good
+dog, she was called away by Hannah to sweep or dust or wash something.
+In William's opinion the whole house was a howling wilderness where
+pails of water easily upset, and brooms that fell upon the unsuspecting
+with resounding blows lay ambushed in unexpected places.
+
+Men and dogs alike abhor "spring-cleaning," and William's heart died
+within him.
+
+There came a day, however, when things were calmer. The echoing,
+draughty house grew still and warm, and a fire was lit in the hall.
+William lay in front of it unmolested; but he felt dejected and lonely,
+and laid his head down on his crossed paws in patient melancholy.
+
+Late in the afternoon, there came a sound of wheels in the drive. Hannah
+and Anne Chitt, decorous in black dresses and clean aprons, came into
+the hall and opened the front door, and in three minutes William knew
+that happier times were in store for him. The "station-fly" stopped at
+the door, and regardless of Hannah's reproving voice he rushed out to
+welcome the strangers. Two children, nice children, who appeared as glad
+to see him as he was to see them, who wished him many happy returns of
+his birthday--William had forgotten it was his birthday--and were as
+lavish with pats and what little Fay called "stlokes" as Hannah had been
+niggardly. There were also two young ladies, who addressed him kindly
+and seemed pleasantly aware of his existence, and William liked young
+ladies, for the three Miss Walcotes had thoroughly spoiled him. But he
+decided to attach himself most firmly to the children and the very small
+young lady. Perhaps they would stay. In his short experience grown
+people had a cruel way of disappearing. There was that tall young man
+... William hardly dared let himself think about that tall young man who
+had allowed him to lie upon his bed and was so kind and jolly. "Master"
+William had called him. Ah, where was he? Perhaps he would come back
+some day. In the meantime here were plenty of people to love. William
+cheered up.
+
+[Illustration: William rushed out to welcome the strangers. Two ... nice
+children.]
+
+He wished to ingratiate himself, and proceeded to show off his one
+accomplishment. With infinite difficulty and patience the Miss Walcotes
+had taught him to "give a paw"; so now, on this first evening, William
+followed the children about solemnly offering one paw and then the
+other; a performance which was greeted with acclamation.
+
+When the children went to the bathroom he somehow got shut outside. So
+he lay down and breathed heavily through the bottom of the door and
+varied this by thin, high-pitched yelps--which were really squeals, and
+very extraordinary as proceeding from such a large and heavy dog.
+
+"William wants to come in," Tony said. He still always accompanied his
+sister to the bath.
+
+Meg was seized with an inspiration. "I know why," she exclaimed. "He
+expects to see little Fay in the big bath."
+
+Fay looked from Meg to her brother and from her brother to Meg.
+
+Another dismal squeal from under the door.
+
+"Does he tluly espect it?" she asked anxiously.
+
+"I think so," Meg said gravely, "and we can't let him in if you're going
+to be washed in the little bath; he'd be so disappointed."
+
+The little bath stood ready on its stand. Fay turned her back upon it
+and went and looked over the edge of the big bath. It was a very big
+bath, white and beautiful, with innumerable silvered handles that
+produced sprays and showers and waves and all sorts of wonders. An
+extravagance of Anthony's.
+
+"Will William come in, too?" she asked.
+
+"No; he'd make such a mess; but he'd love to see you. We'll all bathe
+William some other time."
+
+More squeals from outside, varied by dolorous snores.
+
+"Let him in," said little Fay. "I'll show him me."
+
+Quick as thought Meg lifted her in, opened the door to the delighted
+William, who promptly stood on his hind legs, with his front paws on the
+bath, and looked over the edge at little Fay.
+
+"See me swim," she exclaimed proudly, sitting down in the water, while
+William, with his tongue hanging out and a fond smile of admiration on
+his foolish countenance, tried to lick the plump pink shoulders
+presented to his view. "This is a muts nicer baff than the nasty little
+one. I can't think what you bringed it for, deah Med."
+
+"Deah Med" and Tony nodded gaily to one another.
+
+Hannah had made William sleep in the scullery, which he detested. She
+put his basket there and his blanket, and he was warm enough, but
+creature comforts matter little to the right kind of dog. It's human
+fellowship he craves. That night she came to fetch him at bed-time, and
+he refused point-blank to go. He put his head on Meg's knee and gazed at
+her with beseeching eyes that said as plainly as possible: "Don't banish
+me--where you go I go--don't break my heart and send me away into the
+cold."
+
+Perhaps the cigarette smoke that hung about Meg gave him confidence. His
+master smelt like that. And William went to bed with his master.
+
+"D'you think he might sleep in the dressing-room?" Meg asked. "I know
+how young dogs hate to be alone at night. Put his basket there,
+Hannah--I'll let him out and see to him, and you could get him first
+thing in the morning."
+
+Hannah gave a sniff of disapproval, but she was always very careful to
+do whatever Meg asked her at once and ungrudgingly. It was partly an
+expression of her extreme disapproval of the uniform. But Meg thought it
+was prompted entirely by Hannah's fine feeling, and loved her dearly in
+consequence.
+
+Nearly all the bedrooms at Wren's End had dressing-rooms. Tony slept in
+Jan's, with the door between left open. Fay's little cot was drawn up
+close to Meg's bed. William and his basket occupied the dressing-room,
+and here, also, the door was left open.
+
+While Meg undressed, William was quite still and quiet, but when she
+knelt down to say her prayers he was overcome with curiosity, and,
+getting out of his basket, lurched over to her to see what she was
+about. Could she be crying that she covered her face? William couldn't
+bear people to cry.
+
+He thrust his head under her elbow. She put her arm round his neck and
+he sat perfectly still.
+
+"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"I like to look at it," said Tony.
+
+"Oh, London may be very gay, but it's nothing to the countryside," sang
+Meg.
+
+"What nelse?" inquired little Fay, who could never be content with a
+mere snatch of song.
+
+"Oh, there's heaps and heaps of nelse," Jan answered. "Come along,
+chicks, we'll go and see everything. This is home, you know, where dear
+Mummy wanted you to be."
+
+It was their first day at Wren's End, and the weather was kind. They
+were all four in the drive, looking back at the comfortable
+stone-fronted Georgian house. The sun was shining, a cheerful April sun
+that had little warmth in it but much tender light; and this showed how
+all around the hedges were getting green; that buds were bursting from
+brown twigs, as if the kind spring had covered the bare trees with a
+thin green veil; and that all sorts of green spears were thrusting up in
+the garden beds.
+
+Down the drive they all four ran, accompanied by a joyfully galumphing
+William, who was in such good spirits that he occasionally gave vent to
+a solemn deep-chested bark.
+
+When they came to the squat grey lodge, there was Mrs. Earley standing
+in her doorway to welcome them. Mrs. Earley was Earley's mother, and
+Earley was gardener and general factotum at Wren's End. Mrs. Earley
+looked after the chickens, and when she had exchanged the news with Jan,
+and rather tearfully admired "poor Mrs. Tancred's little 'uns," she
+escorted them all to the orchard to see the cocks and hens and chickens.
+Then they visited the stable, where Placid, the pony, was sole occupant.
+In former years Placid had been kept for the girls to drive in the
+governess-cart and to pull the heavy lawn-mower over the lawns. And
+Hannah had been wont to drive him into Amesberrow every Sunday, that she
+might attend the Presbyterian church there. She put him up at a
+livery-stable near her church and always paid for him herself. Anthony
+Ross usually had hired a motor for the summer months. Now they would
+depend entirely on Placid and a couple of bicycles for getting about.
+All round the walled garden did they go, and Meg played horses with the
+children up and down the broad paths while Jan discussed vegetables with
+Earley. And last of all they went to the back door to ask Hannah for
+milk and scones, for the keen, fresh air had made them all hungry.
+
+Refreshed and very crumby, they were starting out again when Hannah laid
+a detaining hand on Jan's arm: "Could you speak a minute, Miss Jan?"
+
+The children and Meg gone, Hannah led the way into the kitchen with an
+air of great mystery; but she did not shut the doors, as Anne Chitt was
+busy upstairs.
+
+"What is it, Hannah?" Jan asked nervously, for she saw that this
+summons portended something serious.
+
+"It's about Miss Morton I want to speak, Miss Jan. I was in hopes she'd
+never wear they play-acting claes down here ..." (when Hannah was deeply
+earnest she always became very Scotch), "but it seems I hoped in vain.
+And what am I to say to ither folk when they ask me about her?"
+
+"What is there to say, Hannah, except that she is my dear friend, and by
+her own wish is acting as nurse to my sister's children?"
+
+"I ken that; I'm no sayin' a word against that; but first of all she
+goes and crops her hair--fine hair she had too, though an awfu-like
+colour--and not content with flying in the face of Providence that way,
+she must needs dress like a servant. And no a weiss-like servant,
+either, but one o' they besoms ye see on the hoardings in London wha act
+in plays. Haven't I seen the pictures mysel'? 'The Quaker Gerrl,' or
+some such buddy."
+
+"Oh, I assure you, Hannah, Miss Morton in no way resembles those ladies,
+and I can't see that it's any business of ours what she wears. You know
+that she certainly does what she has undertaken to do in the best way
+possible."
+
+"I'm no saying a word against her wi' the children, and there never was
+a young lady who gave less trouble, save in the way o' tobacco ash, and
+was more ready to help--but yon haverals is very difficult to explain.
+_You_ may understand, Miss Jan. I may _say_ I understand--though I
+don't--but who's to make the like o' that Anne Chitt understand? Only
+this morning she keeps on at me wi' her questions like the clapper o' a
+bell. 'Is she a servant? If she's no, why does she wear servants' claes?
+Why does she have hair like a boy? Has she had a fever or something
+wrong wi' her heid? Is she one of they suffragette buddies and been in
+prison?'--till I was fair deeved and bade the lassie hold her tongue.
+But so it will be wherever Miss Morton goes in they fantastic claes.
+Now, Miss Jan, tell me the honest truth--did you ever see a
+self-respecting, respectable servant in the like o' yon? Does she _look_
+like any servant you've ever heard tell of out of a stage-play?"
+
+"Not a bit, Hannah; she looks exactly like herself, and therefore not in
+the least like any other person. Don't you worry. Miss Morton requires
+no explanation. All we must do is to see that she doesn't overwork
+herself."
+
+"Then ye'll no speak to her, Miss Jan?"
+
+"Not I, Hannah. Why should I dictate to her as to what she wears? She
+doesn't dictate to me."
+
+This was not strictly true, for Meg was most interfering in the matter
+of Jan's clothes. Hannah shook her head. "I thocht it my duty to speak,
+Miss Jan, and I'll say no more. But it's sheer defiance o' her Maker to
+crop her heid and to clothe herself in whim-whams, when she could be
+dressed like a lady; and I'm real vexed she should make such an object
+of herself when she might just be quite unnoticeable, sae wee and
+shelpit as she is."
+
+"I'm afraid," said Jan, "that Miss Morton will never be quite
+unnoticeable, whatever she may wear. But don't let us talk about it any
+more. You understand, don't you, Hannah?"
+
+When Jan's voice took that tone Hannah knew that further argument was
+unavailing.
+
+Jan turned to go, and saw Tony waiting for her in the open doorway.
+Neither of them had either heard or seen him come.
+
+Quite silently he took her hand and did not speak till they were well
+away from the house. Meg and little Fay were nowhere in sight. Jan
+wondered how much he had heard.
+
+"She's a very proud cook, isn't she?" he said presently.
+
+"She's a very old servant," Jan explained, "who has known me all my
+life."
+
+"If," said Tony, as though after deep thought, "she gets very
+chubbelsome, you send for me. Then I will go to her and say '_Jao!_'"
+Tony followed this up by some fluent Hindustani which, had Jan but known
+it, seriously reflected on the character of Hannah's female ancestry.
+"I'll say '_Jao!_'," he went on. "I'll say it several times very loud,
+and point to the door. Then she'll roll up her bedding, and you'll give
+her money and her chits, and she will depart."
+
+They had reached a seat. On this Jan sank, for the vision of Tony
+pointing majestically down the drive while little Hannah staggered into
+the distance under a rolled-up mattress, was too much for her.
+
+"But I don't want her to go," she gasped. "I love her dearly."
+
+"She should not speak to you like that; she scolded you," he said
+firmly. "She is a servant ... She _is_ a servant?" he added doubtfully.
+
+"How much did you hear of what she said? Did you understand?"
+
+"I came back directly to fetch you, I thought she _sounded_ cross. Mummy
+was afraid when people were cross; she liked me to be with her. I
+thought you would like me to be with you. If she was very rude I could
+beat her. I beat the boy--not Peter's boy, our boy--he was rude to
+Mummy. He did not dare to touch me because I am a sahib ... I will beat
+Hannah if you like."
+
+Tony stood in front of Jan, very earnest, with an exceedingly pink nose,
+for the wind was keen. He had never before said so much at one time.
+
+"Shall I go back and beat her?" he asked again.
+
+"Certainly not," Jan cried, clutching Tony lest he should fly off there
+and then. "We don't _do_ such things here at home. Nobody is beaten,
+ever. I'm sure Peter never beats his servants."
+
+"No," Tony allowed. "A big sahib must not strike a servant, but I can,
+and I do if they are rude. She was rude about Meg."
+
+"She didn't mean to be rude."
+
+"She found fault with her clothes and her hair. She is a very proud and
+impudent cook."
+
+"Tony dear, you really don't understand. She wasn't a bit rude. She was
+afraid other people might mistake Meg for a servant. She was all _for_
+Meg--truly she was."
+
+"She scolded you," he rejoined obstinately.
+
+"Not really, Tony; she didn't mean to scold."
+
+Tony looked very hard at Jan.
+
+In silence they stared at one another for quite a minute. Jan got up off
+the seat.
+
+"Let's go and find the others," she said.
+
+"She is a very proud cook," Tony remarked once more.
+
+Jan sighed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+That night while she was getting ready for bed Tony woke up. His cot was
+placed so that he could see into Jan's room, and the door between was
+always left open. She was standing before the dressing-table, taking
+down her hair.
+
+Unlike the bedrooms at the flat, the room was not cold though both the
+windows were open. Wren's End was never cold, though always fresh, for
+one of Anthony's earliest improvements had been a boiler-house and
+central heating, with radiators set under the windows, so that they
+could always stand open.
+
+Jan had not put on her dressing-gown, and her night-dress had rather
+short, loose sleeves that fell back from her arms as she raised them.
+
+He watched the white arm wielding the brush with great pleasure; he
+decided he liked to look at it.
+
+"Auntie Jan!"
+
+She turned and flung her hair back from her face in a great silver
+cloud.
+
+"You awake, sonny! Did I make a noise?"
+
+"No, I just woke. Auntie Jan, will Daddie ever come here?"
+
+"I expect so."
+
+"Well, listen. If he does, he shan't take your things, your pretty
+twinkly things. I won't let him."
+
+Jan stood as if turned to stone.
+
+"He took Mummy's. I saw him; I couldn't stop him, I was so little. But
+she _said_--she said it twice before she went away from that last
+bungalow--she said: 'Take care of Auntie Jan, Tony; don't let Daddie
+take her things.' So I won't."
+
+Tony was sitting up. His room was all in darkness; two candles were lit
+on Jan's dressing-table. He could see her, but she couldn't see him.
+
+She came to him, stooped over him, and laid her cheek against his so
+that they were both veiled with her hair. "Darling, I don't think poor
+Daddie would want to take my things. You must try not to think hardly of
+Daddie."
+
+Tony parted the veil of hair with a gentle hand so that they could both
+see the candles.
+
+"You don't know my Daddie ... much," he said, "do you?"
+
+Jan shuddered.
+
+"I saw him," he went on in his queer little unemotional voice. "I saw
+him take all her pretty twinkly things; and her silver boxes. I'm glad I
+sleep here."
+
+"Did she mind much?" Jan whispered.
+
+"I don't know. She didn't see him take them, only me. She hadn't come to
+bed. She never said nothing to me--only about you."
+
+"I don't expect," Jan made a great effort to speak naturally, "that
+Daddie would care about my things ... It's different, you see."
+
+"I'm glad I sleep here," Tony repeated, "and there's William only just
+across the passage."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+"THE BLUDGEONINGS OF CHANCE"
+
+
+They had been at Wren's End nearly three weeks, and sometimes Jan
+wondered if she appeared to Tony as unlike her own conception of herself
+as Tony's of his father was unlike what she had pictured him.
+
+She knew Hugo Tancred to be dishonest, shifty, and wholly devoid of a
+sense of honour, but she had up till quite lately always thought of him
+as possessing a lazy sort of good-nature.
+
+Tony was changing this view.
+
+He was not yet at all talkative, but every now and then when he was
+alone with her he became frank and communicative, as reserved people
+often will when suddenly they let themselves go. And his very simplicity
+gave force to his revelations.
+
+During their last year together in India it was evident that downright
+antagonism had existed between Hugo Tancred and his little son. Tony had
+weighed his father and found him wanting; and it was clear that he had
+tried to insert his small personality as a buffer between his father and
+mother.
+
+Jan talked constantly to the children of their mother. Her portraits,
+Anthony's paintings and sketches, were all over the house, in every
+variety of happy pose. One of the best was hung at the foot of Tony's
+cot. The gentle blue eyes seemed to follow him in wistful benediction,
+and alone in bed at night he often thought of her, and of his home in
+India. It was, then, quite natural that he should talk of them to this
+Auntie Jan who had evidently loved his mother well; and from Tony Jan
+learned a good deal more about her brother-in-law than she had ever
+heard from his wife.
+
+Tony loved to potter about with his aunt in the garden. She worked
+really hard, for there was much to do, and he tried his best to assist,
+often being a very great hindrance; but she never sent him away, for she
+desired above all things to gain his confidence.
+
+One day after a hard half-hour's weeding, when Tony had wasted much time
+by pulling up several sorts of the wrong thing, Jan felt her temper
+getting edgy, so they sat down to rest upon one of the many convenient
+seats to be found at Wren's End. Anthony hated a garden where you
+couldn't sit comfortably and smoke, wheresoever the prospect was
+pleasing.
+
+Tony sat down too, looking almost rosy after his labours.
+
+He didn't sit close and cuddly, as little Fay would have done, but right
+at the other end of the seat, where he could stare at her. Every day was
+bringing Tony more surely to the conclusion that "he liked to look at"
+his aunt.
+
+"You like Meg, don't you?" he said.
+
+"No," Jan shook her head. "I don't like her. I love her; which is quite
+a different thing."
+
+"Do you like people and love them?"
+
+"I like some people--a great many people--then there are others, not so
+many, that I love--you're one of them."
+
+"Is Fay?"
+
+"Certainly, dear little Fay."
+
+"And Peter?"
+
+For a moment Jan hesitated. With heightened colour she met Tony's grave,
+searching eyes. Above everything she desired to be always true and
+sincere with him, that he might, as on that first night in England, feel
+that he "believed" her. "I have every reason to love Mr. Ledgard," she
+said slowly: "he was so wonderfully kind to all of us." She was
+determined to be loyal to Peter with poor Fay's children. Jan hated
+ingratitude. To have said she only liked Peter must have given Tony the
+impression that she was both forgetful and ungrateful. She would not
+risk that even though she might risk misunderstanding of another kind if
+he ever repeated her words to anybody else.
+
+Her heart beat rather faster than was comfortable, and she was thankful
+that she and Tony were alone.
+
+"Who _do_ you like?" he asked.
+
+"Nearly everybody; the people in the village, our good neighbours ...
+Can't you see the difference yourself? Now, you love your dear Mummy and
+you like ... say, William----"
+
+"No," Tony said firmly, "I love William. I don't think," he went on, "I
+like people ... much. Either I love them like you said, or I don't care
+about them at all ... or I hate them."
+
+"That," said Jan, "is a mistake. It's no use to hate people."
+
+"But if you feel like it ... I hate people if they cheat me."
+
+"But who on earth would cheat you? What do you mean?"
+
+"Once," said Tony, and by the monotonous, detached tone of his voice Jan
+knew he was going to talk about his father, "my Daddie asked me if I'd
+like to see smoke come out of his ears ... an' he said: 'Put your hand
+here on me and watch very careful.'" Tony pointed to Jan's chest. "I put
+my hand there and I watched and watched an' he hurt me with the end of
+his cigar. There's the mark!" He held out a grubby little hand, back
+uppermost, for Jan's inspection, and there, sure enough, was the little
+round white scar.
+
+"And what did you do?" she asked.
+
+"I bit him."
+
+"Oh, Tony, how dreadful!"
+
+"I shouldn't of minded so much if he'd really done it--the smoke out of
+his ears, I mean; but not one teeniest little puff came. I watched so
+careful ... He cheated me."
+
+Jan said nothing. What could she say? Hot anger burned in her heart
+against Hugo. She could have bitten him herself.
+
+"Peter was there," Tony went on, "and Peter said it served him right."
+
+"Yes," said Jan, grasping at this straw, "but what did Peter say to
+you?"
+
+"He said, 'Sahibs don't cry and sahibs don't bite,' and if I was a sahib
+I mustn't do it, so I don't. I don't bite people often."
+
+"I should hope not; besides, you know, sometimes quite good-natured
+people will do things in fun, never thinking it will hurt."
+
+Tony gazed gloomily at Jan. "He cheated me," he repeated. "He said he
+would make it come out of his ears, and it didn't. He didn't like
+me--that's why."
+
+"I don't think you ought to say that, and be so unforgiving. I expect
+Daddie forgot all about your biting him directly, and yet you remember
+what he did after this long time."
+
+Poor Jan did try so hard to be fair.
+
+"I wasn't afraid of him," Tony went on, as though he hadn't heard, "not
+really. Mummy was. She was drefully afraid. He said he'd whip me because
+I was so surly, and she was afraid he would ... I _knew_ he wouldn't,
+not unless he could do it some cheaty way, and you can't whip people
+that way. But it frightened Mummy. She used to send me away when he
+came...."
+
+Tony paused and knitted his brows, then suddenly he smiled. "But I
+always came back very quick, because I knew she wanted me, and I liked
+to look at him. He liked Fay, I suppose he liked to look at her, so do
+I. Nobody wants to look at me ... much ... except Mummy."
+
+"I do," Jan said hastily. "I like to look at you just every bit as much
+as I like to look at Fay. I think you care rather too much what people
+look like, Tony."
+
+"It does matter a lot," Tony said obstinately.
+
+"Other things matter much more. Courage and kindness and truth and
+honesty. Look at Mr. Ledgard--he's not what you'd call a beautiful
+person, and yet I'm sure we all like to look at him."
+
+"Sometimes you say Peter, and sometimes Mr. Ledgard. Why?"
+
+Again Jan's heart gave that queer, uncomfortable jump. She certainly
+always _thought_ of him as Peter. Quite unconsciously she occasionally
+spoke of him as Peter. Meg had observed this, but, unlike Tony, made no
+remark.
+
+"Why?" Tony repeated.
+
+"I suppose," Jan mumbled feebly, "it's because I hear the rest of you do
+it. I've no sort of right to."
+
+"Auntie Jan," Tony said earnestly. "What is a devil?"
+
+"I haven't the remotest idea, Tony," Jan replied, with the utmost
+sincerity.
+
+"It isn't anything very nice, is it, or nice to look at?"
+
+"It might be," said Jan, with Scottish caution.
+
+"Daddie used to call me a surly little devil--when I used to come back
+because Mummy was frightened ... she was always frightened when he
+talked about money, and he did it a lot ... When he saw me, he would
+say: 'Wot you doing here, you surly little devil--listening, eh?'"
+Tony's youthful voice took on such a snarl that Jan positively jumped,
+and put out her hand to stop him. "'I'll give you somefin to listen
+to....'"
+
+"Tony, Tony, couldn't you try to forget all that?"
+
+Tony shook his head. "No! I shall never forget it, because, you see,
+it's all mixed up with Mummy so, and you said"--here Tony held up an
+accusing small finger at Jan--"you said I was never to forget her, not
+the least little bit."
+
+"I know I did," Jan owned, and fell to pondering what was best to be
+done about these memories. Absently she dug her hoe into the ground,
+making ruts in the gravel, while Tony watched her solemnly.
+
+"Then why," he went on, "do you not want me to remember Daddie?"
+
+"Because," said Jan, "everything you seem to remember sounds so unkind."
+
+"Well, I can't help that," Tony answered.
+
+Jan arose from the seat. "If we sit idling here all afternoon," she
+remarked severely, "we shall never get that border weeded for Earley."
+
+The afternoon post came in at four, and when Jan went in there were
+several letters for her on the hall-table, spread out by Hannah in a
+neat row, one above the other. It was Saturday, and the Indian mail was
+in. There was one from Peter, but it was another letter that Jan seized
+first, turning it over and looking at the post-mark, which was
+remarkably clear. She knew the excellent handwriting well, though she
+had seen it comparatively seldom.
+
+It was Hugo Tancred's; and the post-mark was Port Said. She opened it
+with hands that trembled, and it said:
+
+      "MY DEAR JAN,
+
+      "In case other letters have miscarried, which is quite
+      possible while I was up country, let me assure you how
+      grateful I am for all you did for my poor wife and the
+      children--and for me in letting me know so faithfully what
+      your movements have been. I sent to the bank for your
+      letters while passing through Bombay recently, and but for
+      your kindness in allowing the money I had left for my
+      wife's use to remain to my credit, I should have been
+      unable to leave India, for things have gone sadly against
+      me, and the world is only too ready to turn its back upon a
+      broken man.
+
+      "When I saw by the notice in the papers that my beloved
+      wife was no more, I realised that for me the lamp is
+      shattered and the light of my life extinguished. All that
+      remains to me is to make the best of my poor remnant of
+      existence for the sake of my children.
+
+      "We will talk over plans when we meet. I hope to be in
+      England in about another month, perhaps sooner, and we will
+      consult together as to what is best to be done.
+
+      "I have no doubt it will be possible to find a good and
+      cheap preparatory school where Tony can be safely bestowed
+      for the present, and one of my sisters would probably take
+      my precious little Fay, if you find it inconvenient to have
+      her with you. A boy is always better at school as soon as
+      possible, and I have strong views as to the best methods of
+      education. I never for a moment forget my responsibilities
+      towards my children and the necessity for a father's
+      supreme authority.
+
+      "You may be sure that, in so far as you make it possible
+      for me to do so, I will fall in with your wishes regarding
+      them in every way.
+
+      "It will not be worth your while writing to me here, as my
+      plans are uncertain. I will try to give you notice of my
+      arrival, but may reach you before my next letter.
+
+                           "Yours affectionately,
+
+                                           "HUGO TANCRED."
+
+Still as a statue sat Jan. From the garden came the cheerful chirruping
+of birds and constant, eager questioning of Earley by the children.
+Earley's slow Gloucestershire speech rumbled on in muffled _obbligato_
+to the higher, carrying, little voices.
