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diff --git a/41107-8.txt b/41107-8.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 3beff2b..0000000 --- a/41107-8.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7712 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Second Fiddle, by Phyllis Bottome - -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/license - - -Title: The Second Fiddle - -Author: Phyllis Bottome - -Illustrator: Norman Price - -Release Date: October 18, 2012 [EBook #41107] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SECOND FIDDLE *** - - - - -Produced by Bill Tozier, Barbara Tozier, Mary Meehan and -the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at -http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - - - - - THE SECOND FIDDLE - - BY PHYLLIS BOTTOME - - AUTHOR OF "THE DARK TOWER," "THE DERELICT AND OTHER STORIES," ETC. - - - ILLUSTRATED BY - NORMAN PRICE - - NEW YORK - THE CENTURY CO. - 1917 - - Copyright, 1917, by - THE CENTURY Co. - - _Published, October, 1917_ - - - TO - MARGUERITE AND LILIAN - TWO SISTERS WHO, ALIKE IN JOY - AND SORROW, ARE A LIGHT - TO THEIR FRIENDS - - - - -[Illustration: "Then have the kindness to inform me ... why Marian has -consented to marry me."] - - - - -LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS - - -PAGE - -"Then have the kindness to inform me ... why Marian has consented to -marry me" _Frontispiece_ - -A proclamation was read by a great person from a bedizened balcony 19 - -"I'm afraid I don't like big feelings much" 91 - -"Women like you can't marry logs of wood" 141 - -"This," Stella thought to herself, "is like a battle" 165 - -Her voice was unfettered music 189 - -She tugged and twisted again 265 - -The most extraordinary figure we had ever seen 295 - -"Not very clever of you," he murmured, "not to guess why I wanted a -taxi" 349 - - - - -THE SECOND FIDDLE - - - - -CHAPTER I - - -On the whole, Stella preferred the Cottage Dairy Company to the People's -Restaurant. It was a shade more expensive, but if you ate less and liked -it more, that was your own affair. You were waited on with more -arrogance and less speed, but you made up for that artistically by an -evasion of visible grossness. - -Stella had never gone very much further than a ham sandwich in either -place. You knew where you were with a ham sandwich, and you could -disguise it with mustard. - -On this occasion she took a cup of tea and made her meal an -amalgamation. She hoped to leave work early, and she would have no time -for tea. She was going to hear Chaliapine. - -All London--all the London, that is, which thinks of itself as -London--was raving about Chaliapine; but Stella in general neither knew -nor cared for the ravings of London. They reached her as vaguely as the -sound of breaking surf reaches the denizens of the deeper seas. - -It was her sister Eurydice who had brought Chaliapine home to her. She -had said quite plainly, with that intensity which distinguished both her -utterances and her actions, that if she didn't hear Chaliapine she would -die. He was like an ache in her bones. - -Eurydice had never discovered that you cannot always do what you want or -have what you very ardently wish to have. She believed that -disappointment was a coincidence or a lack of fervency, and she set -herself before each obstacle to her will like the prophets of Baal -before their deaf god. She cut herself with knives till the blood ran. - -Stella hovered anxiously by her side, stanching, whenever she was able, -the flowing of Eurydice's blood. On this occasion she had only to -provide seven shillings and to make, what cost her considerably more, a -request to Mr. Leslie Travers to let her off at five. - -Mr. Leslie Travers had eyed her with the surprise of a man who runs a -perfect machine and feels it pause beneath his fingers. He could not -remember that Stella Waring had ever made such a request before. - -Her hours were from nine to five daily, but automatically, with the -pressure of her work and the increase of her usefulness, they had -stretched to six or seven. - -Mr. Leslie Travers had never intended to have a woman secretary, but -during the illness of a competent clerk he had been obliged to take a -stop-gap. Miss Waring had appeared on a busy morning with excellent -testimonials and a quiet manner. He told her a little shortly that he -did not want a woman in his office. Her fine, humorous eyebrows moved -upward, and her speculative gray eyes rested curiously upon his -irritable brown ones. - -"But I am a worker," she said gently. "If I can do your work, it is my -own business whether I am a man or a woman. You shall not notice it." - -Mr. Travers felt confused for a moment and as if he had been -impertinent. In the course of a strenuous and successful life he had -never felt impertinent; he believed it to be a quality found only in -underlings. He stared, cleared his throat, read her testimonials, and -temporarily engaged her. That was two years ago. - -Miss Waring had kept her promise; she was a worker and not a woman. She -took pleasure in keeping her wits about her, and Mr. Travers used them -as if they were his own. Sometimes he thought they were. - -She had many agreeable points besides her wits, but they were the only -point she gave to Mr. Travers to notice. She deliberately suppressed her -charm. She reduced his work by one half; he never had to say, "You ought -to have asked me this," or, "You needn't have brought me that." Her -initiative matched her judgment. - -It did not occur to Mr. Travers to praise her for this most unusual -quality, but he paid her the finest tribute of an efficient worker: he -gave her more to do. He woke up to that fact when she tentatively asked -him if he could make it convenient for her to leave at five. - -"Five," he said, "is your hour for leaving this office. Of course you -may go then. You ought always to do so." - -A vague smile hovered about Stella's lips; she looked at him -consideringly for a moment, her eyes seemed to say, "It must be nice for -you, then, that I never do what I ought." Then she drew her secretarial -manner like a veil over her face. - -"You will find the drainage papers for Stafford Street in the second -pigeon-hole on your desk," she said sedately, "with the inspector's -report. I have put the plumber's estimate with it, and added a few -marginal notes where I think their charges might be cut down." - -"You had better see them about it yourself," said Mr. Travers; "then -there won't be any unpleasantness." - -He did not mean to be polite to Stella; he merely stated a convenient -fact. When Stella saw people on business there was no unpleasantness. - -Stella bowed, and left him. - -Mr. Travers looked up for a moment after she had gone. "I am not sure," -he said to himself, "that there are not some things women can do better -than men when they do not know that they are doing them better." He did -not like to think that women had any superior mental qualities to those -of men, but he put them down to mother wit, which does not sound -superior. - -Stella went through the outer office on wings. It was full of her -friends; her exits and her entrances were the events the lesser clerks -liked best during the day. - -Her smile soothed their feelings, and in her eyes reigned always that -other Stella who lived behind her wits, a gay, serene, and friendly -Stella, who did not know that she was a lady and never forgot that she -was a human being. - -Theoretically there is nothing but business in a business office, but -practically in every smallest detail there is the pressure of personal -influence. What gets done or, even more noticeably, what is left undone, -is poised upon an inadmissible principle, the desire to please. - -The office watched Stella, tested her, judged her, and once and for all -made up its mind to please her. - -Stella knew nothing at all about this probation. She only knew all about -the office boy's mother, and where the girl typists spent their -holidays, and when, if all went well, Mr. Belk would be able to marry -his young lady. Mistakes and panic, telegrams and telephones, slipped -into her hands, and were unraveled with the rapidity with which silk -yields to expert fingers. She always made the stupidest clerk feel that -mistakes, like the bites of a mosquito, might happen to any one even -while she was making him see how to avoid them in future. She had the -touch which takes the sting from small personal defeats. She always saw -the person first and the defeat afterward. - -Her day's work was a game of patience and skill, and she played it as -she used to play chess with her father. It was a long game and sometimes -it was a tiring one, but hardly a moment of it was not sheer drama; and -the moment the town hall door swung behind her she forgot her municipal -juggling and started the drama of play. - -On Thursday afternoon she stood for a moment considering her course. -There was the Underground, which was always quickest, or there was the -drive above the golden summer dust on the swinging height of a -motor-bus. She decided upon the second alternative, and slipped into -infinity. She was cut off from duty, surrounded by strangers, unmoored -from her niche in the world. - -This was the moment of her day which Stella liked best; in it she could -lose her own identity. She let her hands rest on her lap and her eyes on -the soft green of the new-born leaves. She hung balanced on her wooden -seat between earth and sky, on her way to Russian music. - -The brief and tragic youth of London trees was at its loveliest. -Kensington Gardens poured past her like a golden flame. The grass was as -fresh as the grass of summer fields, swallows flitted over it, and the -broad-shouldered elms were wrapped delicately in a mist of green. - -Hyde Park Corner floated beneath her; the bronze horses of victory, -compact and sturdy, trundled out of a cloudless sky. St George's -Hospital, sun-baked and brown, glowed like an ancient palace of the -Renaissance. The traffic surged down Hamilton Place and along Piccadilly -as close packed as migratory birds. The tower of Westminster Cathedral -dropped its alien height into an Italian blue sky; across the vista of -the green park and all down Piccadilly the clubs flashed past her, vast, -silver spaces of comfort reserved for men, full of men. Stella did not -know very much about men who lived in clubs. Cicely said they were very -wicked and danced the tango and didn't want women to have votes; but -Stella thought they looked as if they had attractions which rivaled -these disabilities. - -Probably she would see some of them less kaleidoscopically at the opera -later. - -Even men who danced the tango went to hear Chaliapine. It wasn't only -his voice; he was a rage, a prairie fire. All other conversation became -burned stubble at his name. - -Piccadilly Circus shot past her like a bed of flowers. - -The City was very hot, and all the world was in the streets, expansive -and genial. It was the hour when work draws to an end and night is still -far off. Pleasure had stretched down the scale and included workers. -People who didn't dance the tango bought strawberries and flowers off -barrows for wonderful prices to take home to their children. - -In the queue extending half-way down Drury Lane, Eurydice, passionate -and heavy-eyed, was waiting for Stella. - -"If you hadn't come soon," she said, drawing Stella's arm through her -own, "something awful would have happened to me. I got a messenger-boy -to stand here for an hour to keep your place. The suspense has been -agony, like waiting for the guillotine." - -"But, O Eurydice dear, I do hope you will enjoy it!" Stella pleaded. - -"I shall enjoy it, yes," said Eurydice, gloomily, "if I can bear it. I -don't suppose you understand, but when you feel things as poignantly as -I do, almost anything is like the guillotine. It is the death of -something, even if it's only suspense. Besides, he may not be what I -think him. I expect the opening of heaven." - -Eurydice usually expected heaven to open, and this is sometimes rather -hard upon the openings of less grandiose places. - -A stout woman in purple raised an efficient elbow like an oar and dug it -sharply into Stella's side. - -"Oh, Stella, wouldn't it be awful if I fainted before the door opens!" -whispered Eurydice. - -"The doors are opening," said Stella. "People have begun to plunge with -umbrellas." - -The purple woman renewed her rowing motion; the patient queue expanded -like a fan. Stella moved forward in the throng. She was pushed and -elbowed, lifted and driven, but she never stopped being aware of -delight. She watched the faces sweeping past her like petals on a -stream; she flung down her half-crowns and seized her metal disks, -dashing on and up the narrow stairs, with Eurydice fiercely struggling -behind her like a creature in danger of drowning. - -They sprang up and over the back ledges of the gallery on into the first -row, breathless, gasping, and victorious. - -"How horrible people are!" gasped Eurydice. "Dozens of brutal men have -stepped on my toe. Your hat's crooked. Is anything worth this dreadful -mingling with a mob?" - -"Does one mingle really?" asked Stella, taking off her hat. "Only one's -shoulders. Besides, I think I rather like mobs if they aren't purple and -don't dig. I've just been thinking how dull it must be to walk into a -box having done nothing but pay for it, and knowing, too, you are going -to get it! The lady beside me has been to every opera this season. She -sits on a camp-stool from two o'clock till eight with milk chocolate, -and knows every one's name and all the motives and most of the scores. -She's going to lend me this one. She says the excitement of not knowing -whether she is going to get a front seat or not has never palled." - -The great opera house filled slowly. There was splendor in it--the -splendor put on for the occasion in the cheaper seats, and every-day -splendor taking its place later and more expensively because it did not -know how to be anything else but splendid. - -Women's dresses that summer were made as much as possible to resemble -underclothes. From the waist upwards filmy specimens of petticoat -bodices appeared; there were wonderful jewels to be seen above them: -immemorial family jewels, collars of rubies and pearls. The older the -woman, the finer the jewels, and the more they looked like ancient -mosaics glimmering archaically in early Roman churches. - -The safety curtain was lowered reassuringly before a bored audience that -was not afraid of danger. - -Some one on the left of Stella remarked that there was a rumor that the -Crown Prince and Princess of Austria had been assassinated in Serbia. It -did not sound very likely. The Russian music began--fiery melancholy -music, drunk with sorrow. Then the real curtain rose. - -Eurydice flung herself forward; she hung over the ledge, poised like an -exultant Fury. She dared life to disappoint her. - -Stella leaned back in her seat with a little thrill of excitement. -Everything felt so safe, and sorrow sounded beautiful, and far away. - - - - -CHAPTER II - - -The curtain lifted, and civilization swung back. They were in Russia in -the twelfth century--or any other time. It hardly mattered when; the -music was the perpetual music of the Slav, tragic and insecure. The -people were a restless barbaric crowd, beyond or beneath morality; -religious, incalculably led by sensation. They could be unimaginably -cruel or sweep magnificently up the paths of holiness. The steep ascent -to heaven was in their eyes, and they got drunk to attain it. - -The English audience watched them as if they were looking at a -fairy-tale. They were a well-fed, complacent audience. If they got -drunk, it was an accident, and none of them had ever been holy. They had -never been under the heels of tyranny or long without a meal. They took -for granted food, water, light, and fuel. They began to live where the -Russian peasant planted his dreams of heaven. Death was their only -uncertainty, and it was hidden behind the baffling insincerities of -doctors and nurses. It did not take them on the raw. - -The crowd upon the stage became suddenly shaken into movement. Fires -were lighted, bells rang, food was carried about in processions. -Cossacks with long knouts struck back the dazzled, scattering people. A -proclamation was read by a great person from a bedizened balcony. - -[Illustration: A proclamation was read by a great person from a -bedizened balcony] - -Stella knew no Russian; she had no idea that anything worse could happen -to this seriously broken people ruled by knouts. But there was still -something that could happen: this proclamation touched their religion. - -It seemed that they actually had a possession that they weren't prepared -to let go. They could let their daughters and sons go, their houses and -their lives; but there was something they held on to and refused to -renounce. - -This was enough to irritate any tyrant. The bare existence of anything -that is uncontrollable always annoys a tyrant. There was a power in -these people still unsubdued, so the proclamation said that unless they -gave up their religion and became orthodox they would be killed. Then -Chaliapine entered. - -Eurydice gave a long gasp of emotion, and sank silently into her dream; -no more could be expected of her as a companion. Stella endeavored to be -more critical. She felt at once that Chaliapine's power wasn't his -voice. It was a fine, controlled voice, it seemed more resonant and -alive than any other in the company, and vastly easier; but his genius -was behind his voice. It was not merely his acting, though immediately -every one else on the stage appeared to be acting, and Chaliapine alone -was real. - -It consisted in that very uncontrollable something that tyrants cannot -kill, that circumstances do not touch, that surmounts every stroke of -fate, and is the residuum which faces death. There was a little more of -it in Chaliapine than there is in most people. - -She tried to follow the score of "Boris Goudonoff"; it was not easy -music, and the story hardly seemed to matter. - -Chaliapine was the leader of the religious sect that the Czar was going -to stamp out. Everything was against him; was he going to conquer? -The English audience expected him to conquer. It understood conquests. -First, you started all wrong, because you hadn't taken the trouble not -to, because you hadn't measured your antagonist, and because you did not -think that preparation was necessary. - -The audience allowed for things going wrong to begin with, and sat -cheerfully expecting the miracle. - -The opera went on, and it became apparent to Stella that Chaliapine was -not going to get his people out of their difficulties. - -They sank deeper and deeper into them. Tyranny was behind and in front -of them; they were being steadily hemmed in and beaten down. What they -held on to did them no apparent good; it didn't comfort them or relieve -their necessities or hold out a helping hand to them. It did nothing -against their enemies. It simply burned in them like a flame. It didn't -even consume them; it left them to be consumed by the Czar. - -The English audience listened breathlessly and a little surprised, but -not troubled, because they felt quite sure that everything would come -out all right in the last act. - -Religion would triumph, it always did, even when you took no notice of -it. - -You didn't, as a rule, notice the police either, and yet when burglars -broke in to steal your plate, they were caught climbing over the back -fence by a policeman. Religion was there, like the police, to catch your -troubles and restore your spiritual silver plate. - -The melancholy minor Russian music couldn't mean that you weren't going -to get anything out of it. It would wake up soon and be triumphant. - -In the pauses between the acts Eurydice sat in a trance. Stella amused -herself with picking out the kind of people she would have liked to -know. One in particular in a box to the right of them, she found herself -liking. His frosty-blue eyes had the consciousness of strength in them; -the line of his jaw and the ironic, well-chiseled mouth spoke of a will -that had felt and surmounted shocks. He was still a young man in the -early thirties, but he had made his place in the world. He looked as -secure as royalty. With a strange little thrill that was almost -resentment Stella realized that she knew the woman beside him. Marian -sat there very straight and slim in the guarded radiance of her youth, -as intact as some precious ivory in a museum. She was Stella's greatest -friend; that is to say, she gave to her the greatest amount of pleasure -procurable in her life. - -Stella couldn't have told why her heart sprang to meet Marian Young's. -She had nothing in common with her. They had met at a course of lectures -on the Renaissance, and out of a casual meeting had grown a singular, -unequal, relationship. - -Marian saw Stella very rarely, but she told her everything. She hadn't, -however, told her of this new man. His strong, clever face had in it -something different, something unnecessarily different, from Marian's -other young men. - -He lifted his head, and looked up toward the balconies above him. His -eyes did not meet Stella's, but she took from them the strangest -sensation of her life. A pang of sheer pity shot through her. There was -no reason for pity; he looked aggressively strong and perfectly sure of -himself. He even looked sure of Marian, and not without reason. He was -all the things Marian liked best in a man, courageous, successful, -handsome. Providence had thrown in his brains. That was the unnecessary -quality. - -Stella wondered a little wistfully what it must be like to talk to a -really clever man. Her father was very clever, but he was not socially -pliable, and he didn't exactly talk to Stella; he merely expressed in -her presence conclusions at which he had arrived. It clarified his -ideas, but it didn't do anything particular to Stella's. - -Sir Richard Verny was taking trouble to talk to Marian; he bent his -powerful head toward the girl and told her about Siberia. He knew -Siberia well; he had often started from there upon important Arctic -explorations. Marian wondered when he was going to propose. Siberia did -as well as anything else till then. She knew he was going to propose; -she didn't know anything at all about Siberia. She did not see Stella; -it had not occurred to her that any one she knew could be sitting in the -gallery. - -The curtain rose again, and the last act began. - -Chaliapine did not turn defeat into victory; no rabbit rose -triumphantly, to satisfy the British public, out of a top-hat. -Chaliapine led his people into a fire, and they were burned to death. - -Some of them were frightened, and he had to comfort them, to hold them, -and sustain them till the end. He had nothing at all to do it with, but -he did sustain them. They all went into the flames, singing their -disheartening music till the smoke covered them. Chaliapine sang -longest, but there was nothing victorious in his last notes. They were -very beautiful and final; then they weakened and were still. - -The stillness went on for some time afterward. Everybody had been -killed, and life had been so unendurable that they had faced death -without much effort to avoid it. They could have avoided it if they had -given up their faith. Their faith had vanished off the face of the -earth, but they hadn't given it up. - -Stella gave a long sigh of relief; she felt as if she had been saved -from something abominable that might have happened. - -Applause broke out all round them, a little uncertainly at first, -because it was difficult for the audience to realize that the heavens -weren't going to shoot open and do something definitely successful about -it; but finally sustained and prolonged applause. Chaliapine had taken -them all by storm. It was not the kind of storm that they were used to, -but it was a storm. - -"I love Russians," a lady exclaimed to Stella. "Such delightful people, -don't you think, so full of color and what d' you call it?" - -Eurydice shook herself impatiently like a dog after a plunge through -water. - -"Hurry! Let's get out of this," she said to Stella, "or I shall be rude -to somebody. Idiots! Idiots! Don't they see that we've been listening to -the defeat of the soul?" - -"No, no," whispered Stella half to herself; "we've been listening to how -it can't be defeated, how nothing touches it, not even death, not even -despair, not even flames. The end of something that has never given in -is victory." - -They passed behind Marian outside the opera house, but Stella did not -speak to her. She heard Sir Julian saying in a determined, resonant -voice: "Well, of course I'm glad you liked it. Chaliapine is a good -workman, but personally I don't think much of Russian music. It has a -whine in it like a beggar's, sounds too much as if it had knocked under. -My idea, you know, is not to knock under." - -And Stella, slipping into the crowd, was aware again of a sharp pang of -pity for him, as if she knew that, after all, his strength would meet -and be consumed by fire. - - - - -CHAPTER III - - -Nothing in No. 9 Redcliffe Square ever got done; it happened, as leaves -drop in autumn, or as dust accumulates, percolating softly and -persistently through doors and windows. - -The Warings had reached Redcliffe Square as accidentally as a tramp -takes shelter under a hedge. Professor Waring, whose instinct was to -burrow like a mole, blind and silent, into his researches, failed too -completely to teach what he had discovered; and as he had never made the -discovery that teaching was what he was paid for, his payments gradually -ceased. When he found himself faced with an increasing family and a -decreasing income, he thought of the South Kensington Museum. He thought -of it as an habitual drunkard evicted for not paying his rent, thinks of -the public house. - -He brought his family as near to it as he could, dumped them down in a -silent and slatternly street, and disappeared into the museum regularly -every morning at nine. When he came out he wanted only cocoa, a back -room, and the postage necessary for his researches. A Peruvian mummy -went to his head like gin. - -Mrs. Waring had been a gentle, dreamy girl with a strong religious -tendency. She had married Professor Waring because he had wide blue eyes -and a stoop and did not look at all coarse. - -Professor Waring had married her because he wanted to get married a -little and had noticed her at that time. He was under the impression -that women managed households, meals, and children without bothering -their husbands. Mrs. Waring tried not to bother her husband. She lost -her religion because the professor hadn't any, and she thought at first -he was sure to be right. When she ceased to have this magic certainty, -she sought out fresh religions that told you you had everything you -wanted when you knew you hadn't. - -She got through maternity in a desultory way, with a great deal of ill -health and enormous household bills. She did not manage anything, and -when she was very unhappy she said that she was in tune with the -infinite. - -From their earliest years her children fended for themselves, Eurydice -with storms of anguish and through a drastic series of childish -epidemics; Cicely with a stolid, cold efficiency; and Stella with an -intuitive gentleness so great as to hide a certain inner force. - -About two hundred pounds a year trickled in on them from uncertain -sources. Mrs. Waring never knew quite when to expect it, and when it -came it soaked itself solemnly up on non-essentials. The children never -had proper clothes or a suitable education. They were Egyptologists -before they could spell, and the Koran was an open book to them when -they should have been reading "The Water Babies." - -The professor spent what he considered his share of their income upon -hieroglyphics, and Mrs. Waring, never personally extravagant, bought -quantities of little books to teach people how to live, how to develop -the will, how to create a memory, and power through repose. They had one -servant, who had to have wages and insisted every now and then upon a -joint of meat. - -There was no waste-paper basket in the house, and a great deal of -linoleum. When Mrs. Waring made up her mind that she must be more -economical, she always went out and bought linoleum. She had been told -it was a great saving. She never tidied anything up or put anything -away. What was lost was never seen again, or seen only when you were -hunting for something else. It was like a gambler's system at Monte -Carlo: you looked for a bootjack, and were rewarded by black treacle; or -you played, as it were, for black treacle, and discovered the bootjack. - -Mrs. Waring never finished anything; even her conversations, which began -at breakfast, jogged on throughout the day, and were picked up at much -the same spot in the evening. She had covered a quantity of ground, but -she had invariably escaped her destination. Through long years of -perpetual indecision she had nearly succeeded in outwitting time and -space. - -Nobody minded this attitude except Cicely. She fought against chaos from -her youth up. They all dreaded her tongue and clung persistently to -their habits. The professor fled earlier to the museum, sometimes in -carpet slippers. Immediately after breakfast Mrs. Waring retired with a -little book to an untidied bedroom. - -Eurydice, dropping manuscripts, hair-ribbons, and defiance, escaped to a -locked attic; and Stella remained as a gentle adjutant to her severer -sister. Cicely did get a few things done. She saw that meals were -cooked, windows opened, beds made, and clocks wound; but nothing -continuous rewarded her efforts. The power of the human will is a small -weapon against consolidated inertia. - -For five years Cicely played upon No. 9 Redcliffe Square like an -intermittent searchlight; then she gave it up, and became a student in a -women's hospital. The household breathed a sigh of intense relief at her -departure, and collapsed benevolently into chaos. - -Nobody except Stella regretted it. The professor was openly thankful. - -"She may become a student," he observed coldly when it was explained to -him where Cicely had gone, "but she will never become a scholar. She -has a superficial hunger for the definite. - -"I really do not think it will be necessary for me to take my supper at -a given hour. Stella will know that, whenever I ring my bell, I mean -cocoa." - -"Dear Cicely is a pioneer," murmured Mrs. Waring, with a gentle sigh. "I -can always imagine her doing wonderful things in a desert with a -buffalo." - -"Now I shall be able to have my friends at the house without their being -insulted," cried Eurydice, triumphantly. "Last time when Mr. Bolt was in -the middle of reading his new poem, 'The Whirl,' a most delicate and -difficult poem set to a secret rhythm, Cicely burst in and asked for the -slop-pail. It looked so lovely! I had covered it with autumn leaves and -placed it half-way up the chimney. It might have been a Grecian urn, but -of course she dragged it out. She drags out everything." - -Eurydice had a profession, too. She was a suppressed artist. She felt -that she could have painted like Van Gogh, only perfectly individually. -She saw everything in terms of color and in the shape of cubes. Railway -lines reminded her of a flight of asterisks. Flowers subdivided -themselves before her like a tartan plaid. She saw human beings in -tenuous and disjointed outlines suggestive of a daddy-long-legs. She -could not afford paint and canvas, so she had to leave people to think -that the world looked much as usual. - -Eurydice had always felt that she could write out her thoughts as soon -as she and Stella were alone and able to arrange her room in black and -scarlet. When Cicely left, Stella bought black paper and pasted it over -the walls, and dyed a white-wool mat, which had long lost its original -purity, a sinister scarlet. - -Eurydice did not want very much, either. None of the Warings wanted very -much. What as a family they failed to understand was, that not having -the money to pay for what they wanted, some more personal contribution -of time and effort was necessary in order to attain it. - -Stella grasped this fact when she was about eighteen. She said afterward -that she never would have thought of it if it had not been made plain to -her by Cicely. Still, before Cicely had gone to the hospital Stella was -taking cheap lessons in the City in shorthand and type-writing. None of -the three girls had what is called any "youth." They were as ignorant of -young men as if they had been brought up in a convent. Neither Professor -nor Mrs. Waring had ever supposed that parents ought to provide -occupations or social resources for their children, and the children -themselves had been too busy contributing to the family welfare to -manage any other life. Cicely had read statistics and mastered -physiological facts at fifteen. She was under the impression that she -knew everything and disliked everything except work. Her feeling for men -was singularly like that of a medieval and devout monk toward women. She -had an uncomfortable knowledge of them as a necessary evil, to be evaded -only by truculence or flight. When her work forced her into dealings -with them, she was ferocious and unattractive. She was a pretty girl, -but nobody had ever dared to mention it to her. - -Even Stella, who in an unaggressive, flitting way dared most questions, -had avoided telling Cicely that she herself liked men. Stella often -felt that if she could meet a man who was capable of doing all kinds of -dull things for you, very charmingly, and had a pretty wit, it would add -quite enormously to the gaiety of life to put yourself out a little in -order to make him laugh. - -The men Stella worked with wouldn't have done at all. They wouldn't have -cared for the kind of jokes Stella wanted to make, and of course Stella -hadn't time to meet any other men. Perhaps she wouldn't have believed -there were any if it hadn't been for Marian. Marian knew them; she knew -them literally in dozens, and they were generally in love with her, and -they always wanted to make her laugh and to do dull things for her. -Stella used to be afraid sometimes that Marian, in an embarrassment of -riches, might overlook her destiny. But Marian knew what she wanted and -was perfectly certain that she would sooner or later get it. Stella had -no such knowledge; she had long ago come to the conclusion that the -simplest way of dealing with her life was to like what she had. - -She took a scientific secretaryship at nineteen, and left it only at -twenty-six, when her scientist, who was very stout and nearly sixty, -died inconveniently from curried lobster. He left Stella an interesting -experience, of which she could make no immediate use, and a testimonial -which won her job at the town hall. It was very short. "This young -woman," the learned scientist wrote, "is invaluable. She thinks without -knowing it. I have benefited by this blessed process for seven years." - -It did not seem to Stella that she was invaluable. She always saw -herself in the light of the family failure, overlooking the fact that -she was their main financial support. - -Cicely was the practical and Eurydice the intellectual genius; but she -was content if she could be the padding on which these jewels -occasionally shone. - -Sometimes she met Cicely in a tea-shop and had a real talk, but Eurydice -was her chief companion. Eurydice shared with Stella nearly every -thought that she had. She seized her on the stairs to retail her -inspirations as Stella went up to take her things off. She sat on her -bed late at night, and talked with interminable bitterness about the -sharpness of life. Even while Stella buttoned up her boots and flung -things at the last moment into her despatch-case, Eurydice pelted her -with epigrams. She sometimes quoted Swinburne while Stella was jumping -on the corner bus, till the bus-conductor told her not to let him catch -her at it again. There was only one subject they did not discuss: -neither of them voluntarily mentioned Mr. Bolt. Mr. Bolt was the editor -of a magazine called "Shocks," to which Eurydice with trembling delight -contributed weekly. Mr. Bolt had met her at a meeting of protest against -Reticence, and he had taken to Eurydice at once; and almost at once he -told her that her charm was purely intellectual. Emotionally he was -appealed to only by fair, calm women with ample figures. - -Mr. Bolt knew plenty of fair, calm women with ample figures. Eurydice -only knew Mr. Bolt. She made an idol of him, and he used her like a -door-mat. No early-Victorian woman ever bore from a male tyrant what -poor, passionate twentieth-century Eurydice bore from Mr. Bolt, and -Stella could not help her. Stella abhorred Mr. Bolt. She would not -listen to his Delphic oracle utterances upon style and art and life. She -was outraged at his comments upon sex. She was desperately, fiercely -angry with a secret maternal anger that Eurydice should have to listen -to these utterances. It carried her as far as an abortive appeal to her -mother. - -"My dear," said Mrs. Waring, placidly, "these things are outworn. They -are stultified thought products; they do not really exist. Sex is like -dust upon the house-tops; a cleansing process will shortly remove it. -Mr. Bolt is a misconception, a floating microcosm. I really should not -bother about Mr. Bolt. He is not nearly so tangible as the butcher, and -I have made up my mind never really again to bother about the butcher. -Perhaps you will see him for me if he calls about his bill to-morrow. - -"It seems so strange to me that business men should not understand that -when there is no money bills cannot be paid. Even the minor regions of -fact seem closed to them." - -Stella agreed to dip into the minor regions of fact with the butcher, -but she went on bothering about Mr. Bolt. It seemed to Stella that he -was the only real bother that she had. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - - - Darling: - - Do come Sunday to tea. Mama is out of town, and I must have some - support. Julian is going to bring his mother to see me for the - first time. I believe she's rather alarming--awfully blue and - booky; just your sort. I haven't had time to tell you anything. - It's so jolly being engaged; but it takes up all one's spare - moments. I didn't mean to marry Julian; he swept me off my feet. I - suppose I must be awfully in love with him. You know what explorers - are. They go away for years and leave you to entertain alone, and - then people say you don't get on; and of course exploring never - pays. He has a little place in the country and about £2000 a year. - It's awfully little, really, but it's wonderful what you can put up - with when you really care for a man; besides, he's sure to get on. - Don't fail me Sunday. I shall really be rather nervous. Old ladies - never have been my forte. Julian is such a dear! You're sure to - like him. He wants to meet you awfully, but he doesn't think women - ought to work. He is full of chivalry, and has charming manners. It - doesn't in the least matter what you wear. Heaps of love. - - MARIAN. - -It was this last reflection that gave Stella courage to ring the bell. -She had never been in the Youngs' house before. She had vaguely known -that it was in a very quiet square, with a garden in the middle, quite -near everything that mattered, and quite far away from everything that -didn't. It was the kind of house that looks as if no one was in it -unless they were giving a party. The interior was high, narrow, and -box-like. A great deal of money had been unpretentiously spent on it, -with a certain amount of good-humored, ordinary taste. - -The drawing-room ran the whole length of the house, and was pink and -gray, because the Youngs knew that pink and gray go well together, just -as blue and gold do, only that blue fades. - -The chairs were very comfortable, the little tables had the right kind -of ornaments, the pictures were a harmless, unenlightening addition to -the gray-satin walls. - -The books that lay about were novels. They were often a little improper, -but never seriously so, and they always ended in people getting what -they wanted legally. - -It was a clean, comfortable, fresh room and nothing was ever out of -place in it. - -Marian was sitting under a high vase of pink canterbury-bells; by some -happy chance her dress was the same pale pink as the bells. She looked, -with her hands in her lap, her throat lifted, and the sun on her hair, -like a flower of the same family. Her manner was a charming mixture of -ease and diffidence. - -Stella was late, and Lady Verny and Julian had arrived before her. - -Lady Verny was like her son. She was very tall and graceful, and carried -herself as if she had never had to stoop. Her eyes had the steady, -frosty blueness of Julian's, with lightly chiseled edges; her lips were -ironic, curved, and a little thin. - -She had piles of white hair drawn back over her forehead. When Marian -introduced her to Stella, she rose and turned away from the tea-table. - -"I hope you will come and talk to me a little," she said in a clear, -musical voice. "We can leave Julian and Marian to themselves." - -Lady Verny leaned back in the chair she had chosen for herself and -regarded Stella with steady, imperturbable eyes. It struck Stella as a -little alarming that they should all know where they wanted to sit, and -with whom they wanted to talk, without any indecision. She thought that -chairs would walk across the room to Lady Verny if she looked at them, -and kettles boil the moment Julian thought that it was time for tea. But -though she was even more frightened at this calm, unconscious competency -than she had expected to be, she saw it didn't matter about her clothes. -She knew they were all wrong, as cheap clothes always are, particularly -cheap clothes that you've been in a hurry over and not clever enough to -match. Her boots and her gloves weren't good, and her hat was horrid and -probably on the back of her head. Her blue-serge coat and skirt had -indefinite edges. But Stella was aware that Lady Verny, beautifully -dressed as she was, was taking no notice whatever of Stella's clothes. -They might make an extra point against her if she didn't like her. -Stella could hear her saying, "Funny that Marian should make friends -with a sloppy little scarecrow." But if she did like her, she would say -nothing about Stella's clothes. As far as the Vernys were concerned, -the appearances of things were always subsidiary. - -"Engagements are such interrupted times," Lady Verny observed, with a -charming smile. "One likes to poke a little opportunity toward the poor -dears when one can." - -"Yes," said Stella, eagerly, with her little, rapid flight of words. -"You're always running away when you're engaged, and never getting -there, aren't you? And then, of course, when you're married, you're -there, and can't run away. It's such a pity they can't be more mixed -up." - -"Perhaps," said Lady Verny, still smiling. "But marriage is like a -delicate clock; it has to be wound up very carefully, and the less you -take its works to pieces afterward the better. Have you known Marian a -long time?" - -"Three years," said Stella; "but when you say 'know,' I am only an -accident. I don't in any real sense belong to Marian's life; I belong -only to Marian. You see, I work." She thought she ought, in common -fairness to Lady Verny, not let her think that she was one of Marian's -real friends. - -Lady Verny overlooked this implication. - -"And what is your work, may I ask?" she inquired, with her grave, solid -politeness, which reminded Stella of nothing so much as a procession in -a cathedral. - -"I was a secretary to Professor Paulson," Stella explained, "the great -naturalist. He was a perfect dear, too,--it wasn't only beetles and -things,--and when he died, I went into a town hall,--I've been there for -two years,--and that's more exciting than you can think. It isn't -theories and experiments, of course, but it's like being a part of the -hub of the universe. Rates and taxes, sanitary inspectors, old-age -pensions, and the health of babies run through my hands like water -through a sieve. You wouldn't believe how entertaining civic laws and -customs are--and such charming people! Of course I miss the other work, -too,--it was like having one's ear against nature,--but this is more -like having one's ear against life." - -"I think you must have very catholic tastes," said Lady Verny, gently. -"My son knew Professor Paulson; it will interest him to know that you -worked for him. And Marian--did she take any interest in your scientific -experiences?" - -Stella moved warily across this question; she had never spoken to Marian -about her work at all. Marian, as she knew, thought it all very -tiresome. - -"You see," she explained, "they weren't my experiences; they were -Professor Paulson's. Marian couldn't very well be thrilled at third -hand; the thrill only got as far as me. Besides, half of what I do as a -secretary is confidential, and the other half sounds dull. Of course it -isn't really. I've been so lucky in that way. I've never had anything -dull to do." - -"I can quite imagine that," said Lady Verny, kindly. "Dullness is in the -eye, not in the object. Does Marian like life better than intellect, -too?" - -"Ah, Marian's life," said Stella, a little doubtfully, "is so -different!" - -They glanced across at the distant tea-table. Julian was leaning toward -Marian with eyes that held her with the closeness of a frame to a -picture. - -He was laughing at her a little, with the indulgent, delighted laughter -of a man very deeply in love. She was explaining something to him, -simply and gravely, without undue emphasis. Stella guessed that it was -one of the things Marian wanted, and she did not think that Julian could -get out of giving it to her by laughter. - -"Marian's life hasn't got divisions in it like mine," she explained. -"She's just a beautiful human creature. She is equable and strong and -delightful and absolutely honest. She's as honest as crystal; but she -hasn't had to bother about choosing." - -"Ah," said Lady Verny, "you think that, do you? But, my dear Miss -Waring, sooner or later we all have to bother about choosing. Beauty and -strength don't save us. Absolute honesty often lets us in, and -sometimes, when the scales weigh against us, we cease to be equable." - -"But they won't, you see," Stella said eagerly. "They can't weigh -against her now, Lady Verny. Don't you see? There's your son--it's why -one's so delighted. An engagement to him is like some thumping -insurance which somehow or other prevents one's house being burned." - -Lady Verny laughed. - -"Let us hope your theory is a correct one," she said, rising from her -seat. "I am going to talk to her now, and you can talk to the insurance -company." - -Stella gasped. She wanted to run away, to catch Lady Verny's graceful -scarf and tell her she couldn't really talk to anybody's son. Agreeable, -massive beings who explored continents and lived in clubs oughtn't to -come her way. But Julian crossed the room to her side with the quickness -of a military order. His manners hid his reluctance. He was at her -service in a moment. His keen eyes, harder than his mother's and more -metallic, met hers once and glanced easily away. They said nothing to -Stella except that he was a watchful human being who couldn't be taken -in, and was sometimes perhaps unduly aware that he couldn't be taken in. - -"I'm very glad indeed," he said cordially, "to meet Marian's greatest -friend. You must tell me all about her. You see, I'm a new-comer; I've -known her only six weeks, and I've been so busy trying to impress her -with my point of view that I quite feel I may have overlooked some of -hers. Women always understand women, don't they?" - -He wasn't going to be difficult to talk to. That unnecessary ingredient -in his composition saved Stella. As long as she had a brain to call to, -and wasn't only to be awed by splendor of appearance and forms as -difficult for her to cross as five-barred gates, she needn't be afraid -of him. It never was people that Stella was afraid of, but the things, -generally the silly things, that separated her from them. - -"We do and we don't understand each other," she said swiftly. "I don't -think women can tell what another woman will do; but granted she's done -it, I dare say most could say why." - -Julian laughed. - -"Then have the kindness to inform me," he said, "why Marian has -consented to marry me. Incidentally, your reply will no doubt throw a -light for me upon her mental processes." - -Stella saw he did not want any light thrown anywhere; he was simply -giving his mother time to get to know Marian. Then he was going back to -her; that was his light. - -She gave a vague little smile at the sublimated concentration of lovers. -She liked to watch them; she would never have to be one. - -It was like seeing some beautiful wild creature of the woods. It -wouldn't be like you at all, and yet it would be exceedingly amusing and -touching to watch, and sometimes it would make you think of what it -would feel like to be wild and in those woods. - -She reminded herself sharply, as her eyes turned back to Julian, that it -wouldn't do to let him think she thought him wild. He was behaving very -well, and the least she could do was to let him think so. She gave -herself up to his question. - -"You're very strong," she said consideringly. "Marian likes strength. -She's strong herself, you know; probably that's one of her reasons." - -"Good," he said cheerfully. "Physically strong, d' you mean, or an iron -will? Iron wills are quite in my line, I assure you. Any other reason?" - -"Strong both ways," said Stella; "and you're secure. I mean, what you've -taken you'll keep. I think some women like a man they can be sure of." - -"Let us hope they all do," said Sir Julian, laughing. "It would imply a -very bad business instinct if they didn't." - -"I do not think I agree with you," said Stella, firmly. "The best -business is often an adventure, a risk. Safe business does not go far; -it goes only as far as safety." - -"Well, I'm not sure that I want women to go particularly far," said Sir -Julian. "I like 'em to be safe; let 'em leave the better business with -the risk in it to men. I shall be content if Marian does that." - -"I think Marian will," said Stella. "But there are other things, of -course, besides you and Marian: there's life. You can only take all the -risk there is if you take all the life. I see what you would like, Sir -Julian: you want a figurehead guaranteed against collisions. -Unfortunately there's no guarantee against collisions even for a -figurehead. Besides, as I told you before, Marian's strong. Iron wills -don't make good figureheads." - -"Ah, you're one of these new women," said Sir Julian, indulgently. "I -don't mind 'em a bit, you know, myself--all steel and ginger,--and quite -on to their jobs. I admit all that. But Marian ain't one of them. Her -strength is the other kind--the kind you get by sitting still, don't you -know; and if I may say so in passing, if I run a ship, I don't collide. -But let's have your third reason. I see you're keeping something back. -She's going to marry me because I'm strong and because I'm sure; I -approve of both of them, sound business reasons. Now, Miss Waring, -what's the third?" - -"Ah, the third isn't a reason at all," said Stella; "but it's the only -one that I thoroughly agree with as a motive: she likes you for -yourself." - -Sir Julian's eyes suddenly softened; they softened so much that they -looked quite different eyes, almost as if they belonged to a very -pleased little boy. - -"Oh," he said, looking back at Marian. "I shouldn't in the least mind -being guaranteed that, you know." - -Lady Verny rose and walked toward them. - -"I have some other calls to make," she said to her son. "You'll stay, of -course." - -Stella joined her as soon as she had given the happiest of her smiles -into Marian's expectant eyes. Lady Verny's face, as they stood together -outside the door, was perfectly expressionless. - -Without a word she descended the stairs side by side with Stella. When -she reached the front door she held out her hand to Stella and smiled. - -"I hope I shall meet you again some day," she said, with gracious -sincerity. "I enjoyed our little talk together very much." - -She said nothing whatever about Marian. - - - - -CHAPTER V - - -It was a very hot morning in July, a morning when work begins slowly, -continues irritably, and is likely to incite human paroxysms of -forgetfulness and temper. It took the form with Mr. Leslie Travers of -his being more definite than usual. He was an extremely intelligent man, -and most of his intelligence consisted in knowing where other people -were wrong. The heat lent an almost unbearable edge to these -inspirations; the office boy, the mayor's secretary, and two typists -withdrew from his sanctum as if they had been in direct contact with a -razor. - -Stella wished, as she had often wished before, that the inner office in -which she worked could not be invaded by the manner in which Mr. Travers -conducted his interviews. She respected him as her chief, she even -considered him with a kind of loyal awe augmented by her daily duty. She -pleased him, she catered for him, she never in any circumstances let -him down or confused him by a miscalculation or a mistake. - -It is impossible to do this for any man for two years and, if he has -treated you with fairness and respect, not at the end of that time, to -regard him with a certain proprietary affection. This was how Stella -regarded Mr. Travers. He was a clever man, and he never expected any one -under him to work miracles or to give him trouble. He knew what you were -worth, and sometimes he let you see it. - -He was handsome in a thin, set, rather dry way, and when he put his -finger-tips together and smiled a little ironic smile he had, and leaned -forward with his shoulders hunched and his eyes unusually bright, as if -they'd been polished like a boot-button, he had an air of intellectual -strength which usually brought terror to an opponent. He always knew -when his adversary was in the wrong. It sometimes seemed to Stella as if -he never knew anything else. - -He had reduced life to a kind of game in which you caught the other -fellow out. She got very tired of hearing him say, "You see, Miss -Waring, the weak point of this case is--" or, "I think we may just point -out to him that he renders himself liable to--" - -He was a master hand at an interview. To begin with, he always let the -interviewer state his case completely. He never interrupted; he would -sit there smiling a little with his steady, observant eyes fixed on the -man before him, saying in a suave, mild voice, "Yes, yes; I quite see. -Exactly. Your point is--" and Stella, listening, would feel her heart -sink at the dangerous volubility of his opponent. She would have liked -to spring from behind the screen where she was sorting the -correspondence and say, "For Heaven's sake! keep that back! You're -letting yourself in!" As soon as the usually verbose and chaotic -applicant had drawn his final breath, Mr. Leslie Travers gave him back -his case with the points eliminated, and the defenseless places laid out -before him as invertebrate and unmanageable as a jellyfish. It was -hardly necessary for Mr. Leslie Travers to say, with his dry little -smile, "I think you see, my dear fellow, don't you, that it would really -be advisable in your own interests not to go on any further with the -matter? It will be no trouble to us at all if you decide to push it, but -if you take my advice, you will simply go home and think no more about -it." People usually went home, and if their case had been important to -them, they probably thought about it to the end of their lives; but that -didn't affect Mr. Travers. It was his business to safeguard the -interests of the town hall, and the more cases you could drop, the -better. Of course he never dropped a case that could be used against -him; he held on to these until they couldn't. He had to perfection the -legal mind. He never touched what wasn't a safe proposition. A peculiar -idea seized Stella as she listened to him dismissing a worried -rate-payer who had asked for lowered rates, claiming the decreased value -of his property, "We shall act immediately," Mr. Travers said -benevolently. "We receive proof that your property _has_ decreased in -value, but it doesn't do, you know, to come here and tell me the -neighborhood isn't what it was. No neighborhood ever is. Good morning." - -What, she asked herself, would Mr. Leslie Travers be without his -impeccable tie, his black coat, and definitely creased gray trousers, -the polish on his boots, the office background, and, above all, the law? -Was he really very awe-inspiring. Wasn't he just a funny little man? It -was curious how she felt this morning, as if she would have liked to see -some one large and lawless face Mr. Travers and show him that his -successes were tricks, his interviews mousetraps, his words delusive -little pieces of very stale cheese. He was too careful of his dignity, -too certain of his top-hat. You couldn't imagine him dirty and oily at -the north pole, putting grit into half-frozen, starving men. You -couldn't, that is to say, imagine him at a disadvantage, making the -disadvantage play his game. - -His games were always founded on advantages. He wasn't, in fact, at all -like Julian Verny, nor was there any reason why he should be. But -yesterday Stella had seen Julian Verny, and to-day she saw, and saw as -if for the first time, Mr. Leslie Travers. - -"Now, Miss Waring," Mr. Travers said, looking up from his desk, "the -correspondence, please, if you are ready." He always spoke to her, -unless he was in a hurry, as if he were speaking to a good, rather -bright little girl who knew her place, but mustn't be tempted unduly to -forget it. When he was in a hurry he sometimes said, "Look sharp." - -Stella brought the correspondence, and they went through it together -with their usual celerity and carefulness, and all the time she was -thinking: "We've worked together every day for two years except Sundays, -and he's afraid to look at me unless we're discussing a definite -question, and he won't risk a joke, and he'd be shocked if I sneezed. -He's just a very intelligent, cultivated, knowing clerk, and he'd be -awfully upset if I told him he had a smut on his collar." - -Mr. Leslie Travers put to one side the two or three letters he had -reserved for himself to answer. Stella gathered hers together into an -elastic band; but as she turned to leave him he said: - -"Miss Waring, one moment. You came to me on the understanding that your -work here was to be purely temporary. Circumstances have prolonged your -stay with us until it seems to me that we may fairly consider you, -unless you have other plans, a permanent member of our staff!" - -"I hope so," said Stella, with a sudden flicker in her eyes, "unless you -think women shouldn't be permanent." - -Mr. Leslie Travers permitted himself a very slight smile. - -"That disability in your case," he said, "we are prepared to overlook in -view of your value as a worker. As my permanent secretary I should wish -to raise your salary ten pounds yearly. I have put this before our -committee, and they have seen their way to consent to it." - -Stella's eyebrows went up. Ten pounds were worth so much to that -muddled, penurious household standing behind her on the verge of utmost -poverty! The man whose place she had taken had been paid three hundred a -year; her rise brought up her salary to one third of this amount. - -"It _is_ a disability, Mr. Travers," she said gently, "being a woman. I -see that it is going to cost me two hundred a year." - -Mr. Travers looked at her very hard. He knew that she did her work twice -as well as the man she had replaced. That is why she had replaced him. -He thought of her market value as a worker, and he knew that he was -doing a perfectly correct thing. A hundred a year was a fair wage for a -woman secretary. He said: - -"You see, Miss Waring, you have not got a family to support." - -Stella flushed. She had a family to support, but she did not intend to -admit it to Mr. Travers.. She said: - -"I beg your pardon. I had not understood that wages were paid according -to a worker's needs. I had thought the value of the work settled the -rate of payment." - -Mr. Travers was astonished. He had never dreamed that Miss Waring would -argue with him. He had looked forward to telling her of this unexpected -windfall; he had expected a flushed and docile gratitude. She was a -little flushed, it is true, but she was neither docile nor grateful, and -he did not quite see his way to continuing her line of argument. She -had, however, put herself in the wrong, and he pointed this out to her. - -"I am afraid I cannot see my way to offering you more than the increase -I have suggested," he said; "but as you were apparently satisfied to -accept a permanent post at my original offer, I may hope that an extra -ten pounds will prove no obstacle to our continuing to work together." - -"I do not suppose," said Stella, quietly, "that it will be any obstacle -to you that I do not think it fair." - -"Really, Miss Waring, really," said Mr. Travers, "I do not think you are -quite yourself this morning. The heat, the disquieting news in the -papers--Perhaps you had better go on with the correspondence. These -questions are not personal ones, you know--they--" - -Stella interrupted him. - -"All questions that deal with human beings, Mr. Travers," she said, "are -personal questions, and the heat does not affect them." - -For one awful moment Mr. Travers thought that Miss Waring was laughing -at him; there was that strange glint in her eyes that he had noticed -before. She had extraordinarily pretty eyes, usually so gentle. It was -most upsetting. - -She disappeared with her correspondence before he could think of a -suitable reply. Legally he had been perfectly justified, more than -justified, because he was under no obligation to offer her ten pounds -more. - -This is what comes of generosity to women. If he hadn't offered her that -ten pounds she wouldn't have laughed at him, if she really had laughed -at him. - -It was a most disquieting thought; it haunted him all day long, even -more than the possibility of a European war. He couldn't help the -European war if it did come off, but he wished very much that he had -been able to prevent Miss Waring's enigmatic laughter. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - - -When anything happened, Julian's first instinct was to happen with it. -He had never been in the rear of a situation in his life. The blow of -the Austrian ultimatum reached him on a yacht in mid-channel. There was -a cabinet minister on board, for whose sake the yacht slewed round to -make her way swiftly back to port. Julian went directly to him. - -"Look here," he said, "we've got to go in. You grasp that, don't you?" - -Julian had one idea in his head, the cabinet minister had a great many; -every one but Julian was leaving him alone to sort these ideas out. -Julian spent the six hours in which they were flying to port in -eradicating one by one every idea except his own. - -The two men stood together, leaning over the ship's side. It was a clear -summer evening, with a bloom upon the waters. The lights of the boats -they passed--green and red and gold--were like glow-worms in a Southern -night. The sea was very easy under them; it had little movement of its -own, and parted like riven gauze to let the ship through. - -"We can't let France go under," Julian pleaded. "Look at her, -son--stripped, after 1870. How she's sprung up! But thin, you -know--thin, like a gallant boy. - -"Immoral small families? By Gad! how righteous comfortable people are! -How could she help it? Look what she's had to carry--indemnities, cursed -war burdens, and now the three-years service! But she's carried 'em. I -know the French. I've Irish in me, and that helps me to value their -lucidity. Lucidity's sense, you know, it ain't anything dressy or -imaginative, it's horse-sense gone clean as lightning. The French are a -civilized people. Go to Paris,--not the Paris of our luxury-rotted rich, -who have only asked it to be a little private sink of their own,--but to -a Frenchman's Paris. Well, you'll find him there, brain and a heart -under it. And, good Lord, what nerve! - -"I tell you we've got to get down to our own nerve. We've fatted it on -the top, but the French haven't. They're like live wire, with no cover -to it. They're the most serious people on earth, fire without smoke. It -'u'd be an unspeakable shame to help set that damned Prussian heel on -them again. When it comes, it'll come as solid as the mountain that -blotted out Messina, as solid and as senseless, and you'll let that -happen because we aren't '_involved_!' Good Heavens, man, don't sop -yourself or your conscience with catchwords! If this war comes, and I -feel in my bones it's on us, any man who isn't involved is a cur." - -The cabinet minister interrupted him. He cleared his throat, and said -that he was hopeful steps might be taken. - -Julian flung himself upon the phrase. - -"Of course they'll be taken," he shouted across the quiet, shadowy sea. -"They're being taken every minute. Are we the only fellows who've got -feet? - -"What about strategic railways? Ever studied 'em? What about this -spring's having seen Alsace and Lorraine white with camps? What about -Tirpitz slipping his navy votes through the Reichstag, Socialists and -all? I beg your pardon; it's not your department, of course. We've let a -strip of sea as small as a South American river cut us off from the -plain speech of other nations. What speech? My good sir, the plain -speech of other nations is their acts. But it's no use raking up what -we've slid over. We've the national habit of sliding, it's a gift like -any other, and if you've a good eye for ice, it doesn't let you in. But -what Liberal Government ever had a good eye for the ice in Europe. I'm -speaking bitterly, but I'm a Liberal myself, and I've seen in odd places -of the earth that it's no good going slap through an adverse fact, -smiling. You disarm nothing but yourself." - -"We are not," said the cabinet minister, who had a happy disposition and -a strong desire not to be shaken out of it, "really tied up to any -Balkan outbreak--I mean necessarily, of course. Other issues might come -in. But I see no reason, my dear Sir Julian, why we should, in this very -disagreeable crisis, not remind ourselves--and I am, like you, one of -the greatest admirers of the French--that an entente is _not_ an -alliance. Political sympathy can do a great deal to affect these -questions. I can imagine a very strong note--" - -"Is an engagement nothing till you've got the ring on?" asked Julian, -savagely. "Are you going to let down France, who's not very often, but -has just lately, trusted us? If we do, let me tell you this: we shall -deserve exactly what we shall get. And make no mistake about it; we -shall get it. The channel ports, taken from a vindictive, broken France, -used, as they ought to be used, dead against us. A little luck and a -dark night, and I wouldn't give _that_ for England." - -Julian flung his lighted cigarette into the sea; a faint hiss, and the -spark beneath them was sucked into darkness. Neither of the two men -moved. Julian lit another cigarette, and the cabinet minister gazed down -into the lightless sea. After a pause he said in a different voice: - -"Look here, Verny, I've been impressed, devilish impressed, by what -you've said; but have you considered what kind of force we've got? -Picked men, I grant you, but, as you say yourself, when the Germans do -come on, they'll come like half a mountain moving. What's the use of -sending out a handful of grasshoppers to meet half a mountain?" - -Julian laughed. - -"Are you a great man on dog-fights?" he asked. "I've seen a bulldog, -quite a small chap he was, bring down a Great Dane the size of a calf. -The Dane had got a collie by the throat; friend of my little chap's, I -fancy. He couldn't get at the Dane's throat, for fear of piling his -weight on the collie; so he just stepped forward and took half a leg -between his teeth, and buried his head in it. I heard the bone crack. -The Dane tried to face it out,--he was a plucky fellow and the size of a -house,--but after a bit he felt held down. So he wheeled round and -seized the bull by a piece of back (the collie crawled off, he'd had -enough, poor brute!), but the bull didn't stir. He went on cracking that -bone; he gave the Dane all the back he wanted. Devil a bit _he_ turned -till the whole leg went like a split match, that hurled the Dane over, -and I had to take Chang (that was his name) off, or he'd have finished -him up. He'd just begun to enjoy the fight, with half his back chawed -over! - -"We've got a navy that'll do just that to Germany if we hold on long -enough. Don't you forget it. It's pressure that tells against -size--pressure on the right spot, and persistent." - -The cabinet minister tried to say to himself that countries weren't like -dogs; but he was a truthful man, and he thought that on the whole they -were. - -England rose up suddenly before them out of the darkness. They were -coming into Plymouth Sound. The port lights held them steadily for a -minute, and the steam yacht bustled soberly toward the docks. - -"If your little lot sit down under this," said Julian, straightening his -shoulders and holding the other man with his insistent eyes, "by God! -I'll cut my throat and say, 'Here died a Briton whose country had lost -its soul.'" - -"Bit of Irish in him of course," murmured the cabinet minister as Julian -swung away from him. "Still, I suppose what I shall say is that on the -whole, taking everything into consideration, I think we should be wiser -to support France." - - - - -CHAPTER VII - - -Julian had spent thirty-two years--his mother included his first--in -seeing what he wanted to do and doing it. He had never consulted anybody -else, because he had always seen his way clearly, but he had made from -time to time reports to his mother. He had been hostile to his father, -who had opposed him weakly and sometimes unfairly till he died. Julian -never felt disheartened or found any opposition in himself to what he -wanted to do. Opposition in others he liked and overcame. Nothing in him -warned him that love demands participation and resents exclusion. - -On landing, he hurried to London, and went at once to see an old friend -of his in the War Office. - -"Look here, Burton," he said, "you remember 1911, don't you?" - -Burton drew on the blotting-paper with a pencil; he was almost -overwhelmingly cautious. If he had not been, many more serious things -than caution would have been overwhelmed. - -"I think," he said, "if I remember right, you went abroad." - -Julian chuckled. - -"I was a German navvy for six months," he said. "I ate like a German, I -drank thirty bottles of beer at one sitting for a bet, and I lost my -head and my temper in German. It seems as if the best thing I can do -just now is to repeat the experiment." - -"You did it at your own risk," Burton reminded him. "It was certainly -serviceable, but we limited our communications with you as much as -possible. If it should enter into your mind to do such a thing again, we -should of course have no communication with you whatever. Also, you -would need German papers--birth certificates, registrations. I really do -not know at a time like this what you might not find necessary. The -work, if you came back, would be invaluable." - -Julian nodded. - -"Don't you bother yourself about papers," he said. "I've been in a -German consular office, and I've got a German birth-certificate. It's -one of the things I do particularly well. As long as they're not -suspicious they won't ram the papers home, and I don't propose to let -them get suspicious. I shall be Cæsar's wife. Three years of Heidelberg -have oiled my throat to it. My mother tells me I often speak English in -a hearty German voice. My idea is to go out as soon as possible, through -Belgium. They'll strike there, I feel pretty sure, and I'll come back -the same way--October to November, if I can. You can put about that I 'm -off to the Arctic Ocean. If I'm not back by Christmas, don't expect me. -I shall have no communication with any one until my return." - -Burton smiled. - -"My dear Julian," he said, "one moment. I have not yet congratulated you -upon your engagement. I do so with all my heart. But do you intend to -tell Miss Young? She may not like the Arctic Ocean or she may expect you -to fight. She will also, no doubt, look for some communication from you; -and, as you very rightly assert, there can be no communication whatever -with anybody until you return." - -Julian hunched up his shoulders and whistled. - -"She's the pick of women," he said softly. "Leave her to me." - -"It's all going to be left to you," said Burton, gravely. "If you live, -you'll get no apparent acknowledgment; if you die, no one will ever know -how. I do not say this to dissuade you,--there are too many things we -want to know,--but when I saw the announcement of your engagement in the -paper, I said, 'Well, we've lost him.'" - -Julian rose, and walked to the window. Until that moment he had not -given Marian a thought. He was full of a lover's images of her, but he -had not connected them with what he was going to do. He remembered what -Marian's inconspicuous-looking little friend had said to her, "honest as -crystal, equable, strong." - -Then he turned back to his friend. - -"You haven't lost me," he said steadily. "After all, if we're up against -anything at all, Burton, we're up against a pretty big thing. I must do -exactly what is most useful. Of course I'd rather fight. One likes -one's name to go down and all that, and I'd like to please Marian; but -the point, both for her and for me, will be the job." - -"Ah," said Burton. "Then if you'll just come with me, I'll take you to a -fellow who will let you know what we want particularly just now to find -out. You're quite right as far as we are concerned; but it's not fair to -rush a man into our kind of fight. It's not like any other kind. It's -risks without prizes." - -"What you get out of a risk," said Julian, with a certain gravity, "is a -prize." - -Burton looked at him curiously; he rested his hand for a moment on his -friend's shoulder. - -"That's a jolly good phrase, Julian," he said quietly, "and I think it's -true; but it's not necessarily a personal prize. You pay the piper, and -he plays the tune; but you mightn't be there to listen to the tune." - -"Don't be a croaking, weather-beaten, moth-eaten old Scotch raven!" -laughed Julian. "Take my word for it; you get what you want out of life -if you put all you've got into it. That's just at this moment what I -propose to put." - -"And that," said Burton, without returning his smile, "is what we -propose to take, Julian." - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - - -Amberley hung upon a cliff of land above the water meadows. Rising high -behind it, fold on fold, were the Sussex Downs, without lines, without -rigidity, as soft as drifting snow. - -The village had been the seat of a tremendous castle,--little of these -famous ruins were left,--but the old, yellow stone walls still girdled -Amberley in the shape of a broken crown. - -There was only one street, a sleepy, winding, white down road, which ran -between mossy barns and deep-thatched cottages under the Amberley Wall. -The castle was older than Amberley House, yet Amberley House was a -respectable three hundred years, and had been all that time the home of -countless Vernys. It had not retreated into relentless privacy, as most -old English homes have done; it stood, with its wide porch, stoutly upon -the moss-grown cobbles. - -But it was better than its promises. If it had no park, there lay behind -its frontage not a park, but a garden--a garden that fitted in with -nature, only to excel it. - -Lady Verny loved two things, her garden and her son; but she had been -able to do most with her garden. There were terraces that swung from -point to point above the long, blue valley; there was a lawn hemmed in -by black yew hedges, over which the downs piled themselves, bare and -high, with only the clouds beyond them. There was a sunken rose-garden, -with rough-tiled pathways leading to a lake with swans. Three hundred -years had helped Lady Verny with the lawn, but the herbaceous borders -had been her own affair. Julian, crossing the lawn toward her, was the -same strange mixture of her hand and time; and she had always known that -when she had done all she could for Julian and the garden, she would -have to give both up. With all their difficulties, their beauties, and -their sullen patches, they would pass into the hands of some young and -untried person unchosen by herself. - -The person had been chosen now. Marian was already at Amberley for a -week-end, and knowing that Julian was expected, she had left Lady Verny -sitting by the tea-table under the yew hedge and gone up toward the -downs. - -Julian would like this; he would not wish his bride to meet him -half-way. He would delight in Marian's aloofness; her deliberate and -delicate coldness would seem to him like the bloom upon a grape. But the -coldness of a future daughter-in-law is not the quality which most -endears her to a mother. - -"Julian," Lady Verny said to herself as he approached her, "will make a -very trying lover. If he is absorbed in Marian, he will interfere with -her; and if he is absorbed in anything else, he will ignore her. He -needs a great deal of judicious teasing. Marian takes herself too -seriously to see the fun of Julian; she only sees the fun of sex. She -was quite right to go up to the downs. It'll amuse him to pursue her -now, but it'll bore him later; and in the end he'll find out that she -doesn't keep him off because she's got so much to give, but because -she's so afraid of giving anything." - -"Where's Marian?" asked Julian before he kissed her. - -"She went up toward the downs," said Lady Verny. "She left no directions -behind her. She's a will-o'-the-wisp, my dear." - -Julian laughed. - -"She knew I'd follow her," he said; "but I'll have my tea first, -please." - -"She has always been followed, I imagine," said Lady Verny, giving him -his tea, "and she has always known it." - -Julian looked pleased; this was the kind of wife he wanted, a woman used -to admiration, and who never made the fatal mistake of seeking it. He -had not much knowledge of women, but he had very strong opinions about -them, unshaken by any personal reckoning. One opinion was that nothing -too much can be done for a good woman. She must be protected, cared for, -and served under every ordeal in life. She must be like a precious -jewel; bars, safes, banks, must be constructed to insure her -inaccessibility from all the dangers of the open world. - -She must be seen--the East receded from him at this point--and admired; -but she must be immaculate. That is to say, she must at no time in her -career personally handle an experience. She must be a wife and mother -(unmarried women, though often presumably virtuous, were only the shabby -bankrupts of their sex), but, once married and a mother, she must be -kept as far as possible from all the implications of these tremendous -facts. - -Bad women were unsexed. That is to say, no law applied to them; they -were as outcast as a man who cheats at cards. The simile was not exact, -as the women were occasionally themselves the cheated; but it was near -enough for Julian. There were of course considerably more female -outcasts than card-sharpers; but this was fortunate, for inadvertently -they protected good women, in a manner in which card-sharpers have not -been known to protect good men. But Julian thought men needed no -protection, only women who were safe, needed it. - -Julian was kinder to women than his opinions promised, because, being -strong, he was on the whole gentle toward those who were weak; but his -kindness was a personal idiosyncrasy, not a principle. - -Lady Verny looked at him a little helplessly. There was something she -wanted very much to say to him, but she suffered from the disability of -being his mother. There is an unwritten law that mothers should not -touch upon vital matters with their sons. Lady Verny believed that -Julian was a victim of passion. She did not think he had understood -Marian's nature, and she knew that when passion burns itself out, one of -two things is left, comradeship or resentment. She had lived with -resentment for twenty years, and she knew that it was not an easy thing -to live with, and that it would have been worth while had she known more -about it earlier, to have found out if there was comradeship under the -passion before the flames of it had burned her boats. - -"I wonder," she said consideringly, gazing into the bottom of her -tea-cup, "if your lovely Marian has a sense of humor?" - -"Humor?" said Julian, taking two savory sandwiches and wrapping them in -bread and butter. "What does she want with humor at her age? It's one of -the things people fall back on when they've come croppers. Besides, I -don't believe in comradeship between the sexes. Infernally dull policy; -sort of thing that appeals to a bookworm. What I like is a little -friendly scrapping. Honor's easy! I never have cared much for brains in -a woman." - -He smiled at the woman he knew best in the world, who had brains, and -had given him the fruit of them all her life, with kindly tolerance. - -Probably she was jealous; but she wouldn't be tiresome if she was, and -he would make things as easy for her as possible. - -Lady Verny saw that Julian thought that she was jealous. She looked away -from him to the terrace where he had fallen as a baby and struck his -head against the stone cornice of the sun-dial. - -She could never look at the sun-dial without seeing the whole scene -happen again--and the dreadful pause that followed it when the small, -limp figure lay without moving. Julian was the only child she had ever -had. She shivered in the hot summer air and gave up the subject of human -love. There is generally too much to be said about it to make it a good -subject of conversation except for lovers, who only want each other. - -She pointed to the newspaper that lay between them; that also was -serious. - -"My dear," she said quietly, "this appears to be a very bad business?" - -"Yes," Julian acknowledged. "This time there'll be no ducking; there's -nothing to duck under." - -"And I dare say," said his mother, without moving the strong, quiet -hands that lay on her lap, "you have been thinking what you are going to -do in it?" - -"Oh, yes, I've decided," said Julian. "I shall be off in ten days. -You'll guess where, but no one else must know." - -"It was a big risk before, Julian," she said tentatively. - -"This time it'll be a bigger one," he answered, meeting her eyes with a -flash of his pleased blue ones. "That's all. It'll need a jolly lot of -thinking out." - -"And you've--and Marian has agreed to it?" Lady Verny asked anxiously. - -"I haven't told her yet," said Julian, easily. "It didn't occur to me to -mention it to her first any more than to you. I knew you'd both -understand. Obviously it was the one thing I could do. She'll see that, -of course." - -"I'm different," said Lady Verny, with a twist of her ironic mouth. "I'm -your mother. A mother takes what is given; a wife expects all there is -to give." - -Julian looked a little uncomfortable. Burton, who was a man, and might -therefore be assumed to know better than a woman what a woman felt, had -come to the same conclusion. - -Julian was prepared to give everything he had to Marian--Amberley and -all his money and himself. There was something in the marriage service -that put it very well, but didn't, as far as he remembered, say anything -to include plans. - -"I hope she likes Amberley?" he ventured. - -Lady Verny filled his cup a second time, and answered tranquilly: - -"Marian thinks it a charming little place to run down to for week-ends." -Then she added very gently: "This is going to be very hard for Marian, -Julian. You'll remember that, won't you, when you tell her?" - -"Damnably hard," said Julian under his breath. "Of course I'll remember. -I wish to Heaven she'd marry me first. By Jove, I'll _make_ her!" - -Lady Verny's lips closed tightly. She wasn't going to tell Julian -anything, because she did not believe in telling things to people who -will in the course of time find them out for themselves. She knew that -Marian would not marry him at a moment's notice. She knew that he was -asking Marian already to stand a very serious burden, and she did not -think Marian's was the type of love that cares for very serious and -unexpected burdens. She gazed at the bushes of blue anchusa; the -gardener had planted pink monthly roses a little too thickly among them. -She could alter that; she did not think there was anything else she -could alter. - -Julian strode toward the downs full of seriousness, eagerness, and -pride, and in her heart Lady Verny prayed not that God's will might be -done, which seemed to her mind superfluous, but that it might as far as -possible be made to square with Julian's. She was a wise and even a just -woman, but she thought that Providence might be persuaded to stretch a -point or two for Julian. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - - -Julian walked easily and swiftly up the slopes of the downs, whistling -as he went. He knew the point from which he would be sure to see his -flying nymph. The air was full of the songs of larks; beneath his feet -the short grasses and wild thyme sent up a clean and pungent fragrance. - -The little, comfortable beauties of the summer's day filled his heart -with gladness. There was no sound in all the sleepy country-side; the -peaceful shining clouds floated over the low green hills as vague as -waking dreams. - -The cropping of the sheep upon the downs, the searching, spiral laughter -of the larks, were part of the air itself; and the shadows ran an -interminable race across the long green meadows. - -Julian had had experiences of love before, but he had never been in love -as he was now. He compared these earlier efforts in his mind with the -light clouds that melted into the sunshine. Marian was the sunshine; -she thrilled and warmed his whole being. She was like an adventure to -him. He felt very humble in his heart to think the sun had cared to -shine upon him, and very strong to meet its shining. - -He noticed little things he had never noticed before: the feathery, fine -stalks of the harebells, and the blue butterflies that moved among them -like traveling flowers. Usually, when he walked, he noticed only the -quickest way to reach his goal. He noticed that now, but he tried not to -crush the small down flowers on his way. - -He caught sight of Marian from a ridge of down, sitting motionless and -erect upon the rim of an old chalk-pit. A long, blue veil hung over her -shoulders like the wings of a blue butterfly fluttering before him. She -saw his shadow before he reached her, and threw her head back with a -little gesture that was half a welcome and half a defiance. - -He came swiftly across the grass toward her, but it was she who was -breathless when he took her in his arms. - -"Trying to run away from me, are you?" he asked, smiling down at her. -"The world's too small here, and it's mine, you know. You shouldn't -have come here if you had wanted to escape me." - -"Let me go, Julian," she murmured. "I'm sure there's a shepherd close -by. Sit down and be sensible." - -"Shepherds be hanged!" said Julian, kissing her. "Do you suppose -anybody's ever been more sensible than I feel now? Kissing you is the -most sensible thing a man ever did; but don't let anybody else guess -it." - -He sat down at her feet and looked up into the beautiful, flushed face -above him. It was as lovely as a lifted flower; but unlike the flower, -it was not very soft. It was even like a slightly sophisticated hothouse -flower; but she had the look of race he loved. Her level, penciled -brows, small, straight nose, curved lips, and chin like a firm, round -apple, were the heritage of generations of handsome lives. Her coloring -was only a stain of pink upon a delicate, clear whiteness; but the eyes -beneath the low, smooth forehead, were disappointing. They were well-cut -hazel eyes, without light in them. They lay in her head a little flat, -like the pieces of a broken mirror. - -Just now they were at their tenderest. Her whole face, bending over him, -cool and sweet as the southwest wind and as provocative as the flying -clouds, moved his heart almost unbearably. She was like an English -summer day, and he knew now what it would mean to leave her. - -"I couldn't bear to stay down there," she explained. "I was frightened, -not of you, you absurd person, but of being glad. I'm afraid I don't -like big feelings very much. I can't explain exactly, but the papers -frightened me. I wanted to see you too much. Yes, sir, you may keep that -for a prize to your vanity; and I knew that if there should be war--" -She stopped, her lovely lips trembled a little. "I shall have to let you -go so soon!" she whispered. - -[Illustration: "I'm afraid I don't like big feelings much"] - -He bowed his head over her hand and kissed it passionately. - -"If I could spare you this pain," he said, "I'd take a thousand -lives--and lose them to do it!" - -"No! no!" she murmured. "Keep one, Julian!" - -He lifted his head and looked at her steadily. - -"I swear I'll keep it," he said. "I'll keep it, and bring it back to -you, cost what it may." - -It did not look as if it were going to cost very much, with the light -clouds passing overhead, and the soft down grasses under them; and their -great citadels of youth and love about them, unmenaced and erect. - -"I've a piece of work I've got to do," Julian went on, "and I can't tell -you anything about it. It'll take me three months, I fancy. I can fight -afterward." - -She looked at him with eyes in which astonishment turned almost hostile. - -"Not fighting?" she said. "But what do you mean, Julian? If we go in, -every one must fight. I know you're not a soldier, but there'll be -volunteers. With all your adventures and experiences, they are sure to -give you a good post. Everybody knows you. What do you mean--a job you -can't tell me about--unless, of course it's something naval?" - -Julian turned his face to the wild thyme. He shook his head. - -"No, not that," he said. "Can't you trust me, Marian?" - -"Trust you!" she said impatiently. "Of course I can trust you, but why -be so mysterious? Mightn't I equally say, 'Why don't you trust me?'" - -"It's part of my job," said Julian quietly, "not to trust the ground -we're on or the larks in the sky or the light of my heart,--that's you, -Marian,--and it doesn't happen to be the easiest part of my job." - -He waited for her to make it easier for him, but he waited in vain. -Marian expected easy things, but she did not expect to have to make -things easy. These two expectations seldom go together. - -"Do you mean to tell me that you are going to be some kind of spy?" she -asked in a tone of frank disgust. "Oh, Julian! I couldn't bear it! It's -so--so--un-English!" - -Julian chuckled. He ought not to have chuckled. If a man does not like a -woman with brains, he must learn not to laugh at their absence. Marian -stiffened under his laughter. - -"England's got to be awfully un-English in some ways if it wants to win -this war," he explained. "But you mustn't even to yourself put a name -to what I'm going to be. I'm just on a job that'll take me three months, -and I'm afraid, my darling, I can't send you a word. That cuts me all to -bits, but you're so brave, so brave, you'll let me go." - -He buried his head in the grass; he was not brave enough to bear to see -the strain he was putting on her courage. Nor was Marian. - -"No, Julian," she said, "you mustn't ask such a thing of me. Not to know -where you are, and not to be able to tell any one what you are doing! To -let you go out into the dark at a time like this! It's too much to ask -of me. Promise me you'll give up all idea of it, and try to get a -commission like other people. Surely that's hard enough for me. But I'll -bear that; I will never make it difficult for you by a word or a look; I -wouldn't hold you back a day! You've not settled anything of course?" - -He told her that he had settled everything, and that in two days he must -go. - -A terrible silence fell between them, a cold silence that was like the -pressure of a stone. Neither of them moved or looked at the other. -Julian took her hand. She did not withdraw it from him, but she left it -in his as unresponsive as a fallen leaf. - -"Marian," he whispered, "Marian. Love me a little." - -She would not turn her face to him. - -"Why do you talk to me of love," she asked bitterly, "when without -consulting me you do something which involves your whole life and mine!" - -He caught her in his arms and held her close to him, kissing her cold -lips till they answered him. - -"My darling! my darling!" he whispered, "I love you like this and like -this! It's sheer murder to leave you! I feel as if it would break me. -But I've got to go. Don't you see, don't you understand? It's work I do -well, it's important, just now it's more important than fighting; it's -not one man's life that hangs on it, but it's thousands. Believe me, -there's no dishonor in it. Love me or you'll break me, Marian! Don't be -against me. I couldn't stand it. Say you'll let me go, for if I go and -you don't say it, I'll go as a broken man." - -She pushed him gently away from her, considering him. She knew her -terrible power. She was very angry with him, and she had hurt him as -much as she meant to hurt him. She had no intention whatever of breaking -him. If he was going to do this kind of work, he must do it well. -Perhaps, after all, it was rather important; but important or not, he -should have asked her