+
+The whirr of a sewing-machine came from the morning-room, now the
+day-nursery, where Meg was busy with frocks for little Fay.
+
+In a distant pantry somebody was clinking teacups. Jan shivered, though
+the air from the open window was only fresh, not cold. At that moment
+she knew exactly how an animal feels when caught in a trap. Hugo
+Tancred's letter was the trap, and she was in it. With the exception of
+the lie about other letters--Jan was perfectly sure he had written no
+other letters--and the stereotyped phrases about shattered lamps and the
+wife who was "no more," the letter was one long menace--scarcely veiled.
+That sentence, "in so far as you make it possible for me to do so, I
+will fall in with your wishes regarding them in every way," simply meant
+that if Jan was to keep the children she must let Hugo make ducks and
+drakes of her money; and if he took her money, how could she do what she
+ought for the children?
+
+And he was at Port Said; only a week's journey.
+
+Why had she left that money in Bombay? Why had she not listened to
+Peter? Sometimes she had thought that Peter held rather a cynically low
+view of his fellow-creatures--some of his fellow-creatures. Surely no
+one could be all bad? Jan had hoped great things of adversity for Hugo
+Tancred. Peter indulged in no such pleasant illusions, and said so.
+"Schoolgirl sentimentality" Meg had called it, and so it was. "No doubt
+it will be possible to find some cheap preparatory school for Tony."
+
+Would he try to steal Tony?
+
+From the charitable mood that hopeth all things Jan suddenly veered to a
+belief in all things evil of her brother-in-law. At that moment she felt
+him capable of murdering the child and throwing his little body down a
+well, as they do in India.
+
+Again she shivered.
+
+What was she to do?
+
+So helpless, so unprotected; so absolutely at his mercy because she
+loved the children. "Never let him blackmail you," Peter had said.
+"Stand up to him always, and he'll probably crumple up."
+
+Suddenly, as though someone had opened shutters in a pitch-dark room,
+letting in the blessed light, Jan remembered there was also a letter
+from Peter.
+
+She crossed the hall to get it, though her legs shook under her and her
+knees were as water.
+
+She felt she couldn't get back to the window-seat, so she sat on the
+edge of the gate-table and opened the letter.
+
+A very short letter, only one side of a page.
+
+      "DEAR MISS ROSS,
+
+      "This is the last mail for a bit, for I come myself by the
+      next, the _Macedonia_. You may catch me at Aden, but
+      certainly a note will get me at Marseilles, if you are kind
+      enough to write. Tancred has been back in Bombay and gone
+      again in one of the smaller home-going boats. Where he got
+      the money to go I can't think, for from many sources lately
+      I've heard that his various ventures have been far from
+      prosperous, and no one will trust him with a rupee.
+
+      "So look out for blackmail, and be firm, mind.
+
+      "I go to my aunt in Artillery Mansions on arrival. When may
+      I run down to see you all?
+
+                         "Yours always sincerely,
+
+                                          "PETER LEDGARD."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+"THOUGH AN HOST SHOULD ENCAMP AGAINST ME"
+
+
+The flap of the gate-leg table creaked under Jan's weight, but she dug
+her heels into the rug and balanced, for she felt incapable of moving.
+
+Peter was coming home; if the worst came to the worst he would deal with
+Hugo, and a respite would be gained. But Peter would go out to India
+again and Hugo would not. The whole miserable business would be
+repeated--and how could she continue to worry Peter with her affairs?
+What claim had she upon him? As though she were some stranger seeing it
+for the first time, Jan looked round the square, comfortable hall. She
+saw it with new eyes sharpened by apprehension; yet everything was
+solidly the same.
+
+The floor with its draught-board pattern of large, square, black and
+white stones; the old dark chairs; the high bookcases at each side of
+the hearth; the wide staircase with its spacious, windowed turning and
+shallow steps, so easily traversed by little feet; the whole steeped in
+that atmosphere of friendly comfort that kind old houses get and keep.
+
+Such a good place to be young in.
+
+Such a happy place, so safe and sheltered and pleasant.
+
+Outside the window a wren was calling to his mate with a note that
+sounded just like a faint kiss; such a tender little song.
+
+The swing door was opened noisily and Anne Chitt appeared bearing the
+nursery tea-tray, deposited it in the nursery, opened the front door,
+thumped on the gong and vanished again. Meg came out from the nursery
+with two pairs of small slippers in her hand: "Where are my children? I
+left little Fay with Earley while I finished the overalls; he's a most
+efficient under-nurse--I suppose you left Tony with him too. Such a lot
+of letters for you. Did you get your mail? I heard from both the boys.
+Ah, sensible Earley's taking them round to the back door. Where's
+William's duster? Hannah does make such a fuss about paw-marks." And
+Meg, too, vanished through the swing door.
+
+Slowly Jan dragged herself off the table, gathered up her unread
+letters, and went into the nursery. She felt as though she were
+dreadfully asleep and couldn't awake to realise the wholesome everyday
+world around her.
+
+Vaguely she stared round the room, the most charming room in Wren's End.
+Panelled in wood long since painted white, with two delightful rounded
+corner cupboards, it gave straight on to the wrens' sunk lawn from a big
+French window with steps, an anachronism added by Miss Janet Ross. Five
+years ago Anthony had brought a beautiful iron gate from Venice that
+fitted into the archway, cut through the yew hedge and leading to the
+drive. Jan had given this room to the children because in summer they
+could spend the whole day in its green-walled garden, quite safe and
+shut in from every possibility of mischief. A sun-dial was in the
+centre, and in one corner a fat stone cherub upheld a bath for the
+birds. Daffodils were in bloom on the banks, and one small single tulip
+of brilliant red. Jan went out and stood on the top step.
+
+Long immunity from menace of any kind had made all sorts of little birds
+extraordinarily bold and friendly. Even the usually shy and furtive
+golden-crested wrens fussed in and out under the yew hedge quite
+regardless of Jan.
+
+Through an open window overhead came the sound of cheerful high voices,
+and little Fay started to sing at the top of her strong treble:
+
+    Thlee mice went into a hole to spin,
+    Puss came by, and puss peeped in;
+    What are you doing, my littoo old men?
+    We're weaving coats for gentoomen.
+
+"Is that what I've been doing?" thought Jan. "Weaving coats of many
+colours out of happy dreams?" Were she and the children the mice, she
+wondered.
+
+Marauding cats had been kept away from Wren's End for over a hundred
+years. "The little wrens that build" had been safe enough. But what of
+these poor human nestlings?
+
+"Shall I come and help loo to wind up loo thleds?" sang little Fay. "Oh,
+no, Missis Pussy, you'd bite off our heads!" And Tony joined in with a
+shout: "Oh, no, Missis Pussy, you'd bite off our heads."
+
+The voices died away, the children were coming downstairs.
+
+Jan drank three cups of tea and crumbled one piece of bread and butter
+on her plate. The rest of the party were hungry and full of adventures.
+Before she joined Earley little Fay had been to the village with Meg to
+buy tape, and she had a great deal to say about this expedition. Meg saw
+that something was troubling Jan, and wondered if Mr. Ledgard had given
+her fresh news of Hugo. But Meg never asked questions or worried people.
+She chattered to the children, and immediately after tea carried them
+off for the usual washing of hands.
+
+Jan went out into the hall; the door was open and the sunny spring
+evening called to her. When she was miserable she always wanted to walk,
+and she walked now; swiftly down the drive she went and out along the
+road till she came to the church, which stood at the end of the village
+nearest to Wren's End.
+
+She turned into the churchyard, and up the broad pathway between the
+graves to the west door.
+
+Near the door was a square headstone marking the grave of Charles
+Considine Smith; and she paused beside it to read once more the somewhat
+strange inscription.
+
+Under his name and age, cut deep in the moss-grown stone, were the
+words: "_Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not
+fear._"
+
+Often before Jan had wondered what could have caused Tranquil, his wife,
+to choose so strenuous an epitaph. Tranquil, who had never stirred
+twenty miles from the place where she was born; whose very name, so far
+as they could gather, exemplified her life.
+
+What secret menace had threatened this "staid person," this prosperous
+shipper of sherry who, apparently, had spent the evening of his life in
+observing the habits of wrens.
+
+Why should his gentle wife have thus commemorated his fighting spirit?
+
+Be the reason what it might, Jan felt vaguely comforted. There was
+triumph as well as trust in the words. Whatever it was that had
+threatened him, he had stood up to it. His wife knew this and was proud.
+
+Jan tried the heavy oak door and it yielded, and from the soft mildness
+of the spring evening, so full of happy sounds of innocent life, she
+passed into the grey and sacred silence of the church.
+
+It was cold in the beautiful old fourteenth-century church, with that
+pervading smell of badly-burning wood that is so often found in country
+churches till all attempt at heating ceases for the summer. But nothing
+could mar the nobility of its austerely lovely architecture; the
+indefinable, exquisite grace that soothes and penetrates.
+
+She went and knelt in the Wren's End pew where Charles Considine Smith's
+vast prayer-book still stood on the book-board. And even as in the
+Bombay Cathedral she had prayed that strength might be given to her to
+walk in the Way, so now she prayed for courage and a quiet, steadfast
+mind.
+
+Her head was bowed and buried in her hands: "_My heart shall not
+fear_," she whispered; but she knew that it did fear, and fear
+grievously.
+
+The tense silence was broken by an odd, fitful, pattering sound; but
+Jan, absorbed in her petition for the courage she could not feel, heard
+nothing.
+
+Something clumsy, warm, and panting pushed against her, and she
+uncovered her face and looked down upon William trying to thrust his
+head under her arm and join in her devotions.
+
+And William became a misty blur, for her eyes filled with tears; he
+looked so anxious and foolish and kind with his tongue hanging out and
+his absurd, puzzled expression.
+
+He was puzzled. Part of the usual ritual had been omitted.
+
+She ought, by all known precedents, to have put her arm round his neck
+and have admonished him to "pray for his Master." But she did nothing of
+the kind, only patted him, with no sort of invitation to join in her
+orisons.
+
+William was sure something was wrong somewhere.
+
+Then Jan saw Tony sitting at the far end of the seat, hatless, coatless,
+in his indoor strap shoes; and he was regarding her with grave,
+understanding eyes.
+
+In a moment she was back in the present and vividly alive to the fact
+that here was chilly, delicate Tony out after tea, without a coat and
+sitting in an ice-cold church.
+
+She rose from her knees, much to William's satisfaction, who did not
+care for religious services in which he might not take an active part.
+He trotted out of the pew and Jan followed him, stooping to kiss Tony as
+she passed.
+
+"It's too cold for you here, dear," she whispered; "let us come out."
+
+She held out her hand and Tony took it, and together they passed down
+the aisle and into the warmer air outside.
+
+"How did you know I was here?" she asked, as they hurried into the road.
+
+"I saw you going down the drive from the bathroom window, and so I
+runned after you, and William came too."
+
+"But what made you come after me?"
+
+"Because I thought you looked frightened, and I didn't like it; you
+looked like Mummy did sometimes."
+
+No one who has seen fear stamped upon a woman's face ever forgets it.
+Tony had watched his aunt all tea-time, and this quite new expression
+troubled him. Mummy had always seemed to want him when she looked like
+that; perhaps Auntie Jan would want him too. The moment his hands were
+dried he had rushed past Meg and down the stairs with William in his
+wake. Meg had not tried to stop him, for she, too, realised that
+something worried Jan, and she knew that already there had arisen an
+almost unconscious _entente_ between these two. But she had no idea that
+he had gone out of doors. She dressed little Fay and took her out to the
+garden, thinking that Tony and Jan were probably in the nursery, and she
+was careful not to disturb them.
+
+"Are you cold, Tony?" Jan asked anxiously, walking so fast that Tony
+had almost to run to keep up with her.
+
+"No, not very; it's a nice coldness rather, don't you think?"
+
+"Tony, will you tell me--when Daddie was angry with you, were you never
+frightened?"
+
+Tony pulled at her hand to make her go more slowly. "Yes," he said, "I
+used to feel frightened inside, but I wouldn't let him know it, and
+then--it was funny--but quite sunn'ly I wasn't frightened any more. You
+try it."
+
+"You mean," Jan asked earnestly, "that if you don't let anyone else know
+you are frightened, you cease to be frightened?"
+
+"Something like that," Tony said; "it just happens."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+MEG AND CAPTAIN MIDDLETON
+
+
+Meg had worked hard and faithfully ever since Ayah left. Very soon after
+she took over the children entirely she discovered that, however naughty
+and tiresome they were in many respects, they were quick-witted and
+easily interested. And she decided there and then that to keep them good
+she must keep them well amused, and it acted like a charm.
+
+She had the somewhat rare power of surrounding quite ordinary everyday
+proceedings with a halo of romance, so that the children's day developed
+into a series of entrancing adventures.
+
+With Meg, enthusiastic make-believe had never wholly given place to
+common sense. Throughout the long, hard days of her childhood and early
+apprenticeship to a rather unkindly world she had pretended joyously,
+and invented for herself all sorts of imaginary pleasures to take the
+place of those tangible ones denied to her. She had kept the width and
+wistfulness of the child's horizon with a good deal of the child's
+finality and love of detail; so that she was as responsive to the drama
+of common things as the children themselves.
+
+Thus it came about that the daily donning of the uniform was in very
+truth symbolic and inspiring; and once the muslin cap was adjusted, she
+felt herself magically surrounded by the atmosphere most conducive to
+the production of the Perfect Nurse.
+
+For Tony and little Fay getting up and going to bed resolved themselves
+into feats of delicious dexterity that custom could not stale. The
+underneaths of tables were caves and dungeons, chairs became chariots at
+will, and every night little Fay waved a diminutive pocket-handkerchief
+to Tony from the deck of an ocean-going P. and O.
+
+The daily walks, especially since they came to Wren's End, were filled
+with hopeful possibilities. And to hunt for eggs with Mrs. Earley, or
+gather vegetables with her son, partook of the nature of a high and
+solemn quest. It was here Meg showed real genius. She drew all the
+household into her net of interest. The children poked their busy
+fingers into everybody's pies, and even stern Hannah was compelled,
+quite unconsciously, to contribute her share in the opulent happiness of
+their little world.
+
+But it took it out of Meg.
+
+For weeks she had been on the alert to prevent storms and tempests. Now
+that the children's barometer seemed at "set fair" she suddenly felt
+very tired.
+
+Jan had been watching her, and on that particular Sunday, had she been
+able to catch Meg before she got up, Jan would have dressed the children
+and kept her in bed. But Meg was too nimble for her, washed and dressed
+her charges, and appeared at breakfast looking a "wispy wraith."
+
+She had slept badly; a habit formed in her under-nourished youth which
+she found hard to break; and she had, in consequence, been sitting up in
+bed at five in the morning to make buttonholes in garden smocks for
+Tony.
+
+This would have enraged Jan had she but known it. But Meg, frank and
+honest as the day in most things, was, at times, curiously secretive;
+and so far had entirely eluded Jan's vigilance. By the time Anne Chitt
+came with the awakening tea there wasn't a vestige of smock, needles, or
+cotton to be seen, and so far lynx-eyed little Fay had never awoke in
+time to catch her at it.
+
+This morning, however, Jan exerted her authority. She slung the hammock
+between two trees in the sunniest part of the garden; she wrapped Meg in
+her own fur coat, which was far too big for Meg; covered her with a
+particularly soft, warm rug, gave her a book, a sun-umbrella, and her
+cigarette case; and forbade her to move till lunch-time unless it
+rained.
+
+Then she took the two children and William into Squire Walcote's woods
+for the morning and Meg fell fast asleep.
+
+Warm with the double glow that came from being wrapped in Jan's coat
+because Jan loved her; lulled by the songs of birds and a soft, shy wind
+that ruffled the short hair about her forehead, little Meg was supremely
+happy. To be tired, to be made to rest, to be kissed and tucked in and
+sternly commanded to stay where she was till she was fetched--all this,
+so commonplace to cherished, cared-for folk, seemed quite wonderful to
+Meg, and she snuggled down among the cushions in blissful content.
+
+Meanwhile, on that same Sunday morning, Captain Middleton, at Amber
+Guiting Manor, was trying to screw his courage up to the announcement
+that he did not intend to accompany his aunt and uncle to church. Lady
+Mary Walcote was his mother's only sister, and Mrs. Walcote, wife of
+Jan's tenant, was one of his father's, so that he spoke quite truly when
+he told Meg he had "stacks of relations down at Amber Guiting."
+
+Colonel Walcote was much better off than his elder brother, the squire
+of Amber Guiting, for he benefited by the Middleton money.
+
+Miles Middleton's father was the originator of "Middleton's Made
+Starch," which was used everywhere and was supposed to be superior to
+all other starches. Why "Made" scoffers could never understand, for it
+required precisely the same treatment as other starches. But the British
+Public believed in it, the British Public also bought it in large
+quantities, and George Middleton, son of Mutton-Pie Middleton, a
+well-to-do confectioner in Doncaster, became an exceedingly rich man. He
+did not marry till he was forty, and then he married "family," for Lady
+Agnes Keills, younger daughter of Lord Glencarse, had a long pedigree
+and no dower at all. She was a good wife to him, gentle, upright, and
+always affectionate. She adored their only child, Miles, and died quite
+suddenly from heart failure, just after that cheerful youth had joined
+at Woolwich. George Middleton died some three years later, leaving his
+money absolutely to his son, who came of age at twenty-five. And, so
+far, Miles had justified his father's faith in him, for he had never
+done anything very foolish, and a certain strain of Yorkshire shrewdness
+prevented him from committing any wild extravagance.
+
+He was generous, kindly, and keen on his profession, and he had reached
+the age of thirty-two without ever having felt any overwhelming desire
+to marry; though it was pretty well known that considerable efforts to
+marry him suitably had been made by both mothers and daughters.
+
+The beautiful and level-headed young ladies of musical comedy had failed
+to land this considerable fish, angled they never so skilfully; though
+he frankly enjoyed their amusing society and was quite liberal, though
+not lavish, in the way of presents.
+
+Young women of his own rank were pleasant to him, their mothers cordial,
+and no difficulty was ever put in the way of his enjoying their society.
+But he was not very susceptible. Deep in his heart, in some dim,
+unacknowledged corner, there lay a humble, homely desire that he might
+_feel_ a great deal more strongly than he had felt yet, when the time
+and the woman came to him.
+
+Never, until Meg smiled at him when he offered to carry little Fay up
+that long staircase, had the thought of a girl thoroughly obsessed him;
+and it is possible that even after their meetings in Kensington Gardens
+her image might gradually have faded from his mind, had it not occurred
+to Mrs. Trent to interfere.
+
+He had seen a good deal of the Trents while hunting with the Pytchley
+two winters ago. Lotty was a fearless rider and what men called "a real
+good sort." At one time it had sometimes crossed Captain Middleton's
+mind that Lotty wouldn't make half a bad wife for a Horse Gunner, but
+somehow it had always stopped at the idea, and when he didn't see Lotty
+he never thought about her at all.
+
+Now that he no longer saw Meg he thought about her all day and far into
+the night. His sensations were so new, so disturbing and unpleasant, his
+life was so disorganised and upset, that he asked himself in varying
+degrees of ever-accumulating irritation: "What the deuce was the
+matter?"
+
+Then Mrs. Trent asked him to luncheon.
+
+She was staying with her daughters at the Kensington Palace Hotel, and
+they had a suite of rooms. Lotty and her sister flew away before coffee
+was served, as they were going to a _matinee_, and Miles was left
+_tete-a-tete_ with Mrs. Trent.
+
+She was most motherly and kind.
+
+Just as he was wondering whether he might now decently take leave of
+her, she said: "Captain Middleton, I'm going to take a great liberty and
+venture to say something to you that perhaps you will resent ... but I
+feel I must do it because your mother was such a dear friend of mine."
+
+This was a piece of information for Miles, who knew perfectly well that
+Lady Agnes Middleton's acquaintance with Mrs. Trent had been of the
+slightest. However, he bowed and looked expectant.
+
+"I saw you the other day walking with Miss Morton in Kensington Gardens;
+apparently she is now in charge of somebody's children. May I ask if you
+have known her long?"
+
+Mrs. Trent looked searchingly at Miles, and there was an inflection on
+the "long" that he felt was in some way insulting to Meg, and he
+stiffened all over.
+
+"Before I answer that question, Mrs. Trent, may I ask why you should
+want to know?"
+
+"My dear boy, I see perfectly well that it must seem impertinent
+curiosity on my part. But I assure you my motive for asking is quite
+justifiable. Will you try not to feel irritated and believe that what I
+am doing, I am doing for the best?"
+
+"I have not known Miss Morton very long; why?"
+
+"Do you know the people she is living with at present?"
+
+Again that curious inflection on the "present."
+
+"Oh, yes, and so do my people; they think all the world of her."
+
+"Of Miss Morton?" Shocked astonishment was in Mrs. Trent's voice.
+
+"I was not speaking of Miss Morton just then, but of the lady she is
+with. I've no doubt, though," said Miles stoutly, "they'd think just
+the same of Miss Morton if they knew her. They may know her, too; it's
+just a chance we've never discussed her."
+
+"It is very difficult and painful for me to say what I have got to say
+... but if Miss Morton is in charge of the children of a friend of your
+family, I think you ought to know she is not a suitable person to be
+anything of the kind."
+
+"I say!" Miles exclaimed, "that's a pretty stiff thing to say about any
+girl; a dangerous thing to say; especially about one who seems to need
+to earn her own living."
+
+"I know it is; I hate to say it ... but it seemed to me the other day--I
+hope I was mistaken--that you were rather ... attracted, and knowing
+what I do I felt I must speak, must warn you."
+
+Miles got up. He seemed to tower above the table and dwarf the whole
+room. "I'd rather not hear any more, Mrs. Trent, please. It seems too
+beastly mean somehow for me to sit here and listen to scandal about a
+poor little unprotected girl who works hard and faithfully--mind you,
+I've seen her with those children, and she's perfectly wonderful. Don't
+you see yourself how I can't _do_ it?"
+
+Mrs. Trent sat on where she was and smiled at Miles, slowly shaking her
+head. "Sit down, my dear boy. Your feelings do you credit; but we
+mustn't be sentimental, and facts are facts. I have every reason to know
+what I'm talking about, for some years ago Miss Morton was in my
+service."
+
+Miles did not sit down. He stood where he was, glowering down at Mrs.
+Trent.
+
+"That doesn't brand her, does it?" he asked.
+
+Still smiling maternally at him, Mrs. Trent continued: "She left my
+service when she ran away with Mr. Walter Brooke--you know him, I think?
+Disgraceful though it was, I must say this of him, that he never made
+any concealment of the fact that he was a married man. She did it with
+her eyes open."
+
+"If," Miles growled, "all this happened 'some years ago' she must have
+been about twelve at the time, and Brooke ought to have been hounded out
+of society long ago."
+
+"I needn't say that _we_ have cut him ever since. She was, I believe,
+about nineteen at the time. She did not remain with him, but you can
+understand that, naturally, I don't want _you_ to get entangled with a
+girl of that sort."
+
+Miles picked up his hat and stick. "I wish you hadn't told me," he
+groaned. "I don't think a bit less highly of her, but you've made _me_
+feel such a low-down brute, I can't bear it. Good-bye--I've no doubt you
+did it for the best ... but----" And Miles fairly ran from the room.
+
+Mrs. Trent drummed with her fingers on the table and looked thoughtful.
+"It was quite time somebody interfered," she reflected. And then she
+remembered with annoyance that she had not found out the name of Meg's
+employer.
+
+Miles strode through Kensington Gore and past Knightsbridge, when he
+turned down Sloane Street till he came to a fencing school he
+frequented. Here he went in and had a strenuous half-hour with the
+instructor, but nothing served to restore his peace of mind. He was
+angry and hurt and horribly worried. If it was true, if the whole
+miserable story was true, then he knew that something had been taken
+from him. Something he had cherished in that dim, secret corner of his
+heart. Its truth or untruth did not affect his feeling for Meg. But if
+it were true, then he had irretrievably lost something intangible, yet
+precious. Young men like Miles never mention ideals, but that's not to
+say that in some very hidden place they don't exist, like buried
+treasure.
+
+All the shrewd Yorkshire strain in him shouted that he must set this
+doubt at rest. That whatever was to be his action in the future he must
+know and face the truth. All the delicacy, the fine feeling, the
+sensitiveness he got from his mother, made him loathe any investigation
+of the kind, and his racial instincts battled together and made him very
+miserable indeed.
+
+When he left the fencing school, he turned into Hyde Park. The Row was
+beginning to fill, and suddenly he came upon his second cousin, Lady
+Penelope Pottinger, sitting all alone on a green chair with another
+empty one beside it. Miles dropped into the empty chair. He liked Lady
+Pen. She was always downright and sometimes very amusing. Moreover she
+took an intelligent interest in dogs, and knew Amber Guiting and its
+inhabitants. So Miles dexterously led the conversation round to Jan and
+Wren's End.
+
+Lady Pen was looking very beautiful that afternoon. She wore a
+broad-leaved hat which did not wholly conceal her glorious hair. Hair
+the same colour as certain short feathery rings that framed a pale,
+pathetic little face that haunted him.
+
+"Talking of Amber Guiting," he said, "did you ever come across a Miss
+Morton down there? A friend of Miss Ross."
+
+Lady Pen turned and looked hard at him. "Oh dear, yes; she's rather a
+pal of mine. I knew her long before I met her at the Ross's. Why, I knew
+her when she was companion at the Trents, poor little devil."
+
+"Did she have a bad time there? Weren't they nice to her?"
+
+"At first they were nice enough, but afterwards it was rotten. Clever
+little thing she is, but poor as a rat. What do you know about her?"
+
+Again Lady Pen looked hard at Miles. She was wondering whether Meg had
+ever given away the reason for that short hair of hers.
+
+"Oh, I've met her just casually, you know, with Miss Ross. She strikes
+me as a ... rather unusual sort of girl."
+
+"Ever mention me?"
+
+"No, never that I can remember. I haven't seen much of her, you know."
+
+"Well, my son, the less you see of her the better, for her, I should
+say. She's a clever, industrious, good little thing, but she's not in
+your row. After all, these workin' girls have their feelin's."
+
+"I don't fancy Miss Morton is at all the susceptible idiot you appear
+to think her. It's other people's feelings I should be afraid of, not
+hers."
+
+"Oh, I grant you she's attractive enough to some folks. Artists, for
+instance, rave over her. At least, Anthony Ross did. Queer chap, that;
+would never paint me. Now can you understand any man in his senses
+refusin' to paint me?"
+
+"It seems odd, certainly."
+
+"He painted her, for nothin' of course, over an' over again ... just
+because he liked doin' it. Odd chap he was, but very takin'. You
+couldn't dislike him, even when he refused to paint you. Awful swank
+though, wasn't it?"
+
+"Were his pictures of Miss Morton--sold?"
+
+"Some were, I believe; but Janet Ross has got a lot of 'em down at
+Wren's End. She always puts away most of her father's paintin's when she
+lets the house. But you take my advice, Miley, my son: you keep clear of
+that little girl."
+
+This was on Thursday, and, of course, after two warnings in one
+afternoon, Miles went down to Amber Guiting on Saturday night.
+
+"Aunt Mary, it's such a lovely morning, should you mind very much if I
+go for a stroll in the woods--or slack about in the fresh air, instead
+of going to church?"
+
+At the word "stroll" he had seen an interested expression lighten up
+Squire Walcote's face, and the last thing he wanted was his uncle's
+society for the whole morning.
+
+"I don't feel up to much exercise," Miles went on, trying to look
+exhausted and failing egregiously. "I've had rather a hard week in town.
+I'll give the vicar a turn in the evening, I will truly."
+
+Lady Mary smiled indulgently on this large young man, who certainly
+looked far from delicate. But only a hard-hearted woman could have
+pointed this out at such a moment, and where her nephew was concerned
+Lady Mary's heart was all kindly affection. So she let him off church.
+
+Miles carried out a pile of books to a seat in the garden and appeared
+to be settled down to a studious morning. He waved a languid hand to his
+aunt and uncle as they started for church, and the moment they were out
+of sight laid down his book and clasped his hands behind his head.
+
+The vicar of Amber Guiting was a family man and merciful. The school
+children all creaked and pattered out of church after morning prayer,
+and any other small people in the congregation were encouraged to do
+likewise, the well-filled vicarage pew setting the example. Therefore,
+Miles reckoned, that even supposing Miss Morton took the little boy to
+church (he couldn't conceive of anyone having the temerity to escort
+little Fay thither), they would come out in about three-quarters of an
+hour after the bell stopped. But he had no intention of waiting for
+that. The moment the bell ceased he--unaccompanied by any of the dogs
+grouped about him at that moment--was going to investigate the Wren's
+End garden. He knew every corner of it, and he intended to unearth Meg
+and the children if they were to be found.
+
+Besides, he ardently desired to see William.
+
+William was a lawful pretext. No one could see anything odd in his
+calling at Wren's End to see William. It was a perfectly natural thing
+to do.
+
+Confound Mrs. Trent.
+
+Confound Pen, what did she want to interfere for?
+
+Confound that bell. Would it never stop?
+
+Yes it had. No it hadn't. Yes ... it had.
+
+Give a few more minutes for laggards, and then----
+
+Three melancholy and disappointed dogs were left in the Manor Garden,
+while Miles swung down the drive, past the church, and into the road
+that led to Wren's End.
+
+What a morning it was!
+
+The whole world seemed to have put on its Sunday frock. There had been
+rain in the night, and the air was full of the delicious fresh-washed
+smell of spring herbage. Wren's End seemed wonderfully quiet and
+deserted as Miles turned into the drive. As he neared the house he
+paused and listened, but there was no sound of high little voices
+anywhere.
+
+Were they at church, then?
+
+They couldn't be indoors on such a beautiful day.
+
+Miles whistled softly, knowing that if William were anywhere within
+hearing, that would bring him at the double.
+
+But no joyfully galumphing William appeared to welcome him.
+
+He had no intention of ringing to inquire. No, he'd take a good look
+round first, before he went back to hang about outside the church.
+
+It was pleasant in the Wren's End garden.
+
+Presently he went down the broad central path of the walled garden, with
+borders of flowers and beds of vegetables. Half-way down, in the
+sunniest, warmest place, he came upon a hammock slung between an
+apple-tree not quite out and a pear-tree that was nearly over, and a
+voice from the hammock called sleepily: "Is that you, Earley? I wish
+you'd pick up my cigarette case for me; it's fallen into the lavender
+bush just below."
+
+"Yes, Miss," a voice answered that was certainly not Earley's.
+
+Meg leaned out of the hammock to look behind her.
+
+"Hullo!" she said. "Why are you not in church? I can't get up because
+I'm a prisoner on _parole_. Short of a thunderstorm nothing is to move
+me from this hammock till Miss Ross comes back."
+
+Miles stood in the pathway looking down at the muffled figure in the
+hammock. There was little to be seen of Meg save her rumpled, hatless
+head. She was much too economical of her precious caps to waste one in a
+hammock. She had slept for nearly two hours, then Hannah roused her with
+a cup of soup. She was drowsy and warm and comfortable, and her usually
+pale cheeks were almost as pink as the apple-blossom buds above her
+head.
+
+"Do you want to sleep? Or may I stop and talk to you a bit?" Miles
+asked, when he had found the somewhat battered cigarette case and
+restored it to her.
+
+"As I'm very plainly off duty, I suppose you may stay and talk--if I
+fall asleep in the middle you must not be offended. You'll find plenty
+of chairs in the tool house."
+
+When Miles returned Meg had lit her cigarette, and he begged a light
+from her.
+
+What little hands she had! How fine-grained and delicate her skin!
+
+Again he felt that queer lump in his throat at the absurd, sweet pathos
+of her.
+
+He placed his chair where he had her full in view, not too near, yet
+comfortably so for conversation. Jan had swung the hammock very high,
+and Meg looked down at Miles over the edge.
+
+"It is unusual," she said, "to find a competent nurse spending her
+morning in this fashion, but if you know Miss Ross at all, you will
+already have realised that under her placid exterior she has a will of
+iron."
+
+"I shouldn't say _you_ were lacking in determination."
+
+"Oh, I'm nothing to Jan. _She_ exerts physical force. Look at me perched
+up here! How can I get down without a bad fall, swathed like a mummy in
+wraps; while my employer does my work?"
+
+"But you don't want to get down. You look awfully comfortable."
+
+"I am awfully comfortable--but it's most ... unprofessional--please
+don't tell anybody else."
+
+Meg closed her eyes, looking rather like a sleepy kitten, and Miles
+watched her in silence with a pain at his heart. Something kept saying
+over and over again: "Six years ago that girl there ran off with Walter
+Brooke. Six years ago that apparently level-headed, sensible little
+person was dazzled by the pinchbeck graces of that epicure in
+sensations." Miles fully granted his charm, his gentle melancholy, his
+caressing manner; but with it all Miles felt that he was so plainly "a
+wrong-'un," so clearly second-rate and untrustworthy--and a nice girl
+ought to recognise these things intuitively.
+
+Miles looked very sad and grave, and Meg, suddenly opening her eyes,
+found him regarding her with this incomprehensible expression.
+
+"You are not exactly talkative," she said.
+
+"I thought, perhaps, you wanted to rest, and would rather not talk.
+Maybe I'm a bit of a bore, and you'd rather I went away?"
+
+"You have not yet asked after William."
+
+"I hoped to find William, but he's nowhere to be seen."
+
+"He's with Jan and the children. I think"--here Meg lifted her curly
+head over the edge of the hammock--"he is the very darlingest animal in
+the world. I love William."
+
+"You do! I knew you would."
+
+"I do. He's so faithful and kind and understanding."
+
+"Has he been quite good?"
+
+"Well ... once or twice he may have been a little--destructive--but you
+expect that with children."
+
+"I hope you punish him."
+
+"Jan does. Jan has a most effectual slap, but there's always a dreadful
+disturbance with the children on these occasions. Little Fay roars the
+house down when William has to be chastised."
+
+"What has he done?"
+
+"I'm not going to tell tales of William."
+
+Miles and Meg smiled at one another, and Walter Brooke faded from his
+mind.
+
+"Perhaps," he said, and paused, "you will by and by allow to William's
+late master a small portion of that regard?"
+
+"If William's master on further acquaintance proves half as loyal and
+trustworthy as William--I couldn't help it."
+
+"I wonder what you mean exactly by loyal and trustworthy?"
+
+"They're not very elastic terms, are they?"
+
+"Don't you think they mean rather the same thing?"
+
+"Not a bit," Meg cried eagerly; "a person might be ever so trustworthy
+and yet not loyal. I take it that trustworthy and honest in tangible
+things are much the same. Loyalty is something intangible, and often
+means belief in people when everything seems against them. It's a much
+rarer quality than to be trustworthy. William would stick to one if one
+hadn't a crust, just because he liked to be there to make things a bit
+less wretched."
+
+Miles smoked in silence for a minute, and again Meg closed her eyes.
+
+"By the way," he said presently, "I didn't know you and my cousin Pen
+were friends. I met her in the Park the day before yesterday. Her hair's
+rather the same colour as yours--handsome woman, isn't she?"
+
+Meg opened her eyes and turned crimson. Had the outspoken Lady Pen said
+anything about her hair, she wondered.
+
+Miles, noting the sudden blush, put it down to Lady Pen's knowledge of
+what had happened at the Trents, and the miserable feelings of doubt and
+apprehension came surging back.
+
+"She's quite lovely," said Meg.
+
+"A bit too much on the big side, don't you think?"
+
+"I admire big women."
+
+Silence fell again. Meg pulled the rug up under her chin.
+
+Surely it was not quite so warm as a few minutes ago.
+
+Miles stood up. "I have a guilty feeling that Miss Ross will strongly
+disapprove of my disturbing you like this. If you will tell me which way
+they have gone I will go and meet them."
+
+"They've gone to your uncle's woods, and I think they must be on their
+way home by now. If you call William he'll answer."
+
+"I won't say good-bye," said Miles, "because I shall come back with
+them."
+
+"I shall be on duty then," said Meg. "Good-bye."
+
+She turned her face from him and nestled down among her cushions. For a
+full minute he stood staring at the back of her head, with its crushed
+and tumbled tangle of short curls.
+
+Then quite silently he took his way out of the Wren's End garden.
+
+Meg shut her eyes very tight. Was it the light that made them smart so?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE YOUNG IDEA
+
+
+Squire Walcote had given the Wren's End family the run of his woods,
+and, what was even more precious, permission to use the river-path
+through his grounds. Lady Mary, who had no children of her own, was
+immensely interested in Tony and little Fay, and would give Jan more
+advice as to their management in an hour than the vicar's wife ever
+offered during the whole of their acquaintance. But then _she_ had a
+family of eight.
+
+But the first time Tony went to the river Jan took him alone; and not to
+the near water in Squire Walcote's grounds, but to the old bridge that
+crossed the Amber some way out of the village. It was the typical
+Cotswold bridge, with low parapets that make such a comfortable seat for
+meditative villagers. Just before they reached it she loosed Tony's
+hand, and held her breath to see what he would do. Would he run straight
+across to get to the other side, or would he look over?
+
+Yes. He went straight to the low wall; stopped, looked over, leaned
+over, and stared and stared.
+
+Jan gave a sigh of relief.
+
+The water of the Amber just there is deep and clear, an infinite thing
+for a child to look down into; but it was not of that Jan was thinking.
+
+Hugo was no fisherman. Water had no attraction for him, save as a
+pleasant means of taking exercise. He was a fair oar; but for a stream
+that wouldn't float a boat he cared nothing at all.
+
+Charles Considine Smith had angled diligently. In fact, he wrote almost
+as much about the habits of trout as about wrens. James Ross, the
+gallant who carried off the second Tranquil, had been fishing at Amber
+Guiting when he first saw her. Anthony's father fished and so did
+Anthony; and Jan, herself, could throw a fly quite prettily. Yet, your
+true fisherman is born, not made; it is not a question of environment,
+but it is, very often, one of heredity; for the tendency comes out when,
+apparently, every adverse circumstance has combined to crush it.
+
+And no mortal who cares for or is going to care for fishing can ever
+cross a bridge without stopping to look down into the water.
+
+"There's a fish swimming down there," Tony whispered (was it instinct
+made him whisper? Jan wondered), "brown and speckledy, rather like the
+thrushes in the garden."
+
+Jan clutched nervously at the little coat while Tony hung over so far
+that only his toes were on the ground. She had brought a bit of bread in
+her pocket, and let him throw bits to the greedy, wily old trout who had
+defied a hundred skilful rods. On that first day old Amber whispered her
+secret to Tony and secured another slave.
+
+For Jan it was only another proof that Tony possessed a sterling
+character. Since her sister's disastrous marriage she had come to look
+upon a taste for fishing as more or less of a moral safeguard. She had
+often reflected that if only Fay had not been so lukewarm with regard to
+the gentle craft--and so bored in a heavenly place where, if it did rain
+for twenty-three of the twenty-four hours, even a second-rate rod might
+land fourteen or fifteen pounds of good sea-trout in an afternoon--she
+could never have fallen in love with Hugo Tancred, who was equally
+without enthusiasm and equally bored till he met Fay. Jan was ready
+enough now to blame herself for her absorption at this time, and would
+remember guiltily the relief with which she and her father greeted Fay's
+sudden willingness to remain a week longer in a place she previously had
+declared to be absolutely unendurable.
+
+The first time Tony's sister went to Amber Bridge Meg took them both.
+Little Fay descended from her pram just before they reached it,
+declaring it was a "nice dly place to walk." She ran on a little ahead,
+and before Meg realised what she was doing, she had scrambled up on to
+the top of the low wall and run briskly along it till her progress was
+stopped by a man who was leaning over immersed in thought. He nearly
+fell in himself, when a clear little voice inquired, "Do loo mind if I
+climb over loo?"
+
+It was Farmer Burgess, and he clasped the tripping lady of the white
+woolly gaiters in a pair of strong arms, and lifted her down just as the
+terrified Meg reached them.
+
+"Law, Missie!" gasped Mr. Burgess, "you mustn't do the like o' that
+there. It's downright fool'ardy."
+
+"Downlight foolardy," echoed little Fay. "And what nelse?"
+
+According to Mr. Burgess it was dangerous and a great many other things
+as well, but he lost his heart to her in that moment, and she could
+twist him round her little finger ever after.
+
+To be told that a thing was dangerous was to add to its attractions. She
+was absolutely without fear, and could climb like a kitten. She hadn't
+been at Wren's End a week before she was discovered half-way up the
+staircase on the outside of the banisters. And when she had been caught
+and lifted over by a white-faced aunt, explained that it was "muts the
+most instasting way of going up tairs."
+
+When asked how she expected to get to the other side at the top, she
+giggled derisively and said "ovel."
+
+Jan seriously considered a barbed-wire entanglement for the outside edge
+of her staircase after that.
+
+While Meg rested in the hammock Jan spent a strenuous morning in Guiting
+Woods with the children and William. Late windflowers were still in
+bloom, and early bluebells made lovely atmospheric patches under the
+trees, just as though a bit of the sky had fallen, as in the oft-told
+tale of "Cockie Lockie." There were primroses, too, and white violets,
+so that there were many little bunches with exceedingly short stalks to
+be arranged and tied up with the worsted provident Auntie Jan had
+brought with her; finally they all sat down on a rug lined with
+mackintosh, and little Fay demanded "Clipture."
+
+"Clipture" was her form of "Scripture," which Auntie Jan "told" every
+morning after breakfast to the children. Jan was a satisfactory
+narrator, for the form of her stories never varied. The Bible stories
+she told in the actual Bible words, and all children appreciate their
+dramatic simplicity and directness.
+
+That morning Joseph and his early adventures and the baby Moses were the
+favourites, and when these had been followed by "The Three Bears" and
+"Cock Robin," it was time to collect the bouquets and go home. And on
+the way home they met Captain Middleton. William spied him afar off, and
+dashed towards him with joyful, deep-toned barks. He was delighted to
+see William, said he had grown and was in the pink of condition; and
+then announced that he had already been to Wren's End and had seen Miss
+Morton. There was something in the tone of this avowal that made Jan
+think. It was shy, it was proud, it seemed to challenge Jan to find any
+fault in his having done so, and it was supremely self-conscious. He
+walked back with them to the Wren's End gate, and then came a moment of
+trial for William.
+
+He wanted to go with his master.
+
+He wanted to stay with the children.
+
+Captain Middleton settled it by shaking each offered paw and saying very
+seriously: "You must stay and take care of the ladies, William. I trust
+you." William looked wistfully after the tall figure that went down the
+road with the queer, light, jumpetty tread of all men who ride much.
+
+Then he trotted after Jan and the children and was exuberantly glad to
+see Meg again.
+
+She declared herself quite rested; heard that they had seen Captain
+Middleton, and met unmoved the statement that he was coming to tea.
+
+But she didn't look nearly so well rested as Jan had hoped she would.
+
+After the children's dinner Meg went on duty, and Jan saw no more of the
+nursery party till later in the afternoon. The creaking wheels of two
+small wheelbarrows made Jan look up from the letters she was writing at
+the knee-hole table that stood in the nursery window, and she beheld
+little Fay and Tony, followed by Meg knitting busily, as they came
+through the yew archway on to the lawn.
+
+Meg subsided into one of the white seats, but the children processed
+solemnly round, pausing under Jan's window.
+
+"I know lots an' lots of Clipture," her niece's voice proclaimed proudly
+as she sat down heavily in her wheelbarrow on the top of some garden
+produce she had collected.
+
+"How much do you know?" Tony asked sceptically.
+
+"Oh, lots an' lots, all about poor little Jophez in the bullushes, and
+his instasting dleams."
+
+"Twasn't Jophez," Tony corrected. "It was Mophez in the bulrushes, and
+he didn't have no dreams. That was Jophez."
+
+"How d'you know," Fay persisted, "that poor little Mophez had no dleams?
+Why _shouldn't_ he have dleams same as Jophez?"
+
+"It doesn't say so."
+
+"It doesn't say he _didn't_ have dleams. He _had_ dleams, I tell you; I
+know he had. Muts nicer dleams van Jophez."
+
+"Let's ask Meg; she'll know."
+
+Jan gave a sigh of relief. The children had not noticed her, and Meg had
+a fertile mind.
+
+The wheelbarrows were trundled across the lawn and paused in front of
+Meg, while a lively duet demanded simultaneously:
+
+  {"_Did_ little Mophez have dleams?"
+  {"_Didn't_ deah littoo Mophez have dleams?"
+
+When Meg had disentangled the questions and each child sat down in a
+wheelbarrow at her feet, she remarked judicially: "Well, there's nothing
+said about little Moses' dreams, certainly; but I should think it's
+quite likely the poor baby did have dreams."
+
+"What sort of dleams? Nicer van sheaves and sings, wasn't they?"
+
+"I should think," Meg said thoughtfully, "that he dreamed he must cry
+very quietly lest the Egyptians should hear him."
+
+"Deah littoo Mophez ... and what nelse?"
+
+Meg was tempted and fell. It was very easy for her to invent "dleams"
+for "deah littoo Mophez" lying in his bulrush ark among the flags at the
+river's edge. And, wholly regardless of geography, she transported him
+to the Amber, where the flags were almost in bloom at that moment, such
+local colour adding much to the realism of her stories.
+
+Presently William grew restless. He ran to Anthony's Venetian gate in
+the yew hedge and squealed (William never whined) to get out. Tony let
+him out, and he fled down the drive to meet his master, who had come a
+good half-hour too soon for tea.
+
+Jan continued to try and finish her letters while Captain Middleton,
+coatless, on all-fours, enacted an elephant which the children rode in
+turn. When he had completely ruined the knees of his trousers he arose
+and declared it was time to play "Here we go round the mulberry-bush,"
+and it so happened that once or twice he played it hand-in-hand with
+Meg.
+
+Jan left her letters and went out.
+
+The situation puzzled her. She feared for Meg's peace of mind, for
+Captain Middleton was undoubtedly attractive; and then she found herself
+fearing for his.
+
+After tea and more games with the children Captain Middleton escorted
+his hostess to church, where he joined his aunt in the Manor seat.
+
+During church Jan found herself wondering uneasily:
+
+"Was everybody going to fall in love with Meg?"
+
+"Would Peter?"
+
+"What a disagreeable idea!"
+
+And yet, why should it be?
+
+Resolutely she told herself that Peter was at perfect liberty to fall
+in love with Meg if he liked, and set herself to listen intelligently to
+the Vicar's sermon.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Meg started to put her children to bed, only to find that her fertility
+of imagination in the afternoon was to prove her undoing in the evening;
+for her memory was by no means as reliable as her powers of invention.
+
+Little Fay urgently demanded the whole cycle of little Mophez' dleams
+over again. And for the life of her Meg couldn't remember them either in
+their proper substance or sequence--and this in spite of the most
+persistent prompting, and she failed utterly to reproduce the
+entertainment of the afternoon. Both children were disappointed, but
+little Fay, accustomed as she was to Auntie Jan's undeviating method of
+narrating "Clipture," was angry as well. She fell into a passion of rage
+and nearly screamed the house down. Since the night of Ayah's departure
+there had not been such a scene.
+
+Poor Meg vowed (though she knew she would break her vow the very first
+time she was tempted) that never again would she tamper with Holy Writ,
+and for some weeks she coldly avoided both Jophez and Mophez as topics
+of conversation.
+
+Meg could never resist playing at things, and what "Clipture" the
+children learned from Jan in the morning they insisted on enacting with
+Meg later in the day.
+
+Sometimes she was seized with misgiving as to the propriety of these
+representations, but dismissed her doubts as cowardly.
+
+"After all," she explained to Jan, "we only play the very human bits. I
+never let them pretend to be anybody divine ... and you know the
+people--in the Old Testament, anyway--were most of them extremely human,
+not to say disreputable at times."
+
+It is possible that "Clipture's" supreme attraction for the children was
+that it conveyed the atmosphere of the familiar East. The New Testament
+was more difficult to play at, but, being equally dramatic, the children
+couldn't see it.
+
+"Can't we do one teeny miracle?" Tony would beseech, but Meg was firm;
+she would have nothing to do with either miracles nor yet with angels.
+Little Fay ardently desired to be an angel, but Meg wouldn't have it at
+any price.
+
+"You're not in the least _like_ an angel, you know," she said severely.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"Because angels are _perfectly_ good."
+
+"I could _pletend_ to be puffectly good."
+
+"Let's play Johnny Baptist," suggested the ever-helpful Tony, "and we
+could pittend to bring in his head on a charger."
+
+"Certainly not," Meg said hastily. "That would be a horrid game."
+
+"Let me be the daughter!" little Fay implored, "and dance in flont of
+Helod."
+
+This was permitted, and Tony, decorated with William's chain, sat
+gloomily scowling at the gyrations of "the daughter," who, assisted by
+William, danced all over the nursery: and Meg, watching the
+representation, decided that if the original "daughter" was half as
+bewitching as this one, there really might have been some faint excuse
+for Herod.
+
+Hannah had no idea of these goings-on, or she would have expected the
+roof to fall in and crush them. Yet she, too, was included among the
+children's prophets, owing to her exact and thorough knowledge of
+"Clipture." Hannah's favourite part of the Bible was the Book of Daniel,
+which she knew practically by heart; and her rendering of certain
+chapters was--though she would have hotly resented the phrase--extremely
+dramatic.
+
+It is so safe and satisfying to know that your favourite story will run
+smoothly, clause for clause, and word for word, just as you like it
+best, and the children were always sure of this with Hannah.
+
+Anne Chitt would listen open-mouthed in astonishment, exclaiming
+afterwards, "Why, 'Annah, wot a tremenjous lot of Bible verses you 'ave
+learned to be sure."
+
+The children once tried Anne Chitt as a storyteller, but she was a
+failure.
+
+As she had been present at several of Hannah's recitals of the Three
+Children and the burning fiery furnace, they thought it but a modest
+demand upon her powers. But when--instead of beginning with the sonorous
+"_Then an herald cried aloud, To you it is commanded, O people, nations
+and languages_"--when she wholly omitted any reference to "_the sound of
+cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer_, and all kinds of
+musick"--and essayed to tell the story in broad Gloucestershire and her
+own bald words, the disappointed children fell upon her and thumped her
+rudely upon the back; declaring her story to be "_kutcha_" and she,
+herself, a _budmash_. Which, being interpreted, meant that her story was
+most badly made and that she, herself, was a rascal.
+
+Anne Chitt was much offended, and complained tearfully to Jan that she
+"wouldn't 'ave said nothin' if they'd called 'er or'nery names, but them
+there Injian words was more than she could abear."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+"ONE WAY OF LOVE"
+
+
+Among the neighbours there was none more assiduous in the matter of
+calls and other friendly manifestations than Mr. Huntly
+Withells--emphasis on the "ells"--who lived at Guiting Grange, about a
+couple of miles from Wren's End. Mr. Withells was settled at the Grange
+some years before Miss Janet Ross left her house to Jan, and he was
+already a person of importance and influence in that part of the county
+when Anthony Ross and his daughters first spent a whole summer there.
+
+Mr. Withells proved most neighbourly. He had artistic leanings himself,
+and possessed some good pictures; among them, one of Anthony's, which
+naturally proved a bond of union. He did not even so much as sketch,
+himself--which Anthony considered another point in his favour--but he
+was a really skilled photographer, possessed the most elaborate cameras,
+and obtained quite beautiful results.
+
+Since Jan's return from India he had completely won her heart by taking
+a great many photographs of the children, pictures delightfully natural,
+and finished as few amateurs contrive to present them.
+
+It was rumoured in Amber Guiting that Mr. Withells' views on the
+subject of matrimony were "peculiar"; but all the ladies, especially the
+elderly ladies, were unanimous in declaring that he had a "beautiful
+mind."
+
+Mrs. Fream, the vicar's wife, timidly confided to Jan that Mr. Withells
+had told her husband that he cared only for "spiritual marriage"--
+whatever that might be; and that, as yet, he had met no woman whom he
+felt would see eye to eye with him on this question. "He doesn't approve
+of caresses," she added.
+
+"Well, who wants to caress him?" Jan asked bluntly.
+
+Meg declared there was one thing she could not bear about Mr. Withells,
+and that was the way he shook hands, "exactly as if he had no thumbs. If
+he's so afraid of touching one as all that comes to, why doesn't he let
+it alone?"
+
+Yet the apparently thumbless hands were constantly occupied in bearing
+gifts of all kinds to his friends.
+
+In appearance he was dapper, smallish, without being undersized, always
+immaculately neat in his attire, with a clean-shaven, serious, rather
+sallow face, which was inclined to be chubby as to the cheeks. He wore
+double-sighted pince-nez, and no mortal had ever seen him without them.
+His favourite writer was Miss Jane Austen, and he deplored the
+licentious tendency of so much modern literature; frequently, and with
+flushed countenance, denouncing certain books as an "outrage." He was
+considered a very well-read man. He disliked anything that was "not
+quite nice," and detested a strong light, whether it were thrown upon
+life or landscape; in bright sunshine he always carried a white umbrella
+lined with green. The game he played best was croquet, and here he was
+really first class; but he was also skilled in every known form of
+Patience, and played each evening unless he happened to be dining out.