first. She laid her small hand over his big one -with a delicate pressure. - -"Never settle such a thing again without telling me," she said gravely. - -Julian promised quickly that he never would. He saw for the first time -that love was not liberty, and for the moment he preferred love. He had -not felt deeply enough to know that there is a way in which you may -widen liberty and yet keep love. - -"I shall let you go," Marian said gently, "and I shall try to bear it as -best I can." - -At the thought of how difficult it was going to be to bear, not to be -able to tell anybody anything, she cried a little. Her face was -uncontorted by her tears. They streamed down her blossom-colored cheeks -like drops of pearly dew. Julian thought her tears were softness, and -he struck at his chance. Now perhaps she would surrender to his hidden -hope. - -He pleaded, with her head against his heart, that she would marry him, -marry him now--at once. He could arrange it all in twenty-four hours. He -presented a thousand impetuous arguments. All his wits and his ardor -fought for him against her soft, closed eyes. She was his; she would be -his forever. He would go with that great possession in his heart; he -would go like a man crowned to meet his future. - -She opened her eyes at last and moved away from him. At that instant she -would have liked to marry him, she would have liked it very much; but -besides the fact that she had no things, there loomed the blank -uncertainty of the future. Would she be a wife or a widow, and how -should she know which she was? There were more immediate difficulties. -Her parents were in Scotland; hurried weddings were always very awkward; -you couldn't have bridesmaids or wedding presents; and a few hours' -honeymoon, with an indefinite parting ahead of it, would be extremely -painful. - -Even if a marriage under all these disabilities was legal--wouldn't it -be worse than illegal--wouldn't it be rather funny? - -Julian was sometimes impossible; he had been nearly overwhelming, but he -was quite impossible. He might be a dangerous man to marry in a hurry. -She would have to train him first. - -"It's out of the question, Julian," she said firmly. "The whole future -is too uncertain. I should love to--but I can't do it. It wouldn't be -right for me to do it. We must wait till you come back." - -Julian returned to his study of the short down grasses. He knew that if -she had loved to--she would have done it. He had a moment that was -bitter with doubt and pain; then his love rose up and swallowed it. He -saw the uncertainty for her. - -He wanted her now because he knew that he might never have her. He -wanted her with the fierce hunger of a pirate for a prize; but the very -sharpness of his desire made him see that it was sheer selfishness to -press his point. He overlooked the fact that it would have been -perfectly useless. No pressure would have changed Marian. Pressure had -done what it could for her already: it had moved her to tears. She dried -them now, and suggested that they had stayed on the downs long enough. - - - - -CHAPTER X - - -It sometimes seemed to Stella as if Chaliapine had brought on the war. -Those last long golden summer days were filled with his music, and then -suddenly out of them flashed the tents in the park, the processions of -soldiers and bands, the grim stir that swept over London like a squall -striking the surface of a summer sea. - -The town hall did not collapse, but it shook. It was a place where, as a -rule, the usual things took place, and even unusual things happened -usually; but there were several weeks at the beginning of the war when -all day long strange things happened strangely. Offices were changed, -the routine of years was swept up like dust into a dust-pan, and a new -routine, subject to further waves of change, took its place. Workers -voluntarily offered to do work that they were unaccustomed to do. The -council hall became a recruiting office. No. 8, the peculiar sanctum of -the sanitary inspector, was given up to an army surveyor. Tramps asked -the cashier questions. It was like the first act of "Boris Goudonoff." -Even food was carried about on trays, and as for proclamations, somebody -or other was proclaiming something all day long. - -There was no religion and no dancing, but there was the same sense of -brooding, implacable fate; it took the place of music, and seemed, -without hurry and without pause, to be carrying them all along in a -secret rhythm of its own toward an unseen goal. - -Mr. Leslie Travers ruled most of the town hall committees, and he -required innumerable statistics to be compiled and ready to be launched -intimidatingly at the first sign of any opposition to his ruling. - -Stella, to whom the work of compiling fell, had very little time to -consider the war. - -When she got home she usually went to sleep. From time to time she heard -Mrs. Waring announcing that there was no such thing as war and Eurydice -reciting battle-odes to Belgium. - -For the first time in her life Eurydice shared a common cause. She was -inclined to believe that England was fighting for liberty. She knew -that France was, partly because France was on the other side of the -channel and partly because of the French Revolution. The destruction of -Louvain settled the question of Belgium. To Eurydice, whatever was -destroyed was holy. Later on she became a violent pacifist because Mr. -Bolt said that we ourselves were Prussian; but for the moment nobody, -not even Mr. Bolt, had traced this evasive parallel. - -Professor Waring wrote several letters to the papers, asking what -precautions the Belgians were taking about Sanskrit manuscript. He had a -feeling that King Albert, though doubtless an estimable young man and -useful in the trenches, might, like most kings, have been insufficiently -educated to appreciate the importance of Sanskrit. That men should die -in large numbers to protect their country was an unfortunate incident -frequent in history, but that a Sanskrit manuscript should be destroyed -was a national calamity, for the manuscript could never be replaced. - -He made an abortive effort to reach Belgium and see about it himself, -but at the Foreign Office he was stopped by a young man with a single -eyeglass, from whom the professor had demanded a passport. The exact -expression used by this ignorant young person was, "I'm awfully sorry, -sir, but I'm afraid just at present Sanskrit manuscript will have to -rip." - -Professor Waring promptly addressed letters of remonstrance and advice -to several German professors upon the subject. They were returned to him -after three weeks, with a brief intimation that he was not to -communicate with the enemy. Professor Waring had considered German -professors to be his natural enemies all his life; this had been his -chief reason for communicating with them. He was fitted, as few -officials in the Foreign Office can ever have been fitted, to point out -to the German professors the joints in their armor. - -They had a great deal of armor and very few joints, and it discouraged -Professor Waring to leave these unpierced spots to the perhaps -less-practised hands of neutrals. - -But it was not until the destruction of Louvain that he grasped to the -full the reaction of his former antagonists. When Professor Waring read -a signed letter from some of the German professors agreeing to the -destruction of the famous Belgian library he acquiesced in the war. He -stood in front of his wife and woke Stella up in order to make his -declaration. - -"Henrietta, there _is_ a war," he announced. "It is useless for you to -assert that there is not. Not only _is_ there a war, but there should be -one; and if I were twenty years younger, though wholly unaccustomed to -the noisy mechanisms of physical destruction, I should join in it. As it -is, I propose to write a treatise upon the German mind. It is not one of -my subjects, and I shall probably have to neglect valuable work in order -to undertake it; still, my researches into the rough Stone Age will no -doubt greatly assist me. Many just parallels have already occurred to -me. I hope that no one in this house will be guilty of so uneducated a -frame of mind as to sympathize with the Teutonic iconoclasts even to the -extent of asserting, as I believe I heard you assert just now, -Henrietta, that none of them exist." - -Mrs. Waring murmured gently that she thought an intense hopefulness -might refine degraded natures, but the next day she bought wool and -began to knit a muffler. She had capitulated to the fact of the war. -While she knitted she patiently asserted that there was no life, truth, -intelligence, or force in matter; and Stella, when she came home in the -evening, picked up the dropped stitches. - -It was strange to Stella that her only personal link with the war was a -man whom she had seen only once and might never see again. She thought -persistently of Julian. She thought of him for Marian's sake, because -Marian was half frozen with misery. She thought of him because -unconsciously he stood in her mind for England. He was an adventurer, -half-god, half-child, who had the habit of winning without the -application of fear. She thought of him because he was the only young, -good-looking man of her own class with whom she had ever talked. - -Marian was afraid that Stella might think she had been unsympathetic to -Julian about his mission. She told Stella, with her usual direct -honesty, how angry she had been with him. - -"I know I was nasty to him," she said. "I can't bear to have any one -involve me first and tell me about it afterward." - -"Of course you can't," agreed Stella, flaming up with a gust of -annoyance more vivid than Marian's own. "How like him! How exactly like -him to be so high-handed! Fancy whirling you along behind him as if you -were a sack of potatoes! Of course you were annoyed, and I hope you gave -him a good sharp quarrel. One only has to look at Julian to see that he -ought to be quarreled with at regular intervals in an agreeable way for -the rest of his life." - -"I don't like quarrels," Marian said slowly. "They don't seem to me to -be at all agreeable; but I don't think Julian will act without -consulting me again." - -Stella looked at Marian curiously. What was this power that Marian had, -which moved with every fold of her dress, and stood at guard behind her -quiet eyes? How had she made Julian understand without quarreling that -he must never repeat his independences? Stella was sure Marian _had_ -made him understand it. It would be of no use to ask Marian how she had -done it, because Marian would only laugh and say: "Nonsense! It was -perfectly easy." She probably did not know herself what was the secret -of her power; she would merely in every circumstance in life composedly -and effectively use it. Was it perhaps that though Julian had involved -her actions, he had never involved Marian? Was love a game in which the -weakest lover always wins? - -"Of course I've never been in love," Stella said slowly, "and I haven't -the slightest idea how it's done or what happens to you; but I fancy -quarreling might be made very agreeable. Love is so tremendous, isn't -it, that there must be room for concealed batteries and cavalry charges; -and yet of course you know all the time that you are loving the person -more and more outrageously, so that nothing gets wasted or destroyed -except the edges you are knocking off for readjustments." - -"I don't think I do love Julian outrageously," Marian objected. "I -didn't, you see, do what he wanted: he had a mad idea of getting a -special license and having a whirlwind wedding, leaving me directly -afterward. Of course I couldn't consent to that." - -"Couldn't you?" asked Stella, wonderingly. "I don't see that it matters -much, you know, when you give that kind of thing to a person you love. -If you do love them, I suppose it shows you're willing to marry them, -doesn't it? But how, when, or where is like the sound of the -dinner-bell. You don't owe your dinner to the dinner-bell; it's simply -an arrangement for bringing you to the table. Marriage always seems to -me just like that. I should have married Julian in a second if I'd been -you; but I should have made him understand that I wasn't a sack of -potatoes, if I'd had to box his ears regularly every few minutes for -twenty-four hours at a stretch." - -"Surely marriage is sacred," said Marian, gravely. Stella's point of -view was so odd that Marian thought it rather coarse. - -"But it needn't be long," objected Stella; "you can be short and sacred -simultaneously. In fact, I think I could be more sacred if I was quick -about it; I should only get bored if I was long." - -"You have such a funny way of putting things," said Marian, a little -impatiently. "Of course I know what you mean, but I don't like being -hurried. I love Julian dearly, and I will marry him when there is time -for us to do it quietly and properly. Meanwhile it's quite awful not -hearing from him. I have never been so miserable in my life." - -Stella sat on the floor at Marian's feet with Marian's misery. She -entered into it so deeply that after a time Marian felt surprised as -well as comforted. She had not thought grief so pictorial. She felt -herself placed on a pinnacle and lifted above the ranks of happier -lovers. She thought it was her love for Julian that held her there; she -did not know that it was Stella's love for her. Stella for a time saw -only Marian--Marian frozen in a vast suspense, Marian racked with -silences and tortured with imagined dangers. She did not see Julian -until Marian had gone, and then suddenly she put her hands to her -throat, as if she could not bear the sharp pulsation of fear that -assailed her. If all this time they were only fearing half enough and -Julian should be dead? - -She whispered, "Julian dead!" Then she knew that she was not feeling any -more for Marian. She was feeling for herself. Fortunately, she knew -this didn't matter. Feeling for oneself was sharp and abominable, but it -could be controlled. It did not count; and she could keep this much of -Julian--the fear that he might be dead. It would not interfere with -Marian or with Julian. Hopes interfere: but Stella had no personal -hopes; she did not even envisage them. She claimed only the freedom of -her fears. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - - -It is disconcerting to believe that you are the possessor of one kind of -temper--a cold, deadly, on-the-spot temper--which cuts through the -insignificant flurries of other people like a knife through butter, and -then to find a sloppy explosiveness burst from you unaware. - -Mr. Travers had never dreamed that in the town hall itself he could ever -be led to lose a thing he had in such entire control as his temper. He -did not lose it when the blushing Mr. Belk had the audacity to stop him -in mid-career, on his way to his sanctum through No. 7, the outer office -of his assistant clerks, though they were, as a body, strictly forbidden -to address him while passing to and fro. Mr. Belk was so ill advised as -to say: - -"If you please, sir, it's four o'clock, and Miss Waring hasn't been out -to lunch yet." Mr. Travers merely ran his eye over Mr. Belk as a -fishmonger runs his eyes over vulnerable portions of cod laid out for -cutting, and brought down his chopper at an expert angle. - -"Since when, Mr. Belk," he asked, with weary irony, "has Miss Waring's -lunch been on your list of duties?" - -Then he passed swiftly into his office and faced Stella, closing the -door behind him. Temper shook him as a rough wind shakes an -insignificant obstacle. He could not hold it; it was gone. It blew -inside out like a deranged umbrella. He glared at Miss Waring. There was -nothing in her slight, bent figure, with its heavy, brown hair neatly -plaited in a crown about her head, which should have roused any town -clerk to sudden fury. - -"It's abominable," Mr. Travers exclaimed, bringing his trembling hand -down with a bang upon Stella's table, "how women behave!" - -Stella said out loud, "One hundred pounds, ten shillings, and sixpence," -and then looked up at her employer. She asked very quietly who had vexed -him. There might have been a fugitive gleam of laughter at the back of -her eyes, but there were shadows under them that made her look too tired -for laughter. - -"You, of course," he cried. "How are we ever to get through with our -work if you won't eat? It's so silly! It's so tiresome! It's so uncalled -for! Why are you doing these wretched lists now?" - -"Because," said Stella--and now the laughter ran out at him unexpectedly -and tripped him up--"the town clerk has a meeting at five o'clock at -which these statistics must be at hand to justify him in having his own -way!" - -"Put them down!" said Mr. Travers savagely. Stella laid down her pen -with the ready obedience which can be made so baffling when it proceeds -from an unconsenting will. "Now go out and get something to eat," he -went on, "while I do the wretched things. And don't let this occur -again. If you have too much to do,--and I know the correspondence gets -more and more every day,--mention it. We must get some help in." - -She was gone before he had finished his sentence--gone with that absurd -dimple in the corner of her cheek and the sliding laughter of her eyes. - -She had left behind her a curious, restless emptiness, as if the very -room itself waited impatiently for her return. It was half an hour -before she came back. The town clerk had had to answer three telephone -messages and four telegrams. If the outer office had not known that he -was there and Miss Waring wasn't, he would have had more interruptions. -Nevertheless, the figures had helped Mr. Travers to recover his temper. - -He was an expert accountant, and you can take figures upon their -face-value. They are not like women; they have no dimples. - -Mr. Travers was prepared to be the stern, but just, employer again. He -remained seated, and Stella leaned over his shoulder. He had not -expected that she would do this. - -"What have you had to eat?" he asked. It was not at all what he had -intended to say to Stella. - -"A cup of tea, two ham sandwiches, and a bun:--such a magnificent spread -for seven-pence!" replied Stella, cheerfully. "You've forgotten to put -in what the insurance will be--there at the bottom of the page." - -Mr. Travers rose to his feet. He was taller than Stella, and he -considered that he had a commanding presence. Stella slid back into her -seat. - -"You ought to have had," said Mr. Travers, with labored quietness, -"beefsteak and a glass of port." - -"Anybody could tell," said Stella, tranquilly, "that you are an -abstemious man, Mr. Travers. Port! Port _and_ steak! You mean porter. -All real drinkers know that port is sacred. Bottles of it covered with -exquisite cobwebs are kept for choice occasions; they are brought in -softly by stately butlers, walking delicately like Agag. It is drunk in -companionable splendor, tenderly ministered to by nothing more solid -than a walnut, and it follows the courses of the sun. There, you did -quite a lot while I was away, and if you don't mind just looking through -those landlords' repairing leases on your desk, I dare say I shall have -finished this before five." - -Mr. Travers opened his mouth, shut it again, and returned to his -repairing leases. He was not an employer any more. He was not an icy, -mysterious tyrant ruling over a trembling and docile universe: his own -secretary had literally told him to run away and play! - -But it was in the night watches that the worst truth struck him. He had -been furious with Miss Waring for not spending more upon her lunch, he -had upbraided her for it, and she had never turned round and said, "Look -what I earn!" The opportunity was made to her hand. "How can women -secretaries earning a hundred a year eat three-and-sixpenny lunches?" -That ought to have been her answer. Why wasn't it? She hadn't been too -stupid to see it. She had seen it, and she had instantly, before he had -had time to see it himself, covered it up and hidden it under that -uncalled-for eulogy on port. It was not fear. She hadn't been afraid to -stand up to him (uncalled-for eulogies _were_ standing up to him); -besides she had previously called him unfair to his face. It was just -something that Miss Waring _was_--something that made the color spring -into Mr. Traver's face in the dark till his cheeks burned; something -that had made Mr. Belk dare his chief's displeasure to get her lunch; -something that wasn't business. - -"She wouldn't take an advantage, because I'd given it to her," he said -to himself. "I thought everybody took an advantage when they had the -sense to see it; but she doesn't, though she has plenty of sense. But -the world couldn't go on like that." - -This brilliant idea reassured Mr. Travers; he stopped blushing. He was -relieved to think that the world couldn't go on like Stella; but there -was something in him, a faint contradictory something, that made him -glad that Stella didn't go on like the world. - -He went to sleep with these two points unreconciled. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - - -Stella had always known that it would come; she had spent two months -far-seeing it. It had usually taken the form of a telegram falling out -of Mrs. Waring's wool, or Eurydice standing upon the steps, -Cassandra-like, to greet her with a message from Marian. Marian would -come to give her the message, but she wouldn't wait; she would drive -swiftly away in a motor, and leave the broken universe behind her. But -disasters do not come as we have planned their coming. - -It was a dull November day, the streets were full of dying leaves, and -at the end of all the cross-roads surrounding the town hall a blue mist -hung like a curtain. Marian, in black velvet and furs, with old Spanish -ear-rings gleaming from her shell-like ears, stood in disgust upon the -steps of the town hall. Her small face was frozen with unexpected pain, -but she could still feel annoyed with the porter. She stood in the -thronged corridor and asked decisively for Miss Waring. - -The porter told her that Miss Waring worked in No. 7, or, at any rate, -No. 7 would know where she was working. - -Marian stared slightly over the porter's head. - -"My good man," she said, "how am I to know where No. 7 is? Go and tell -her to come to me. Here is my card." - -All the way to No. 7 the porter concocted brilliant retorts to this -order. He would tell her he was not a footman and that this wasn't -Buckingham Palace. He would say roughly that, if she had eyes in her -head, she could find No. 7 for herself. But he was intimidated by -Marian's ear-rings. A secret fear that she might turn out to be the lord -mayor's daughter drove him to No. 7. - -Stella was filing letters when he knocked, and when he saw the card she -knew the messenger had come; but she did not forget to say as usual, -"Oh, thank you, Humphreys." - -She finished filing the letters before she looked for Mr. Travers. - -He was coming out of the council chamber at the top of a flight of -stairs. She stood there for a moment, holding him with her eyes, her -lips parted. She looked like a bird that has been caught in a room and -despairs of finding the way out. - -Her face was strained and eager, and her sensitive eyebrows were drawn -together in a little tortured frown; but she spoke quietly as soon as -her breath came back to her. - -"Mr. Travers, a friend of mine is in trouble. May I go to her for the -afternoon? There is still a great deal to do,--I know I ought not to ask -you to let me go,--but Mr. Belk and Miss Flint are so kind that I am -sure they would help me. I--I should be very grateful if you could spare -me." - -"Certainly not," said Mr. Travers, sharply. "I mean, of course, you can -go; but I won't have Mr. Belk or Miss Flint near me. I will do the work -myself." - -"Oh," she cried, aghast at this magnanimous humility on the part of her -employer, "please don't! Do let me ask them! I'd so much rather--" - -Mr. Travers waved her away. He wanted to do the work himself, and he -wanted her to be aghast. He descended the stairs rapidly beside her. - -"You may leave immediately, Miss Waring," he said sternly as they -reached No. 7; "and I will make my own arrangements about your work." - -Stella fled. Again he felt the sense of wings, as if he had opened a -window, and a bird had flown past him into liberty. - -He did not want her to be grateful, but he thought she might have looked -back. She had noticed him only as a barrier unexpectedly fallen. She had -not seen how strange it was that a barrier of so stubborn and erect a -nature as Mr. Travers should have consented to fall. - -If any one else had asked him for an afternoon with a friend in trouble, -Mr. Travers knew that he would have said, "Your friends' troubles must -take place outside office-hours." But when he had seen Stella's face he -had forgotten office-hours. - -Marian was sitting on a chair in the corridor. Her expression implied -that there was no such thing as a town hall, and that the chair was a -mere concession to unnecessary space. She said, as she saw Stella: - -"Please be quick about putting your things on. Yes, it's bad news about -Julian." - -Stella was quick. Marian said no more until they were seated together in -the motor; then she gave Stella a letter she had received from Lady -Verny. Lady Verny wrote: - - My dear Marian: You must prepare yourself for a great distress. - Julian is in England, but he is very much injured. I want you to go - to him at once. Whenever he is conscious he asks for you. My dear, - if he recovers,--and they think that if he has an incentive to live - he will live,--he will be partially paralyzed. I know that he will - want to free you, and it will be right that you should even now - feel free; but till then--for a month--will you give him all you - can? All he needs to live? It is a great deal to ask of you, but I - think you are good and kind, and that I shall not ask this of you - in vain. His life is valuable, and will still be so, for his brain - is not affected. Before he relapsed into unconsciousness he was - able to give the Government the information he acquired. I think it - is not wrong to help him to live; but of course I am his mother, - and it is difficult for me to judge. All this is very terrible for - you, even the deciding of whether you ought to help him to live or - not. If I might suggest anything to you, it would be to talk about - it with that friend of yours, Miss Waring. - - Come to me when you have seen him. Do not think, whatever your - decision is, that I shall not realize what it costs you, or fail - to do all in my power to help you to carry it out. - - Yours affectionately, - - HELEN VERNY. - -Stella dropped the letter and looked at Marian. Marian sat erect, and -her eyes burned. She was tearless and outraged by sorrow. There are -people who take joy as a personal virtue and sorrow as a personal -insult, and Marian was one of these people. Happiness had softened and -uplifted her; pain struck her down and humiliated her solid sense of -pride. - -"Why wasn't he killed?" she asked bitterly, meeting Stella's questioning -eyes. "I could have borne his being killed. Value! What does Lady Verny -mean by value? His career is smashed; his life is to all intents and -purposes over. And mine with it! It is very kind of her to say he will -release me. I do not need his mother to tell me that. She seems to have -overlooked the fact that I have given him my word! Is it likely that I -should fail him or that I could consent to be released? I do not need -any one to tell me my duty. But I hate life! I _hate_ it! I think it all -stupid, vile, senseless! Why did I ever meet him? What good has love -been to me? A few hours' happiness, and then this martyrdom set like a -trap to catch us! And I don't like invalids. I have never seen any one -very ill. I sha'n't know what to say to him." - -"Oh, yes, you will, when you see him," said Stella; it was all that for -a while she could say. - -She had always believed that Marian had a deep, but close-locked, -nature. Love presumably would be the key. - -It was unlocked now. Pain had unlocked it, instead of love, and Stella -shivered at the tearless hardness, the sharp, shallow sense of personal -privation that occupied Marian's heart. She had not yet thought of -Julian. - -Stella told herself that Marian's was only the blindness of the -unimaginative. The moment Marian saw Julian it would pass, and yield -before the directer illumination of the heart. Marian's nature was -perhaps one of those that yields very slowly to pain. When she saw -Julian she would forget everything else. She would not think of her -losses and sacrifices any more, or her duties. Stella felt curiously -stung and wasted by Marian's use of the word "duty." Was that all there -was for the woman whom Julian loved? Was that all there was for Julian! - -But she could deal only with what Marian had; so, when she spoke again, -Stella said all she could to comfort Marian. She spoke of Julian's -courage; she said no life in Julian could be useless that left his brain -free to act. She suggested that he would find a new career for himself, -and she pictured his future successes. Beneath her lips and her quick -outer mind she thought only of Julian, broken. - -They stopped in a large, quiet square, at the door of a private -hospital. There was no sound but the half-notes of birds stirring at -twilight in the small square garden, and far off the muffled murmur of -distant streets. - -A nurse opened the door. - -"You are Miss Young?" she said to Marian. "Yes, of course, we were -expecting you. Sister would like to see you first." - -They stood for a moment in a small neat office. The sister rose from an -old Dutch bureau, one of the traces of the house's former occupants, and -held out her hand to Marian. Her eyes rested with intentness upon the -girl's face. - -"Sir Julian is almost certain to know you," she said gently, "but you -mustn't talk much to him. He has been much weakened by exposure. He lay -in a wood for three days without food or water. There is every hope of -his partial recovery, Miss Young; but he needs rest and reassurance. We -can give him the rest here, but we must look to you to help us to bring -back to him the love of life." - -Marian stood with her beautiful head raised proudly. She waited for a -moment to control her voice; then she asked quietly: - -"Is the paralysis likely to be permanent?" - -The sister moved a chair toward her, but Marian shook her head. - -"It is a state of partial paralysis. He will be able to get about on -crutches," the sister replied. "Won't you rest for a few moments before -going up to him, Miss Young?" - -"No, thank you," said Marian; "I will go up to him at once." - -She turned quickly toward the door, and meeting Stella's eyes, she took -and held her arm tightly for a moment, and then, loosing it, walked -quickly toward the stairs. Stella followed her as if she had no being. -She had lost all consciousness of herself. She was a thought that clung -to Julian, an unbodied idea fixed upon the cross of Julian's pain. She -did not see the staircase up which she passed; she walked through the -wood in which Julian had lain three days. - -He was in a large, airy room with two other men. Stella did not know -which was Julian until he opened his eyes. There was no color in his -face, and very little substance. The other men were raised in bed and -looked alive, but Julian lay like something made of wax and run into a -mold. Only his eyes lived--lived and flickered, and held on to his -drifting consciousness. - -The nurse guided Marian to his bed, and, drawing a chair forward, placed -it close to him. Marian leaned down and kissed his forehead. She had -determined to do that, whatever he looked like; and she did it. - -His lips moved. She bent down, and a whisper reached her: "I said I'd -come back to you, and I have." Then he closed his eyes. He had nothing -further to say. - -Marian did not cry. After the first moment she did not look at Julian; -she looked away from him out of the window. She did not feel that it was -Julian who lay there like a broken toy. It was her duty. She had -submitted to it; but nothing in her responded to this submission except -her iron will. - -The nurse had forgotten to bring a chair for Stella. She leaned against -the door until a red-haired boy with a bandaged arm, on the bed nearest -to her, exclaimed earnestly: - -"Do take my chair! You look awfully done." - -She was able to take his chair because her hands were less blind than -any other part of her, and she smiled at him because she had the habit -of smiling when she thanked people. Then her eyes went back to Julian. -Her heart had never left him; and she knew now that it never would leave -him again. - -She did not know how long or short it was before Marian rose gracefully, -and said in her clear, sweet voice, "I shall come again to-morrow, -Julian." - -Marian stopped at each of the other bedsides before she joined Stella. -She said little, friendly, inclusive words to the other two men, which -made them feel as if they would like to sweep the floor under her feet. - -"All the same," the red-haired man explained after the door closed, "it -was the untidy little one, piled up against the door, that minded most. -I dare say she was his sister." - -He had no need to lower his voice, though he did lower it, for fear of -its reaching Julian. - -Julian had been reassured, and now he was resting. Consciousness had -altogether receded from him, perhaps that it might give him a better -chance of resting. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - - -Julian roused himself with the feeling that he had said only half of -what he had intended to say to Marian. It had been in his mind a long -time. It was while he was lying out under the pine-trees that he had -realized what he had got to say to Marian if he ever got back. There was -a complicated cipher message for the Government, which he had kept quite -clear in his mind, and eventually given to an intelligent doctor to send -off; and there was the message to Marian, which he himself would have to -say when he saw her. - -"I've come back, as I promised; but I can't marry you now, of course. -I'm a crock." - -The first time he saw Marian he had got through only the first part of -the sentence. There was no hurry about the rest of it. The doctor and -the sister had both assured him that there was no hurry. They had been -very kind, and quite as honest as their profession permitted. They said -Marian would come back, and he could tell her then. - -They admitted, when he cross-questioned them with all the sharpness of -which he was capable, that he would be a cripple. They did not bother -him with futile commiserations. They gave him quietly and kindly the -facts he asked for. He would never be able to walk again, but he could -get about easily on crutches. - -Julian did not want to live very much, but his mother's eyes hurt him -when he tried not to; and then Marian came again, and he got through the -rest of his sentence. - -"You see," he explained in a low whisper which sounded in his head like -a gong, "marriage is quite out of the question." - -Marian was there with smiles and flowers, just as he had so often -pictured her; but she sat down with a curious solidity, and her voice -sounded clearer than it had sounded in his dreams. - -"Nothing alters our engagement, Julian," she said. "Nothing can." - -She spoke with a finality that stopped his thinking. He had finished his -sentence, and it seemed hardly fair to be expected to start another on -the spur of the moment. He gave himself up to a feeling of intense -relief: he had got off his cipher to the Government and he had released -Marian. - -He had known these were going to be difficult things to do. The cipher -had been the worst. The French doctor had taken some time to understand -that Julian must neither die nor be attended to until he had sent the -cipher off; and now the business about Marian was over, too. He had only -to lie there and look at her day by day coming in with roses. They did -not talk much. Julian never spoke of his symptoms, but they were too -radical to free him. He lay under them like a creature pinned under the -wreckage of a railway accident. - -Slowly, day by day, his strength came back to him; and as it came back, -peace receded. His eyes lost their old adoring indulgence; they seemed -to be watching Marian covertly, anxious for some gift that she was -withholding from him. He did not demand this as a right, as the old -Julian would have done, breaking down the barriers of her pride to -reach it. He pleaded for it with shamed eyes that met hers only to -glance away. Something in her that was not cruelty as much as a baffling -desire to escape him made her refuse to give him what his eyes asked. - -Julian had loved her for her elusiveness, and the uncaptured does not -yield readily to any appeal from the hunter. The prize is to the strong. - -She would not have withstood a spoken wish of his; but there is -something in speechless suffering from which light sympathies shrink -away. Pity lay in Marian a tepid, quickly roused feeling, blowing -neither hot nor cold. She cried easily over sad books, but she had none -of the maternal instinct which seizes upon the faintest indication of -pain with a combative passion for its alleviation. She became -antagonistic when she was personally disturbed by suffering. - -She was keeping her word to Julian while her heart was drifting away -from him; and he, while he desired her to be free, instinctively tried -to hold her back. They had both put their theories before their -instincts, and they expected their instincts to stand aside until their -theories had been carried out. - -Perhaps if Julian could have told her his experiences he might have -recaptured her imagination; but when she asked him to tell her about -them, he said quickly, "I can't," and turned away his head. He was -afraid to trust himself. He wanted to tell her everything. He was afraid -that if he began, his reticence would break down, and he would tell her -things which must never pass his lips. He longed for her to know that -every day, and nearly every hour, he had fought and conquered intricate -abnormal obstacles. He had slipped across imminent death as a steady -climber grips and passes across the face of a precipice. - -He had never faltered. All that he had gone to find he had found, and -more. At each step he had seen a fresh opportunity, and taken it. He had -been like a bicyclist in heavy traffic assailed on every side by -converging vehicles, and yet seeing only the one wavering ribbon of his -way out. And he had won his way out with knowledge that was worth a -king's ransom. He could have borne anything if Marian would realize that -what he had borne had been worth while. But after her first unanswered -question, Marian never referred again to what he had done. She behaved -as if his services had been a regrettable mistake. - -She talked with real feeling about the sufferings of those who fought in -the war. Her eyes seemed to tell him what her lips refrained from -uttering, that she could have been more sorry for him if he had been -wounded in a trench, and not shot at and abandoned by a nervous sentry -firing in the dark. He could not remember the exact moment when out of -the vague turmoil of his weakened mind he gripped this cold truth: -Marian was not tender. - -When she was not there he could pretend. He could make up all the -beautiful, loving little things she had not said, and sometimes he would -not remember that he had made them up. Those were the best moments of -all. He believed then that she had given him what his heart hungered -for. He was too much ashamed of his ruined strength to feel resentment -at Marian's coldness. It struck him as natural that she should care less -for a broken man. - -His mind traveled slowly, knocking against the edges of his old dreams. - -He thought perhaps a nursing home wasn't the kind of place in which -people could really understand one another, all mixed up with screens -and medicine bottles, and nurses bringing things in on trays. If he -could see Marian once at Amberley for the last time, so that he could -keep the picture of her moving about the dark wainscoted rooms, or -looking out from the terrace above the water meadows, he would have -something precious to remember for the rest of his life; and she -mightn't mind him so much there, surrounded by the dignity of the old -background of his race. One day he said to her: - -"I want to go to Amberley as soon as I can be moved. I want to see it -again with you." - -"In December?" asked Marian, with lifted, disapproving brows. "It would -be horribly damp, my dear Julian, all water-meadows and mist. You would -be much more comfortable here." - -Julian frowned. He hated the word "comfort" in connection with himself. - -"You don't understand," he said, a little impatiently. "I know every -inch of it, and it's quite jolly in the winter. We are above the water. -I want to see the downs. One gets tired of milk-carts and barrel organs, -and the brown tank on the roof across the way. You remember the downs, -Marian?" - -His eyes met hers again with that new, curiously weak look of his. -Marian turned her head away. How could Julian bear to speak of the -downs? - -She saw for a moment the old Julian springing up the hillside assured -and eager, the fine, strong lover who had taken her heart by storm. She -spoke coldly to this weaker Julian. - -"Yes," she said, "I am not likely to forget the downs. I spent the last -happy hours of my life there; but I cannot say I ever wish to see them -again." - -Julian's eyes fell, so that she could not see if he had even noticed how -bitterly she remembered Amberley. - -The next day she found him sitting up for the first time. He was propped -up by cushions, but it made him look as if he had gained some of his -old incisive strength. - -The other two men had been moved, and they had the large, bare room to -themselves. - -No sound came from the square beneath them; in the house itself there -were passing footsteps and the occasional persistent buzzing of an -electric bell. - -"Look here," said Julian in a queer, dry voice, "I've got an awful lot -to say to you--d'you mind drawing your chair nearer? I meant to say it -at Amberley. I'd have liked it better there. I rather hate this kind of -disinfected, sloppy place for talk. You must loathe it, too. But here or -there it's got to be said. You said something or other when I first put -it to you--about our engagement never being broken. It was awfully good -of you, of course. I couldn't see through it at the time. I wanted to -let things slide. But it's all nonsense my dear girl. Women like you -can't marry logs of wood." - -[Illustration: "Women like you can't marry logs of wood"] - -He looked at her anxiously. Her eyes were shut to expression. She sat -there, just as lovely, just as sphinx-like as some old smiling portrait. -There was the same unfluctuating, delicate color in her face, and the -same unharassed, straightforward glancing of the eyes. She was not the -least perturbed by what he said; she expected him to say it. - -"We should be foolish," she answered quietly, "to try to ignore the -terrible difference in our lives, Julian, and I was sure you would want -to set me free; but you cannot do it. I took the risk of your accident, -unwillingly at first; but, still, eventually I accepted it, and I will -not be set free." - -His eyes held hers compellingly, as if he were searching for some inner -truth behind her words, and then slowly reluctant tears gathered across -the keenness of his vision. He leaned his head back on his pillow and -looked away. - -"I don't think," he said slowly, "you're glad to have me back. I don't -want to marry you, I couldn't marry you; but I wish to Heaven you'd been -glad! O Marian, I'm a coward and a fool, but if you'd been glad, I'd -have gone down under it! I'd have married you then. I oughtn't to say -this. It's all nonsense, and you're quite right. It's awfully fine of -you to want to keep your word; but, you see, I didn't want your word. -It's your heart I wanted. I used to say out there sometimes, when things -were a bit thick, 'Never mind. If I get through, she'll be glad.'" - -Marian drew herself up. This did not seem to her fair of Julian. She had -prayed very earnestly to God for his safe return. Neither God nor he had -been quite fair about it. This was not a safe return. - -"I don't know what more I can do, Julian," she said steadily, "than -offer to share my life with you." - -"That's just it," said Julian, with that curious look in his eyes which -kept fighting her, and yet appealing to her simultaneously. "You can't -do more. If you could, I'm such a weak hound, I'd lie here and take it. -If you wanted me, Marian,--wanted a broken fragment of a man fit for a -dust-pan,--I'd land you with it. But, 'pon my word, it's too steep when -you don't want it. Out of some curious sense of duty toward the -dust-pan--I'm afraid I'm being uncivil to the universe, but I feel a -little uncivil to it just now. No; you've got to go. I'm sorry. Don't -touch me. Just let me be; but if you could say just where you are -before you go! But it doesn't matter. I shouldn't believe it. I wouldn't -believe the mother that bore me now. I've seen the end of love." - -The tears burned themselves away from his eyes; they gazed at her as -sunken and blue as the sea whipped by an east wind. She turned slowly -toward the door. - -"I want you to remember, Julian," she said, "that I meant what I said. I -mean it still. I _wish_ to carry out our engagement." - -Julian said something in reply that Marian didn't understand. He was -repeating out loud and very slowly the cipher he had sent to the -Government. - -After all, it had been easier to send the cipher to the Government than -to release Marian. His mind had sprung back to the easier task. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - - -It was not often that Stella took anything for herself, least of all -Saturday afternoons. They belonged by a kind of sacred right to -Eurydice, and what was left over from Eurydice was used on the weekly -accounts. Mrs. Waring found it easier to explain to Stella than to any -one else why one and sixpence that was really due to the butcher should -have been expended upon "The Will of God," bound in white and gold for -eighteenpence, an indisputable spiritual bargain, but a poor equivalent -to the butcher. - -But this Saturday afternoon Stella hardened her heart against Eurydice -and turned her mind away from the vista of the weekly bills. She wanted -to think about Julian. - -Marian had left London the day after her interview with him. She -belonged to that class of people which invariably follows a disagreeable -event by a change of address; but she had found time before she went to -write to Stella. There was something she wanted Stella to send on after -her from the Army and Navy stores. She was really too upset and rushed -to go there herself. Julian had been so extraordinary; he apparently -expected her to be fonder of him now than when he was all right. She had -really made tremendous sacrifices going to that horrid nursing home -every day for a month. Both her parents were delighted that the -engagement was at an end, and of course it was a relief in some ways, -though horribly sad and upsetting, especially as Julian behaved as if -she were to blame. Marian was afraid he wasn't as chivalrous as she had -always thought. She had idealized him. One does when one is in love with -people; but it doesn't last. One wakes up and finds everything -different. - -Stella wanted to forget Marian's letter. It seemed to her as cursory and -callous as a newspaper account of a storm in China. It was all so far -off, and drowned Chinamen are so much alike; and yet she had written to -tell Stella about Julian and the end of love. "Many waters cannot quench -love"; it had not taken many waters to quench Marian's. It occurred to -Stella for the first time that the quality of love depends solely upon -the heart that holds it; not even divine fire can burn on an untended -hearth. - -It was a mild December day; winter had given itself a few soft hours in -which to brood upon the spring. London, the last of places to feel the -touch of nature and the first to profit by it, had passed into a golden -mist. - -Stella left the town hall at two o'clock, and walked down the busy -highway. All the little, lively shops were awake and doing their noisy -business of the week, while farther west all the big, quiet shops, with -other habits, closed on the heels of their departing customers. Stella -slipped away from the eager friendly crowd, glued together in -indissoluble groups upon the pavement. She wanted to be alone and not to -have to keep reminding herself not to think of Julian until she had -finished what she had to do. - -She turned down a narrow lane with high brick walls. Silence and -solitude were at the turn of a corner. London fell away from her like a -jangling dream. - -She passed an iron-scrolled gateway which led into an old garden. The -low-browed house, with its overhanging eaves, was once the home of a -famous poet. Poetry clung about it still; it was in the air, and met her -like the touch of a friend's hand. A little farther along the lane she -came to an opening in the wall, and saw before her a small, surrounded -field of grass. It was a Quaker burial-ground. This unique and quiet -people, in their enmity with form, had chosen of all forms the most -resilient. They had made in the heart of London a picture, and a place -of peace for death. - -There was no sense of desolation in the silent field; only the sunshine, -the old walls, and the green emptiness. It might have been the -grass-grown citadel of Tusculum spread out at Stella's feet, it was a -spot so acquainted with the air, with solitude, and with a nameless -history. - -Beyond it lay a maze of old and narrow streets, with quaint, lop-sided -houses, uneven roofs, and winding causeways. - -At the end of one of these she came suddenly upon a waste of waters the -color of a moonstone. Stella had never been abroad; but she felt as if -a wall between her mind and space had broken down and shown her Venice. -Drifting slowly down the broad stream were two white swans, and across -the river a green bank stood beneath a row of shining towers. - -They were a row of factory chimneys; but rising out of the mist, above -the moonstone flood, they looked like ancient towers. Stella sat upon a -wooden float; it made a luxurious seat for her opposite the drifting -swans. She felt as if all her thoughts at last were free. There was no -one in sight; old and dignified houses leaned toward the water-front: -but for all the life that inhabited them, they might have been the -ghosts of houses. Nothing stirred, but sometimes up the river a -sea-gull, on level wings, with wary eyes, wandered above the watery -highway, challenging the unaccustomed small spaces of the sky. - -Stella wished for the first time that Julian were dead. She did not -believe in a capricious or an impatient God, moved by well-timed -petitions; but all her being absorbed itself into an unconscious prayer -for Julian's peace. - -She could not have told how long she had been there when she heard the -sound of footsteps, strangely familiar footsteps, direct, regular, and -swift. She looked up, to meet the grave, intent gaze of Mr. Leslie -Travers. - -Stella rubbed her eyes as if she had been asleep. Surely in a place of -whispering silences, town clerks did not burst upon you except in -dreams? - -Of course Mr. Travers might live in one of these old, quiet houses, -though it did not seem very likely to Stella. She thought he must live -in some place where the houses looked as if they knew more what they -were about, and did not brood over a deserted waterway - - Seeing all their own mischance - With a glassy countenance, - -like that immortal gazer, the _Lady of Shalott_. - -Mr. Travers did not pass Stella with his usual air of cutting through -space like a knife. He crossed the float gingerly, and asked firmly, but -with kindness, if he might sit down. - -Stella gave a helpless gesture of assent. She could not stop him, but he -was inappropriate. The row of factory chimneys ceased to disguise -themselves as towers; the float looked as if it knew suddenly how -unsuitable it was for a winter afternoon's repose. The swans, -approaching fatally near for the ideal, were very nearly black. - -"Do you not find it damp here?" asked Mr. Travers. - -Stella said: - -"Yes, very"; and then, meeting his surprised eyes, she hastily corrected -herself. "No, not at all." Then gave a little, helpless laugh. "Forgive -me!" she said. "You surprised me so. Has anything gone wrong at the town -hall?" - -Mr. Travers did not immediately answer her question. He had never sat on -a float before. Still, it was not this fact which silenced him. He had -not been sure when he approached if Stella was crying or not. There was -still something that looked suspiciously like the pathway of a tear upon -the cheek next him, and though she was laughing now, it had not the -sound of her usual laughter; it stirred in him a sense of tears. - -"I think I shall confess at once," he said finally, "that I followed -you. I wanted to talk to you without interruption. I might have called -upon you at your home, of course, but I have not had the pleasure of -meeting your family, and in this instance my business was with you." - -Stella gave a faint sigh of relief. She was glad it was business. She -was used to business with Mr. Travers. She was not used to pleasure with -him, and she was not in the mood for new experiences. - -"I shall be glad to talk over anything with you about which I can be of -use," she said gently, "and I think this is a beautiful place to do it -in." - -"The rents," said Mr. Travers, glancing critically at the silent houses, -"must be very low, necessarily low. I hope you do not often come here," -he added after a pause. "It is the kind of place in which I should -strongly suspect drains. We might mention it to the sanitary inspector -and ask him for a report upon it." - -"Oh, must we?" murmured Stella. - -"Not if you would rather not," said Mr. Travers, unexpectedly. "In that -case I would waive the question." - -Stella glanced at him in alarm. Was Mr. Travers going mad from -overstrain at the town hall? He must be very nearly mad to come and sit -upon a float with his secretary on Saturday afternoon, and waive a -question of drains. - -"But that wouldn't be business," she said gravely. - -"Yes, it would," said Mr. Travers, relentlessly. "It is my immediate -business to please you." - -Stella's alarm deepened; but it became solely for Mr. Travers. She did -not mind if he was sane or not if only he refrained from saying anything -that he would ultimately regret. - -"I don't know whether you realize, Miss Waring," Mr. Travers continued, -"that I am a very lonely man. I have no contemporary relatives. My -father died when I was a young child. I lost my mother two years ago. My -work has not entailed many friendships. I began office work very young, -and it has to a great extent absorbed me. I think I should be afraid to -say it to any one but you,--it would sound laughable,--but my chief -attachment of late years has been to a cat." - -It was curious that, though Mr. Travers had often been nervous of his -secretary's humor, he understood that she would not laugh at him about -his cat. - -"Oh," she cried, "I hope it loves you as well. They won't sometimes, I -know; you can pour devotion out on them, and they won't turn a hair. But -when they do, it's so wonderfully reassuring. Dogs will love almost any -one, but cats discriminate. I do hope your cat discriminates toward you, -Mr. Travers?" - -"I think it was attached to me in its way," said Mr. Travers, clearing -his throat. "It was an old cat, and now it is dead. I merely mention it -in passing." - -"Yes, yes," said Stella, quickly. "But I'm so sorry! I hate to think you -had to lose what you loved." - -"You would," said Mr. Travers. "But the point I wish to make to you is -that a man whose sole dependence is upon the attachment of a cat does -not know much about human relationships. I fear I am exceedingly -ignorant upon this subject. Until lately this had not particularly -disturbed me. Now I should wish to have given it more consideration." - -"But I think you have," said Stella, eagerly; "I mean I think you've -changed lately about relationships. Now I think of it, I'm quite sure -you have. I have always enjoyed my work with you, and you have never -been inconsiderate to me. But I used to think people weren't very real -to you, as if you wanted to hurry through them and stick them on a neat, -tight file, like the letters, according to their alphabetical order. But -now I know you're not like that. Even if you hadn't told me about the -cat I should have known it." - -"Thank you," said Mr. Travers. "Thank you very much." - -For a while he said nothing at all, and Stella wondered if that was all -he wanted. She hoped it was all he wanted. Then he turned and looked -down at her. - -"I have formed an attachment now, Miss Waring," he said, "and I am in a -suitable position to carry it out. You have been the best secretary a -man ever had. Could you undertake to become my wife?" - -Stella bowed her head. She had come here to think about Julian, but she -had not been able to think about him for very long. She did not think -about him at all now. She thought only about Mr. Travers. She was so -sorry for him that she could not look at him. What compensation was -there for what she had not got to give him, and in what mad directions -does not pity sometimes drive? For a moment she felt as if she could not -say "No" to him; but to say "Yes" would make nothing any easier, for -after she had said "Yes" she would have nothing more to give. - -There is seldom any disastrous situation in which there is not something -that can be saved. Stella saw in a flash what she might still save out -of it. She could save Mr. Travers's pride at the cost of hers. She was a -very proud and a very reticent woman; she would take the deepest thing -in her heart and show it to Mr. Travers that he might not feel ashamed -at having shown her his own. - -"I can't," she said quickly, slipping her small, firm hand over his; -"not because it isn't beautiful of you. It is, of course; it's one of -the most beautiful things I've ever known, because you know nothing -about me, and I'm so glad I'm not what you would really like if you did -know me. Remember that afterward." - -"Excuse me," interrupted Mr. Travers, dryly; "I am the best judge of -what I like." - -"I wonder if you really are," said Stella, with a little gasp, as if she -had been running. "I wonder if I really am myself. But we both think we -are, don't we? We can't help that--and the very same thing has happened -to us both: we've seen and wanted a little--something that wouldn't -do--that wouldn't do at all for either of us ever. If you _had_ to like -somebody that wouldn't do, I think I'm glad you came to me, because, you -see, I know what it feels like. I can be sorry and proud and glad you've -given it to me, and then we need never talk about it any more." - -Mr. Travers looked straight in front of him. Stella had not withdrawn -her hand; but Mr. Travers pressed it, and laid it down reverentially -between them. He would never forget that he had held it, but to continue -to hold it until she had accepted him would have seemed to Mr. Travers a -false position. - -"There is another point to which I should like to draw your attention," -he said after a slight pause. "Marriage does not necessarily imply any -feeling of an intense nature by both parties. I wish to offer you -security and companionship. As I told you before, I am a lonely man; I -could be content with very little. I have noticed that when you come -into a room it makes a difference to me." - -"Don't make me cry!" said Stella, suddenly, and then she did cry a -little, a nervous flurry of tears that shook her for a brief moment and -left her laughing at the consternation in his face. - -"You see how silly I am!" she said. "But however silly, I'm not a cheat. -You offer me everything. I couldn't take it and not offer you everything -back. To me marriage means everything. It isn't only--is it?