+
+As regards food he was something of a faddist, and on the subject of
+fresh air almost a monomaniac. He declared that he could not exist for
+ten minutes in a room with closed windows, and that the smell of apples
+made him feel positively faint; moreover, he would mention his somewhat
+numerous antipathies as though there were something peculiarly
+meritorious in possessing so many. This made his entertainment at any
+meal a matter of agitated consideration among the ladies of Amber
+Guiting.
+
+Nevertheless, he kept an excellent and hospitable table himself, and in
+no way forced his own taste upon others. He disliked the smell of
+tobacco and hardly ever drank wine, yet he kept a stock of excellent
+cigars and his cellar was beyond reproach.
+
+He had been observing Jan for several years, and was rapidly coming to
+the conclusion that she was an "eminently sensible woman." Her grey hair
+and the way she had managed everything for her father led him to believe
+that she was many years older than her real age. Recently he had taken
+to come to Wren's End on one pretext and another almost every day. He
+was kind and pleasant to the children, who amused and pleased
+him--especially little Fay; but he was much puzzled by Meg, whom he had
+known in pre-cap-and-apron days while she was staying at Wren's End.
+
+He couldn't quite place Meg, and there was an occasional glint in her
+queer eyes that he found disconcerting. He was never comfortable in her
+society, for he objected to red hair almost as strongly as to a smell of
+apples.
+
+He really liked the children, and since he knew he couldn't get Jan
+without them he was beginning to think that in such a big house as the
+Grange they would not necessarily be much in the way. He knew nothing
+whatever about Hugo Tancred.
+
+Jan satisfied his fastidious requirements. She was dignified, graceful,
+and, he considered, of admirable parts. He felt that in a very little
+while he could imbue Jan with his own views as to the limitations and
+delicate demarcations of such a marriage as he contemplated.
+
+She was so sensible.
+
+Meanwhile the object of these kind intentions was wholly unaware of
+them. She was just then very much absorbed in her own affairs and
+considerably worried about Meg's. For Captain Middleton's week-end was
+repeated on the following Saturday and extended far into the next week.
+He came constantly to Wren's End, where the children positively adored
+him, and he seemed to possess an infallible instinct which led him to
+the village whensoever Meg and her charges had business there.
+
+On such occasions Meg was often quite rude to Captain Middleton, but the
+children and William more than atoned for her coldness by the warmth of
+their welcome, and he attached himself to them.
+
+In fact, as regards the nursery party at Wren's End, Miles strongly
+resembled William before a fire--you might drive him away ninety and
+nine times, he always came thrusting back with the same expression of
+deprecating astonishment that you could be other than delighted to see
+him.
+
+Whither was it all tending? Jan wondered.
+
+No further news had come from Hugo; Peter, she supposed, had sailed and
+was due in London at the end of the week.
+
+Then Mr. Huntly Withells asked her one afternoon to bicycle over to see
+his spring irises--he called them "_irides_," and invariably spoke of
+"_croci_," and "_delphinia_"--and as Meg was taking the children to tea
+at the vicarage, Jan went.
+
+To her surprise, she found herself the sole guest, but supposed she was
+rather early and that his other friends hadn't come yet.
+
+They strolled about the gardens, so lovely in their spring blossoming,
+and it happened that from one particular place they got a specially good
+view of the house.
+
+"How much larger it is than you would think, looking at the front," Jan
+remarked. "You don't see that wing at all from the drive."
+
+"There's plenty of room for nephews and nieces," Mr. Withells said
+jocularly.
+
+"Have you many nephews and nieces?" she asked, turning to look at him,
+for there was something in the tone of his voice that she could not
+understand.
+
+"Not of my own," he replied, still in that queer, unnatural voice, "but
+you see my wife might have ... if I was married."
+
+"Are you thinking of getting married?" she asked, with the real interest
+such a subject always rouses in woman.
+
+"That depends," Mr. Withells said consciously, "on whether the lady I
+have in mind ... er ... shall we sit down, Miss Ross? It's rather hot in
+the walks."
+
+"Oh, not yet," Jan exclaimed. She couldn't think why, but she began to
+feel uncomfortable. "I must see those Darwin tulips over there."
+
+"It's very sunny over there," he objected. "Come down the nut-walk and
+see the _myosotis arvensis_; it is already in bloom, the weather has
+been so warm.
+
+"Miss Ross," Mr. Withells continued seriously, as they turned into the
+nut-walk which led back towards the house, "we have known each other for
+a considerable time...."
+
+"We have," said Jan, as he had paused, evidently expecting a reply.
+
+"And I have come to have a great regard for you...."
+
+Again he paused, and Jan found herself silently whispering, "Curtsy
+while you're thinking--it saves time," but she preserved an outward
+silence.
+
+"You are, if I may say so, the most sensible woman of my acquaintance."
+
+"Thank you," said Jan, but without enthusiasm.
+
+"We are neither of us quite young"--(Mr. Withells was forty-nine, but it
+was a little hard on Jan)--"and I feel sure that you, for instance,
+would not expect or desire from a husband those constant outward
+demonstrations of affection such as handclaspings and kisses, which are
+so foolish and insanitary."
+
+Jan turned extremely red and walked rather faster.
+
+"Do not misunderstand me, Miss Ross," Mr. Withells continued, looking
+with real admiration at her downcast, rosy face--she must be quite
+healthy he thought, to look so clean and fresh always--"I lay down no
+hard-and-fast rules. I do not say should my wife desire to kiss me
+sometimes, that I should ... repulse her."
+
+Jan gasped.
+
+"But I have the greatest objection, both on sanitary and moral grounds
+to----"
+
+"I can't imagine anyone _wanting_ to kiss you," Jan interrupted
+furiously; "you're far too puffy and stippled."
+
+And she ran from him as though an angry bull were after her.
+
+Mr. Withells stood stock-still where he was, in pained astonishment.
+
+He saw the fleeing fair one disappear into the distance and in the
+shortest time on record he heard the clanging of her bicycle bell as she
+scorched down his drive.
+
+"Puffy and stippled"--"Puffy and stippled"!
+
+Mr. Withells repeated to himself this rudely personal remark as he
+walked slowly towards the house.
+
+What could she mean?
+
+And what in the world had he said to make her so angry?
+
+Women were really most unaccountable.
+
+He ascended his handsome staircase and went into his dressing-room, and
+there he sought his looking-glass, which stood in the window, and
+surveyed himself critically. Yes, his cheeks _were_ a bit puffy near the
+nostrils, and, as is generally the case in later life, the pores of the
+skin were a bit enlarged, but for all that he was quite a personable
+man.
+
+He sighed. Miss Ross, he feared, was not nearly so sensible as he had
+thought.
+
+It was distinctly disappointing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+For the first mile and a quarter Jan scorched all she knew. The angry
+blood was thumping in her ears and she exclaimed indignantly at
+intervals, "How dared he! How dared he!"
+
+Then she punctured a tyre.
+
+There was no hope of getting it mended till she reached Wren's End, when
+Earley would do it for her. As she pushed her bicycle along the lane she
+recovered her sense of humour and she laughed. And presently she became
+aware of a faint, sweet, elusive perfume from some flowering shrub on
+the other side of somebody's garden wall.
+
+It strongly resembled the smell of a blossoming tree that grew on Ridge
+Road, Malabar Hill. And in one second Jan was in Bombay, and was
+standing in the moonlight, looking up into a face that was neither puffy
+nor stippled nor prim; but young and thin and worn and very kind. And
+the exquisite understanding of that moment came back to her, and her
+eyes filled with tears.
+
+Yet in another moment she was again demanding indignantly, "How dared
+he!"
+
+She went straight to her room when she got in, and, like Mr. Withells,
+she went and looked at herself in the glass.
+
+Unlike Mr. Withells, she saw nothing there to give her any satisfaction.
+She shook her head at the person in the glass and said aloud:
+
+"If that's all you get by trying to be sensible, the sooner you become a
+drivelling idiot the better for your peace of mind--and your vanity."
+
+The person in the glass shook her head back at Jan, and Jan turned away
+thoroughly disgusted with such a futile sort of _tu quoque_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE
+
+
+Meg and the children, returning from their tea-party at the vicarage,
+were stopped continually in their journey through the main street by
+friendly folk who wanted to greet the children. It was quite a triumphal
+progress, and Meg was feeling particularly proud that afternoon, for her
+charges, including William, had all behaved beautifully. Little Fay had
+refrained from snatching other children's belongings with the cool
+remark, "Plitty little Fay would like 'at"; Tony had been quite merry
+and approachable; and William had offered paws and submitted to
+continual pullings, pushings and draggings with exemplary patience.
+
+Once through the friendly, dignified old street, they reached the main
+road, which was bordered by rough grass sloping to a ditch surmounted by
+a thick thorn hedge. They were rather late, and Meg was wheeling little
+Fay as fast as she could, Tony trotting beside her to keep up, when a
+motor horn was sounded behind them and a large car came along at a good
+speed. They were all well to the side of the road, but William--with the
+perverse stupidity of the young dog--above all, of the young
+bull-terrier--chose that precise moment to gambol aimlessly right into
+the path of the swiftly-coming motor, just as it seemed right upon him;
+and this, regardless of terrified shouts from Meg and the children,
+frantic sounding of the horn and violent language from the driver of the
+car.
+
+It seemed that destruction must inevitably overtake William when the car
+swerved violently as the man ran it down the sloping bank, where it
+stuck, leaving William, unscathed and rather alarmed by all the clamour,
+to run back to his family.
+
+Meg promptly whacked him as hard as she could, whereupon, much
+surprised, he turned over on his back, waving four paws feebly in the
+air.
+
+"Why don't you keep your dog at the side?" the man shouted with very
+natural irritation as he descended from his seat.
+
+"He's a naughty--stupid--puppy," Meg ejaculated between the whacks. "It
+wasn't your fault in the least, and it was awfully good of you to avoid
+him."--Whack--whack.
+
+The man started a little as she spoke and came across the road towards
+them.
+
+Meg raised a flushed face from her castigation of William, but the
+pretty colour faded quickly when she saw who the stranger was.
+
+"Meg!" he exclaimed. "_You!_"
+
+For a tense moment they stared at one another, while the children stared
+at the stranger. He was certainly a handsome man; melancholy,
+"interesting." Pale, with regular features and sleepy, smallish eyes set
+very near together.
+
+"If you knew how I have searched for you," he said.
+
+His voice was his great charm, and would have made his fortune on the
+stage. It could convey so much, could be so tender and beseeching, so
+charged with deepest sadness, so musical always.
+
+"Your search cannot have been very arduous," Meg answered drily. "There
+has never been any mystery about my movements." And she looked him
+straight in the face.
+
+"At first, I was afraid ... I did not try to find you."
+
+"You were well-advised."
+
+"Who is 'at sahib?" little Fay interrupted impatiently. "Let us go
+home." She had no use for any sahib who ignored her presence.
+
+"Yes, we'd better be getting on," Meg said hurriedly, and seized the
+handle of the pram.
+
+But he stood right in their path.
+
+"You were very cruel," the musical voice went on. "You never seemed to
+give a thought to all _I_ was suffering."
+
+Meg met the sleepy eyes, that used to thrill her very soul, with a look
+of scornful amusement in hers that was certainly the very last
+expression he had ever expected to see in them.
+
+She had always dreaded this moment.
+
+Realising the power this man had exercised over her, she always feared
+that should she meet him again the old glamour would surround him; the
+old domination be reasserted. She forgot that in five years one's
+standards change.
+
+Now that she did meet him she discovered that he held no bonds with
+which to bind her. That what she had dreaded was a chimera. The real
+Walter Brooke, the moment he appeared in the flesh, destroyed the image
+memory had set up; and Meg straightened her slender shoulders as though
+a heavy burden had dropped from them.
+
+The whole thing passed like a flash.
+
+"You were very cruel," he repeated.
+
+"There is no use going into all that," Meg answered in a cheerful,
+matter-of-fact tone. "Good-bye, Mr. Brooke. We are most grateful to you
+for not running over William, who is," here she raised her voice for the
+benefit of the culprit, "a naughty--tiresome dog."
+
+"But you can't leave me like this. When can I see you again--there is so
+much I want to explain...."
+
+"But I don't want any explanations, thank you. Come children, we _must_
+go."
+
+"Meg, listen ... surely you have some little feeling of kindness towards
+me ... after all that happened...."
+
+He put his hand on Meg's arm to detain her, and William, who had never
+been known to show enmity to human creature, gave a deep growl and
+bristled. A growl so ominous and threatening that Meg hastily loosed the
+pram and caught him by the collar with both hands.
+
+Tony saw that Meg was flustered and uncomfortable. "Why does he not go?"
+he asked. "I thought he was a sahib, but I suppose he is the
+gharri-wallah. We have thanked him--does he want backsheesh? Give him a
+rupee."
+
+"He _does_ want backsheesh," the deep, musical voice went on--"a little
+pity, a little common kindness."
+
+It was an embarrassing situation. William was straining at his collar
+and growling like an incipient thunderstorm.
+
+"We have thanked you," Tony said again with dignity. "We have no money,
+or we would reward you. If you like to call at the house, Auntie Jan
+always has money."
+
+The man smiled pleasantly at Tony.
+
+"Thank you, young man. You have told me exactly what I wanted to know.
+So you are with your friends?"
+
+"I can't hold this dog much longer," Meg gasped. "If you don't
+go--you'll get bitten."
+
+William ceased to growl, for far down the road he had heard a footstep
+that he knew. He still strained at his collar, but it was in a direction
+that led away from Mr. Walter Brooke. Meg let go and William swung off
+down the road.
+
+"Shall we all have a lide in loo ghalli?" little Fay asked--it seemed to
+her sheer waste of time to stand arguing in the road when a good car was
+waiting empty. The children called every form of conveyance a "gharri."
+
+"We shall meet again," said this persistent man. "You can't put me off
+like this."
+
+He raised his voice, for he was angry, and its clear tones carried far
+down the quiet road.
+
+"There's Captain Middleton with William," Tony said suddenly. "Perhaps
+_he_ has some money."
+
+Meg paled and crimsoned, and with hands that trembled started to push
+the pram at a great pace.
+
+The man went back to his car, and Tony, regardless of Meg's call to him,
+ran to meet William and Miles.
+
+The back wheels of the car had sunk deeply into the soft wet turf. It
+refused to budge. Miles came up. He was long-sighted, and he had seen
+very well who it was that was talking to Meg in the road. He had also
+heard Mr. Brooke's last remark.
+
+Till lately he had only known Walter Brooke enough to dislike him
+vaguely. Since his interview with Mrs. Trent this feeling had
+intensified to such an extent as surprised himself. At the present
+moment he was seething with rage, but all the same he went and helped to
+get the car up the bank, jacking it up, and setting his great shoulders
+against it to start it again.
+
+All this Tony watched with deepest interest, and Meg waited, fuming, a
+little way down the road, for she knew it was hopeless to get Tony to
+come till the car had once started. Once on the hard road again, it
+bowled swiftly away and to her immense relief passed her without
+stopping.
+
+She saw that Miles was bringing Tony, and started on again with little
+Fay.
+
+Fury was in her heart at Tony's disobedience, and behind it all a dull
+ache that Miles should have heard, and doubtless misunderstood, Walter
+Brooke's last remark.
+
+Tony was talking eagerly as he followed, but she was too upset to listen
+till suddenly she heard Miles say in a tone of the deepest satisfaction,
+"Good old William."
+
+This was too much.
+
+She stopped and called over her shoulder: "He isn't good at all; he's a
+thoroughly tiresome, disobedient, badly-trained dog."
+
+They came up with her at that, and William rolled over on his back, for
+he knew those tones portended further punishment.
+
+"He's an ass in lots of ways," Miles allowed, "but he is an excellent
+judge of character."
+
+And as if in proof of this William righted himself and came cringing to
+Meg to try and lick the hand that a few minutes ago had thumped him so
+vigorously.
+
+Meg looked up at Miles and he looked down at her, and his gaze was
+pained, kind and grave. _His_ eyes were large and well-opened and set
+wide apart in his broad face. Honest, trustworthy eyes they were.
+
+Very gently he took the little pram from her, for he saw that her hands
+were trembling: "You've had a fright," he said. "I know what it is. I
+had a favourite dog run over once. It's horrible, it takes months to get
+over it. I can't think why dogs are so stupid about motors ... must have
+been a near shave that ... very decent of Brooke--he's taken pounds off
+his car with that wrench."
+
+While Miles talked he didn't look at Meg.
+
+"I say, little Fay," he suddenly suggested, "wouldn't you like to walk a
+bit?" and he lifted her out. "There, that's better. Now, Miss Morton,
+you sit down a minute; you've had a shake, you know. I'll go on with the
+kiddies."
+
+Meg was feeling a horrible, humiliating desire to cry. Her eyes were
+bright with unshed tears, her knees refused to bear her. Thankfully she
+sat down on the foot-board of Fay's little pram. The tall figure between
+the two little ones suddenly grew blurred and dim. Furtively she blew
+her nose and wiped her eyes. They were not a stone's throw from the
+lodge at Wren's End.
+
+How absurd to be sitting there!
+
+And yet she didn't feel inclined to move just yet.
+
+"'Ere, my dear, you take a sip o' water; the gentleman's told me all
+about it. Them sort o' shocks fair turns one over."
+
+And kind Mrs. Earley was beside her, holding out a thick tumbler. Meg
+drank the deliciously cold water and arose refreshed.
+
+And somehow the homely comfort of Mrs. Earley's presence made her
+realise wherein lay the essential difference between these two men.
+
+"He still treats me like a princess," she thought, "even though he
+thinks ... Oh, what _can_ he think?" and Meg gave a little sob.
+
+"There, there!" said Mrs. Earley, "don't you take on no more, Miss. The
+dear dog bain't 'urted not a 'air of him. 'E cum frolicking in that
+friendly--I sometimes wonders if there do be anyone as William 'ud ever
+bite. 'E ain't much of a watchdog, I fear."
+
+"He nearly bit someone this afternoon," Meg said.
+
+"Well, I'm not sorry to yer it. It don't do for man nor beast to be too
+trustful--not in this world it don't."
+
+At the drive gate Miles was standing.
+
+Mrs. Earley took the pram with her for Earley to clean, and Meg and
+Miles walked on together.
+
+"I'm sorry you've had this upset," he said. "I've talked to William like
+a father."
+
+"It wasn't only William," Meg murmured.
+
+They were close to the house, and she stopped.
+
+"Good night, Captain Middleton. I must go and put my children to bed;
+we're late."
+
+"I don't want to seem interfering, Miss Morton, but don't you let anyone
+bully you into picking up an acquaintance you'd rather drop."
+
+"I suppose," said Meg, "one always has to pay for the things one has
+done."
+
+"Well, yes, sooner or later; but it's silly to pay Jew prices."
+
+"Ah," said Meg, "you've never been poor enough to go to the Jews, so you
+can't tell."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Miles walked slowly back to Amber Guiting that warm May evening. He had
+a good deal to think over, for he had come to a momentous decision. When
+he thought of Meg as he had just seen her--small and tremulous and
+tearful--he clenched his big hands and made a sound in his throat not
+unlike William's growl. When he pictured her angry onslaught upon
+William, he laughed. But the outcome of his reflections was this--that
+whether in the past she had really done anything that put her in Walter
+Brooke's power, or whether he was right to trust to that intangible
+quality in her that seemed to give the direct lie to the worst of Mrs.
+Trent's story, Meg appeared to him to stand in need of some hefty chap
+as a buffer between her and the hard world, and he was very desirous of
+being that same for Meg.
+
+His grandfather, "Mutton-Pie Middleton," had married one of his own
+waitresses for no other reason than that he found she was "the lass for
+him"--and he might, so the Doncaster folk thought, have looked a good
+deal higher for a wife, for he was a "warm" man at the time. Miles
+strongly resembled his grandfather. He was somewhat ruefully aware that
+in appearance there was but little of the Keills about him. He could
+just remember the colossal old man who must have weighed over twenty
+stone in his old age, and Miles, hitherto, had refused to buy a motor
+for his own use because he knew that if he was to keep his figure he
+must walk, and walk a lot.
+
+Like his grandfather, he was now perfectly sure of himself; Meg "was the
+lass for him"; but he was by no means equally sure of her. By some
+infallible delicacy of instinct--and this he certainly did not get from
+the Middletons--he knew that what the world would regard as a
+magnificent match for Meg, might be the very circumstance that would
+destroy his chance with her. The Middletons were all keenly alive to the
+purchasing powers of money, and saw to it that they got their money's
+worth.
+
+All the same, a man's a man, whether he be rich or poor, and Miles still
+remembered the way Meg had smiled upon him the first time they ever met.
+Surely she could never have smiled at him like that unless she had
+rather liked him.
+
+It was the pathos of Meg herself--not the fact that she had to
+work--that appealed to Miles. That she should cheerfully earn her own
+living instead of grousing in idleness in a meagre home seemed to him
+merely a matter of common sense. He knew that if he had to do it he
+could earn his, and the one thing he could neither tolerate nor
+understand about a good many of his Keills relations was their
+preference for any form of assistance to honest work. He helped them
+generously enough, but in his heart of hearts he despised them, though
+he did not confess this even to himself.
+
+As he drew near the Manor House he saw Lady Mary walking up and down
+outside, evidently waiting for him.
+
+"Where have you been, Miles?" she asked, impatiently. "Pen has been
+here, and wanted specially to see you, but she couldn't stay any longer,
+as it's such a long run back. She motored over from Malmesbury."
+
+"What did she want?" Miles asked. "She's always in a stew about
+something. One of her Pekinese got pip, or what?"
+
+Lady Mary took his arm and turned to walk along the terrace. "I think,"
+she said, and stopped. "Where _were_ you, Miles?"
+
+"I strolled down the village to get some tobacco, and then I saw a chap
+who'd got his motor stuck, and helped him, and then ..." Here Miles
+looked down at his aunt, who looked up at him apprehensively. "I caught
+up with Miss Morton and the children, and walked back to Wren's End with
+them. There, Aunt Mary, that's a categorical history of my time since
+tea."
+
+Lady Mary pressed his arm. "Miles, dear, do you think it's quite wise to
+be seen about so much with little Miss Morton ... wise for her I mean?"
+
+"I hope I'm not the sort of chap it's bad to be seen about with...."
+
+"Of course not, dear Miles, but, you see, her position...."
+
+"What's the matter with her position?"
+
+"Of course I know it's most creditable of her and all that ... but ...
+when a girl has to go out as a sort of nursery governess, it is
+different, isn't it, dear? I mean...."
+
+"Yes, Aunt Mary, I'm awfully interested--different from what?"
+
+"From girls who lead the sheltered life, girls who don't work ... girls
+of our own class."
+
+"I don't know," Miles said thoughtfully, "that I should say Pen, for
+instance, lives exactly a _sheltered_ life, should you?"
+
+"Pen is married."
+
+"Yes, but before she was married ... eh, Aunt Mary? Be truthful, now."
+
+Miles held his aunt's arm tightly within his, and he stooped and looked
+into her face.
+
+"And does the fact that Pen is married explain or excuse her deplorable
+taste in men? Which does it do, Aunt Mary? Speak up, now."
+
+Lady Mary laughed. "I'm not here to defend Pen; I'm here to get your
+answer as to whether you think it's ... quite fair to make that little
+Miss Morton conspicuous by running after her and making her the talk of
+the entire county, for that's what you're doing."
+
+"What good old Pen has been telling you I'm doing, I suppose."
+
+"I had my own doubts about it without any help from Pen ... but she said
+Alec Pottinger had been talking...."
+
+"Pottinger's an ass."
+
+"He doesn't talk _much_, anyhow, Miles, and she felt if _he_ said
+anything...."
+
+"Look here, Aunt Mary, how's a chap to go courting seriously if he
+doesn't run after a girl?... he can't work it from a distance ... not
+unless he's one of those poet chaps, and puts letters in hollow trees
+and so on. And you don't seem to have provided any hollow trees about
+here."
+
+"Courting ... seriously!" Lady Mary repeated with real horror in her
+tones. "Oh, Miles, you can't mean that!"
+
+"Surely you'd not prefer I meant the other thing?"
+
+"But, Miles dear, think!"
+
+"I have thought, and I've thought it out."
+
+"You mean you want to _marry_ her?"
+
+Lady Mary spoke in an awed whisper.
+
+"Just exactly that, and I don't care who knows it; but I'm not at all
+sure she wants to marry me ... that's why I don't want to rush my fences
+and get turned down. I'm a heavy chap to risk a fall, Aunt Mary."
+
+"Oh, Miles! this is worse than anything Pen even dreamt of."
+
+"What is? If you mean that she probably won't have me--I'm with you."
+
+"Of course she'd jump at you--any girl would.... But a little
+nursemaid!"
+
+"Come now, Aunt Mary, you know very well she's just as good as I am;
+better, probably, for she's got no pies nor starch in her pedigree. Her
+father's a Major and her mother was of quite good family--and she's got
+lots of rich, stingy relations ... and she doesn't sponge on 'em. What's
+the matter with her?"
+
+"Please don't do anything in a hurry, dear Miles."
+
+"I shan't, if you and Pen and the blessed 'county,' with its criticism
+and gossip, don't drive me into it ... but the very first word you
+either say or repeat to me against Miss Morton, off I go to her and to
+the old Major.... So now we understand each other, Aunt Mary--eh?"
+
+"There are things you ought to know, Miles."
+
+"You may depend," said Miles grimly, "that anything I ought to know I
+shall be told ... over and over again ... confound it.... And remember,
+Aunt Mary, that what I've told you is not in the least private. Tell
+Pen, tell Mrs. Fream, tell Withells, but just leave me to tell Miss
+Ross, that's all I beg."
+
+"Miles, I shall tell nobody, for I hope ... I hope----"
+
+"'Hope told a flattering tale,'" said Miles, and kissed his aunt ... but
+to himself he said: "I've shut their mouths for a day or two anyway."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE ENCAMPMENT
+
+
+It was the morning of the first Monday in June, and Tony had wandered
+out into the garden all by himself. Monday mornings were very busy, and
+once Clipture was over Jan and Meg became socially useless to any
+self-respecting boy.
+
+There was all the washing to sort and divide into two large heaps: what
+might be sent to Mrs. Chitt in the village, and what might be kept for
+the ministrations of one Mrs. Mumford, who came every Monday to Wren's
+End. And this division was never arrived at without a good deal of
+argument between Jan and Meg.
+
+If Jan had had her way, Mrs. Mumford's heap would have been very small
+indeed, and would have consisted chiefly of socks and handkerchiefs. If
+Meg had had hers, nothing at all would have gone to Mrs. Chitt. Usually,
+too, Hannah was called in as final arbitrator, and she generally sided
+with Meg. Little Fay took the greatest interest in the whole ceremony,
+chattered continually, and industriously mixed up the heaps when no one
+was looking.
+
+At such times Tony was of the opinion that there were far too many women
+in the world. On this particular morning, too, he felt injured because
+of something that had happened at breakfast.