--a -perpetual companionship, though when you think of it, that's -tremendous,--almost all the other companionships of life are -intermittent, but it's the building up of fresh life out of a single -love." - -Mr. Travers looked away. He was surprised that Stella had not shocked -him. The idea of any woman mentioning the existence of a child until she -had a child might have shocked him; but Stella failed to move his sense -of propriety. It even struck him that marriage would be less inclined -to lapse into the sordid and irregular struggles of his experience if it -was based upon so plain a foundation. He looked away because he felt -that now he could not change her. - -Stella wished that they were in a house. It struck her that a room would -give more of the advantages of a retreat to Mr. Travers. She was very -anxious to make his retreat easy for him. - -"Would you do me a tremendous service?" she asked gently. - -He turned quickly to face her. - -"That is what I should like to do you," he said. But he looked at her a -little suspiciously, for he was not sure that the service Stella asked -wouldn't, after all, be only some new way of helping him. - -"You said the other day," she said, meeting his eyes with unswerving -candor, "that I might have extra help if I wanted it. I do want very -much to find some work for my sister, Eurydice. She is very clever; -cleverer than I am a great deal, only in a different way. She used to -write books, but that did not pay her very well, and when the war came, -she went into the city and worked for a secretarial diploma. I think -she would be of use to you, if you would go slowly with her and make -allowances for her different ways of being clever. Would you like to -help her?" - -Mr. Travers hesitated. Then he stood up and held out his hand to her. - -"The sun has begun to go," he said; "I assure you it is not healthy for -you to linger here. Of course I will engage your sister." - -Stella gave a little sigh of relief. She had found a way out for Mr. -Travers. - - - - -CHAPTER XV - - -After the arrival of Eurydice, Mr. Travers saw very little of Stella. At -certain moments of the day she came and asked him for orders, but in -some mysterious manner she seemed to have withdrawn herself from -personal contact. She had been impersonal before, but only in a -businesslike and friendly way. She was impersonal now as if she was not -there. - -She could control her attention, but she no longer felt any vitality -behind it. She knew where her life had gone, and she was powerless to -call it back to her. It hovered restlessly about the spirit of Julian. -Stella had never known what it was to repine at her own fate. If there -were many things she wanted that she could not have, she had consoled -herself with driving her desires into what was left to her. But she -could not do this for Julian. - -He had had so much farther to fall. She saw his face as she had seen it -first, with its look of human strength; his frosty, blue eyes, his heavy -sledge-hammer chin, and all the alertness, the controlled activity, of -his young figure. She saw him again like something made of wax, -emaciated and helpless, with flickering eyes. He had not believed in -knocking under, and he had felt defeat incredible. - -But defeat had met him, a blundering defeat that wrecked his body and -left his unprotected heart to face disaster. - -Would he have courage enough for this restricted battle against -adversity? Courage did strange things with pain. It transformed and -utilized it; but courage does not spring readily from a mortally wounded -pride. Marian, with a complete lack of intention, had robbed Julian of -his first weapon. She had dissipated his resources by undermining his -confidence, and left him perilously near to the stultification of -personal bitterness. - -Would it be possible for Julian to escape resentment? Or would he pass -down that long lane which has no turning, and ends in the bottomless bog -of self-pity, in which the finest qualities of the human spirit sink -like a stone? - -Step by step Stella passed with him, by all the hidden and vivid -obstacles between his soul and victory, between it and defeat. - -She could do nothing, but she could not stop her ceaseless watchfulness. -She was like some one who strains his eyes forever down an empty road. -The days began to lengthen into a long cold spring. There were no -outward changes in her life: the drafty town hall, the long bus-rides, -the bad news from France, and at home the pinch and ugliness of poverty. -She had stopped being afraid that people would notice a difference in -her. Nobody noticed any difference. She behaved in the same way and did -the same things. She had gone down under the waters of life without so -much as a splash. - -"I suppose," Stella said to herself, "lots of us see ghosts every day -without knowing it." She had a vague feeling that Mr. Travers knew it, -but that he kept it in the back of his mind like an important paper in a -case, which it was no use producing unless you could act upon it. - -It was an awful day of snow and wind. Everybody but Stella and the -porter had gone home. She had been stupid over the municipal accounts; -over and over again her flagging mind stuck at the same mistake. At last -she finished. She was still sixpence out; but she might see the sixpence -in a flash the next morning, and there would be no flash in anything she -could see to-night. - -When she reached the door she found the gale had become formidable and -chaotic. She staggered out of the town hall into the grip of a fury. All -London shook and quivered; trees were torn down and flung across the -road like broken twigs; taxis were blown into lamp-posts; the icy air -tore and raged and screamed as if the elements had set out to match and -overwhelm the puny internecine struggles of man. "This," Stella thought -to herself, "is like a battle--noise, confusion, senselessness. I must -hold on to whatever keeps stillest, and get home in rushes." - -But nothing kept very still. She was doubtful about trembling -lamp-posts, and area-railings twitched and shook under her hands. Her -skirts whipped themselves about her like whom panic was overcoming -fury, "why not send for her? Lizzie, here are two shillings; go out and -see if you can find a taxi." - -Stella tried to say what might happen to Lizzie in the search for a -taxi, but the effort to speak finished her strength. When she could -realize what was happening again, Cicely had arrived. She pounced upon -the emergency as a cat upon a mouse. - -In a few minutes Stella was tucked up warm and dry, poulticed and eased, -capable of a little very short breath, propped up by pillows. The -professor had retired to his study with a cup of cocoa hotter than he -had known this cheering vegetable to be since Cicely's departure. - -Mrs. Waring was breathing very slowly in her bedroom to restore calm to -the household, and Eurydice was crying bitterly into the kitchen sink. -She was quite sure that Stella was going to die, and that Cicely would -save her. - -The second of these two calamities took place. Stella was very ill with -pleurisy, and remained very ill for several days. Cicely interfered with -death as drastically as she interfered with everything else. She -dragged Stella reluctantly back into a shaky convalescence. - -"Now you're going to get well," she announced to her in a tone of abrupt -reproach. "But what I don't understand is the appalling state of -weakness you're in. You must have been living under some kind of strain. -I don't mean work. Work alone wouldn't have made such a hash of you. -Come, you may as well own up. What was it?" - -Stella blinked her eyes, and looked round her like a dazzled stranger. -Usually she was very fond of her room,--it was a small back room, over a -yard full of London cats,--but it struck her now that there were too -many things with which she was familiar. It was the same with Cicely. -She dearly loved and valued Cicely, but she knew the sight and sound of -her extraordinarily well. - -"Nothing," said Stella, deprecatingly. "It's no use applying gimlets and -tweezers to my moral sense, Cicely. Not even the Inquisition could deal -with a hole. Heretics were solid. I have a perfect right to be ill from -a cold wind. The world seemed made of it that night, and I swallowed -half the world. It must be rather a strain for a thin person to swallow -half the world on an empty stomach. I'm quite all right now, thanks to -you. I was thinking I ought to get back to the town hall next week. -Only, queerly enough, I had another offer of work. Still, it's so -sketchy, that I couldn't honestly fling up my own job for it, though it -sounds rather attractive." - -"Let's see it," said Cicely, succinctly. "You do conceal things, -Stella." - -Stella withdrew an envelop from under her pillow. She looked a little -anxious after its surrender. Cicely always made her a little anxious -over a tentative idea. She had a way of materializing a stray thought, -and flinging it back upon Stella as an incontrovertible fact. Stella was -very anxious not to think that what was in the letter she gave to Cicely -was really a fact. It was like some strange dream that hasn't any right -to come true. Cicely read: - - Dear Miss Waring: You will think this a most extraordinary request - for me to make, and in many ways it is too unformulated to be a - request. You will have heard from Marian that six months ago her - engagement with my son came to an end. This was the natural and - right thing to happen, but it has left him in his invalid condition - very much without resources. - - You were, I remember your telling me, a secretary to Professor - Paulson. I am inclined to think that my son might have his mind - directed to some scientific work if he could meet any one who would - interest him anew in the subject. Probably you are immersed in - other work, but if by any possible chance you should be at liberty - and cared to make the experiment, could you come here for a few - weeks? You would be conferring a great favor upon us, and if the - secretaryship developed out of your little visit, we would arrange - any terms that suited you. I may add that I find my son has no - remembrance of your association with Marian; indeed, he has - forgotten the occasion of your meeting. - - He has been so very ill that you will understand and excuse this, I - feel sure; and in the circumstances I think we had better not refer - to it. I am very anxious to divert his mind from the past, and I - have a feeling that if I could count upon your cooperation, we - might succeed. - - Yours sincerely, - - HELEN VERNY. - -"I don't see anything sketchy about it," said Cicely, slowly; "in the -circumstances, I mean. You needn't definitely chuck the town hall. -You'll get a couple of weeks' holiday. They'll give you a fortnight's -extension easily, and if the job comes your way, it would be a suitable -one. Anyway, you must of course accept it provisionally--" - -"I don't see why I must of course accept it," said Stella. "You never -see any alternatives, Cicely. Your mind is like one of those sign-posts -that have only one name on it, with fields all round and heaps of other -places to go to. It must be awfully confusing to be as simple as you -are. Why couldn't I go back to the town hall next week?" - -"Well, I'll tell you one reason why," said Cicely, grimly. "Simple or -not, your heart's as weak as a toy watch; you very nearly died a week -ago, and in my opinion if you went back to the town hall, you'd be -signing your own death-certificate." - -"I couldn't do that," said Stella, gravely; "it's not legal. I'm not the -next of kin to myself. I know much more about death-certificates than -you do. If I go to Lady Verny at Amberley, what's to become of -Eurydice?" - -"Eurydice will stay where she is," said Cicely. "If you ever saw to the -end of your nose, you'd know that she is as glued to the town hall as -she used to be to 'Shocks,' only this time, let us hope, more -successfully. Some women have to be married. They contract a fatal -desire for it, like the influenza habit every winter. Eurydice is one of -them. It takes different forms, of course. This time it's Mr. Travers; -the Mr. Bolt attachment was far more dangerous. I have made up my mind -that she will marry Mr. Travers, if it's humanly speaking possible." - -"Oh," said Stella, "will she? How clever you are, Cicely! You know -nearly everything. Why do you say 'humanly speaking possible?'" - -"Because you've always made him out as cold as a fish and as hard as -iron," said Cicely. "He may be one of the few men who won't yield to -vanity or fancy." - -"I see," said Stella. "It's not very nice of you to want Eurydice to -marry an iron fish. But, as a matter of fact, I'm not quite so certain -about Mr. Travers. The iron and the fish are only on the top. I think, -humanly speaking, he's quite possible. I'm going to sleep now. When -you've made up your mind about Amberley you can wake me up." - - - - -CHAPTER XVI - - -There are two winds in March; one comes in like a tight-lipped -school-master set on punishment. It is frequently accompanied by dust, -sunshine, and influenza. It has all the cold of winter, and acts as if -life could be produced solely by formidable harshness. - -But there is another wind, a mild, sensitive wind which carries the -secrets of the spring--a wind that wanders and sings on sunless days, -penetrating the hard crust of the earth as softly and as inveterately as -love, a wind that opens while its forceful brother shuts. - -It was this wind, calling along the railway lines against the swinging -train, that brought Stella to Amberley. It lifted her out of her -carriage to the small, wayside station, embracing her with its welcome -under shaking trees. The air was full of the earth scents of growing -fields. The sky was wide and very near and without strangeness. - -A porter, lurching out of the surrounding darkness, told Stella there -was a car from Amberley House waiting for her. It could only be for her, -because no one else was on the platform. - -The station-master himself put her into it. She sank into soft cushions, -and shut her eyes to feel the soundless speed. Stella had been on rare -occasions in a taxi; but this creature that leaped without friction -forward into the darkness, flinging a long road behind it with the ease -with which an orange is peeled, was a wholly new experience. When she -opened her eyes again they became gradually accustomed to the flying -darkness, which was not wholly dark; trees loomed up mysteriously out of -it, and the tender shapes of little hills as soft and vague as clouds. - -Stella was sorry when the car stopped; she could not see the doorway of -Amberley House, hidden under a mass of ivy. It opened suddenly before -her into a dusky hall lighted by tall candles in silver candle-sticks. - -The hall was full of shadows. There was a fragrance in it of old roses -and lavender, and it was quiet. It was so quiet that Stella held her -breath. She felt as if for centuries it had been still, and as if no one -who had ever lived there had made a noise in it. She was afraid of the -sound of her own voice. - -At the farther end of the hall there was a glow of firelight on old oak -panels. A door opened, and Lady Verny came toward her, very tall and -stately, but with the same kind, steady eyes. - -Lady Verny came all the way across the long, shadowy room to meet -Stella, and held out both her hands; but when she came near, Stella saw -that only her eyes were the same. Her face was incredibly older. The -firm lines were blurred, the delicate color was gone. The woman who -looked down at her was at the mercy of the years. Grief had forced her -prematurely out of her comfortable upward path. Even her smile had -changed; it carried no serenity. - -"I am very glad you have come," Lady Verny said gently. "We will have -tea in my room, I think, and then you must rest. I can see you have been -ill." - -She led the way into a room that seemed curiously like her. It was -spacious and convenient, with very few small objects in it. Even the -pictures on the walls had the same quality: they were very definite, -clear-colored French landscapes, graceful and reticent. - -The china, on a low table by the fire, was old and valuable; but it was -used every day. Lady Verny had no special occasions, and nothing that -she possessed was ever too priceless or too important for use. - -"I hope you did not have a very tiresome journey," she continued. "I do -not like a change on so short a run, but we have not been able to -arrange to have a train straight through from town. Julian was thinking -of doing something about it some time ago, but the matter has dropped." - -Stella noticed that as Lady Verny spoke of Julian her voice hurried a -little. It did not shake; but it passed over his name quickly as if she -were afraid that it might shake. - -"Since his illness he has taken less interest in local matters," she -finished tranquilly. - -Stella did not dare to ask if Julian was better. She did not like to -speak about his interests; it seemed to her as if almost anything would -be better than to say something stupid to Lady Verny about Julian. - -"It was a lovely journey," she said quickly, "and I would have hated not -to change at Horsham. I was so sorry it was nearly dark. Shelley lived -there once, didn't he? I wanted to go and look for the pond where he had -sailed five-pound notes because he hadn't anything else to make boats -with. Amberley came much too soon; and I couldn't see anything but a -bundle of dark clouds. I could only feel it, awfully friendly and kind, -blowing across the fields!" - -"Yes," said Lady Verny, consideringly, giving Stella her tea; "I think -it is a kind little place. There is nothing dreadful about it, not even -an ugly chapel, or one of those quite terrible little artist's -houses,--you know the type I mean,--as uncomfortable as a three-cornered -chair. The kind that clever people live in and call cottages. They've -quite spoiled the country round Pulborough; but mercifully the station -is inconvenient here, and a good deal of the land is Julian's. I hope -you will like it,"--she met Stella's eyes with a long, questioning -look,--"because I hope you will stay here for a long time." - -"As long as you want me to stay," said Stella, firmly. - -"We must not spoil your other opportunities for work," said Lady Verny; -"that would be most unfair. I must confess to you, Miss Waring, that I -am leaving the whole question very much in the air. It would be more -satisfactory to have the arrangement come direct from Julian. If, as I -hope, by your presence the old interest and the old questions come back -to him, he will ask you to stay himself. For the present I have simply -told him that you are my friend and that you have given up your -secretarial work to come here for a much-needed holiday; but we must not -waste your time or do anything against your interests. I could not allow -that." - -"It won't take very long, I expect," Stella answered, "because he would -take a dislike so quickly. And if he did that, it wouldn't do, of -course. We should see in a week or two. If he _doesn't_ dislike me; I -can easily talk to him about Professor Paulson. I remember they had an -argument once--about reindeer-moss. Your son said he had discovered it -where Professor Paulson had said it didn't exist. I could bring that up -quite comfortably. The mere mention of a fellow-laborer's effort stings -a man into the wish to prove something or other about it; and once you -start proving, secretaries follow." - -"Make them follow," said Lady Verny, smiling. "I don't think he will -dislike you,--we usually dislike the same people,--only Julian always -goes further than I do; he dislikes them more." Then her smile faded. -"You will see him to-night at dinner," she said gravely. She could not -smile again after she had said that; but she took Stella herself through -the dark oak hall and up the broad, winding staircase to a little, old, -square room that looked out over the garden to the flooded -water-meadows. - -"I don't know if you like gardens," Lady Verny said a little shyly. -"It's rather a hobby of mine. You'll see it to-morrow." - -"I like even my own," said Stella, "though it only holds one plane-tree -and ten cats. At least it doesn't really _hold_ the cats. They spill in -and out of it in showers like the soot, only more noisily; and I -pretend there's a lilac-bush in the corner." - -Lady Verny stood by the door for a moment as if she were making up her -mind for an immense advance, an almost dazzling plunge into confidence. - -"I have a feeling," she said slowly, "as if you would make a _good_ -gardener." - -After she had gone, Stella opened the window, and leaned out into the -garden. She could see nothing but the soft darkness, sometimes massed in -the thickness of the yew-hedges, and sometimes tenuous and spread out -over the empty spaces of the lawns. - -The air blew fresh upon her face, full of sweetness and the promise of -life. Stella told herself bitterly that nature was cruel; it let strong -young things die, and if that didn't matter (and she sometimes thought -dying didn't), nature did worse: it maimed and held youth down. But -nothing in her responded to the thought that nature was cruel. A tiny -crescent moon shone out between the hurrying clouds, and cast a slim -shadow of silver across the dark waters. "Things are cruel," Stella said -to herself, "but what is behind them is not cruel, and it must come -through. And I'm little and stupid and shy; but some of it is in me for -Julian, and he'll have to have it. I shan't know how to give it to him. -I shall make hideous blunders and muddles, and the more I want to give, -the harder it'll be to do it. Fortunately, it does not depend on me. I -can be as stupid as I like if I'm only thinking of him and only caring -for him and only wanting it to come through me. Nothing can stop it but -minding because I'm stupid. And as for being in love, the more I'm in it -the better. For that's what we're all in really, only we're none of us -in it enough. As long as I'm not in it for anything I can get out of it, -everything will be all right. If I do mind, it doesn't matter if only -what I want gets through to Julian." - -She lay down on the bed and listened to the wind in the garden playing -among the tree-tops. She listened for a long time, until she thought -that the garden was upon her side, and then she heard another sound. She -knew in a moment what it was; it struck straight against her heart: it -was the _tap-tap_ along the passage of wooden crutches. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII - - -Lady Verny and Julian were sitting in the hall when Stella joined them. -It wasn't in the least terrible meeting Julian; he had reduced his -physical disabilities to the minimum of trouble for other people. He -swung himself about on his crutches with an extraordinary ease, and he -had taught himself to deal with his straitened powers so that he needed -very little assistance; he had even controlled himself sufficiently to -bear without apparent dislike the occasional help that he was forced to -accept. - -It was the Vernys' religion that one shouldn't make a fuss over anything -larger than a broken boot-lace. Temper could be let loose over the -trivial, but it must be kept if there was any grave cause for it. - -Julian wished to disembarrass the casual eye of pity, partly because it -was a nuisance to make people feel uncomfortable, and partly because it -infuriated him to be the cause of compassion. Lady Verny had not -pointed this out to Stella; she had left her to draw her own inferences -from her own instincts. Lady Verny did not believe in either warnings or -corrections after the days of infancy were passed. - -She smiled across at Stella and said quietly: - -"My son--Miss Waring." - -Stella was for an instant aware of Julian's eyes dealing sharply and -defensively with hers. He wanted to see if she was going to be such a -fool as to pity him. She wasn't such a fool. Without a protest she let -him swing himself heavily to his feet before he held out his hand to -her. Her eyes met his without shrinking and without emphasis. She knew -she must look rather wooden and stupid, but anything was better than -looking too intelligent or too kind. - -She realized that she hadn't made any mistake from the fact that Lady -Verny laid down her embroidery. She would have continued it steadily if -anything had gone wrong. - -There was no recognition in Julian's eyes except the recognition that -his mother's new friend looked as if she wasn't going to be a bother. -Stella hadn't mattered when he met her before, and she didn't matter -now. She had the satisfaction of knowing that she owed his oblivion of -her to her own insignificance. - -"I'm sure it's awfully good of you," Julian said, "to come down here and -enliven my mother when we've nothing to offer you but some uncommonly -bad weather." - -"I find we have one thing," Lady Verny interposed. "Miss Waring is -interested in Horsham. You must motor her over there. She wants to see -Shelley's pond." - -"Do you?" asked Julian. "I'll take you with pleasure, but I must admit -that I think Shelley was an uncommonly poor specimen; never been able to -stand all that shrill, woolly prettiness of his. It sets my teeth on -edge. I don't think much of a man, either, who breaks laws, and then -wants his conduct to be swallowed like an angel's. Have you ever watched -a dog that's funked a scrap kick up the earth all round him and bark -himself into thinking he's no end of a fine fellow in spite of it?" - -"I don't believe you've read Shelley," cried Stella, stammering with -eagerness. "I mean properly. You've only skimmed the fanciest bits. And -he never saw the sense of laws. They weren't his own; he didn't break -_them_. The laws he broke were only the dreadful, muddled notions of -respectable people who didn't want to be inconvenienced by facts. I dare -say it did make him a little shrill and frightened flying in the face of -the whole world. However stupid a face it has, it's a massive one; but -he didn't, for all the fright and the defiance, funk his fight." - -"Let us settle Shelley at the dinner-table," said Lady Verny, drawing -Stella's arm into hers and leaving Julian to follow. "Personally I do -not agree with either of you. I do not think Shelley was a coward, and I -do not think that as a man he was admirable. He has always seemed to me -apart from his species, like his own skylark; 'Bird _thou_ never wert.' -He was an 'unpremeditated art,' a 'clear, keen joyance,' anything you -like; but he hadn't the rudiments of a man in him. He was neither tough -nor tender, and he never looked a fact in the face." - -"There are plenty of people to look at facts," objected Stella, "Surely -we can spare one to live in clouds and light and give us, in return for -a few immunities, their elemental spirit." - -"People shouldn't expect to be given immunities," said Julian. "They -should take 'em if they want 'em, and then be ready to pay for 'em; -nobody is forced to run with the crowd. What I object to is their taking -to their heels in the opposite direction, and then complaining of -loneliness. Besides, start giving people immunities, and see what it -leads to--a dozen Shelleys without poems and God knows how many -Harriets. What you want in a poet is a man who has something to say and -sticks to the path while he's saying it." - -"Oh, you might be talking about bishops!" cried Stella, indignantly. -"How far would you have gone yourself on your Arctic explorations if -you'd stuck to paths? Why should a poet run on a given line, like an -electric tram-car?" - -"I think Miss Waring has rather got the better of you, Julian," said -Lady Verny, smiling. "You chose an unfortunate metaphor." - -"Not a bit of it," said Julian, with a gleam of amusement. "I chose a -jolly good one, and she's improved it. You can go some distance with a -decent poet, but you can't with your man, Miss Waring. He twiddles up -into the sky before you've got your foot on the step." - -"That's a direct challenge," said Lady Verny. "I think after dinner we -must produce something of Shelley's in contradiction. Can you think of -anything solid enough to bear Julian?" - -"Yes," said Stella. "All the way here in the train I was thinking of one -of Shelley's poems. Have you read it--'The Ode to the West Wind'?" - -"No," said Julian, smiling at her; "but it doesn't sound at all -substantial. You started your argument on a cloud, and you finish off -with wind. The Lord has delivered you into my hand." - -"Not yet, Julian," said Lady Verny. "Wait till you've heard the poem." - -It did not seem in the least surprising to Stella to find herself, half -an hour later, sitting in a patch of candle-light, on a high-backed oak -chair, saying aloud without effort or self-consciousness Shelley's "Ode -to the West Wind." - -Neither Lady Verny nor Julian ever made a guest feel strange. There was -in them both an innate courtesy, which was there to protect the feelings -of others. They did not seem to be protecting Stella. They left her -alone, but in the act of doing so they set her free from criticism. Lady -Verny took up her embroidery, and Julian, sitting in the shadow of an -old oak settle, contentedly smoked a cigarette. He did not appear to be -watching Stella, but neither her movements nor her expressions escaped -him. She was quite different from any one he had seen before. She wore a -curious little black dress, too high to be smart, but low enough to set -in relief her white, slim throat. She carried her head badly, so that it -was difficult to see at first the beauty of the lines from brow to chin. -She had a curious, irregular face, like one of the more playful and less -attentive angels in a group round a Botticelli Madonna. She had no -color, and all the life of her face was concentrated in her gray, -far-seeing eyes. Julian had never seen a pair of eyes in any face so -alert and fiery. They were without hardness, and the fire in them melted -easily into laughter. But they changed with the tones of her voice, -with the rapid words she said, so that to watch them was almost to know -before she spoke what her swift spirit meant. Her voice was unfettered -music, low, with quick changes of tone and intonation. - -[Illustration: Her voice was unfettered music] - -Stella was absorbed in her desire to give Julian a sense of Shelley. She -wanted to make him see that beyond the world of fact, the ruthless, -hampering world of which he was a victim, there was another, finer -kingdom where no disabilities existed except those that a free spirit -set upon itself. - -She was frightened of the sound of her own voice; but after the first -verse, the thought and the wild music steadied her. She lost the sense -of herself, and even the flickering firelight faded; she felt out once -more in the warm, swinging wind, with its call through the senses to the -soul. The first two parts of the poem, with their sustained and -tremendous imagery, said themselves without effort or restraint. It was -while she was in the halcyon third portion of - - "The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, - Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams," - -that it shot through Stella's mind how near she was to the tragic -unfolding of a fettered spirit which might be the expression of Julian's -own. She dared not stop; the color rushed over her face. By an enormous -effort she kept her voice steady and flung into it all the -unconsciousness she could muster. He should not dream she thought of -him; and yet as she said: - - "Oh! lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud! - I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed! - A heavy weight of hours has chain'd and bowed - One too like thee--tameless, and swift, and proud." - -it seemed to her that she was the voice of his inner soul stating his -bitter secret to the world. A pulse beat in her throat and struggled -with her breath, her knees shook under her; but the music of her low, -grave voice went on unfalteringly: - - "Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is. - What if my leaves are falling, like its own!" - -Lady Verny laid down her embroidery. Julian had not moved. There was no -sound left in the world but Stella's voice. - -She moved slowly toward the unconquerable end, - - "Oh, Wind, - If winter comes, can spring be far behind?" - -All the force of her heart throbbed through Shelley's words. They were -only words, but they had the universe behind them. Nobody spoke when she -had finished. - -She herself was the first to move. She gave a quick, impatient sigh, and -threw out her hands with a little gesture of despair. - -"I can't give it to you," she said, "but it's _there_. Read it for -yourself! It's worth breaking laws for; I think it's worth being broken -for." - -Julian answered her. He spoke carefully and a little stiffly. - -"I don't think I agree with you," he said. "Nothing is worth being -broken for." - -Stella bowed her head. She was aware of an absolute and appalling sense -of exhaustion and of an inner failure more terrible than any physical -collapse. - -It was as if Julian had pushed aside her soul. - -"Still, I think you must admit, Julian," Lady Verny said quietly, "that -'The Ode to the West Wind' is an admirable poem. I'm afraid, my dear, -you have tired yourself in saying it for us. I know the poem very well, -but I have never either understood or enjoyed it so much before. Do you -not think you had better go to bed? Julian will excuse us. I find I am a -little tired myself." - -Stella rose to her feet uncertainly. She was afraid that Julian would -get up again and light their candles; but for a moment he did not move. -He was looking at her reconsideringly, as if something in his mind was -recognizing something in hers; then he dragged