+
+It was always a joy to Meg and Jan that whatever poor Fay might have
+left undone in the matter of disciplining her children, she had at least
+taught them to eat nicely. Little Fay's management of a spoon was a joy
+to watch. The dimpled baby hand was so deft, the turn of the plump wrist
+so sure and purposeful. She never spilled or slopped her food about. Its
+journey from bowl to little red mouth was calculated and assured. Both
+children had a horror of anything sticky, and would refuse jam unless it
+was "well covelled in a sangwidge."
+
+That very morning Jan and Meg exchanged congratulatory glances over
+their well-behaved charges, sitting side by side.
+
+Then, all at once, with a swift, sure movement, little Fay stretched up
+and deposited a spoonful of exceedingly hot porridge exactly on the top
+of her brother's head, with a smart tap.
+
+Tony's hair was always short, and had been cut on Saturday, and the hot
+mixture ran down into his eyes, which filled him with rage.
+
+He tried to get out of his high chair, exclaiming angrily, "Let me get
+at her to box her!"
+
+Jan held him down with one hand while she wiped away the offending mess
+with the other, and all the time Tony cried in _crescendo_, "Let me get
+at her!"
+
+Little Fay, quite unmoved, continued to eat her porridge with studied
+elegance, and in gently reproachful tones remarked, "Tony velly closs
+littoo boy."
+
+Jan and Meg, who wanted desperately to laugh, tried hard to look
+shocked, and Meg asked, "What on earth possessed you to do such a
+thing?"
+
+"Tony's head so shiny and smoove."
+
+Tony rubbed the shiny head ruefully.
+
+"Can't I do nuffin to her?" he demanded.
+
+"No," his sister answered firmly, "loo can't, 'cos I'm plitty littoo
+Fay."
+
+"Can't I plop some on _her_ head?" he persisted.
+
+"It certainly seems unfair," Jan said thoughtfully, "but I think you'd
+better not."
+
+"It _is_ unfair," Tony grumbled.
+
+Jan loosed his hands. "Now," she said, "you can do what you like."
+
+Little Fay leaned towards her brother, smiling her irresistible,
+dimpled, twinkling smile, and held out a spoonful of her porridge.
+
+"Deah littoo Tony," she cooed, "taste it."
+
+And Tony meekly accepted the peace-offering.
+
+"You haven't smacked her," Jan remarked.
+
+Tony sighed. "It's too late now--I don't feel like it any more."
+
+All the same he felt aggrieved as he set out to seek Earley in the
+kitchen garden.
+
+Earley was not to be found. He saw Mrs. Mumford already hanging kitchen
+cloths on a line in the orchard, but he felt no desire for Mrs.
+Mumford's society.
+
+Tony's tormented soul sought for something soothing.
+
+The garden was pleasant, but it wasn't enough.
+
+Ah! he'd got it!
+
+He'd go to the river; all by himself he'd go, and not tell anybody. He'd
+look over the bridge into that cool deep pool and perhaps that big fat
+trout would be swimming about. What was it he had heard Captain
+Middleton say last time he was down at Amber Guiting? "The Mayfly was
+up."
+
+He had seemed quite delighted about it, therefore it must mean something
+pleasant.
+
+After all, on a soft, not too sunny morning in early June, with a west
+wind rustling the leaves in the hedges, the world was not such a bad
+place; for even if there were rather too many women in it, there were
+dogs and rivers and country roads where adventurous boys could see life
+for themselves.
+
+William agreed with Tony in his dislike of Monday mornings. He went and
+lay on the front door mat so that he was more than ready to accompany
+anyone who happened to be going out.
+
+By the time they reached the bridge all sense of injury had vanished,
+and buoyant expectation had taken its place.
+
+Three men were fishing. One was far in the distance, one about three
+hundred yards up stream, and one Tony recognised as Mr. Dauncey,
+landlord of "The Full Basket," the square white house standing in its
+neat garden just on the other side of the bridge. The fourth gentleman,
+who had forgotten his hat, and was clad in a holland smock, sandals,
+and no stockings, leaned over luxuriously, with his elbows on the low
+wall and his bare legs thrust out. He was very still, even trying not to
+twitch when William licked his bare legs, as he did at intervals just to
+show he was there on guard.
+
+There had been heavy rain in the night and the water was discoloured.
+Nobody noticed Tony, and for about an hour nothing happened. Then Mr.
+Dauncey got a rise. The rigid little figure on the bridge leaned further
+over as Mr. Dauncey's reel screamed and he followed his cast down
+stream.
+
+Presently, with a sense of irritation, Tony was aware of footsteps
+coming over the bridge. He felt that he simply could not bear it just
+then if anyone leaned over beside him and talked. The footsteps came up
+behind him and passed; and William, who was lying between Tony's legs
+and the wall, squeezed as close to him as possible, gave a low growl.
+
+"Hush, William, naughty dog!" Tony whispered crossly.
+
+William hushed, and drooped as he always did when rebuked.
+
+It occurred to Tony to look after this amazing person who could cross a
+bridge without stopping to look over when a reel was joyfully
+proclaiming that some fisherman was having luck.
+
+It was a man, and he walked as though he were footsore and tired. There
+was something dejected and shabby in his appearance, and his clothes
+looked odd somehow in Amber Guiting. Tony stared after the stranger,
+and gradually he realised that there was something familiar in the back
+of the tall figure that walked so slowly and yet seemed trying to walk
+fast.
+
+The man had a stick and evidently leant upon it as he went. He wore an
+overcoat and carried nothing in his hand.
+
+Mr. Dauncey's reel chuckled and one of the other anglers ran towards him
+with a landing-net.
+
+But Tony still stared after the man. Presently, with a deep sigh, he
+started to follow him.
+
+Just once he turned, in time to see that Mr. Dauncey had landed his
+trout.
+
+The sun came out from behind the clouds. "The Full Basket," the river,
+brown and rippled, the bridge, the two men talking eagerly on the bank
+below, the muddy road growing cream-coloured in patches as it dried,
+were all photographed upon Tony's mind. When he started to follow the
+stranger he was out of sight, but now Tony trotted steadily forward and
+did not look round again.
+
+William was glad. He had been lying in a puddle, and, like little Fay,
+he preferred "a dly place."
+
+Meanwhile, at Wren's End the washing had taken a long time to count and
+to divide. There seemed a positively endless number of little smocks and
+frocks and petticoats and pinafores, and Meg wanted to keep them all for
+Mrs. Mumford to wash, declaring that she (Meg) could starch and iron
+them beautifully. This was quite true. She could iron very well, as she
+did everything she undertook to do. But Jan knew that it tired her
+dreadfully, that the heat and the wielding of the heavy iron were very
+bad for her, and after much argument and many insulting remarks from Meg
+as to Jan's obstinacy and extravagance generally, the things were
+divided. Meg put on little Fay's hat and swept her out into the garden;
+whereupon Jan plunged into Mrs. Mumford's heap, removed all the things
+to be ironed that could not be tackled by Anne Chitt, stuffed them into
+Mrs. Chitt's basket, fastened it firmly and rang for Anne and Hannah to
+carry the things away.
+
+She washed her hands and put on her gardening gloves preparatory to
+going out, humming a gay little snatch of song; and as she ran down the
+wide staircase she heard the bell ring, and saw the figure of a man
+standing in the open doorway.
+
+The maids were carrying the linen down the back stairs, and she went
+across the hall to see what he wanted.
+
+"Well, Jan," he said, and his voice sounded weak and tired. "Here I am
+at last."
+
+He held out his hand, and as she took it she felt how hot and dry it
+was.
+
+"Come in, Hugo," she said quietly. "Why didn't you let me know you were
+coming, and I'd have met you."
+
+The man followed her as she led the way into the cool, fragrant
+drawing-room. He paused in the doorway and passed his hand across his
+eyes. "It does bring it all back," he said.
+
+He sat down in a deep chair and leaned his head against the back,
+closing his eyes. Jan saw that he was thin to emaciation, and that he
+looked very ill; shabby, too, and broken.
+
+The instinct of the nurse that exists in any woman worth her salt was
+roused in Jan. All the passionate indignation she had felt against her
+brother-in-law was merged at the moment in pity and anxiety.
+
+"Hugo," she said gently, "I fear you are ill. Have you had any
+breakfast?"
+
+"I came by the early train to avoid ordering breakfast; I couldn't have
+paid for it. I'd only enough for my fare. Jan, I haven't a single rupee
+left."
+
+He sat forward in the chair with his hands on the arms and closed his
+eyes again.
+
+Jan looked keenly at the handsome, haggard face. There was no pretence
+here. The man was gravely ill. His lips (Jan had always mistrusted his
+well-shaped mouth because it would never really shut) were dry and
+cracked and discoloured, the cheekbones sharp, and there was that deep
+hollow at the back of the neck that always betrays the man in
+ill-health.
+
+She went to him and pressed him back in the chair.
+
+"What do you generally do when you have fever?" she asked.
+
+"Go to bed--if there is a bed; and take quinine and drink hot tea."
+
+"That's what you'd better do now. Where are your things?"
+
+"There's a small bag at the station. They promised to send it up. I
+couldn't carry it and I had no money to pay a boy. I came the long way
+round, Jan, not through the village. No one recognised me."
+
+"I'll get you some tea at once, and I have quinine in the house. Will
+you take some now?"
+
+Hugo laughed. "Your quinine would be of no earthly use to me, but I've
+already taken it this morning. I've got some here in my pocket. The
+minute my bag comes I'll go to bed--if you don't mind."
+
+Someone fumbled at the handle of the door, and Tony, followed by
+William, appeared on the threshold.
+
+Hugo Tancred opened his eyes. "Hullo!" he said. "Do you remember me,
+young shaver?"
+
+Tony came into the room holding out his hand. "How do you do?" he said
+solemnly.
+
+Hugo took it and stared at his son with strange glazed eyes. "You look
+fit enough, anyhow," he said, and dropped the little hand.
+
+"I came as quick as I could," Tony said eagerly to Jan. "But Mr. Dauncey
+caught a trout, and I _had_ to wait a minute."
+
+"Good heavens!" Hugo exclaimed irritably. "Do you all _still_ think and
+talk about nothing but fishing?"
+
+"Come," said Jan, holding out her hand to Tony, "and we'll go and see
+about some breakfast for Daddie."
+
+William, who had been sniffing dubiously at the man in the chair, dashed
+after them.
+
+As they crossed the hall Tony remarked philosophically: "Daddie's got
+fever. He'll be very cross, then he'll be very sad, and then he'll want
+you to give him something, and if you do--p'raps he'll go away."
+
+Jan made no answer.
+
+Tony followed her through the swing door and down the passage to speak
+to Hannah, who was much moved and excited when she heard Mr. Tancred had
+arrived. Hannah was full of sympathy for the "poor young widower," and
+though she could have wished that he had given them notice of his
+coming, still, she supposed him to be so distracted with grief that he
+forgot to do anything of the kind. She and Anne Chitt went there and
+then to make up his bed, while Jan boiled the kettle and got him some
+breakfast.
+
+While she was doing this Meg and little Fay came round to the back to
+look for Tony, whom they found making toast.
+
+"Who's tum?" asked little Fay, while Jan rapidly explained the situation
+to Meg.
+
+"Your Daddie's come."
+
+Little Fay looked rather vague. "What sort of a Daddie?" she asked.
+
+"You take her to see him, Tony, and I'll finish the toast," said Jan,
+taking the fork out of his hand.
+
+When the children had gone Meg said slowly: "And Mr. Ledgard comes
+to-morrow?"
+
+"He can't. I must telegraph and put him off for a day or two. Hugo is
+really ill."
+
+"I shouldn't put him off long, if I were you."
+
+Jan seized the tray: "I'll send a wire now, if you and the children will
+take it down to the post-office for me."
+
+"Why send it at all?" said Meg. "Let him come."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+TACTICS
+
+
+It was a fortnight since Hugo Tancred arrived at Wren's End, and Jan had
+twice put off Peter's visit.
+
+During the first few days Hugo's temperature remained so high that she
+grew thoroughly alarmed; and in spite of his protestations that he was
+"quite used to it," she sent for the doctor. Happily the doctor in his
+youth had been in the East and was able to reassure her. His opinion,
+too, had more weight with Hugo on this account, and though he grumbled
+he consented to do what the doctor advised. And at the end of a week
+Hugo was able to come downstairs, looking very white and shaky. He lay
+out in the garden in a deck-chair for most of the day and managed to eat
+a good many of the nourishing dishes Hannah prepared for him.
+
+It had been a hard time for Jan, as Hugo was not an invalid who excited
+compassion in those who had to wait upon him. He took everything for
+granted, was somewhat morose and exacting, and made no attempt to
+control the extreme irritability that so often accompanies fever.
+
+When the fever left him, however, his tone changed, and the second
+stage, indicated by Tony as "sad," set in with severity.
+
+His depression was positively overwhelming, and he seemed to think that
+its public manifestation should arouse in all beholders the most
+poignant and respectful sympathy.
+
+Poor Jan found it very difficult to behave in a manner at all calculated
+to satisfy her brother-in-law. She had not, so far, uttered one word of
+reproach to him, but she _would_ shrink visibly when he tried to discuss
+his wife, and she could not even pretend to believe in the deep
+sincerity of a grief that seemed to find such facile solace in
+expression. The mode of expression, too, in hackneyed, commonplace
+phrases, set her teeth on edge.
+
+She knew that poor Hugo--she called him "poor Hugo" just then--thought
+her cold and unsympathetic because she rather discouraged his
+outpourings; but Fay's death was too lately-lived a tragedy to make it
+possible for her to talk of it--above all, with him; and after several
+abortive attempts Hugo gave up all direct endeavour to make her.
+
+"You are terribly Scotch, Jan," he said one day. "I sometimes wonder
+whether anything could make you _really_ feel."
+
+Jan looked at him with a sort of contemptuous wonder that caused him to
+redden angrily, but she made no reply.
+
+He was her guest, he was a broken man, and she knew well that they had
+not yet even approached their real difference.
+
+Two people, however, took Hugo's attitude of profound dejection in the
+way he expected and liked it to be taken. These were Mr. Withells and
+Hannah.
+
+Mr. Withells did not bear Jan a grudge because of her momentary lapse
+from good manners. In less than a week from the unfortunate interview in
+the nut-walk he had decided that she could not properly have understood
+him; and that he had, perhaps, sprung upon her too suddenly the high
+honour he held in store for her.
+
+So back he came in his neat little two-seater car to call at Wren's End
+as if nothing had happened, and Jan, guiltily conscious that she _had_
+been very rude, was only too thankful to accept the olive-branch in the
+spirit in which it was offered.
+
+He took to coming almost as often as before, and was thoroughly
+interested and commiserating when he heard that poor Mrs. Tancred's
+husband had come home from India and been taken ill almost immediately
+on arrival. He sent some early strawberries grown in barrels in the
+houses, and with them a note conjuring Jan "on no account to leave them
+in the sickroom overnight, as the smell of fruit was so deleterious."
+
+Hannah considered Hugo's impenetrable gloom a most proper and husbandly
+tribute to the departed. She felt that had there been a Mr. Hannah she
+could not have wished him to show more proper feeling had Providence
+thought fit to snatch her from his side. So she expressed her admiration
+in the strongest of soups, the smoothest of custards, and the most
+succulent of mutton-chops. Gladly would she have commanded Mrs. Earley
+to slay her fattest cockerels for the nourishment of "yon poor
+heartbroken young man," but that she remembered (from her experience of
+Fay's only visit) that no one just home from India will give a thank-you
+for chickens.
+
+Jan had cause to bless kind Mr. Withells, for directly Hugo was able for
+it, he came with his largest and most comfortable car, driven by his
+trustworthy chauffeur, to take the invalid for a run right into
+Wiltshire. He pressed Jan to go too, but she pleaded "things to see to"
+at home.
+
+Hugo had seen practically nothing of Meg. She was fully occupied in
+keeping the children out of their father's way. Little Fay "pooah
+daddied" him when they happened to meet, and Tony stared at him in the
+weighing, measuring way Hugo found so trying, but Meg neither looked at
+him nor did she address any remark whatever to him unless she positively
+could not help it.
+
+Meg was thoroughly provoked that he should have chosen to turn up just
+then. She had been most anxious that Peter should come. Firstly,
+because, being sharply observant, she had come to the conclusion that
+his visit would be a real pleasure to Jan, and secondly, because she
+ardently desired to see him herself that she might judge whether he was
+"at all good enough."
+
+And now her well-loved Jan, instead of looking her best, was growing
+thin and haggard, losing her colour, and her sweet serenity, and in
+their place a patient, tired expression in her eyes that went to Meg's
+heart.
+
+She had hardly seen Jan alone for over a week; for since Hugo came
+downstairs Meg had taken all her meals with the children in the nursery,
+while Jan and Hugo had theirs in the rarely-used dining-room. The girls
+breakfasted together, as Hugo had his in his room, but as the children
+were always present there was small chance of any confidential
+conversation.
+
+The first afternoon Mr. Withells took Hugo for a drive, Meg left her
+children in Earley's care the minute she heard the car depart, and went
+to look for Jan in the house.
+
+She found her opening all the windows in the dining-room. Meg shut the
+door and sat on the polished table, lit a cigarette and regarded her own
+pretty swinging feet with interest.
+
+"How long does Mr. Tancred propose to stay?" she asked.
+
+"How can I tell," Jan answered wearily, as she sat down in one of the
+deep window-seats. "He has nowhere to go and no money to go with; and,
+so far, except for a vague allusion to some tea-plantation in Ceylon, he
+has suggested no plans. Oh, yes! I forgot, there was something about
+fruit-farming or vine-growing in California, but I fancy considerable
+capital would be needed for that."
+
+"And how much longer do you intend to keep Mr. Ledgard waiting for _his_
+visit?"
+
+"It would be small pleasure for Mr. Ledgard to come here with Hugo, and
+horrid for Hugo, for he knows perfectly well what Peter ... Mr. Ledgard
+thinks of him."
+
+"But if friend Hugo knew Mr. Ledgard was coming, might it not have an
+accelerating effect upon his movements? You could give him his
+fare--single, mind--to Guernsey. Let him go and stay with his people for
+a bit."
+
+Jan shook her head. "I can't turn him out, Meg; and I'm not going to let
+Mr. Ledgard waste his precious leave on an unpleasant visit. If I could
+give him a good time it would be different; but after all he did for us
+while we were in Bombay, it would be rank ingratitude to let him in for
+more worries at home."
+
+"Perhaps he wouldn't consider them worries. Perhaps he'd _like_ to
+come."
+
+Jan's strained expression relaxed a little and she smiled with her eyes
+fixed on Meg's neat swinging feet. "He _says_ he would."
+
+"Well, then, take him at his word. We can turn the excellent Withells on
+to Hugo. Let him instruct Hugo in the importance of daily free
+gymnastics after one's bath and the necessity for windows being left
+open at the top 'day and night, but _especially_ at night.' Let's tell
+that Peter man to come."
+
+Jan shook her head.
+
+"No, I've explained the situation to him and begged him not to consider
+us any more for the present. We must think of the maids too. You see,
+Hugo makes a good deal of extra work, and I'm afraid Hannah might turn
+grumpy if there was yet another man to do for."
+
+Meg thoughtfully blew beautiful rings of smoke, carefully poked a small
+finger exactly into the centre of each and continued to swing her feet
+in silence.
+
+Jan leaned her head against the casement and closed her eyes.
+
+Without so much as a rustle Meg descended from the table. She went over
+to Jan and dropped a light kiss on the top of the thick wavy hair that
+was so nearly white. Jan opened her tired eyes and smiled.
+
+This quaint person in the green linen frock and big white apron always
+looked so restfully neat and clean, so capable and strong with that
+inward shining strength that burns with a steady light. Jan put her arms
+round Meg and leaned her head against the admirable apron's cool, smooth
+bib.
+
+"You're here, anyway," she said. "You don't know how I thank God for
+that."
+
+Meg held her close. "Listen to me," she said. "You're going on quite a
+wrong tack with that brother-in-law. You are, Jan--I grieve to say
+it--standing between him and his children--you don't allow him to see
+his children, especially his adored daughter, nearly enough. Now that he
+is well enough to take the air with Mr. Withells I propose that we allow
+him to _study_ his children--and how can he study them if they are never
+left with him? Let him realise what it would be if he had them with him
+constantly, and no interfering aunt to keep them in order--do you
+understand, Jan? Have you tumbled to it? You are losing a perfectly
+magnificent opportunity."
+
+Jan pushed Meg a little away from her and looked up: "I believe there's
+a good deal in what you say."
+
+"There's everything in what I say. As long as the man was ill one
+couldn't, of course, but now we can and will--eh, Jan?"
+
+"Not Tony," Jan said nervously. "Hugo doesn't care much for Tony, and
+I'm always afraid what he may say or do to the child."
+
+"If you let him have them both occasionally he may discover that Tony
+has his points."
+
+"They're _both_ perfect darlings," Jan said resentfully. Meg laughed and
+danced a two-step to the door.
+
+"They're darlings that need a good deal of diplomatic managing, and if
+they don't get it they'll raise Cain. I'm going to take them down to the
+post-office directly with my Indian letters. Why not come with us for
+the walk?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hugo quite enjoyed his run with Mr. Withells and Mr. Withells enjoyed
+being consulted about Hugo's plans. He felt real sympathy for a young
+man whose health, ruined by one bad station after another, had forced
+him to give up his career in India. He suggested various ameliorating
+treatments to Hugo, who received his advice with respectful gratitude,
+and they arranged to drive again together on Saturday, which was next
+day but one.
+
+Hugo sought the sofa in the drawing-room for a quiet hour before dinner
+and lit a cigar. He had hardly realised his pleasantly tired and rather
+somnolent condition when his daughter entered carrying a large
+Teddy-bear, two dolls, a toy trumpet and a box containing a wooden
+tea-set. She dropped several of these articles just inside the door.
+"Come and help me pick up my sings," she commanded. "I've come to play
+wis loo, Daddie."
+
+Hugo did not move. He was fond of little Fay; he admired her good looks
+and her splendid health, but he didn't in the least desire her society
+just then.
+
+"Poor Daddie's tired," he said in his "saddest" tone. "I think you'd
+better go and play in the nursery with Tony."
+
+"No," said little Fay, "Tony's not zere; _loo_ mus' play wis me.
+Or"--she added as a happy alternative--"loo can tell me sumfin
+instastin."
+
+"Surely," said Hugo, "it's your bed-time?"
+
+"No," little Fay answered, and the letters were never formed that could
+express the finality of that "no," "Med will fesh me when it's time.
+I've come to play wis _loo_. Det up, Daddie; loo can't play p'oply lying
+zere."
+
+"Oh, yes, I can," Hugo protested eagerly. "You bring all your nice toys
+one by one and show them to me."
+
+"'At," she remarked with great scorn, "would be a velly stupid game. Det
+up!"
+
+"Why can't Meg play with you?" Hugo asked irritably. "What's she doing?"
+
+Little Fay stared at her father. She was unaccustomed to be addressed
+in that tone, and she resented it. Earley and Mr. Burgess were her
+humble slaves. Captain Middleton did as he was told and became an
+elephant, a camel, or a polar bear on the shortest notice, moreover he
+threw himself into the part with real goodwill and enjoyment. The lazy
+man lying there on the sofa, who showed no flattering pleasure in her
+society, must be roused to a sense of his shortcomings. She seized the
+Teddy-bear, swung it round her head and brought it down with a
+resounding thump on Hugo's chest. "Det up," she said more loudly. "Loo
+don't seem to know any stolies, so you _mus'_ play wis me."
+
+Hugo swung his legs off the sofa and sat up to recover his breath, which
+had been knocked out of him by the Teddy-bear.
+
+"You're a very rude little girl," he said crossly. "You'll have to be
+punished if you do that sort of thing."
+
+"What sort of sing?"
+
+"What you did just now; it's very naughty indeed."
+
+"What nelse?"
+
+Little Fay stood with her head on one side like an inquisitive sparrow.
+One of the things she had not dropped was the tin trumpet. She raised it
+to her lips now, and blew a blast that went through Hugo's head like a
+knife.
+
+He snatched it from her. "You're not to do that," he said. "I can't
+stand it. Go and pick up those other things and show them to me."
+
+"Loo can see zem from here."
+
+"Not what's in the box," he suggested diplomatically.
+
+"I'm tah'ed too," she said, suddenly sitting down on the floor. "You
+fesh 'em."
+
+"Will you play with them if I do?"
+
+She shook her head. "Not if loo're closs, and lude and naughty and ...
+stupid."
+
+Hugo groaned and stalked over to collect the two dolls and the
+tea-things. He brought them back and put them down on one end of the
+sofa while he sat down at the other.
+
+"Now," he said, "show me how you play with them."
+
+His cigar had gone out and he struck a match to light it again. Little
+Fay scrambled to her feet and blew it out before he had touched his
+cigar with it.
+
+"Adain," she said joyously. "Make anozer light."
+
+He struck another match, but sheltered it with his hand till he'd got
+his cigar going, his daughter blowing vigorously all the time.
+
+"Now," she said, "you can be a nengine and I'll be the tlain."
+
+Round that drawing-room the unfortunate Hugo ran, encouraged in his
+efforts by blasts upon the trumpet. The chairs were arranged as
+carriages, the dolls as passengers, and the box of tea-things was
+luggage. None of these transformations were suggested by Hugo, but
+little Fay had played the game so often under Meg's brilliant
+supervision that she knew all the properties by heart.
+
+At the end of fifteen minutes Hugo was thoroughly exhausted and audibly
+thanked God when Meg appeared to fetch her charge. But he hadn't
+finished even then, for little Fay, aided and abetted by Meg, insisted
+that every single thing should be tidily put back exactly where it was
+before.
+
+At the door, just as they were on the point of departure, Meg paused.
+"You must enjoy having her all to yourself for a little while," she said
+in honeyed, sympathetic tones such as Hugo, certainly, had never heard
+from her before. "I fear we've been rather selfish about it, but for the
+future we must not forget that you have the first right to her.... Did
+you kiss your dear Daddie, my darling?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Through the shut door Hugo heard his daughter's voice proclaiming in
+lofty, pitying tones, "Pooah Daddie velly stupid man, he was a velly bad
+nengine, he did it all long."
+
+"Damn!" said Hugo Tancred.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+During dinner that night Jan talked continually about the children. She
+consulted Hugo as to things in which he took not the smallest interest,
+such as what primers he considered the best for earliest instruction in
+reading, and whether he thought the Montessori method advantageous or
+not.
+
+As they sat over dessert he volunteered the remark that little Fay was
+rather an exhausting child.
+
+"All children are," Jan answered, "and I've just been thinking that
+while you are here to help me, it would be such a good chance to give
+Meg a little holiday. She has not had a day off since I came back from
+India, and it would be so nice for her to go to Cheltenham for a few
+days to see Major Morton."
+
+"But surely," Hugo said uneasily, "that's what she's here for, to look
+after the children. She's very highly paid; you could get a good nurse
+for half what you pay her."
+
+"I doubt it, and you must remember that, because she loved Fay, she is
+accepting less than half of what she could earn elsewhere to help me
+with Fay's children."
+
+"Of course, if you import sentiment into the matter you must pay for
+it."
+
+"But I fear that's just what I don't do."
+
+"My dear Jan, you must forgive me if I venture to think that both you
+and your father, and even Fay, were quite absurd about Meg Morton. She's
+a nice enough little girl, but nothing so very wonderful, and as for her
+needing a holiday after a couple of months of the very soft job she has
+with you ... that's sheer nonsense."
+
+There was silence for a minute. Hugo took another chocolate and said,
+"You know I don't believe in having children all over the place. The
+nursery is the proper place for them when they're little, and school is
+the proper place--most certainly the proper place, anyway, for a boy--as
+soon as ever any school can be found to take him."
+
+"I quite agree with you as to the benefit of a good school," Jan said
+sweetly. "I am painfully conscious myself of how much I lost in never
+having had any regular education. Have you thought yet what preparatory
+school you'd prefer for Tony?"
+
+"Hardly yet. I've not been home long enough, and, as you know, at
+present, I've no money at all...."
+
+"I shall be most pleased to help with Tony's education, but in that case
+I should expect to have some voice in the school selected."
+
+"Certainly, certainly," Hugo agreed. "But what I really want to know is
+what you propose to do to help me to attain a position in which I _can_
+educate my children as we both should wish."
+
+"I don't quite see where I come in."
+
+"My dear Jan, that's absurd. You have money--and a few hundreds now will
+start me again...."
+
+"Start you again in what direction?"
+
+"That's what we've got to thresh out. I've several propositions to lay
+before you."
+
+"All propositions will have to be submitted to Mr. Davidson."
+
+"That's nonsense. You must remember that I could contest Fay's will if I
+liked--it was grossly unfair to leave that two thousand pounds away from
+me."
+
+"She left it to her children, Hugo, and _you_ must remember you spent
+eight thousand pounds of her money."
+
+"_I_ didn't spend it. Do you think _I_ benefited? The investments were
+unfortunate, I grant you, but that's not to say I had it."
+
+"Anyway that money is gone."
+
+"And the sooner I set about making some more to replace it the better,
+but I must have help."
+
+"It takes every penny of my income to run things here."
+
+"Well, you know, Jan, to be quite candid, I think it's rather ridiculous
+of you to live here. You could let this place easily and for a good
+rent. In a smaller house you'd be equally comfortable and in easier
+circumstances. I'm not at all sure I approve of my children being
+brought up with the false ideas they will inevitably acquire if they
+continue to live in a big place like this."
+
+"You see, Hugo, it happens to be my house, and I'm fond of it."
+
+"No doubt, but if you make a fetish of the house, if the house stands in
+the way of your helping your own flesh and blood...."
+
+"I don't think I've ever refused to help my _own_ relations."
+
+"Which means, I suppose, that your sister's husband is nothing to you."
+
+Jan rose. "You are rather unjust, I think," she said quietly. "I must
+put the children first."
+
+"And suppose you marry----"
+
+"I certainly wouldn't marry any man who would object to my doing all I
+could for my sister's children."
+
+"You think so now, but wait till a man comes along. You're just getting
+to the age, Jan, when a woman is most apt to make a fool of herself over
+a man. And, remember this, I'd much rather my children were brought up
+simply with my people in Guernsey than that they should grow up with all
+sorts of false ideas with nothing to back them."
+
+Jan clenched her teeth, and though outwardly she was silent, her soul
+was repeating, "I _will_ not fear," over and over again.
+
+"Perhaps you are right, Hugo," she said quietly. "You must arrange as
+you think best; only please remember that you can hardly expect me to
+contribute to the keeping of the children if I am allowed no voice in
+their upbringing. Have you consulted your parents as to their living
+with them in Guernsey? Shall we go out? It's such a beautiful evening."
+
+Hugo followed her into the hall and out into the garden. Involuntarily
+he looked after her with considerable admiration. She held herself well,
+that quiet woman. She waited for him in the drive, and as she did so
+Tony's words came back to her: "I used to feel frightened inside, but I
+wouldn't let him know it, and then--it was funny--but quite sunnly I
+wasn't frightened any more. You try it."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan had tried it, and, again to quote Tony, "it just happened."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+"THE WAY OF A MAN WITH A MAID"
+
+
+Peter began to feel annoyed. More and more clearly did he realise that
+his chief object in coming home was to see Jan again; and here was he,
+still in London in the third week of June, and never so much as a
+glimpse of her.
+
+Her last letter, too, had postponed his visit indefinitely, and he
+almost thought she was not treating him quite fairly. It was, of course,
+a confounded bore that Hugo Tancred should have turned up just now, but
+Peter saw no reason for staying away for ever on that account. He knew
+Wren's End was a good-sized house, and though he appreciated Jan's
+understanding of the fact that he wouldn't exactly choose to be a
+fellow-guest with such a thoroughly bad hat as Hugo Tancred, still he
+considered it was laying too much stress upon the finer shades of
+feeling to keep him away so long.
+
+His aunt was delighted to have him; London was very pleasant; he had
+dined out quite a number of times, attended some big parties, seen all
+the best plays, and bought or ordered all the new clothes he needed, and
+a good deal that he didn't need at all. He had also bought a motor to
+take out with him. It was more than time to get within range of the main
+objective of his leave.
+
+Suggestions that Jan _must_ have shopping to do and might as well come
+up for a day or two to do it only elicited the reply that she had no
+money for shopping and that it was most unlikely that she would be in
+London again for ages.
+
+She hadn't answered his last letter, either, which was another
+grievance.
+
+Then came a letter with the Amber Guiting post-mark, and in a
+handwriting he did not know--a funny little, clear, square handwriting
+with character in every stroke.
+
+He opened it and read:
+
+      "DEAR MR. LEDGARD,
+
+      "It is just possible you may have heard of me from Mrs.
+      Tancred or Miss Ross, but in case you haven't I will
+      explain that I am nurse to the little Tancreds and that
+      Miss Ross is my dearest friend. I think it would be a very
+      good thing if you came down to see her, for her
+      brother-in-law is here, and I am never quite sure what he
+      might persuade her to do if he put the screw on about the
+      children. There is a comfortable inn called 'The Green
+      Hart,' and there's another called 'The Full Basket,' but I
+      fear you'd not get a room there as it's very small and
+      always chock-full at this time of year with fishing people.
+
+      "You see, if you came down to 'The Green Hart,' Jan
+      couldn't say anything, for you've a perfect right to stay
+      there if you choose, and I know it would help her and
+      strengthen her hands to talk things over with you. She has
+      spoken much of your kindness to them all in India.
+
+      "Do you fish, I wonder? I'm sure Squire Walcote would be
+      amiable to any friend of Jan's.
+
+                        "Believe me, yours truly,
+
+                                        "MARGARET MORTON."
+
+Peter put the letter in his pocket and left the rest of his
+correspondence till after breakfast, and his aunt decided that he really
+was a most amusing and agreeable companion, and that she must have been
+mistaken last night in thinking he seemed rather depressed and worried.
+
+After breakfast he went out to send a reply-paid telegram, and then to
+the garage, where he kept his car. Among other places he drove to "Hardy
+Brothers" in Pall Mall, where he stayed over an hour.
+
+By the time he got back to Artillery Mansions it was lunch time. More
+letters awaited him, also a telegram.
+
+During lunch he mentioned casually that he was going down into the
+country for the week-end to fish. He was going to motor down.
+
+"Yes," in answer to his aunt's inquiry, "I do know people down there,
+but I'm not going to stay with them. I'm going to the inn--one's freer,
+you know, and if the sport's good I may stay on a few days."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Withells came again for Hugo on Saturday morning and proposed a run
+right over to Cheltenham for a rose show. Hugo declined the rose show,
+but gratefully accepted the drive. He would potter about the town while
+Mr. Withells inspected the flowers. The Grange head-gardener had
+several exhibits, and was to be taken on the front seat.
+
+They started soon after breakfast and would be gone the whole day, for
+it was an hour and three-quarters run by road and two by train.
+
+"I wish he had offered to take you," Jan said to Meg when the big motor
+had vanished out of the drive. "It would have been so nice for you to
+see Major Morton."
+
+"And sit bodkin between Hugo and Mr. Withells or on one of those horrid
+little folding-seats--no, thank you! When I go to see my poor little
+papa I shall go by train by myself. I'll choose a day when their dear
+father can help you with the children."
+
+After lunch Meg began to find fault with Jan's appearance. "I simply
+won't see you in that old grey skirt a minute longer--go and put on a
+white frock--a nice white frock. You've got plenty."
+
+"Who is always grumbling about the washing? Besides, I want to garden."
+
+"You can't garden this afternoon. On such a lovely day it's your duty to
+dress in accordance with it. I'm going to clean up my children, and then
+we'll all go down to the post-office to buy stamps and show ourselves.
+_You_ ought to call on Lady Mary--you know you ought. Go and change, and
+then come and see if I approve of you. You might leave a card at the
+vicarage, too. I know they're going to the rose show, so you'd be quite
+safe."
+
+"You're a nuisance, Meg," Jan complained. "Let you and little Fay go
+swanking down the village if you like, but why can't you leave Tony and
+me to potter comfortably in our old clothes?"
+
+"I'm tired of your old clothes; I want you to look decent for once. You
+haven't done anything I asked you for ages. You might as well do this."
+
+Jan sighed. "It seems rather absurd when you yourself say every soul we
+know will be at the flower show."
+
+"I never said anything of the kind. I said Mrs. Fream was going to the
+flower show. Hurry up, Jan."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Well, will I do? Will I satisfy the hedges and ditches, do you think?"
+Jan asked later, as she appeared in the hall clad in the white raiment
+Meg had commanded.
+
+Meg turned her round. "Very nice indeed," she said. "I'm glad you put on
+the expensive one. It's funny why the very plain things cost such a lot.
+I like the black hat with your white hair. Yes, I consent to take you
+out; I don't mind owning you for my missus. Children, come and admire
+Auntie Jan."
+
+Jan dutifully delivered a card at the vicarage, and the nursery party
+left her to walk up the Manor drive alone. Lady Mary was in, and pleased
+to see her, but she only stayed a quarter of an hour, because Meg had
+made her promise to meet them again in the village. They were to have
+tea in the garden with the children and make it a little festival.
+
+What a funny little thing Meg was, she thought as she strolled down the
+drive under the splendid beeches. So determined to have her own way in
+small things, such an incarnation of self-sacrifice in big ones.
+
+A man was standing just outside the great gates in a patch of black
+shade thrown by a holly-tree in the lodge garden. Jan was long-sighted,
+and something in the figure and its pose caused her to stop suddenly. He
+wore the usual grey summer suit and a straw hat. Yet he reminded her of
+somebody, but him she had always seen in a topee, out of doors.
+
+Of course it was only a resemblance--but what was he waiting there for?
+
+He moved out from the patch of shade and looked up the drive through the
+open gates. He took off his hat and waved it, and came quickly towards
+her.
+
+"I couldn't wait any longer," he said. "I won't be the least bit of a
+nuisance. I've come to fish, and I'm staying at 'The Green Hart'.... And
+how are you?"
+
+She could never make it out, when she thought it over afterwards, but
+Jan found herself standing with both her hands in his and her beautiful
+black parasol tumbled unheeded in the dust.
+
+"I happened to meet the children and Miss Morton, and they asked me to
+tell you they've gone home. They also invited me to tea."
+
+"So do I," said Jan.
+
+"I should hardly have known Tony," he continued; "he looks capital. And
+as for little Fay--she's a picture, but she always was."
+
+"Did they know you?"
+
+"_Did_ they know me!"
+
+"Were they awfully pleased?"
+
+"They were ever so jolly; even Tony shouted."
+
+At the lodge they met the Squire. Jan introduced Peter and explained
+that he had just come down for a few days' fishing and was staying at
+"The Green Hart." The Squire proffered advice as to the best flies and a
+warning that he must not hope for much sport. The Amber was a difficult
+river, very; and variable; and it had been a particularly dry June.
+
+Peter bore up under this depressing intelligence and he and Jan walked
+on through warm, scented lanes to Wren's End; and Peter looked at Jan a
+good deal.
+
+Those who happened to be in London during the season of 1914 will
+remember that it was a period of powder and paint and frankest
+touching-up of complexions. The young and pretty were blackened and
+whitened and reddened quite as crudely as the old and ugly. There was no
+attempt at concealment. The faces of many Mayfair ladies filled Peter
+with disrespectful astonishment. He had not been home for four years,
+and then nice girls didn't do that sort of thing--much.
+
+Now one of Jan's best points was her complexion; it was so fair and
+fresh. The touch of sunburn, too, was becoming, for she didn't freckle.
+
+Peter found himself positively thankful to behold a really clean face;
+a face, too, that just then positively beamed with warm welcome and
+frank pleasure.
+
+A clean face; a cool, clean frock; kind, candid eyes and a gentle,
+sincere voice--yes, they were all there just as he remembered them, just
+as he had so often dreamt of them. Moreover, he decided there and then
+that the Georgian ladies knew what they were about when they powdered
+their hair--white hair, he thought, was extraordinarily becoming to a
+woman.
+
+"You are looking better than when I was in Bombay. I think your leave
+must have done you good already," said the kind, friendly voice.
+
+"I need a spell of country air, really to set me up," said Peter.
+
+They had an hilarious tea with the children on the Wren's lawn, and the
+tamest of the robins hopped about on the step just to show that he
+didn't care a fig for any of them.
+
+Meg was just going to take the children to bed when Mr. Withells brought
+Hugo back. It was an awkward moment. Peter knew far too much about Hugo
+to simulate the smallest cordiality; and Hugo was too well aware of some
+of the things Peter knew to feel at all comfortable in his presence. But
+he had no intention of giving way an inch. He took the chair Meg had
+just vacated and sat down. Mr. Withells, too, sat down for a few
+minutes, and no sooner had he done so than William dashed out from
+amongst them, and, returning, was accompanied by Captain Middleton.
+
+"No tea, thank you. Just got down from town, came with a message from
+my uncle--would Miss Ross's friend care for a rod on the Manor water on
+Monday? A brother officer who had been coming had failed at the last
+minute--there was room for four rods, but there wasn't a chance of much
+sport."
+
+Miles was introduced to Peter and sat down by him. The children rushed
+at Miles and, ably impeded by William, swarmed over him in riotous
+welcome, wholly regardless of their nurse's voice which summoned them to
+bed.
+
+Meg stood waiting.
+
+"Miss Morton's father lives in Cheltenham," Jan said to Mr. Withells,
+who seemed rather left out. "She's going to see him on Tuesday--to spend
+the day."
+
+"Then," said Mr. Withells in his clear staccato, "she must take the
+9.15--it's much the best train in the day. And the 4.55 back. No other
+trains are at all suitable. I hope you will be guided by me in this
+matter, Miss Morton. I've made the journey many times."
+
+So had Meg; but Mr. Withells always irritated her to such an extent that
+had it been possible, she would have declared her intention to go and
+return by quite different trains. As it was, she nodded pleasantly and
+said those were the very trains she had selected.
+
+Miles thrust his head out from among the encompassing three and
+respectfully implored Mr. Withells' advice about trains to Cricklade,
+which lay off the Cheltenham route, even going so far as to note the
+hours of departure and arrival carefully in a little book.
+
+Finally Meg came and disencumbered Miles of the children and bore them
+away.
+
+When her voice took on a certain tone it was as useless to cope with Meg
+as with Auntie Jan. They knew this, and like wise children gave in
+gracefully.
+
+Elaborate farewells had to be said to everybody, and with a final warm
+embrace for Miles, little Fay called to him "Tum and see me in my baff."
+
+"Captain Middleton will have gone long before you are ready for that,"
+Meg said inhospitably, and trying to look very tall and dignified she
+walked up the three steps leading to the nursery. But it is almost
+impossible to look imposing with a lagging child dragging at each hand,
+and poor Meg felt that her exit was far from effective.
+
+William settled himself comfortably across his master's knees and in two
+minutes was snoring softly.
+
+Miles manifested so keen an interest in Mr. Withells' exhibits (he had
+got a second prize and a highly commended) that the kindly little man
+was quite attracted; and when Miles inquired about trains to Cheltenham
+he gave him precisely the same advice that he had given Meg.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The station at Amber Guiting is seldom crowded; it's on a shuttle line,
+and except on market-day there is but little passenger traffic.
+
+Therefore a small young lady with rather conspicuously red hair, a neat
+grey coat and skirt, a shady grey straw hat trimmed with white clover
+and green leaves, and a green parasol, was noticeable upon the platform
+out of all proportion to her size.
+
+The train was waiting. The lady entered an empty third-class carriage,
+and sitting in the corner with her back to the engine, shut herself in.
+The train departed punctually, and she took out from her bag a note-book
+which she studied with frowning concentration.
+
+Ten minutes further down the line the train stops again at Guiting
+Green, and here the young lady looked out of the window to see whether
+anyone was travelling that she recognised.
+
+There was. But it was impossible to judge from the young lady's
+expression whether the recognition gave her pleasure or not.
+
+She drew in her head very quickly, but not before she had been seen.
+
+"Hullo, Miss Morton! Where are you going? May I get in here?"
+
+"Aren't you travelling first?"
+
+"Not a bit of it. Sure you don't mind? How jolly to have met you!"
+
+Miles looked so smiling, so big and well turned out, and pleased with
+life, that Meg's severe expression relaxed somewhat.
+
+"I suppose," she said, "you're just going to the junction. But why come
+to Guiting Green?"
+
+"I came to Guiting Green because it's exactly four miles from the Manor
+House. And I've walked those four miles, Miss Morton, walked 'em for
+the good of my health. Wish it wasn't so dusty, though--look at my
+boots! _I'm_ going to Cheltenham. Where are you going?"
+
+"Cheltenham?" Meg repeated suspiciously. "What are you going to do
+there?"
+
+"I'm going to see about a horse--not a dog this time--I hear that
+Smith's have got a horse that may suit me; really up to my weight they
+say it is, so I took the chance of going over while I'm with my
+uncle--it's a lot nearer than town, you know. But where are _you_
+going?"
+
+"I," said Meg, "am going to Cheltenham----"
+
+"To Cheltenham!" Miles exclaimed in rather overdone astonishment. "What
+an extraordinary coincidence! And what are _you_ going to buy in
+Cheltenham?"
+
+"I am going to see my father. I thought I had told you he lives there."
+
+"So you did, of course. How stupid of me to forget! Well, it's very
+jolly we should happen to be going down together, isn't it?"
+
+They looked at one another, and Miles laughed.
+
+"I'm not at all sure that we ought to travel together after we reach the
+junction, and I don't believe you've got a third-class ticket." Meg
+looked very prim.
+
+Miles produced his ticket--it _was_ third-class.
+
+"There!" he said triumphantly.
+
+"You would be much more comfortable in a smoker."
+
+"So would you. We'll take a smoker; I've got the sort of cigarette you
+like."
+
+At the junction they got a smoker, and Miles saw to it that they had it
+to themselves; he also persuaded the guard to give Meg a square wooden
+box to put her feet on, because he thought the seats were too high for
+her.
+
+It seemed a very short journey.
+
+Major Morton was awaiting Meg when they arrived; a little gentleman
+immaculately neat (it was quite clear whence Meg got her love of detail
+and finish)--who looked both washed-out and dried-up. He embraced her
+with considerable solemnity, exclaiming, "God bless you, my dear child!
+You look better than I expected."
+
+"Papa, dear, here is Captain Middleton, a friend from Amber Guiting. We
+happened to travel together."
+
+"Pleased to meet you, sir," said the little Major graciously; and
+somehow Miles contrived in two minutes so to ingratiate himself with
+Meg's "poor little papa" that they all walked out of the station
+together as a matter of course.
+
+Then came the question of plans.
+
+Meg had shopping to do, declared she had a list as long as her arm, but
+was entirely at her father's disposal as to whether she should do it
+before or after lunch.
+
+Miles boldly suggested she should do it now, at once, while it was still
+fairly cool, and then she could have all her parcels sent to the station
+to meet her. He seemed quite eager to get rid of Meg. The little Major
+agreed that this would be the best course. He would stroll round to his
+club while Meg was shopping, and meet her when she thought she would
+have finished. They walked to the promenade and dropped her at Cavendish
+House. Miles, explaining that he had to go to Smith's to look at a
+horse, asked for directions from the Major. Their way was the same, and
+without so much as bidding her farewell, Miles strolled up one of the
+prettiest promenades in England in company with her father. Meg felt
+rather dazed.
+
+She prided herself on having reduced shopping to a fine art, but to-day,
+somehow, she didn't get through as quickly as usual, and there was a
+number of items on her list still unticked when it was time to meet her
+father just outside his club at the top of the promenade.
+
+Major Morton was the essence of punctuality. Meg flew to meet him, and
+found he had waited five minutes. He was not, however, upset, as might
+have been expected. He took her to his rooms in a quiet terrace behind
+the promenade and comfortably near his club. The sun-blinds were down
+outside his sitting-room windows, and the room seemed cool and pleasant.
+
+Then it was that Meg discovered that her father was looking at her in
+quite a new way. Almost, in fact, as though he had never seen her
+before.
+
+Was it her short hair? she wondered.
+
+Yet that was not very noticeable under such a shady hat.
+
+Major Morton had vigorously opposed the nursemaid scheme. To the
+sympathetic ladies who attended the same strictly evangelical church of
+which he was a pillar, he confided that his only daughter did not care
+for "a quiet domestic life." It was a grief to him--but, after all,
+parents are shelved nowadays; every girl wants to "live her own life,"
+and he would be the last man to stand in the way of his child's
+happiness. The ladies felt very sorry for Major Morton and indignant
+with the hard-hearted, unfilial Meg. They did not realise that had Meg
+lived with her father--in rooms--and earned nothing, the Major's
+delicate digestion might occasionally have suffered, and Meg would
+undoubtedly have been half-starved.
+
+To-day, however, he was more hopeful about Meg than he had been for a
+long time. Since the Trent episode he had ceased even to imagine her
+possible marriage. By her own headstrong folly she had ruined all her
+chances. "The weariful rich" who had got her the post did not spare him
+this aspect of her deplorable conduct. To-day, however, there was a rift
+in these dark clouds of consequence.
+
+Captain Middleton--he only knows how--had persuaded Major Morton to go
+with him to see the horse, had asked his quite useless advice, and had
+subtly and insidiously conveyed to the Major, without one single
+incriminating sentence, a very clear idea as to his own feelings for the
+Major's daughter.
+
+Major Morton felt cheered.
+
+He had no idea who Miles really was, but he had remarked the gunner tie,
+and, asking to what part of the Royal Regiment Miles belonged, decided
+that no mere pauper could be a Horse-Gunner.
+
+He regarded his daughter with new eyes.
+
+She was undoubtedly attractive. He discovered certain resemblances to
+himself that he had never noticed before.
+
+Then he informed her that he had promised they would both lunch with her
+agreeable friend at the Queen's Hotel: "He made such a point of it,"
+said Major Morton, "I could hardly refuse; begged us to take pity on his
+loneliness, and so on--and I'm feeling rather better to-day."
+
+Meg decided that the tide of fate was too strong for her, she must just
+drift with it.
+
+It was a most pleasant lunch, save for one incident. Lady Penelope
+Pottinger and her husband, accompanied by Lottie Trent and a man, were
+lunching at another table.
+
+Lady Penelope's party came in late. Miles and his guests had already
+arrived at coffee when they appeared.
+
+They had to pass Miles' table, and Lady Penelope stopped; so did her
+husband. She shook hands with Meg. Miss Trent passed by with her nose in
+the air.
+
+Miles presented his relations to the Major and they passed on.
+
+The Major was quite pleased and rather flattered. He had no idea that
+the tall young woman with Lady Penelope had deliberately cut his host.
+But Meg knew just why she had done it.
+
+After lunch Miles very properly effaced himself, but made a point of
+asking the Major if he might act as Miss Morton's escort on the journey
+back to Amber Guiting.
+
+The Major graciously accompanied Meg while she did the rest of her
+shopping, and in the promenade they met the Pottinger party again.
+
+The 4.55 was crowded. Miles collected Meg's parcels and suggested to the
+Major that it would be less tiring for his daughter if they returned
+first-class. Should he change the tickets?
+
+The Major thought it a sensible proposition, especially with all those
+parcels. Meg would pay Captain Middleton the difference.
+
+Again an amiable porter secured them an empty carriage. The parcels
+spread themselves luxuriously upon the unoccupied seats. The Major
+kissed his daughter and gave her his benediction, shaking hands quite
+warmly with her "pleasant young friend."
+
+The 4.55 runs right up to the junction without a stop. Meg took off her
+best hat and placed it carefully in the rack. She leaned her bewildered
+head against the cushions and closed her eyes. She would drift with the
+tide just a few minutes more, and then----
+
+Miles put a box of groceries for Lady Mary under her feet. She smiled
+faintly, but did not speak.
+
+Presently she opened her eyes to find him regarding her with that
+expression she had surprised once or twice before, and never understood.
+
+"Tired?" he asked.
+
+"Only pleasantly. I think I've only travelled first-class about five
+times in my life before--and then it was with Mr. Ross."
+
+"And now it's with me, and I hope it's the first of many."
+
+"You say very odd things."
+
+"What I mean isn't in the least odd--it's the most natural thing in the
+world."
+
+"What is?"
+
+"To want to go on travelling with you."
+
+"If you're going to talk nonsense, I shall go to sleep again."
+
+"No, I don't think I can allow you to go to sleep. I want you to wake up
+and face facts."
+
+"Facts?"
+
+"A fact."
+
+"Facts are sometimes very unpleasant."
+
+"I hope the fact I want you to face isn't exactly that--if it is ...
+then I'm ... a jolly miserable chap. Miss Morton--Meg--you must see how
+it is with me--you must know that you're dearer to me than anything on
+earth. I think your father tumbled to it--and I don't think he minded
+... that I should want you for my wife."
+
+"My poor little papa would be relieved to think that anyone could...."
+
+"Could what?"
+
+"Care for me ... in that way."
+
+"Nonsense! But I'm exceedingly glad to have met your father."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because I wanted to meet him."
+
+"Again, why?"
+
+"Because he's your father."
+
+"Did you observe that Miss Lotty Trent cut you dead at the Queen's
+to-day?"
+
+"I did notice it, and, like you, I wonder why."
+
+"I can tell you."
+
+"I don't think you'd better bother. Miss Trent's opinion of me really
+doesn't matter----"
+
+"It was because you were with me."
+
+"But what a silly reason--if it is a reason."
+
+"Captain Middleton, will you answer a question quite truthfully?"
+
+"I'll try."
+
+"What have you heard about me in connection with the Trents?"
+
+"Not much, and that I don't believe."
+
+"But you must believe it, some of it. It may not be so bad--as it might
+have been--but I put myself entirely in the wrong. I deceived Mrs. Trent
+and I did a thing no girl in her senses ought to have done."
+
+"Look here, Meg," said Miles, leaning forward. "I don't want to know
+anything you don't choose to tell me; but since you _are_ on the
+subject--what did happen between you and that ... and Walter Brooke?"
+
+Meg, too, leant forward; the express swayed and lurched. Their faces
+were very near; their eyes met and held each other in a long, searching
+gaze on the one side and an answering look of absolute candour on the
+other.
+
+"I promised to go away with him, and I went away a few miles, and
+something came over me that I couldn't go any further, and I broke my
+promise and ran away. Jan knows it's true, for it was to them I went.
+But the Trents would never believe it, though Mr. Ross saw Mrs. Trent
+herself, and told her exactly what had happened. And I daresay ... they
+are quite justified."
+
+"And how many times have you seen him since?"
+
+"Never till the other day, when he nearly ran over William."
+
+"And how long ago is it since all this happened?"
+
+"Nearly six years."
+
+"Don't you think it's about time you put it all out of your mind?"
+
+"I had put it out of my mind ... till ... you came."
+
+"It didn't make any difference to me."
+
+"I shall never forget that," Meg said, so low that the rattle of the
+train wholly drowned her remark, but it couldn't conceal her smile.
+
+Miles lost his head. He kneeled down plump on the floor of that
+compartment and took her in his arms and kissed her.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"All the same, I don't believe I can marry you," she said later.
+
+"Why on earth not?"
+
+"Because I don't think I'm a suitable wife for you."
+
+"Surely I'm the best judge of that."
+
+"No, you're not a judge at all. You think you're in love with me...."
+
+"I'm hanged if I do--I _know_."
+
+"Because you're sorry for me----"
+
+"On the contrary, I'm sorry for myself. I think you're a hard-hearted
+... obstinate ... little...."
+
+Mr. Withells would have been scandalised at the conduct of Miles. He
+would undoubtedly have described it as both "insanitary and improper."
+
+"Oh, please listen!" Meg gasped. "Perhaps a long time hence ... if
+you're still of the same mind...."
+
+"Anyway, may I tell people?"
+
+"Not a soul. I won't have my Jan worried just now. I've undertaken those
+children ... and she's having a bad time with that brother-in-law----"
+
+"I say, Meg, what is it about that chap Tancred? I can't stick him....
+Is he a bad egg, or what?"
+
+"He is...."
+
+"Poor Miss Ross! But why does she have him there?"
+
+"Oh, it's a long story--and here we are at the junction, and I'm not
+going on first to Amber Guiting--so there!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan in the pony-cart was waiting outside when Meg came from the little
+station. Captain Middleton followed in her train, laden with parcels
+like a Father Christmas.
+
+He packed her and the parcels in, covered both the ladies with the
+dust-holland, announced that he had bought a charger, and waited to get
+into the Manor motor till they had driven out of the station.
+
+They neither of them spoke till they had turned into the road. Then Jan
+quoted softly: "When I go to see my poor little papa, I shall go by
+train _by myself_."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+A DEMONSTRATION IN FORCE
+
+
+Hugo was dissatisfied. So far, beyond a miserable ten pounds to buy some
+clothes, he had got no money out of Jan; and he was getting bored.
+
+To be sure, he still had most of the ten pounds, for he had gone and
+ordered everything in the market-town, where the name of Ross was
+considered safe as the Bank of England. So he hadn't paid for anything.
+
+Then there was that fellow Ledgard--what did he want hanging about,
+pretending to fish? He was after Jan and her money, that was his game.
+
+But however clear Peter Ledgard's nefarious intentions might be, Hugo
+confessed his sister-in-law puzzled him. She wasn't nearly as much
+afraid of him as he had expected. She was always gentle and courteous,
+but under the soft exterior he had occasionally felt a rock of
+determination, that was disconcerting.
+
+He had ceased to harp upon the string of his desolation. Somehow Jan
+contrived to show him that she didn't believe in it, and yet she never
+said one word to which he could take exception.
+
+It was awkward that his own people were all of them so unsympathetic
+about the children. His father and mother declared themselves to be too
+old to undertake them unless Hugo could pay liberally for their board
+and for a thoroughly capable nurse. Neither of his sisters would
+entertain the idea at all; and both wrote pointing out that until Hugo
+was able to make a home for them himself, he would be most foolish to
+interfere with the arrangements of a devoted aunt who appeared not only
+willing but anxious to assume their entire maintenance.
+
+He had told his people that his health forced him to relinquish his work
+in India. His brothers-in-law, although they had no idea of the real
+cause, thought there was something fishy about this, and were
+unsympathetic.
+
+Peter got at the doctor, and the doctor declared sea-air to be the one
+thing necessary to insure Hugo's complete restoration to health. Jan
+happened to mention that her brother-in-law's people lived in Guernsey,
+close to the shore. The doctor said he couldn't do better than go and
+stay with them, and that the journey wouldn't hurt him a bit.
+
+Still Hugo appeared reluctant to leave Wren's End.
+
+Peter came one day and demanded a business talk with him. It was a most
+unpleasant conversation. Peter declared on Jan's behalf that she was
+quite ready to help him to some new start in life, but that if it meant
+a partnership in any rubber plantation, fruit-farm, or business of any
+sort whatsoever, the money required must be paid through her lawyer
+directly into the hands of the planter, farmer, or merchant concerned.
+
+Hugo declared such an offer to be an insult. Peter replied that it was
+a great deal better than he deserved or could expect; and that he,
+personally, thought Miss Ross very silly to make it; but she did make
+it, and attached to its acceptance was a clause to the effect that until
+he could show he was in a position to maintain his family in comfort, he
+was to give their aunt an undertaking that he would not interfere with
+her arrangements for the welfare of the children.
+
+"I see no reason," said Hugo, "why you should interfere between my
+sister-in-law and me, but, of course, any fool could see what you're
+after. _You_ want her money, and when you've married her, I suppose my
+poor children are to be thrown out into the street, and me too far off
+to see after them."
+
+"Up to now," Peter retorted, "you have shown no particular desire to
+'see after' your children. Why are you such a fool, Tancred? Why don't
+you thankfully accept Miss Ross's generous offer, and try to make a
+fresh start?"
+
+"It's no business of yours what I do."
+
+"Certainly not, but your sister-in-law's peace and happiness is my
+business, because I have the greatest admiration, respect and liking for
+her."
+
+"_Les beaux yeux de sa cassette_," growled Hugo.
+
+"You _are_ an ass," Peter said wearily. "And you know very little of
+Miss Ross if you haven't seen by this time ..." Peter stopped.
+
+"Well, go on."
+
+"No," said Peter, "I won't go on, for it's running my horses on a rock.
+Think it over, that's all. But remember the offer does not remain open
+indefinitely."
+
+"Well, and if I choose to refuse it and go to law and _take_ my
+children--what then?"
+
+"No court in England would give you their custody."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Because you couldn't show means to support them, and we could produce
+witnesses to prove that you are not a fit person to have the custody of
+children."
+
+"We should see about that."
+
+"Well, think it over. It's your affair, you know." And Peter went away,
+leaving Hugo to curse and bite his nails in impotent rage. Peter really
+was far from conciliatory.
+
+Jan needed a fright, Hugo decided; that's what she wanted to bring her
+to heel. And before very long he'd see that she got it. She shouldn't
+shelter herself for ever behind that supercilious beast, Ledgard. Hugo
+was quite ready to have been pleasant to Jan and to have met her more
+than half-way if she was reasonable, but since she had chosen to bring
+Ledgard into it, she should pay. After all, she was only a woman, and
+you can always frighten a woman if you go the right way about it. It was
+damned bad luck that Ledgard should have turned up just now. It was
+Ledgard he'd got to thank that Fay had made that infamously unjust will
+by which she left the remnant of her money to her children and not to
+her husband. Oh yes! he'd a lot to thank Ledgard for. Well, he wouldn't
+like it when Jan got hurt. Ledgard was odd about women. He couldn't
+bear to see them worried; he couldn't bear to see Fay worried,
+interfered then. A blank, blank, blank interfering chap, Ledgard was.
+_What Jan needed was a real good scare._
+
+They suggested Guernsey. Well, he'd go to Guernsey, and he wouldn't go
+alone. Hugo thoroughly enjoyed a plot. The twilight world that had been
+so difficult and perplexing to poor Fay had for him a sort of exciting
+charm. Wren's End had become dreadfully dull. For the first week or two,
+while he felt so ill, it had been restful. Now its regular hours and
+ordered tranquillity were getting on his nerves. All those portraits of
+his wife, too, worried him. He could go into no room where the lovely
+face, with youth's wistful wonder as to what life held, did not confront
+him with a reminder that the wife he had left to die in Bombay did not
+look in the least like that.
+
+There were few things in his life save miscalculation that he regretted.
+But he did feel uncomfortable when he remembered Fay--so trustful
+always, so ready to help him in any difficulty. People liked her; even
+women liked her in spite of her good looks, and Hugo had found the world
+a hard, unfriendly place since her death.
+
+The whole thing was getting on his nerves. It was time to shuffle the
+cards and have a new deal.
+
+He packed his suit-case which had been so empty when he arrived, and
+waited for a day when Peter had taken Jan, Meg and the children for a
+motor run to a neighbouring town. He took care to see that Earley was
+duly busy in the kitchen garden, and the maids safely at the back of the
+house. Then he carried it to the lodge gate himself and waited for a
+passing tradesman's cart. Fortune favoured him; the butcher came up with
+(had Hugo known it) veal cutlets for Hugo's own dinner. Hugo tipped the
+butcher and asked him to leave the suit-case at the station to be sent
+on as carted luggage to its address.
+
+Next morning he learned that Tony was to go with Earley to fetch extra
+cream from Mr. Burgess' farm.
+
+It was unfortunate that he couldn't get any of Tony's clothes without
+causing comment. He had tried the day before, but beyond a jersey and
+two little vests (which happened to be little Fay's), he had been unable
+to find anything. Well, Jan would be glad enough to send Tony's clothes
+when he let her know where they were to be sent. Tony had changed a good
+deal from the silent, solemn child he had disliked in India. He was
+franker and more talkative. Sometimes Hugo felt that the child wasn't
+such a bad little chap, after all. But the very evident understanding
+between Jan and Tony filled Hugo with a dull sort of jealousy. He had
+never tried to win the child, but nevertheless he resented the fact that
+Tony's attitude to Jan and Meg was one of perfect trust and
+friendliness. He never looked at them with the strange judging, weighing
+look that Hugo hated so heartily.
+
+He strolled into the drive and waited. Meg and Jan were busy in the
+day-nursery, making the little garments that were outgrown so fast.
+Little Fay was playing on the Wren's lawn and singing to herself:
+
+    The fox went out one moonlight night,
+    And he played to the moon to give him light,
+    For he had a long way to tlot that night
+    Before he could leach his den-oh.
+
+Hugo listened for a minute. What a clear voice the child had. He would
+like to have taken little Fay, but already he stood in wholesome awe of
+his daughter. She could use her thoroughly sound lungs for other
+purposes than song, and she hadn't the smallest scruple about drawing
+universal attention to any grievance. Now Tony would never make a scene.
+Hugo recognised and admired that quality in his queer little son. He did
+not know that Tony already ruled his little life by a categorical
+imperative of things a sahib must not do.
+
+At the drive gate he met Earley carrying the can of cream, with Tony
+trotting by his side.
+
+"I'm going into the village, Tony, and Auntie Jan says you may as well
+come with me for company. Will you come?"
+
+Tony looked dubious. Still, he remembered that Auntie Jan had said he
+must try and be kind to poor Daddie, who had been so ill and was so sad.
+
+"All right," he said with a little sigh, and took the hand Hugo held
+out.
+
+"He'll be quite safe with me, Earley," Hugo said with a pleasant smile.
+"Miss Ross knows I'm going to take him."
+
+Nevertheless Earley went to the back door and asked Hannah to inform her
+mistress that "Mr. Tancred had taken Mazter Tony along of 'im."
+
+Hannah was busy, and serene in her conception of Hugo as the sorrowing
+widower, did not think the fact that Tony had gone for a walk with his
+own father was worth a journey to the day-nursery.
+
+"How would you like a ride down to the junction?" Hugo said. "I believe
+we could just catch a train if we take the omnibus at 'The Green Hart.'
+I want to make inquiries about something for Auntie Jan."
+
+Tony loved trains; he had only been twice to the junction since he came
+to Wren's End; it was a fascinating place. Daddie seemed in an agreeable
+mood this morning. Auntie Jan would be pleased that he should be nice to
+him.
+
+It all fell out as if the fates had arranged things for Hugo. They saw
+very few people in the village; only one old woman accompanied them in
+the bus; he heard his father ask for a ticket to the junction, and they
+arrived without incident of any kind.
+
+The junction, however, was busy. There were quite a lot of people, and
+when Hugo went to the ticket-office he had to stand in a queue of others
+while Tony waited outside the long row.
+
+Suddenly Tony began to wonder why his father should go to the
+ticket-office at all to inquire for a parcel. Tony was observant, and
+just because everything was so different from things in India small
+incidents were impressed upon his mind. If his father was going on
+anywhere else, he wasn't going; for Peter had promised to take them out
+in his car again that afternoon. When Hugo reached the window of the
+ticket-office Tony heard something about Paddington.
+
+That decided him. Nothing would induce him to go to Paddington.
+
+He pushed his way among the crowd and ran for dear life up the stairs,
+and over the bridge to the other platform where the train for Amber
+Guiting was still waiting, lonely and deserted. He knew that train. It
+went up and down all day, for Amber Guiting was the terminus. No one was
+on the platform as he ran along. With the sure instinct of the hunted he
+passed the carriages with their shut doors. Right at the end was a van
+with empty milk-cans. He had seen a porter putting them in the moment
+the train stopped. Tony darted into the van and crouched down between
+the milk-cans and the wall. He thought of getting into one of them. The
+story of Morgiana and the Forty Thieves was clear in his mind, for Meg
+had told it to them the night before. But the cans were so high and
+narrow he decided that it was impossible. Someone slammed the door of
+the van. There came a bump and a jar, and the train moved out onto a
+siding till it should go back to Amber Guiting when the 1.30 from London
+came in. Tony sat quite still in the dark, stuffy van. His little heart
+was beating with hammer strokes against his ribs, but his face expressed
+nothing but scorn.
+
+Again his father had lied to him. Again he had said he was going to do
+one thing when he fully intended to do another. The pleasantness, the
+kindliness, the apparent desire for Tony's society were a cheat. Tony
+spoke rapidly to himself in Hindustani, and by the time he had finished
+expressing his views Hugo Tancred hadn't a shred of character left.
+
+He didn't know when the train would go back to Amber Guiting. It might
+not be till evening. Tony could wait. Some time it would go back, and
+once in that dear, safe place all would be well.
+
+He disliked the sound of Paddington; it had to do with London, he knew.
+He didn't mind London, but he wasn't going there with his father, and no
+Meg and no Jan and no little Fay and no kind sahibs who were _real_
+sahibs.
+
+He was very hungry, and his eyes grew a bit misty as he thought of
+little Fay consuming scones and milk at the "elevens" Meg was always so
+careful they should have.
+
+A new and troubling thought perturbed him. Did Auntie Jan know he had
+gone at all? Would she be frightened? Would she get that look on her
+dear face that he couldn't bear to see? That Auntie Jan loved them both
+with her whole heart was now one of the fixed stars in Tony's firmament
+of beliefs. He began to think that perhaps it would be better for Auntie
+Jan to give his father some of her twinkly things and let him go away
+and leave them in peace; but he dismissed that thought as cowardly and
+unworthy of a sahib.
+
+Oh, dear! it was very long sitting in the dark, scrunched up behind
+those cans. He must tell himself stories to pass the time; and he
+started to relate the interminable legend of Cocky-locky and Henny-Penny
+who by their superior subtlety evaded the snares set for them by
+Toddy-Loddy the fox. He felt a sort of kinship with those harried fowls.
+Gradually the constant repetition of the various other birds involved,
+"Juckie-Puckie, Goosie-Loosie, Turkey-lurkey and Swannie-Lonnie," had a
+soothing effect, and Tony fell asleep.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Meanwhile Hugo had hunted through every corner of the four platforms; he
+had even gone to look for the Amber Guiting train, but was told it
+always was moved on to a siding directly it had discharged its
+passengers.
+
+It was mysterious, it was profoundly annoying, but it was not, to Hugo,
+alarming. He suspected that Peter Ledgard was in some way mixed up in
+it; that he, himself, had been shadowed and that Peter had stolen Tony
+in the crowd. In his mistrustful wrath he endowed Peter with such
+abnormal foresight and acumen as he certainly did not possess.
+
+It really was an impossible situation. Hugo could not go about asking
+porters and people for a lost child, or the neighbourhood would be
+roused. He couldn't go back to Wren's End without Tony, or there would
+be the devil to pay. He even got a porter to look in every carriage of
+the side-tracked train for a mythical despatch-case, and accompanied him
+in his search. Naturally they didn't seek a despatch-case in the van.
+
+He had lost his train, but there was another, very slow, about
+three-quarters of an hour later, and this he decided to take. He would
+telegraph to Jan from London. Somehow he was not in the least concerned
+about the fate of Tony. Peter and Peter's car had something to do with
+this mysterious disappearance. He was sure of that.
+
+Well, if this particular deal had failed, he must shuffle the cards and
+deal again. In any case Jan should see that where his children were
+concerned he was not to be trifled with.
+
+He was sorry, though, he had bought the half-ticket for Tony, and to ask
+them to take it back might cause comment.
+
+As the slow train steamed out from the junction Hugo felt a very
+ill-used man.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At eleven o'clock Anne Chitt brought in the tray with two cups of milk
+and a plate of Hannah's excellent scones.
+
+"Please go into the kitchen garden and ask Master Tony to come for his
+lunch," Jan said.
+
+Presently Anne returned. "Master Tony ain't in the garden, miss; and
+'Annah says as 'e most likely ain't back yet, miss."
+
+"Back! Back from where?"
+
+"Please, miss, 'Annah says as 'is pa've took him with him down the
+village."
+
+Jan laid her sewing on the table and got up.
+
+"Is Earley in the garden?"
+
+"Yes, miss. I ast Earley an' 'e says the same as 'Annah. Mr. Tancred
+'ave took Master Tony with 'im."
+
+Anne went away, and Jan and Meg, who had stopped her machining to
+listen, stared at each other across the table.
+
+"I suppose they'll be back directly," Jan said uneasily. "I'll go and
+ask Earley when Hugo took Tony."
+
+"He got up to breakfast to-day for the first time," Meg remarked
+irrelevantly.
+
+Jan went out into the Wrens' garden and through Anthony's gate. She
+fumbled at the catch, for her hands trembled.
+
+Earley was picking peas.
+
+"What time did Mr. Tancred take Master Tony?" she asked.
+
+"Just as we got back from fetchin' the cream, miss. I should say as it
+was about 'alf-past nine. He did meet us at the lodge, and took the
+young gentleman with 'im for company--'e said so."
+
+"Thank you, Earley," Jan said quietly.
+
+Earley looked at her and over his broad, good-natured face there passed
+a shade of misgiving. "I did tell Hannah to let you know the minute I
+cum in, miss."
+
+"Thank you," Jan said again; "that's quite right."
+
+"Be you feelin' the 'eat, miss?" Earley asked anxiously. "I don't think
+as you ought to be out without an 'at."
+
+"No, I expect not. I'll go and get one."
+
+By lunch time there was still no sign of Hugo and Tony; and Jan was
+certainly as much scared as even Hugo could have wished.
+
+Meg had been down to the village and discovered that Hugo and Tony had
+gone by bus to the junction in time for the 10.23.
+
+Peter was playing golf with Squire Walcote on a little course he had
+made in some of his fields. It was impossible to go and hunt for Peter
+without giving away the whole situation, and Jan was loth to do that.
+
+She and Meg stared at one another in dismayed impotence.
+
+Jan ordered the pony-carriage; she would drive to the junction, leaving
+a note for Peter at "The Green Hart," but it was only too likely he
+would lunch with the Walcotes.
+
+"You must eat something," said Meg. "There's a train in at a quarter to
+two; you'd better meet that before you go to the junction; the guard
+might be able to tell you something."
+
+At lunch little Fay wept because there was no Tony.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+IN WHICH SEVERAL PEOPLE SPEAK THEIR MINDS
+
+
+"After all, you know," Meg said, with intent to comfort, "no great harm
+can happen to Tony. Hugo will only take the child a little way off, to
+see what he can get out of you."
+
+"It's the moral harm to Tony that I mind," Jan answered sadly. "He was
+getting so happy and trustful, so much more like other children. I know
+his father has got him to go away by some ruse, and he will be miserable
+and embittered because he has been cheated again."
+
+"Shall you drive to the junction if you hear nothing at the station?"
+
+"Yes, I think so, though I've little hope of learning anything there.
+You see, people come there from three directions. They couldn't possibly
+notice everybody as they do at a little station like this."
+
+"Wait," said Meg, "don't go to the junction. Have you forgotten Mr.
+Ledgard was to fetch us all at half-past two? He'll run you over in his
+car in a quarter the time you'd take to go with Placid, and be some use
+as well. You'd better come straight back here if you get no news, and
+I'll keep him till you get back if he turns up first."
+
+By this time the pony-cart was at the door. Meg helped Jan in, kissed
+her, and whispered, "Cheer up; I feel somehow you'll hear something,"
+and Jan drove off. She found a boy to hold the pony when she reached the
+station, and went in. The old porter was waiting for the train, and she
+asked if he happened to notice her little nephew that morning.
+
+"Yes, miss, I did see 'un along with a holder gentleman unbeknownst to
+me."
+
+Jan walked up and down in an agony of doubt and apprehension.
+
+The train came in. There were but few passengers, and among them was
+Miles, come down again for the week-end.
+
+He greeted Jan with effusion. Had she come to meet anyone, or was it a
+parcel?
+
+To his astonishment Miss Ross broke from him and rushed at the guard
+right up at the far end of the train.
+
+The guard evidently disclaimed all knowledge of the parcel, for Miles
+saw him shaking his head vigorously.
+
+"Any other luggage, sir?" asked the old porter, lifting out Miles'
+suit-case.
+
+"Yes, a box of rods in the van."
+
+The old porter went to the end of the train near where Jan had been to
+the guard three minutes before.
+
+He opened the van door and nearly tumbled backward in astonishment, for
+right in the doorway, blinking at the light, stood "Miss Rass' young
+gen'leman."
+
+"Well, I am blessed!" exclaimed the porter, and lifted him out.
+
+Tony was dreadfully dirty. The heat, the dust, the tears he had shed
+when he woke up with the putting in of luggage at the junction and
+couldn't understand what had happened to him, all combined to make him
+about the most miserable-looking and disreputable small boy you could
+imagine. He had left his hat behind the milk-cans.
+
+Jan had gone out of the station. She had passed Miles blindly, and her
+face caused that young man to whistle softly, just once. Then he dashed
+after her.
+
+"Your haunt bin askin' for you," the old porter said to Tony. "'Peared
+to me she was a bit worried-like."
+
+Tony moved stiffly down the little station, the old porter following
+with Miles' luggage on a truck.
+
+The ticket-collector stood in the doorway. Tony, of course, had none.
+"Don't you say nothin'," whispered the old porter. "'Is haunt'll make it
+good; there's some sort of a misteree."
+
+Tony felt queer and giddy. Jan, already in her little pony-trap, had
+started to drive away. Miles, waiting for his baggage beside his uncle's
+car, saw the dejected little figure appear in the station entrance.
+
+He let fly a real barrack-square bellow after Jan, and she pulled up.
+
+She looked back and saw the reason for Captain Middleton's amazing roar.
+
+She swung the indignant Placid round, and in two minutes she was out of
+the pony-trap and had Tony in her strong arms.
+
+Miles tipped the porter and drove off. He, too, realised that there was
+some sort of a "misteree," something painful and unpleasant for Miss
+Ross, and that she would probably prefer that no questions were asked.
+
+Whatever mischief could that young Tony have been after? And dared Miles
+call at Wren's End that evening, in the hope of a glimpse of Meg, or
+would it look inquisitive and ill-bred?
+
+Placid turned a mild, inquiring head to discover the reason for this new
+delay.
+
+When Jan, after paying Tony's fare back from the junction, had driven
+away, the old porter, the ticket-collector, and the station-master sat
+in conclave on the situation. And their unanimous conclusion was summed
+up by the old porter: "Byes be a mishtiful set of young varmints, an' it
+warn't no job for a lone 'ooman to 'ave to bring 'em up."
+
+The lone woman in question held her reins in one hand and her other arm
+very tightly round the dirty little boy on the seat beside her.
+
+As they drove through the village neither of them spoke, but when they
+reached the Wren's End Road, Tony burst into tears.
+
+"I _am_ so hungry," he wailed, "and I feel so nasty in my inside."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+As Meg was putting him to bed that night she inquired if he had done
+anything with his green jersey, for she couldn't find it.
+
+"No," Tony answered. "I haven't had it for a long time--it's been too
+warm."
+
+"It's very odd," said Meg. "It has disappeared, and so have two vests
+of little Fay's that I put in the nursery ottoman to mend. Where can
+they be? I hate to lose things; it seems so untidy."
+
+"I 'spect," said Tony, thoughtfully, "my Daddie took them. He'd never
+leave without takin somefin."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+There was a dinner-party at the Manor House. Peter had come down from
+town for it, and this time he was staying at Wren's End. Lady Penelope
+and her husband were to dine and sleep at the Manor, likewise Miles, who
+had come down with Peter; and Lady Pen contrived thoroughly to upset her
+aunt before dinner, by relating how she had met Miles with Miss Morton
+and her father in Cheltenham. And poor Lady Mary had been hoping that
+the unfortunate affair would die a natural death. She had asked the
+prettiest girl in the neighbourhood for Miles to take in, and now,
+looking down the table at him, she would have said he was as
+well-pleased with his neighbour as any young man could be. The Freams
+were there and Mr. Withells, the pretty girl's mamma and a bride and
+bridegroom--fourteen in all. A dangerous number to ask, the Squire had
+declared; one might so easily have fallen through. No one did, however,
+and Peter found himself allotted to Lady Penelope, while Jan's fate was
+the bridegroom. "His wife won't be jealous of Miss Ross, you know," Lady
+Mary had said while arranging her couples.
+
+It happened that Peter sat opposite to Jan, and he surveyed her across
+the sweet-peas with considerable satisfaction. He had never seen Jan in
+what her niece bluntly called "a nekked dless" before. To-night she wore
+black, in some soft, filmy stuff from which her fine arms and shoulders
+and beautiful neck stood out in challenging whiteness. Her hair, too,
+had "pretty twinkly things" in it, and she wore a long chain of small
+but well-matched pearls, her father's last gift to her. Yes, Jan was
+undoubtedly distinguished, and oh, thank heaven! she _had_ a clean face.
+
+Beautiful Lady Pen was painted to the eyes, and her maid was not quite
+skilful in blending her complexion rightly with her vivid hair;
+beautiful hair it was, with a large ripple that was most attractive, but
+Mr. Withells, sitting on the other side of Lady Pen, decided that he
+didn't approve of her. She was flamboyant and daring of speech. She made
+him nervous. He felt sincerely sorry for Pottinger.
+
+Peter found Lady Pen very amusing, and perhaps she rather neglected her
+other neighbour.
+
+The dinner was excellent and long; and after it the ladies, when they
+left the men to smoke, strolled about on the terrace, and Jan found
+herself side by side with Lady Penelope.
+
+"How's your little friend?" she asked abruptly. "I suppose you know my
+cousin's playin' round?"
+
+Jan was a little taller than Lady Pen, and turned her head slowly to
+look at her: "I'm afraid I don't quite understand," she said.
+
+"Surely," Lady Pen retorted, "you must have seen."
+
+"If you mean that Captain Middleton admires Miss Morton, I believe he
+does. But you see, to say that anyone is 'playing round' rather reflects
+on me, because she is in my charge."
+
+"I should say you've got a pretty good handful," Lady Pen said
+sympathetically.
+
+"I don't think you quite understand Miss Morton. I've known her, as it
+happens, known her well, for close upon nine years."
+
+"And you think well of her?"
+
+"It would be difficult to express how well."
+
+"You're a good friend, Miss Ross. I had occasion to think so once
+before--now I'm pretty sure of it. What's the sayin'--'Time tryeth
+thingummy'?"
+
+"Troth?" Jan suggested.
+
+"That's it. 'Time tryeth troth.' I never was any good at quotations and
+things. But now, look here, I'd like to ask you somethin' rather
+particular ..." Lady Pen took Jan's arm and propelled her gently down a
+side-walk out of earshot of the others. "Suppose you knew folks--and
+they weren't exactly friends, but pleasant, you know, and all that, and
+you were aware that they went about sayin' things about a third person
+who also wasn't exactly a friend, but ... well, likeable; and you
+believed that what the first lot said gave a wrong impression ... in
+short, was very damaging--none of it any business of yours, mind--would
+you feel called upon to do anything?"
+
+The two tall women stopped and faced one another.
+
+The moon shone full on Lady Pen's beautiful painted face, and Jan saw,
+for the first time, that the eyes under the delicately darkened eyebrows
+were curiously like Miles'.
+
+"It's always tiresome to interfere in other people's business," said
+Jan, "but it's not quite fair, is it, not to stand up for people if you
+believe an accusation to be untrue--whether you like them or not. You
+see, it may be such a serious thing for the person implicated."
+
+"I believe you're right," said Lady Pen, "but oh, lord! what a worry it
+will be."
+
+Lady Mary called to them to come, for the bride was going to sing.
+
+The bride's singing was not particularly pleasing, and she was followed
+by Miles, who performed "Drake's Drum," to his aunt's rather uncertain
+accompaniment, in a voice that shook the walls. Poor Mr. Withells fled
+out by the window, and sat on the step on his carefully-folded
+handkerchief, but even so the cold stones penetrated, and he came in
+again.
+
+And after "Drake's Drum" it was time to go home.
+
+Jan and Peter walked back through the scented night, Peter carrying her
+slippers in a silk bag, for the sternly economical Meg wouldn't hear of
+wasting good suede slippers at 22s. 6d. a pair by walking half a mile in
+them, no matter how dry it was.
+
+When all the guests had gone, Lady Pen seized Miles by the arm and
+implored him to take her outside for a cigarette. "That little Withells
+had given her the hump."
+
+Lady Mary said it was bed-time and the servants wanted to lock up. The
+Squire and Mr. Pottinger melted away imperceptibly to smoke in peace
+elsewhere.
+
+Lady Pen, still holding Miles in an iron grip, pulled him over to the
+door, which she shut, led him back, and stood in front of Lady Mary, who
+was just going to ring for the servants to shut the windows.
+
+"Wait a minute, Aunt Mary. I've got somethin' to say, and I want to say
+it before Miles."
+
+"Oh, don't let us go into all that to-night," Lady Mary implored, "if
+what you have to say has anything to do with what you told me before
+dinner."
+
+"It has and it hasn't. One thing I've decided is that I've got to tell
+the Trents they are liars; and the other thing is that, though I
+disapprove with all my strength of the game Miles is playing, I believe
+that little girl is square...."
+
+"You see," Lady Pen went on, turning to Miles, "I've repeated things to
+Aunt Mary that I heard from the Trents lately--but I heard a different
+story at the time--and though I think you, Miles, are throwing yourself
+away, I won't be a party to spreadin' lies. Somethin' that _poudree_
+woman with the good skin said to-night made me feel a swab----"
+
+"I'm glad you've spoken up like this, Pen," Miles said slowly, "for if
+you hadn't, we couldn't have been friends any more. I promised Meg I
+wouldn't tell anybody--but I've asked her to marry me ... and though she
+isn't over keen, I believe I'll get her to do it some day."
+
+"Isn't over keen?" Lady Mary repeated indignantly. "Why, she ought to be
+down on her knees with joy!"
+
+Miles laughed. "She's not a kneeling sort, Aunt Mary. It's I who'll have
+to do the kneeling, I can tell you."
+
+Lady Pen was looking straight at her cousin with the beautiful candid
+eyes that were so like his own. "Just for curiosity," she said slowly,
+"I'd dearly like to know if Meg Morton ever said anything to you about
+me--anything rather confidential--I won't be offended, I'd just like to
+know."
+
+"About you?" Miles echoed in a puzzled voice.
+
+"About my appearance, you know--my looks."
+
+"I think she called you good-looking, like everybody else, but I don't
+remember that she was specially enthusiastic. To tell you the honest
+truth, Pen, we've had other things to talk about than you."
+
+"Now listen, you two," said Lady Pen. "That little girl is straight. You
+won't understand, Miles, but Aunt Mary will. Meg Morton knew I was
+against her--about you, Miles--women always know these things. And yet
+she held her tongue when she could have said something true that I'd
+rather not have talked about. You'll hold your tongue, old chap, and so
+will Aunt Mary. I've got her hair; got it on this minute. That's why
+she's such a croppy."
+
+Lady Mary sat down on the nearest chair and sighed deeply.
+
+"It's been a real satisfaction to me, this transformation, because I
+know where it came from."
+
+Miles took his cousin's hand and kissed it. "If somebody had to have it,
+I'm glad it's you," he said.
+
+"Yes, she's straight," Lady Pen repeated. "I don't believe there's many
+girls who would have kept quiet--not when the man they cared about was
+being got at. You may ring now, Aunt Mary. I'm through. Good night."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Do you realise," said Peter as they turned out of the dark Manor drive
+into the moonlit road, "that I've been here on and off over a month, and
+that we are now nearly at the end of July?"
+
+"You've only just come to _us_," said Jan. "You can't count the time you
+stayed at 'The Green Hart' as a visit."
+
+"And now I have come ... I'm not quite sure I've done wisely,
+unless...."
+
+"Unless what?"
+
+"Unless I can put something through that I came back from India to do."
+
+Jan did not answer. They walked on in silence, and Peter looked at the
+moon.
+
+"I think," he said, "you've always had a pretty clear idea why I came
+home from India ... haven't you?"
+
+"It was time for your leave," Jan said nervously. "It isn't good to
+stay out there too long."
+
+"I shouldn't have taken leave this year, though, if it hadn't been for
+you."
+
+"You've always been kind and helpful to me ... I hope it hasn't been
+very ... inconvenient."
+
+Peter laughed, and stopped in the middle of the road.
+
+"I'm fond of fencing," he said lightly, "and free play's all very well
+and pretty; but I've always thought that the real thing, with the
+buttons off the foils, must have been a lot more sport than anything we
+get now."
+
+Again Jan was silent.
+
+"You've fenced with me, Jan," he said slowly, "ever since I turned up
+that day unexpectedly. Now, I want a straight answer. Do you care at
+all, or have you only friendship for me? Look at me; tell me the truth."
+
+"It's all so complicated and difficult," she faltered, and her eyes fell
+beneath Peter's.
+
+"What is?"
+
+"This caring--when you aren't a free agent."
+
+"Free fiddlestick! You either care or you don't--which is it?"
+
+"I care a great deal too much for my own peace of mind," said Jan.
+
+"I am quite satisfied," said Peter. And if Mr. Withells had seen what
+happened to the "sensible" Miss Ross just then, his neatly-brushed hair
+would have stood straight on end.
+
+In the road, too!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+AUGUST, 1914
+
+
+"No," said Jan, "it would be like marrying a widow ... with
+encumbrances."
+
+"But you don't happen to be a widow--besides, if you were, and had a
+dozen encumbrances, if we want to get married it's nobody's business but
+our own."
+
+Peter spoke testily. He wanted Jan to marry him before he went back to
+India in October, and if he got the billet he hoped for, to follow him,
+taking the two children out, early in November.
+
+But Jan saw a thousand lions in the way. She was pulled in this
+direction and that, and though she knew she had got to depend on Peter
+to--as she put it--"a dreadful extent," yet she hesitated to saddle him
+with her decidedly explosive affairs, without a great deal more
+consideration than he seemed disposed to allow her.
+
+Hugo, for the present, was quiet. He was in Guernsey with his people,
+and beyond a letter in which he directly accused Peter Ledgard of
+abducting Tony when his father was taking him to visit his grandparents,
+Jan had heard nothing.
+
+By Peter's advice she did not answer this letter. But they both knew
+that Hugo was only waiting to make some other and more unpleasant
+demonstration than the last.
+
+"You see," Jan began again, "I've got so many people to think of. The
+children and Meg and the house and all the old servants.... You mustn't
+hustle me, dear."
+
+"Yes, I see all that; but I've got _you_ to think of, and if we're
+married and anything happens to me you'll get your pension, and I want
+you to have that."
+
+"And if anything happened to me, you'd be saddled with the care of two
+little children who've got a thoroughly unsatisfactory father, who can
+always make life hateful for them and for you. No, Peter, it wouldn't be
+fair--we must wait and see how things work out."
+
+"At present," Peter said gloomily, "it looks as if things were working
+out to a fair bust-up all round."
+
+This was on the 30th of July.
+
+Peter went up to London, intending to return on the first to stay over
+the Bank Holiday, but he did not come. He wanted to be within easy reach
+of recalling cablegram.
+
+Meg got a wire from Miles on Saturday: "Try to come up for to-morrow and
+Monday I can't leave town must see you."
+
+And half an hour after it, came a note from Squire Walcote, asking her
+to accept his escort, as he and Lady Mary were going up to the
+Grosvenor, and hoped Meg would be their guest.
+
+It was during their stay in London that Lady Mary and the Squire got the
+greatest surprise of their whole lives.
+
+Miles, looking bigger than ever in uniform, rushed in and demanded an
+interview with Meg alone in their private room. He showed her a special
+licence, and ordered, rather than requested, that she should marry him
+at once.
+
+"I can't," she said, "it's no use asking me ... I _can't_."
+
+"Listen; have you any objection to me?"
+
+Meg pulled a little away from him and pretended to look him up and down.
+"No ... in fact ... I love every bit of you--especially your boots."
+
+"Have you thought how likely it is that I may not come back ... if
+there's war?"
+
+"Don't!" said Meg. "Don't put it into words."
+
+"Then why won't you marry me, and let me feel that, whether I'm killed
+or not, I've had the thing I wanted most in this world?"
+
+"Dear, I can't help it, but I feel if I married you now ... you would
+never come back ... but if I wait ... if I don't try to grasp this
+wonderful thing too greedily ... it will come to us both. I _daren't_
+marry you, Miles."
+
+"Suppose I'm all smashed up ... I couldn't ask you then ... suppose I
+come back minus an arm or a leg, or blind or something?"
+
+"If the least little bit of you comes back, I'll marry that; not you or
+anyone else could stop me then."
+
+"You'd make it easier all round if you'd marry me now...."
+
+"That's it ... I don't want it to be easier. If I was your wife, how
+could I go on being nurse to those children?"
+
+"I wouldn't stop you--you could go back to Miss Ross and do just
+exactly what you're doing. I agree with you--the children are
+cheery----"
+
+Meg shook her head. "No; if I was your wife, it wouldn't do. As it is
+... the nursemaid has got her soldier, and that's as it should be."
+
+"Will you marry me the first leave I get, if I live to get any?"
+
+"I'll think about that."
+
+He gave her the ring she had refused before. Such an absurd little ring,
+with its one big sapphire set with diamonds, and "no backing to it,"
+Miles said.
+
+And he gave her a very heavy brass-studded collar for William, and on
+the plate was engraved her name and address.
+
+"You see," he explained, "Miss Ross would never really have him, and I'd
+like to think he was your dog. And here's his licence."
+
+Then Miles took her right up in his arms and hugged her close, and set
+her gently down and left her.
+
+That night he asked his uncle and a brother-officer to witness his will.
+He had left most of his money among his relations, but twenty thousand
+pounds he had left to Meg absolutely, in the event of his being killed
+before they were married.
+
+His uncle pointed out that there was nothing said about her possible
+marriage. "She'll be all the better for a little money of her own if she
+does marry," Miles said simply. "I don't want her to go mourning all her
+days, but I do want the capital tied up on her so that he couldn't
+waste it ... if he was an unfortunate sort of chap over money."
+
+The Squire blew his nose.
+
+"You see," Miles went on, "she's a queer little thing. If I left her too
+much, she'd refuse it altogether. Now I trust to you, Uncle Edward, to
+see that she takes this."
+
+"I'll do my best, my boy, I'll do my best," said the Squire; "but I hope
+with all my soul you'll make settlements on her yourself before long."
+
+"So do I, but you never can tell in war, you know. And we must always
+remember," Miles added with his broad, cheerful smile, "there's a good
+deal of target about me."
+
+Miles wrote to the little Major, a very manly, straightforward letter,
+telling him what he had done, but swearing him to secrecy as regarded
+Meg.
+
+He also wrote to Jan, and at the end, he said, "I am glad she is to be
+with you, because you really apreciate her."
+
+The one "p" in "appreciate" fairly broke Jan down. It was so like Miles.
+
+Meg, white-faced and taciturn, went back to Wren's End on Tuesday night.
+The Squire and Lady Mary remained in town.
+
+In answer to Jan's affectionate inquiries, Meg was brief and
+business-like. Yes; she had seen Miles several times. He was very busy.
+No, she did not expect to see him again before ... he left. Yes; he was
+going with the First Army.
+
+Jan asked no more questions, but was quietly, consistently kind. Meg
+was adorable with her children and surpassed herself in the telling of
+stories.
+
+The First Army left England for Flanders with the silence of a shadow.
+
+But Meg knew when it left.
+
+That night, Jan woke about one o'clock, conscious of a queer sound that
+she could neither define nor locate.
+
+She sat up in bed to listen, and arrived at the conclusion that it came
+from the day-nursery, which was below her room.
+
+Tony was sleeping peacefully. Jan put on her dressing-gown and went
+downstairs. The nursery door was not shut, and a shaft of light shone
+through it into the dark hall. She pushed it open a little way and
+looked in.
+
+Meg was sitting at the table, making muslin curtains as if her life
+depended on it. She wore her nightgown, and over it a queer little
+Japanese kimono of the green she loved. Her bare feet were pillowed upon
+William, who lay snoring peacefully under the table.
+
+Her face was set and absorbed. A grave, almost stern, little face. And
+her rumpled hair, pushed back from her forehead, gave her the look of a
+Botticelli boy angel. It seemed to merge into tongues of flame where the
+lamplight caught it.
+
+The window was wide open and the sudden opening of the door caused a
+draught, though the night was singularly still.
+
+The lamp flickered.
+
+Meg rested her hand on the handle of the sewing-machine, and the
+whirring noise stopped. She saw Jan in the doorway.
+
+"Dear," said Jan gently, standing where she was, half in and half out of
+the door, "are you obliged to do this?"
+
+Meg looked at her, and the dumb pain in that look went to Jan's heart.
+
+Jan came towards her and drew the flaming head against her breast.
+
+"I'm sorry I disturbed you," Meg murmured, "but I was _obliged_ to do
+something."
+
+William stirred at the voices, and turning his head tried to lick the
+little bare feet resting on his back.
+
+"Dearest, I really think you should go back to bed."
+
+"Very well," said Meg meekly. "I'll go now."
+
+"He," Jan continued, "would be very angry if he thought you were making
+curtains in the middle of the night."
+
+"He," Meg retorted, "is absurd--and dear beyond all human belief."
+
+"You see, he left you in my charge ... what will he say if--when he
+comes back--he finds a haggard Meg with a face like a threepenny-bit
+that has seen much service?"
+
+"All right, I'm coming."
+
+When Meg got back to her room, she went and leaned over little Fay
+sleeping in the cot beside her bed. Rosy and beautiful, warm and
+fragrant, the healthy baby brought comfort to Meg's stricken heart.
+
+Perhaps--who knows--the tramp of that silent army sounded in little
+Fay's ears, for she stretched out her dimpled arms and caught Meg round
+the neck.
+
+"Deah Med!" she sighed, and was still.
+
+William stood at attention.
+
+Presently Meg knelt down by her bed, and according to the established
+ritual he thrust his head into her encircling arm.
+
+"Pray for your master, William," Meg whispered. "Oh, William, pray for
+your master as you never prayed before."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The strange tense days went on in August weather serene and lovely as
+had not been seen for years. Young men vanished from the country-side
+and older men wistfully wondered what they could do to help.
+
+Peter came down from Saturday to Monday, telling them that every officer
+and every civilian serving in India was recalled, but he had not yet
+learned when he was to sail.
+
+They were sitting in the wrens' garden with the children.
+
+"Earley's going," Tony said importantly.
+
+"Earley!" Jan exclaimed. "Going where?"
+
+"To fight, of course," little Fay chimed in.
+
+"Oh, poor dear Earley!" Jan sighed.
+
+"Happy, fortunate Earley," said Peter. "I wish I stood in his shoes."
+
+Earley joined the Gloucesters because, he said, "he couldn't abear to
+think of them there Germans comin' anigh Mother and them childring and
+the ladies; and he'd better go and see as they didn't."
+
+Mr. Withells called the men on his place together and told them that
+every man who joined would have his wages paid to his wife, and his wife
+or his mother, as the case might be, could stop on in her cottage. And
+Mr. Withells became a special constable, with a badge and a truncheon.
+But he worried every soldier that he knew with inquiries as to whether
+there wasn't a chance for him in _some_ battalion: "I've taken great
+care of my health," he said. "I do exercises every day after my bath;
+I'm young-looking for my age, don't you think? And anyway, a bullet
+might find me instead of a more useful man."
+
+No one laughed then at Mr. Withells and his exercises.
+
+Five days after the declaration of war Jan got a letter from Hugo
+Tancred. He was in London and was already a private in a rather famous
+cavalry regiment.
+
+"They didn't ask many questions," he wrote, "so I hadn't to tell many
+lies. You see, I can ride well and understand horses. If I get knocked
+out, it won't be much loss, and I know you'll look after Fay's kiddies.
+If I come through, perhaps I can make a fresh start somewhere. I've
+always been fond of a gamble, and this is the biggest gamble I've ever
+struck."
+
+Jan showed the letter to Peter, who gave it back to her with something
+like a groan: "Even the wrong 'uns get their chance, and yet I have to
+go back and do a deadly dull job, just because it _is_ my job."
+
+Peter went up to town and two days after came down again to "The Green
+Hart" to say good-bye. He had got his marching orders and was to sail in
+the _Somali_ from Southampton. Some fifteen hundred civilians and
+officers serving in India were sailing by that boat and the _Dongola_.
+
+By every argument he could bring forward he tried to get Jan to marry
+him before he sailed. Yet just because she wanted to do it so much, she
+held back. She, too, she kept telling herself, had her job, and she knew
+that if she was Peter's wife, nothing, not even her dear Fay's children,
+could be of equal importance with Peter.
+
+The children and Meg and the household had by much thinking grown into a
+sort of Frankenstein's monster of duty.
+
+Her attitude was incomprehensible to Peter. It seemed to him to be
+wrong-headed and absurd, and he began to lose patience with her.
+
+On his last morning he sought and found her beside the sun-dial in the
+wrens' garden.
+
+Meg had taken little Fay to see Lady Mary's Persian kittens, but Tony
+preferred to potter about the garden with the aged man who was trying to
+replace Earley. William was not allowed to call upon the kittens, as
+Fatima, their mother, objected to him vehemently, and Tony cared to go
+nowhere if William might not be of the party.
+
+Peter came to Jan and took both her hands and held them.
+
+"It's the last time I shall ask you, my dear. If you care enough, we
+can have these last days together. If you don't I must go, for I can't
+bear any more of this. Either you love me enough to marry me before I
+sail or you don't love me at all. Which is it?"
+
+"I do love you, you know I do."
+
+"Well, which is it to be?"
+
+"Peter, dear, you must give me more time. I haven't really faced it all.
+I can't do anything in such a hurry as that."
+
+Peter looked at her and shook his head.
+
+"You don't know what caring is," he said. "I can't stand any more of
+this. Do you see that motto on the sun-dial: 'I bide my time'--I've read
+it and read it, and I've said it over to myself and waited and hoped to
+move you. Now I can't wait any more."
+
+He kissed her, dropped her hand, and turning from her went out through
+the iron gate and down the drive. For a moment Jan stood by the sun-dial
+as though she, too, were stone.
+
+Then blindly she went up the steps into the empty nursery and sat down
+on an old sofa far back in the room. She leaned face-downward against
+the cushions, and great, tearing sobs broke from her.
+
+Peter was gone. He would never come back. She had driven him from her.
+And having done so she realised that he was the one person in the world
+she could not possibly do without.
+
+Tony's own hen had laid an egg. Carrying it very carefully in a
+cabbage-leaf, he went, accompanied by the faithful William, to show it
+to Auntie Jan, and was just in time to see Peter going down the drive.
+
+He went through the wrens' garden and in by the window. For a moment he
+didn't see his aunt; and was turning to go again when a strange sound
+arrested him, and he saw her all huddled up at the head of the sofa,
+with hidden face and heaving shoulders.
+
+He laid his egg on the table and went and pulled at her arm.
+
+"What is the matter?" he asked anxiously. "And why has Peter gone?"
+
+Jan raised her head; pride and shame and self-consciousness were dead in
+her: "He's gone," she sobbed. "He won't come back, and I shall never be
+happy any more," and down went her head again on her locked arms.
+
+Tony did not attempt to console her. He ran from the room, and Jan felt
+that this was only an added pang of abandonment.
+
+Down the drive ran Tony, with William galumphing beside him. But William
+was not happy, and squealed softly from time to time. He felt it unkind
+to leave a poor lady crying like that, and yet was constrained to go
+with Tony because Meg had left him in William's charge.
+
+Tony turned out of the gate and into the road.
+
+Far away in the distance was a man's figure striding along with
+incredible swiftness. Tony started to run all he knew. Now, seldom as
+William barked, he barked when people ran, and William's bark was so
+deep and sonorous and distinctive that it caused the swiftly striding
+man to turn his head. He turned his body, too, and came back to meet
+Tony and William.
+
+Tony was puffed and almost breathless, but he managed to jerk out: "You
+must go back; she's ... crying dreadful. You _must_ go back. Go quick;
+don't wait for us."
+
+Peter went.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jan very rarely cried. When she did it hurt fiercely and absorbed all
+her attention. She was crying now as if she would never stop. If people
+seldom cry it has a devastating effect on their appearance when they do.
+Jan's eyelids were swollen, her nose scarlet and shiny, her features all
+bleared and blurred and almost scarred by tears.
+
+Someone touched her gently on the shoulder, and she looked up.
+
+"My dear," said Peter, "you must not cry like this. I was losing my
+temper--that's why I went off."
+
+Jan sprang to her feet and flung her arms round his neck. She pressed
+her ravaged face against his: "I'll do anything you like," she
+whispered, "if you'll only like it. I can't stand by myself any more."
+
+This was true, for as she spoke her knees gave under her.
+
+Peter held her close. Never had Jan looked less attractive and never had
+Peter loved her more, or realised so clearly how dear and foolish and
+wise and womanly she was.
+
+"You see," she sobbed, "you said yourself everyone _must_ do his job,
+and I thought----"
+
+"But surely," said Peter, "I _am_ your job--part of it, anyway."
+
+Jan sobbed now more quietly, with her head against his shoulder.
+
+Tony and William came and looked in at the window.
+
+His aunt was still crying, crying hard, though Peter was there close
+beside her, very close indeed.
+
+Surely this was most unreasonable.
+
+"She said," Tony remarked accusingly to Peter, "she was crying because
+you had gone, so I ran to fetch you back. And now I _have_ fetched you,
+she's crying worse nor ever."
+
+But William Bloomsbury knew better. William had cause to know the
+solitary bitter tears that hurt. These tears were different.
+
+So William wagged his tail and ran into the room, jumping joyously on
+Peter and Jan.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+
+
+The following corrections were made:
+
+p. 44: Daddy to Daddie, to match all other occurrences (Daddie was very
+daylight.)
+
+p. 113: log to long (long grey dust-cloak)
+
+p. 113: froward to forward (Anthony came forward)
+
+p. 118: bread-an-butter to bread-and-butter (several pieces of
+bread-and-butter)
+
+p. 152: minunte to minute (pondered this for a minute)
+
+p. 284: quit to quick ("I came as quick as I could,")
+
+p. 318: fluttered to flattered (rather flattered)
+
+In the Latin-1 plain text version, an a-macron and an o-breve have been
+removed from the word Jao! (p. 196).
+
+Inconsistencies in hyphenation (e.g. country-side vs. countryside) have
+not been changed. All dialect and "baby talk" has been left as in the
+original. Two different types of thought breaks were used in the
+original: extra whitespace between paragraphs (represented by 5 spaced
+asterisks in this text) and a line of 8 spaced asterisks (left as in the
+original.) Ellipses match the original, even when inconsistent. The
+exception is when they occur at the end of a paragraph, where they are
+always accompanied by a period.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Jan and Her Job, by L. Allen Harker
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