himself up, as she had -feared he would, and punctiliously lighted their candles. - -"It's rather absurd not having electric light here, isn't it?" he -observed, handing Stella her candle. "But we can't make up our minds to -it. We like candle-light with old oak. I'm not prepared to give in about -your fellow Shelley; but I confess I like that poem better than the -others I have read. You must put me up to some more another time." - -If she had made one of her frightful blunders, he wasn't going to let -her see it. His smile was perfectly kind, perfectly impenetrable. She -felt as if he were treating her like an intrusive child. Lady Verny -said nothing more about the poem; but as she paused outside Stella's -door she leaned over her and very lightly kissed her cheek. - -It was as if she said: "Yes, I know you made a mistake; but go on making -them. I can't. I'm too like him; so that the only thing for me to do is -to leave him alone. But perhaps one day one of your mistakes may reach -him; and if they can't, nothing can." - -Stella shivered as she stood alone before the firelight. Everything in -the room was beautiful, the chintz covers, the thick, warm carpet, the -gleam of the heavy silver candle-sticks. The furniture was not chosen -because it had been suitable. It was suitable because it had been chosen -long ago. It had grown like its surroundings into a complete harmony, -and all this beauty, all this warm, old, shining polish of inanimate -objects and generations of good manners, covered an ache like a hollow -tooth. Nobody could get down to what was wrong because they were too -well bred; and was it very likely that they were going to let Stella? -She would annoy Julian, she had probably annoyed him to-night; but would -she ever reach him? In her mind she had been able to think of him as -near her; but now that she was in the same house, she felt as if she -were on the other side of unbridged space. He was frightening, too; he -was so much handsomer than she remembered, and so much more alive. It -was inconceivable that he should ever want to work with her. - -She sat down before an oval silver mirror and looked at her face. It -seemed to her that she was confronted by an empty little slab without -light. She gave it a wintry smile before she turned away from it. - -"I don't suppose he'll ever want anything of you," she said to herself, -"except to go away." - - - - -CHAPTER XVIII - - -Later Stella wrote: - - Eurydice dearest: - - It's the strangest household, or else, perhaps, everybody else's - is. You never see anybody doing anything, and yet everything gets - done. It's all ease and velvet and bells; and yet in spite of - nothing being a minute late, you never notice the slightest hurry. - It isn't clockwork; it's more like the stars in their courses. I - always thought being properly waited on made people helpless; it - would me in ten minutes. I can see myself sinking into a cream-fed - cushion, but the Vernys sit bolt upright, and no servant they - possess can do any given thing as well for them as they can do it - for themselves. - - I have breakfast in my room, with a robin, and the window open--oh, - open on to the sharpest paradise! - - While I lie in bed I can see an old, moss-covered barn which always - manages to have a piece of pink sky behind it and a black elm bough - in front. It's a wonderful barn, as old as any hill, and with all - the colors of the rainbow subservient to it. That's one window; the - other two look over the garden. - - There's a terrace, and a lawn out of which little glens and - valleys wander down the hillside into the water-meadows, and - there's a lake drowned out by the water, with swans more or less - kept in it by a hedge of willows. - - The water-meadows are more beautiful than all the little shiny - clouds that race across the valley. Sometimes they're like a silver - tray, with green islands and wet brown trees on them; and sometimes - they are a traveling mist; and then the sun slants out (I haven't - seen it full yet), and everything's blue--the frailest, pearliest - blue. - - Yesterday was quite empty, with only its own light, and when - evening came the water-meadows and the little hills were lost in - amethyst. - - I haven't said anything about the downs. I can't. We walk on them - in the afternoon. At least we walk along the lane that goes through - the village (it's full of mud; but one gets quite fond of mud), and - then when you feel the short turf under you, and the fields drop - down, you go up into the sky and float. - - One begins so well, too. At breakfast there's such beautiful china, - butter in a lordly dish, always honey, and often mushrooms. - Everything tastes as if it came fresh out of the sky. - - I can do exactly as I like all day. Nobody's plans conflict with - any one else's. That's partly being rich and partly being sensible; - it's quite wonderful how easy life is if you're both. There's a - special room given to me, with a piano and books; and if I want - Lady Verny, I can find her in the garden. - - I can see her out of my window now; she's wearing a garment that's - a cross between a bathing-dress and a dressing-gown, enormous - gauntlets, and one of Sir Julian's old caps. There _are_ gardeners, - especially one called Potter. (Whenever anything goes wrong Lady - Verny shakes her head and says, "Ah, that's the Potter's thumb!") - But you never see them. She's always doing something in the garden. - Half the time I can't discover what; but she just smiles at me and - says, "Nature's so untidy," or, "The men need looking after." Both - Lady Verny and Sir Julian are very serious over their servants. In - a way they're incredibly nice to them, they seem to have them so - much on their minds. They're always discussing their relatives or - their sore throats, and they give very polite, plain orders; but - then just when you're thinking how heavenly it must be to work for - them, they say something that chills you to the bone. One of the - housemaids broke a china bowl yesterday, and came to Lady Verny, - saying: - - "If you please, m' Lady, I didn't mean to do it." - - "I should hope not," Lady Verny said in a voice like marble. "If - you had _meant_ to do it, I should hardly keep you in the house; - but your not having criminal tendencies is not an excuse for - culpable carelessness." - - Sir Julian's worse because his eyes are harder; he must have caught - them from one of his icebergs. But the servants stay with them - forever, and when one of the grooms had pneumonia in the winter, - Sir Julian sat up with him for three nights because the man was - afraid of dying, and it quieted him to have his master in the - room. - - I'm beginning to work in the garden myself, the smells are so nice, - and the dogs like it. Lady Verny has a spaniel and two - fox-terriers, and Sir Julian a very fierce, unpleasant Arctic - monster, with a blunt nose like a Chow, and eyes red with temper - and a thirst for blood. - - He's always locked up when he isn't with Sir Julian. If he wasn't, - I'm sure he'd take the other three dogs as hors-d'oeuvre, and - follow them up with the gardeners. - - I don't know what he does all day. Sir Julian I mean; the Arctic - dog growls. They never turn up till tea-time; then they disappear - again, and come back at dinner. At least Sir Julian does. The - Arctic dog (his name is Ostrog) is not allowed at meals, because he - thinks everything in the room ought to be killed first. - - After dinner I play chess with Sir Julian. He's been quite - different to me since he found I could; before he seemed to think I - was something convenient for his mother, like a - pocket-handkerchief. He was ready to pick me up and give me back to - her if I fell about, but I didn't have a life of my own. - - Now he often speaks to me as if I were really there. They're both - immensely kind and good to everybody in the neighborhood, but they - see as little of people as possible. - - They're not a bit religious, though they always go to church, and - Lady Verny reads Montaigne--beautifully bound, like Sir Thomas à - Kempis--during the sermon. A great deal of the land belongs to - them, and I suppose they could use a lot of influence if they - chose. I always dislike people having power over other human - beings; but the Vernys never use it to their own advantage. In nine - cases out of ten they don't use it at all. I heard the vicar - imploring Sir Julian to turn a drunken tenant out of a cottage, as - his example was bad for the village. But Sir Julian wouldn't even - agree to speak to him. "I always believe in letting people go to - the devil in their own way," he said. "If you try to stop 'em, they - only go to him in yours. Of course I don't mean you, Parson. It's - your profession to give people a lead. But I couldn't speak about - his morals to a man who owed me three years' rent." - - I expect I shall have to come back next week to the town hall. - Thank Mr. Travers so much for saying I may stay on longer, but I - really couldn't go on taking my salary when I'm bursting with - health and doing nothing. I'll wait two more days before writing to - him, but I must confess I'd rather have all my teeth extracted than - mention Professor Paulson to Sir Julian. - - I haven't seen the slightest desire for work in him; but, then, I - haven't seen any desire in him at all except a suicidal fancy for - driving a dangerous mare in a high dog-cart. He never speaks of - himself or of the war, and he is about as personal as a mahogany - sideboard. - - Lady Verny isn't much easier to know, though she seems to like - talking to me. I asked her to call me Stella the other day, and she - put down her trowel and looked at me, as if she thought it wasn't - my place to make such a suggestion; then she said, "Well, perhaps - I will." I wish we'd been taught whose place things are; it would - be so much simpler when you are with people who have places. But - Lady Verny doesn't dislike me, because I've seen her with people - she dislikes. She's much more polite then, and never goes on with - anything. Last night when I was playing chess with Sir Julian (it - was an awful fight, for he's rather better than I am, though I - can't let him know it) she said to him, "I hope you are not tiring - Stella." - - He looked up sharply, as if he was awfully surprised to hear her - saying my name, and then he gave me a queer little smile as if he - were pleased with me. I believe they're fond of each other, but - I've never seen them show any sign of affection. - - But, O Eurydice, though they're awfully charming and interesting - and dear, they're terribly unhappy. You feel it all the time--a - dumb, blind pain that they can't get over or understand, and that - nothing will ever induce them to show. They aren't a bit like the - Arctic dog, who is always disagreeable unless he has a bone and Sir - Julian. You know where you are with the Arctic dog. - - Tell Mr. Travers I'll write directly I have fixed a date for my - return. - - Your ever-loving, disheveled, enthralled, perturbed, unfinished - - STELLA. - - P.S. I suppose as a family we all talk too much; we over-say - things, and that makes them seem shallow. If you say very little, - it comes out in chunks and sounds solid. You remember those - dreadful old early-Saxon people we read once who never used - adjectives? I think we ought to look them up. - - - - -CHAPTER XIX - - -Stella found Lady Verny weeding. She drew the weeds up very gracefully -and thoroughly, with a little final shake. - -It was a hard, shivering March morning. Next to the bed upon which Lady -Verny was working was a sheet of snowdrops under a dark yew-hedge. They -trembled and shook in the light air like a drift of wind-blown snow. - -Stella hovered irresolutely above them; then she said: - -"Lady Verny, I am afraid I must go back to the town hall next week. I -haven't been any use." - -Lady Verny elaborately coaxed out a low-growing weed, and then, with a -vicious twist, threw it into the basket beside her. - -"Why don't you go and talk to Julian?" she asked. "He can't be expected -to jump a five-barred gate if he doesn't know it's there." - -Stella hesitated before she spoke; then she said with a little rush: - -"What I feel now is that I'm not the person to tell him--to tell him -it's there, I mean. I don't know why I ever thought I was. The person to -tell him that would be some one he could notice like a light, not a -person who behaves like a candle caught in a draft whenever he speaks to -her." - -"My dear," said Lady Verny, ruthlessly exposing, and one by one -exterminating, a family of wireworms, "I fear you have no feminine -sense. You have a great many other kinds,--of the mind, and no doubt of -the soul. You should try to please Julian. You don't; you leave him -alone, and in consequence he thinks he's a failure with you. Women with -the feminine sense please a man without appearing to make the effort. -The result is that the man thinks he's pleasing _them_, and a man who -thinks that he has succeeded in pleasing an agreeable woman is not -unaware of her." - -"But I'm so afraid of him," pleaded Stella. "I don't believe you know -how frightening he is." - -"Yes," said Lady Verny; "he has lost his inner security. That makes a -person very frightening, I know. He has become aggressive because he -feels that something he has always counted on as a weapon has been -withdrawn from him. It's like living on your wits; people who do that -are always hard. I think you can give him the weapon back; but to -succeed you must use all your own. You must go into a room as if it -belonged to you. It's astonishing how this place suits you; but you must -hold your head up, and lay claim to your kingdom." - -"But I've never had a kingdom," objected Stella, "and I only want him to -be interested in the idea of writing a book." - -"Well, that's what I mean," said Lady Verny, decently interring the -corpses of the worms. "At least it's part of what I mean. The only way -to get Julian to write a book just now is to charm him. Men whose nerves -and hearts are broken don't respond readily to the abstract. You can do -what I can't, because I'm his mother. He's made all the concessions he -could or ought to make to me. He promised not to take his life. -Sometimes in these last few months I've felt like giving him his -promise back. Now are you going to be afraid of trying to please -Julian?" - -"O Lady Verny," Stella cried, "you make me hate myself! I'll do anything -in the world to please him; I'd play like a brass band, or cover myself -with bangles like Cleopatra I Don't, _don't_ think I'll ever be a coward -again!" - -"You needn't go as far as the bangles," said Lady Verny, smiling grimly. -"Do it your own way, but don't be afraid to let Julian think you like -him. He finds all that kind of thing rather hard to believe just now. - -"He's been frozen up. Remember, if he isn't nice to you, that thawing is -always rather a painful process. Now run along, and leave me in peace -with my worms." - -It cannot be said that Stella ran, but she went. She passed through the -hall and down a passage; and wondered, if she had been an -early-Christian martyr about to step into the arena, whether she -wouldn't on the whole have preferred a tiger to Julian. - -The door opened on a short passage at the end of which was an old oak -doorway heavily studded with nails. She knew this must be Julian's -room, because she heard Ostrog growling ominously from inside it. Julian -presumably threw something at him which hit him, for there was the sound -of a short snap, and then silence. - -"Please come in," said Julian in a voice of controlled exasperation. -Stella stepped quickly into the room, closing the door behind her. - -It was a long, wide room with a low ceiling. There were several polar -bear-skins on the floor, and a row of stuffed penguins on a shelf behind -Julian's chair. Three of the walls were covered with bookcases; the -fourth was bare except for an extraordinarily vivid French painting of a -girl seated in a café. She had red hair and a desperate, laughing face, -and was probably a little drunk. There was a famous artist's signature -beneath her figure, but Stella had a feeling that Julian had known the -girl and had not bought the picture for the sake of the signature. - -Ostrog stood in front of her, growling, with every separate hair on his -back erect. - -"Keep quite still for a moment," said Julian, quickly. "Ostrog, lie -down!" The dog very slowly settled himself on his haunches, with his -red, savage eyes still fixed on Stella. "Now I think you can pass him -safely," Julian added. "He has a peculiar dislike to human proximity, -especially in this room. You can't write him down as one who loves his -fellow-men, and I fear he carries his unsociability even further in -respect to his fellow-women." - -"It must be nice for you," said Stella, "to have some one who expresses -for you what you are too polite to say for yourself." - -Julian gave her a quick, challenging look. - -"I beg your pardon," he said. "Why should you suppose any such thing?" - -"I expect because it is true," said Stella, quietly. "Of course you -don't growl or show your teeth, and your eyes aren't red; but nobody -could suppose when you said 'Come in' just now that you wanted anybody -to come in." - -"The chances were all in favor of its being somebody that I didn't -want," explained Julian, politely. "For once they misled me. I -apologize." - -Stella smiled; her eyes held his for a moment. She did not contradict -him, but she let him see that she didn't believe him. "If he was ever -really sorry," she thought, "he wouldn't apologize. When he's polite, -it's because he isn't anything else." - -"I came," she explained, "to ask you to lend me Professor Paulson's book -on reindeer-moss. Will you tell me where it is and let me get it for -myself, if Ostrog doesn't mind?" - -To her surprise, Julian allowed her to find it for herself. Ostrog -continued to growl, but without immediate menace. When she had found it, -she took it across to Julian. - -"Please don't run away," he said quickly, "unless you want to. Tell me -what you intend to look up about the moss. I had a little tussle with -Paulson over it once. He was an awfully able fellow, but he hadn't the -health to get at his facts at first hand. That was unfortunate; -second-hand accuracy leaks." - -Stella sat down near him, and in a minute they were launched into an -eager discussion. She had typed the book herself, and had its facts at -her fingers'-end. She presented a dozen facets to her questions, with a -light on them from her dancing mind. - -Julian differed, defended himself, and explained, till he found himself -at length in the middle of an account of his last expedition. He pulled -himself up abruptly. - -"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "what a dark horse you are! Do tell me how you -come to know anything about such a subject. Did you smuggle yourself -into an Arctic expedition as a stowaway, or have you been prospecting -gold at Klondike with a six-shooter and a sleeping-sack? It's amazing -what you know about the North." - -"It is not so uncanny as you think," said Stella, quietly. "I was -Professor Paulson's secretary. For five years I studied the fauna and -flora of arctic regions. I used to help him examine the tests brought -back by explorers. He taught me how to understand and check climate and -weather charts. All the collected specimens went through my hands. I did -the drawings for this book, for instance. You know, a secretary is a -kind of second fiddle. Give him a lead, and he catches up the music and -carries it through as thoroughly, though not so loudly, as the first -violin. I like being a second fiddle and I like the North." - -"That's odd," said Julian, drawing his heavy eyebrows together. "I had -an idea I had met Professor Paulson's secretary before." - -"You are quite right," said Stella; "you did meet her before." - -Julian stared at her; his eyes hardened. - -"Do you mean that it was you I met at Sir Francis Young's?" he asked -her. "You are Miss Young's great friend, then, are you not?" - -Stella turned her eyes away from him. She hated to see him guarding -himself against her. - -"I was her friend," she said in a low voice; "but I have not seen her or -heard from her for six months, nor have I written." - -Sir Julian still looked at her, but the sternness of his eyes decreased. - -She sat meekly beside him, with her drooping head, like the snowdrops -she had brought in with her from the March morning. She did not look -like a woman who could be set, or would set herself, to spy upon him. He -acquitted her of his worst suspicions, but his pride was up in arms -against her knowledge. - -"It's too stupid for me," he said, "not to have recognized you -immediately; for I haven't in the least forgotten you or our talk. You -said some charming things, Miss Waring; but fate, a little unkindly, has -proved them not to be true." - -Stella turned her eyes back to his. She no longer felt any fear of him. -She was too sorry for him to be afraid. - -"No," she said eagerly, "I was perfectly right. I said you were strong. -Things have happened to you,--horrible things,--but you're there; you're -there as well as the things--in control of them. Why, look at what -you've been telling me--the story of your last expedition! It's so -fearfully exciting, and it's all, as you say, first-hand knowledge. You -brought back with you the fruits of experience. Why don't you select and -sort them and give them to the world?" - -He looked at her questioningly. - -"Do you mean these old arctic scraps?" he said slowly. "They might have -mattered once, but they're all ancient history now. The flood and the -fire have come on us since then. All that's as dead--as dead and useless -as a crippled man. Besides, no one can write a book unless it interests -him. I'm not even interested." - -Stella's eyes fell; her breath came quickly. - -"But don't you think," she said, "you could be made a little interested -again? You were interested, weren't you, when you were talking to me a -few minutes ago?" - -Sir Julian laughed good-naturedly. - -"I dare say I was interested talking to you," he said. "You're such a -changeling: you play chess like a wizard and know the North like a -witch. I'm afraid, Miss Waring, that interest in your conversation isn't -in itself sufficient to turn a man into an author." - -Stella rose slowly to her feet. She opened her lips as if to speak to -Julian, but he was looking past her out of the window, with a little -bitter smile that took away her hopefulness. Ostrog escorted her, -growling less and less menacingly, to the door. Stella did not look back -at Julian, and she forgot to hold her head up as she went out of the -room. After she had gone Julian discovered that she had dropped two of -her snowdrops on the floor. He picked them up carefully and laid them on -his desk. - -"A curious, interesting girl," he said to himself; "an incredible friend -for Marian to have had. I wonder what made my mother take her up?" - - - - -CHAPTER XX - - -Lady Verny finished her weeding. It took her an hour and a half to do -what she wanted to the bed; then she rose from her cramped position, and -went into Julian's library by one of the French windows. She guessed -that Stella had failed. - -Julian was lying on a long couch, with his hands behind the back of his -head and his eyes fixed on the ceiling. Lady Verny knew that, when he -was alone, he was in the habit of lying like this for hours. He had told -her that since his accident it amused him more than anything else. - -She came in without speaking, and, drawing off her long gauntlets, -folded them neatly together, and sat down, facing him. - -Julian's eyes moved toward her as she entered; but he gave her no -further greeting, and after a speculative glance his eyes returned to -the ceiling. - -"It's a pity," said Lady Verny, thoughtfully, "that poor child has to go -back to the town hall next week, a dreadful, drafty place, and be made -love to by a common little town clerk." - -Julian's eyes flickered for a moment, but did not change their position. - -"Town clerks," he observed, "are, I feel sure, distinguished persons who -confine their passions to rates and taxes." - -"That must make it all the more trying," said Lady Verny. "But I don't -mind the town clerk as much as I mind the drafts. Stella had pleurisy -before she came here; and you know what girls who do that kind of work -eat--ghastly little messes, slopped on to marble tables, and tasting -like last week's wash." - -"Well, why the devil doesn't she look for another job?" Julian asked -irritably. "She has brains enough for twenty. That's what I dislike -about women: they get stuck anywhere. No dash in 'em, no initiative, no -judgment." It was not what he disliked about women. - -"She has tried," said Lady Verny. "The man she hoped to get a job from -wouldn't have her. She tried this morning." - -Julian's eyes moved now; they shot like a hawk's on to his mother's, -while his body lay as still as a stone figure on a tomb. - -"Then it was a trap," he said coldly. "I wondered. I thought we'd -settled you were going to leave me alone." - -"Yes," said Lady Verny in a gentle, even voice, "I know we had, Julian; -but I can't bear it." - -Julian's eyes changed and softened. He put his hand on her knee and let -it rest there for a moment. - -"I can, if it's only you," he said; "but I can't stand a lot of -sympathetic women. One's a lot." - -"You don't like her, then?" his mother asked. "I'm sorry; I always did -from the first day I saw her. I don't know why; she hasn't any -behavior." - -"I don't dislike her," said Julian. "I don't think her behavior matters. -She isn't at all a bother. I rather like her being so awfully little a -woman; it's restful. Half the time I don't notice if she's in the room -or not." - -"And the other half of the time?" Lady Verny asked, with apparent -carelessness. - -"Oh, the other half of the time," said Julian, with a little, twisted -smile, "I quite appreciate the fact that she is. Especially when you've -taken the trouble to dress her as you did last night." - -"I had to see what she looked like," Lady Verny explained defensively. - -"I think, if you want her to stay in this house," said Julian, dryly, -"you'd better let her look as little like that again as possible. I -might have tolerated a secretary if I had wanted to write a book; but -I'd tolerate no approach to a picture. She can go and be picturesque at -the town hall. My artistic sense has already been satisfied up to the -brim. How did you get her to take the clothes she had on last night?" - -"I told her," said Lady Verny, blushing, "that I had the materials by -me, and couldn't possibly use them, as I was too old for light colors, -and Girton could make her a simple little dress. And then I stood over -Girton. As a matter of fact, I _did_ send for the green jade comb and -the shoes and stockings." - -"You seem to me," said Julian, "to have entered most light-heartedly -upon a career of crime and deceit unusual at your age. I don't wonder -that you blush for it." - -"It wasn't only you, Julian," Lady Verny pleaded. "I did want to help -the girl. I can't bear public offices for gentlewomen. It's so -unsuitable!" - -"Most," agreed Julian. "But, my dear mother, this is a world in which -the unsuitable holds an almost perfect sway, a fact which your usual -good sense seldom overlooks." - -"You don't know," said Lady Verny, earnestly, "how even a bad patch of -ground facing north _can_ improve with cultivation." - -"Do what you like with the north side of the garden," replied Julian, -"do even what you like with the apparently malleable Miss Waring; but -please don't try the gardening habit any more on me." - -Lady Verny sighed. Julian looked as inexpressive and immovable as a -stone crusader. - -Lady Verny was a patient woman, and she knew that, once seed is dropped, -you must leave it alone. - -She had learned to abstain from all the little labors of love which are -its only consolations. From the first she had realized that the things -she longed to do for Julian he preferred to have done for him by a -servant. - -She had accepted his preferences as the only outlet of her emotions; but -when she saw he was fast approaching the place where nothing is left but -dislikes, she made an effort to dislodge him. She was not sure, but she -thought that she had failed. Without speaking again, she went back to -the garden and did a little more digging before lunch. The earth was -more malleable than Julian; digging altered it. - -If you have never been able to buy any clothes except those which you -could afford, none of them having any direct relation to the other, but -merely replacing garments incapable of further use, to be dressed -exactly as you should be is to obtain a new consciousness. It was not -really Stella who looked with curious eyes at herself in a long mirror -beneath the skilful hands of Girton. It was some hidden creature of -triumphant youth with a curious, heady thirst for admiration. She gazed -at herself with alien eyes. - -"It's like an olive-tree," she said dreamily to Girton, "a silvery gray -olive-tree growing in the South." - -"I dare say, Miss," said Girton; "but if you was to remember when you -sit down just to bring your skirts a trifle forward, it would sit -better." - -"Yes, Girton," said Stella, submissively. But the submission was only -skin-deep. She knew that whatever she did, she couldn't go far wrong; -her dress wouldn't let her. It gave her a freedom beyond the range of -conduct. People whose clothes fit them, as its sheath of green fits a -lily of the valley, become independent of their souls. - -Julian's eyes had met hers last night with a perfectly different -expression in them. He was too polite to look surprised, but he looked -as soon as it was convenient, again. - -Usually he looked at Stella as if he wanted to be nice to her, but last -night for the first time he had looked as if he wished Stella to think -him nice. She had had to hold her head up because of the jade comb. - -It wouldn't matter how either of them looked now, as she was going away -so soon; but she was glad that for once he had noticed her, even if his -notice was inspired only by the green dress. - -Julian did not appear at dinner; it was the first time since Stella's -arrival that this had happened. - -"He's had a bad day," Lady Verny explained. "He will get about more than -he ought. It's a great strain on him, and then he suffers from fatigue -and misery--not pain, exactly. I don't think he would mind that so much, -but it makes him feel very helpless. He wants his chess though, if you -don't mind going into his library and playing with him." - -Julian was sitting up in his arm-chair when Stella joined him. His back -was to the light, and the chess-board in front of him. - -His face was gray and haggard, but there was a dogged spark of light in -his eyes, as if he was amused at something. - -"Thanks tremendously for coming in to cheer me up," he said quickly. -"You see, I've dispensed with Ostrog for the evening, to prevent further -comparison between us. D'you mind telling me why you didn't let me know -this morning that, if I wrote a book, you'd work for me?" - -Stella flushed, and let her jade comb sink beneath its level. - -"If you didn't want to write the book," she said, "why should you want a -secretary?" - -"It didn't occur to you, I suppose," Sir Julian asked, "that if I wanted -the secretary, I might wish to write the book?" - -"What has Lady Verny said to you?" Stella demanded, lifting her head -suddenly, and looking straight across at him. - -"Nothing that need make you at all fierce," Julian replied, with -amusement. "She said you were going back to the town hall next week, and -I said I thought it was a pity. You don't seem to me in the least fitted -for a town hall. I've no doubt you can do incredible things with drains, -but I fear I have a selfish preference for your playing chess with me. -My mother added that it was my fault; you were prepared, if I wished to -write a book, to see me through it." - -"Yes," said Stella, defensively, "I was prepared, if I thought you -wanted it." - -"I suppose you and my mother thought it would be good for me, didn't -you?" asked Julian, suavely. "I have an idea that you had concocted a -treacherous underground plot." - -"We--I--well, if you'd _liked_ it, it might have been good for you," -Stella admitted. - -"Most immoral," said Julian, dryly, "to try to do good to me behind my -back, wasn't it? You see, I dislike being done good to; I happen very -particularly to dislike it, and above all things I dislike it being done -without my knowledge." - -"Yes," said Stella, humbly. "So do I; I see that now. It was silly and -interfering. Only, if you _had_ been interested--" - -"I wasn't in the least interested," said Julian, implacably, "but I'm -glad you agree about your moral obliquity. My mother, of course, was -worse; but there is no criminal so deep seated in her career as a woman -under the sway of the maternal instinct. One allows for that. And now, -Miss Waring, since neither of us likes being done good to, and since -it's bad for you to go back to the town hall, and worse for me to remain -unemployed, shall we pool this shocking state of things and write the -book together?" - -"Oh!" cried Stella with a little gasp. "But are you sure you want to?" - -Julian laughed. - -"I may be politer than Ostrog," he said, "but I assure you that, like -him, unless reduced by force, I never do what I don't want to." - -"And you haven't been reduced?" Stella asked a little doubtfully. - -"Well," said Julian, beginning to place his chessmen, "I don't think so; -do you? Where was the force?" - -Stella could not answer this question, and Lady Verny, who might have -been capable of answering it, was up-stairs. - - - - -CHAPTER XXI - - -Stella found that there were several Julians. The first one she knew -quite well; he only wanted to be left alone. She dealt quite simply with -him, as if he were Mr. Travers before Mr. Travers was human. - -She came into his library every morning at ten o'clock, and this Julian, -looking out of the window or at Ostrog or at the ceiling, dictated to -her in a dry voice, slowly and distinctly, the first draft of a chapter. - -Julian had never worked with an efficient woman before, and Stella's -promptness and prevision surprised him; but this Julian never showed any -surprise. He did the work he had set himself to do from the notes he had -prepared before she came. If there were any facts of which he was -doubtful, he asked her to look them up, telling her where she would be -likely to find references to them. Stella went to the right bookcase by -a kind of instinct, placed a careful hand on the book, and found the -index with flying fingers. She never asked this Julian questions or -troubled him with her own opinions. She carried off her notes without -comment, and returned them to him carefully typed for his final -inspection next morning. It was like the town hall, only quieter. - -The second Julian was almost like a friend. He was a mischievous, -challenging Julian, who wouldn't at any price have an impersonal, -carefully drilled secretary beside him, but who insisted upon Stella's -active cooperation. They discussed the chapter from every point before -they wrote it. This Julian demanded her opinions; he dragged out her -criticisms and fought them. He made their work together a perilous, -inspiriting tug-of-war. The chapters that resulted from this cooperation -were by far the most interesting in the book. They even interested -Julian. - -But these were rare days, and what was most curious to Stella was that -Julian, who seemed at least to enjoy them as much as she did, should -appear to want to suppress and curtail them. He was obviously reluctant -to let the second Julian have his fling. - -Stella saw the third Julian only in the evenings. He was a polite and -courteous host, stranger to Stella than either of the others. He was -always on his guard, as if he feared that either of the watchful women -who wanted to see him happy might think he was happy or might, more -fatally still, treat him as if he were unhappy. - -While Stella and Lady Verny were anxiously watching the transformations -of Julian, spring came to Amberley. It came very quietly, in a cold, -green visibility, clothing the chilly, shivering trees in splendor. The -hedges shone with a green as light as water, and out of their dried -brown grasses the fields sprang into emerald. The streams that ran -through the valley fed myriads of primroses. Stella found them -everywhere, in lonely copses, in high-shouldered lanes, or growing like -pale sunshine underneath the willows. - -The spring was young and fugitive at Amberley; it fled before its own -promises, and hid behind a cloak of winter. Dull gray days, cold -showers, and nipping raw down winds defied it, and for weeks the earth -looked as hard as any stone; but still the green leaves unsheathed -themselves, and the birds sang their truculent triumphant songs, certain -of victory. - -Lady Verny spent all her time in the garden now, watching against -dangers, preparing for new births, protecting the helpless, and leaving -things alone. The bulbs were up and out already; crocus and daffodil, -hyacinth and narcissus, flooded the glades and glens. Crocuses ran like -a flock of small gold flames under the dark yew-hedges; daffodils -streamed down the hillside to the lakes, looking as if they meant to -overtake the sailing swans. The willows in the valley had apricot and -pale-gold stems. They hung shivering over the lake like a race of -phantom lovers searching for their lost brides. - -Stella never saw Julian outdoors. He was always interested and polite -about the garden, but he was never in it. He did not seem to want to see -things grow. She did not know how far he could drag himself upon his -crutches, and it gave her a little shock of surprise to find him one day -in one of her favorite haunts. - -It was outside the garden altogether, behind the village street. A sunk -lane under high hedges led to a solitary farm. One of the fields on the -way to it overlooked a sheltered copse of silver birches. Julian was -stretched at full length under the hedge, looking down into the wood; -his crutches lay beside him. Under the silver birches the ground was as -blue as if the sky had sprung up out of the earth. There was no space at -all for anything but bluebells. Far away in the valley a cuckoo called -its first compelling notes. - -Julian's face was set. He looked through the silver-and-blue copse as if -it were not there; his eyes held a tortured universe. - -Stella would have slipped away from him unseen, but his voice checked -her. - -"Is that you, Stella?" he asked quietly. "Won't you come and sit down -here and look at this damned pretty world with me?" - -His voice was startlingly bitter; it was the first time that he had used -her name. - -She came to him quickly, and sat down beside him, motionless and alert. -She knew that this was yet another Julian, and an instinct told her that -this was probably the real one. - -He, too, said nothing for a moment; then he began to speak with little -jerks between his sentences. - -"What do you suppose," he said, "is the idea? You know what I mean? You -saw the papers this morning? Have you ever seen a man gassed? I did -once, in Wales--a mine explosion. We got to the fellows. One of them was -dead, and one was mad, and one would have liked to be mad or dead. I -rather gather that about two or three thousand Canadians were gassed -near Ypres. They stood, you know,--stood as long as you can -stand,--gassed. I always thought that phrase, 'died at their posts,' -misleading. There aren't any posts, for one thing, and, then, -dying--well, you don't die quickly from gas. If you're fairly strong, -it's a solid performance, and takes at the least several hours. - -"I beg your pardon. I oughtn't to talk to you like that. Please forgive -me for being such a brute. On such a lovely morning, too! Are there any -new bulbs up? I ought to be ashamed of myself." - -"Julian--" said Stella. - -He turned his head quickly and looked at her. - -"Yes," he said; "what is it?" - -"You ought to be ashamed _not_ to talk to me," Stella said, with sudden -fierceness. "Doesn't it make any difference to you that we're friends?" - -He put his hand over hers. - -"Yes," he said, smiling; "but I happen to be rather afraid of -differences." - -He took his hand away as quickly as he had touched her. - -"Do you know," she asked in a low voice, "what was the saddest thing I -ever saw--the saddest and the most terrible?" - -"No," he said, turning his eyes carefully back to the silver birches; -"but I have an idea that it was something that happened to somebody -else." - -"Yes," said Stella; "it happened to a sea-gull. It was the only time I -ever went to the sea. Eurydice had been ill, and I went away with her. I -think I was fourteen. I had gone out alone after tea on to the cliffs -when I saw a motionless sea-gull at the very edge. I walked close up to -it. It was as still as a stone, and when I came up, O Julian, one of its -wings was broken! It could not fly again. Its eyes were searching the -sea with such despair in them; it knew it could not fly again. I picked -it up and carried it home. We did everything we could for it, but it -died--like that, without ever changing the despair in its eyes--because -it could not fly." - -"Lucky brute to be able to die," said Julian under his breath. Stella -said nothing. "Why did you tell me?" he asked after a pause. "Any lesson -attached to it?" - -She shook her head. - -"You're not crying?" he asked suspiciously. Then he looked at her. She -was sitting very still, biting her lips to keep her tears back. - -"You really mustn't, Stella!" he urged in a queer, soft voice she had -never heard him use before. "I'm not a sea-gull and I'm not dying, and -I'm not even a stone." - -"No," she whispered, "but you're just like the sea-gull: you won't share -your pain." - -"Look here," said Julian, "I--you--Would you mind sitting on that log -over there,--it's quite dry,--just opposite? Thanks. Now I can talk more -easily. I want you to remember that I'm a million times better off than -most people. What troubles me isn't what the vicar calls my affliction. -I'm rather proud of what I'm able to do with a pair of crutches in six -months. It's being out of it; that's what set me off on those Canadian -chaps. I miss the idea that I might be in that kind of thing, rather. -You see, I feel quite well. I'll settle down to it in time, and I won't -shut you out, if you'll remember not to let me--you're most awfully -innocent, aren't you? D'you mind telling me how old you are?" - -"Twenty-eight," said Stella. "But I'm not really innocent. I think I -know all the horrible things." - -Julian laughed ruefully. "You wouldn't see them coming though," he said; -"and, besides, the things that aren't innocent are by no means always -horrible. However, that's not what I was going to say. If we're to be -friends at all, and it's not particularly easy even for me to live in -the same house with you and not be friends, you'll have to help me -pretty considerably." - -"How shall I help you?" Stella asked eagerly. "I have wanted to, you -know. I mean that I did sometimes think you wanted to be friends--as -Mr. Travers did when he tried to become human because his cat died. I -haven't told you about that; it made him see how important it was. And -when you didn't want to be friendly, I tried not to bother you; I just -went on with the work. That _was_ the best way, wasn't it?" - -"Yes," said Julian, carefully. "You did the work uncommonly well, my -dear, and you never bothered me in that way. I'm afraid I don't quite -follow Mr. Travers. I suppose he is the town clerk, isn't he? He may -have meant the same thing that I do; but I should have thought it would -have been--well--simpler for him. I don't know how to explain to you -what I mean. You remember Marian?" Stella nodded, "I came a cropper over -Marian," Julian explained. "She behaved extraordinarily well. No one -could possibly blame her; but she wasn't exactly the kind of woman I'd -banked on, and I had banked on her pretty heavily. When I saw my -mistake, I understood that I wasn't fit for marriage, and I became -reconciled to it. I mean I accepted the idea thoroughly. It would be -tying a woman to a log. But I don't want to start feeling just yet--any -kind of feeling. Even nice, mild, pitying friendship like yours stings. -D'you understand?" - -"I'm not mild and I'm not pitying," said Stella, quietly. "And you don't -only shut me out; you shut out everybody. Why, you won't even let -yourself go over your old polar bears in the book!" - -"I can't afford to let myself go," said Julian, "even to the extent of a -polar bear--with you." - -"Just because I'm a woman?" asked Stella, regretfully. - -"If you like, you may put it that way," agreed Julian; "and as to the -rest of the world, it's very busy just at present fighting Germans. All -the men I like are either dead or will be soon. What's the use of -getting 'em down here to look at a broken sign-post? I'd rather keep to -myself till I've got going. I will get going again, and you'll help me, -if you'll try to remember what I've just told you." - -"Oh, I shall _remember_ it," replied Stella, hurriedly; "only I don't -quite know what it is. Still, I dare say, if I think it over, I shall -find out. At any rate, I'm _very, very_ glad you'll let me help you. Of -course I think you're all wrong about the other men. You think too much -of the outside of things. I dare say it's better than thinking too -little, as we do in our family. Besides, you have such a lovely house -and live so tidily. Still, I think it's a mistake. The men wouldn't see -your crutches half as much as they'd see _you_. The things that matter -most are always behind what anybody sees. Even all this beauty isn't -half as beautiful as what's behind it--the spirit of the life that -creates it, and brings it back again." - -"And the ugliness," asked Julian, steadily, "the ugliness we've just -been talking about over there, that long line of it cutting through -France like a mortal wound, drawing the life-blood of Europe,--what's -behind that?" - -"Don't you see?" she cried, leaning toward him eagerly. "Exactly the -same thing--life! All this quietness that reproduces what it takes away, -only always more beautifully. Don't you think, while we see here the -passing of the great procession of spring, behind in the invisible, -where their poured-out souls have rushed to, is a greater procession -still, forming for us to join? That even the ugliness is only an awful -way out into untouched beauty, like a winter storm that breaks the -ground up for the seed to grow?" - -"I can see that _you_ see it," said Julian, gently. "I can't see -anything else just now. You'd better cut along back to the house; you'll -be late for lunch. Tell my mother I'm not coming--and--and try not to -think I'm horrid if I'm not always friendly with you. I sha'n't be so -unfriendly as I sound." - -"I don't believe you know," said Stella, consideringly, "how very nice I -always think you--" - -"That," said Julian, "happens to be exactly one of the things you'd -better refrain from telling me. Good-by." - - - - -CHAPTER XXII - - -It is always hard to return in the character of a captive to a scene in -which you have played the part of victor, and Julian had told the truth -to Stella when he said that what stung him most was his new relation to -women. Men knew what he had done; many of them were facing the same -odds. They had a common experience and a common language to fall back -upon. They were his mates, but they did not come near enough to him to -hurt him; they had no wish to understand or help his sufferings. It was -sufficient for them to say, "Hard luck!" and leave that side of it -alone. Women were different: he had pursued women. - -Julian had a good average reputation. Very few women attracted him -beyond a certain point; but all his experiences had been successes. - -He had loved Marian with the best love his heart had known; but it had -been the love of Marian as a creature to possess. It had not been an -invasion of his personality. He would have given anything to possess -Marian; he had not been for a moment possessed by her. It did not seem -to Julian that a woman could ever do more than charm a man. - -She could charm you, if you let her, to distraction; but if you had any -strength, you remained intact. Nothing in you moved to meet her charm. -You simply, not to put too fine a point upon it, took what you could -get. Naturally, if you could no longer let a woman charm you, she -became, if she wasn't merely a nuisance, a menace. - -Julian acquiesced in Stella's remaining as his secretary only because he -had a theory that she did not charm him. He could not make head or tail -of her. He recognized that she had a mind, but it was a perplexing and -unchallenging mind, a private enjoyment of her own. She never attempted -to attract Julian by it. If he stirred her, she ran off like a poet or a -bird, upon her subject. She did not, as Julian supposed all women did, -put Julian himself at the other end of her subject. - -She had attractions: sympathy, wit, a charming, fugitive smile. She -arranged them no better than she arranged her hair; and it was -lamentable how she arranged her hair. - -Julian could not have borne her constant presence if she had not effaced -herself; his bitter self-consciousness would have been up in arms -against an effective personality at his elbow. Nevertheless, he was -obscurely annoyed that Stella made no attempt to impress him. She would -sit there morning after morning without looking at him, without noticing -him, without the lift of an eyelid to make him feel that he was anything -to her but the supply of copy for his chapter. She was as inhuman and -unpretentious as a piece of moss on a wall. - -But her voice haunted him; he would catch snatches of her talk with Lady -Verny in the garden. His mother had no scruple against intimacy with -Stella, and Stella was not docile with Lady Verny; she was enchanting. -She had a tantalizing voice full of music, with little gusts of mischief -and revolt in it. - -Julian told himself that he must put up with Stella for his mother's -sake. Lady Verny did not make friends easily, and liked bookworms. He -dismissed Stella as a bookworm. She had ways that, he told himself, were -intensely annoying. She came punctually to her work,--probably the poor -town clerk had taught her that much,--but she had no other -punctualities. Bells, meals, the passage of time, had no landmarks for -her. She seemed to drift along the hours like a leaf upon a stream. - -She was disorderly: she left things about; books face downward, scraps -of paper, flowers. She was always saying that she had lost her -fountain-pen. She didn't say this to Julian, but he heard her say it to -Ostrog, whom she accused outrageously of having eaten it, to all the -servants, and to his mother. None of them seemed to mind, not even -Ostrog. - -Ostrog's growls had ceased. He slept in Stella's presence, uneasily, -with half a red eye upon her; but he slept. - -After a few days he chose a position close to her feet and slept -solidly, with snores; finally he took her out for walks. Julian approved -of this, since she would go all over the place by herself, hatless, and -looking like a tramp, it was as well she should be accompanied by -Ostrog. - -Ostrog had never before been known to go for walks with any one except -Julian. He took plenty of exercise independently of human control in the -direction of rabbits. - -Stella was extremely wasteful with writing-paper. Over and over again -Julian saw her throw half a sheet, white and untouched, into the -waste-paper basket; and she cut string. It was curious how little Julian -felt annoyed by these depredations, considering how much he wished to be -annoyed. He was not by nature economical, but he lashed himself into -imaginary rages with Stella, and told her that she must once for all -turn over a new leaf. She was quite meek about it, and next time she -lost her fountain-pen she went into the village and bought a new one -which wouldn't write. She paid for it with her own money, and Julian -wanted to box her ears. He subsequently found the other one on the rack -where he kept his pipes. - -For some time he believed that she was not provocative because she was -negligible. She was one of those clever neutral women who haven't the -wit to be attractive. - -Then one day it flashed across him that for all her mild agreement with -his wishes, her spirit never for one instant surrendered to him. It did -not even think of escaping; it was free. - -This startled Julian. He liked evasive women, but he had thought Stella -extraordinarily the opposite. She was as frank as a boy. But was this -frankness merely because she was dealing with what was non-essential to -her? He tried to make her talk; he succeeded perfectly. - -Stella would talk about anything he liked. She enjoyed talking. She made -Julian enjoy it; and then he found that he had arrived nowhere. She gave -him her talk, as she gave him her attention, exactly as she would have -got up and handed him a book if he had asked for it. There was no more -of herself in it than in the simplest of her services. - -Julian was not sure when it was that he discovered that he had a new -feeling about her, which was even more disconcerting than her -independence; it was anxiety. - -Perhaps it was during the extremely slow and tiresome week-end on which -Stella paid a visit to her family. She went without her umbrella,--not -that it would have done much good if she had taken it, for Julian found, -to his extreme vexation, that it was full of holes,--the weather was -atrocious, and she came back with a cold. - -It might have been gathered that no one at Amberley had ever had a cold -before. As far as Julian was concerned nobody ever had. - -Julian possessed a sane imagination, and generally treated the subject -of health with a mixture of common sense and indifference. But this cold -of Stella's! - -It was no good Stella's saying it was a slight cold; he forced her to -take a list of remedies suitable for severe bronchitis. He quarreled -with his mother for saying that people had been known to recover from -colds, and finally he sent for the doctor. - -The doctor, being a wise man with a poor country practice, agreed with -Julian that you could not be too careful about colds, and thought that -priceless old port taken with her meals would not do Miss Waring any -harm. - -Stella disliked port very much, but she drank it submissively for a -week. - -"Nobody can call me fussy," Julian announced sternly, "but I will not -have a neglected cold in the house." - -He was not contradicted, though everybody knew that for weeks the cook -and two housemaids had been sneezing about the passages. - -It was a strange feeling, this sharp compulsion of fear. It taught -Julian something. It taught him that what happened to Stella happened to -himself. He no longer thought of pursuit in connection with her. He had -found her in his heart. - -It was an extremely awkward fact, but he accepted it. After all, he had -crushed passions before which had gone against his code. He had iron -self-control, and he thought it would be quite possible to stamp out -this fancy before it got dangerous, even while he retained her presence. - -He couldn't remain friendly to her, but he could be civil enough. He -tried this process. For nine days it worked splendidly. Of course Stella -didn't like it, but it worked. She had too much sense to ask him what -was the matter, but she looked wistful. On the tenth she cut her finger -sharpening a pencil, and Julian called her "Darling." Fortunately she -didn't hear him, and he managed to bandage her finger up without losing -his head; but he knew that it had been an uncommonly near shave, and if -she hurt herself again, he wasn't at all sure how he would stand it. - -Love flooded him like a rising tide; all his landmarks became submerged. -He could not tell how far the tide would spread. He clung to Stella's -faults with positive vindictiveness despite the fact that he had -surprised himself smiling over them. He dared not let himself think -about her qualities. The one support left to him was her own -unconsciousness. He needn't tell her, and she wouldn't guess; and as -long as she didn't know, he could keep her. If she did know, she would -have to go away; even if she didn't want to go, as she most probably -would, he would have to send her away. He became as watchful of himself -as he had been when his life depended on every word he said; but he -could not help his eyes. When other people were there he did not look at -Stella at all. - -It was the first day Stella had been late for her work, and Julian had -prepared to be extremely angry until he saw her face. She came slowly -toward the open window out of the garden, looking oddly drawn and white. -The pain in her eyes hurt Julian intolerably. - -"Hullo!" he said quickly, "what's wrong?" - -She did not answer at once; her hands trembled. She was holding a -letter, face downward, as if she hated holding it. - -"Your mother asked me to tell you myself," she began. "I am afraid to -tell you; but she seemed to think you would rather--" - -"Yes," said Julian, quickly. "Are you going away?" - -"Oh, no," whispered Stella. "If it was only that!" - -Julian said, "Ah!" It was an exclamation that sounded like relief. He -leaned back in his chair, and did nothing further to help her. - -Stella moved restlessly about the room. She had curious graceful -movements like a wild creature; she became awkward only when she knew -she was expected to behave properly. Finally she paused, facing a -bookcase, with her back to Julian. - -"Well?" asked Julian, encouragingly. "Better get it over, hadn't we? -World come to pieces worse than usual this morning?" - -"I don't know how to tell you," she said wretchedly. "For you perhaps it -has--I have heard from Marian." - -Julian picked up his pipe, which he had allowed to go out when Stella -came in, relit it, and smiled at the back of her head. He looked -extraordinarily amused and cheerful. - -"She hadn't written to me," Stella went on without turning round, "for -ages and ages,--you remember I told you?--and now she has." - -"She was always an uncertain correspondent," said Julian, smoothly. "Am -I to see this letter? Message for me, perhaps? Or doesn't she know -you're here?" - -"Oh, no!" cried Stella, quickly. "I mean there's nothing in it you -couldn't see, of course. There _is_ a kind of message; still, she didn't -mean you actually to see it. She heard somehow that I was here, and she -wanted me to tell you--" Stella's voice broke, but she picked herself up -and went on, jerking out the cruel words that shook her to the heart,-- -"she wanted me to tell you that she's--she's going to be married." - -Stella heard a curious sound from Julian incredibly like a chuckle. She -flinched, and held herself away from him. He would not want her to see -how he suffered. There was a long silence. - -"Stella," said Julian at last in that singular, soft, new voice of his -that he occasionally used when they were alone together, "the ravages of -pain are now hidden. You can turn round." - -She came back to him uncertainly, and sat down by the window at his -feet. He had a tender teasing look that she could not quite understand. -His eyes themselves never wavered as they met hers, but the eagerness in -them wavered; his tenderness seemed to hold it back. - -She thought that Julian's eyes had grown curiously friendly lately. -Despite his pain, they were very friendly now. - -"Any details?" Julian asked. "Don't be afraid to tell me. I'm not--I -mean I'm quite prepared for it." - -"It's to be next month," she said hurriedly. "She didn't want you to see -it first in the papers." - -"Awfully considerate of her, wasn't it?" interrupted Julian. "By the -by, tell her when you write that she couldn't have chosen anybody better -to break it to me than you." - -"O Julian," Stella pleaded, "please don't laugh at me! Do if it makes -you any easier, of course; only I--I mind so horribly!" - -"Do you?" asked Julian, carefully. "I think I'm rather glad you mind, -but you mustn't mind horribly; only as much as a friend should mind for -another friend." - -"That is the way I mind," said Stella. - -She had a large interpretation of friendship. - -"Oh, all right," said Julian, rather crossly. "Go on!" - -"She says it's a Captain Edmund Stanley, and he's a D.S.O. They're to be -married very quietly while he's on leave." - -"Lucky man!" said Julian. "Any money?" - -"Oh, I think so," murmured Stella, anxiously skipping the letter in her -lap. "She says he's fairly well off." - -"I think," observed Julian, "that we may take it that if Marian says -Captain Stanley is fairly well off, his means need give us no anxiety. -What?" - -"Julian, must you talk like that?" Stella pleaded. "You'll make it so -hard for yourself if you're bitter." - -"On the whole, I think I must," replied Julian, reflectively. "If I -talked differently, you mightn't like it; and, anyhow, I daren't run the -risk. I might break down, you know, and you wouldn't like that, would -you? Shall we get to work?" - -"Oh, not this morning!" Stella cried. "I'm going out; I knew you -wouldn't want me." - -"Did you though?" asked Julian. "But I happen to want you most -particularly. What are you going to do about it?" - -She looked at him in surprise. He had a peculiarly teasing expression -which did not seem appropriate to extreme grief. - -"I'll stay, of course, if you want me," she said quietly. - -"You're a very kind little elf," said Julian, "but I don't think you -must make a precedent of my wanting you, or else--look here, d' you mind -telling me a few things about your--your friendship with Marian?" - -Stella's face cleared. She saw now why he wanted her to stay. She turned -her eyes back to the garden. - -"I'll tell you anything you like to know," she answered. - -"You liked her?" asked Julian. - -"She was so different from everybody else in my world," Stella -explained. "I don't think I judged her; I just admired her. She was -awfully good to me. I didn't see her very often, but it was all the -brightness of my life." - -"Stella, you've never told me about your life," Julian said -irrelevantly. "Will you some day? I want to know about the town hall and -that town clerk fellow." - -"There isn't anything to tell you," said Stella. "I mean about that, and -Marian was never in my life. She couldn't have been, you know; but she -was my special dream. I used to love to hear about all her experiences -and her friends; and then--do you remember the night of Chaliapine's -opera? It was the only opera I ever went to, so of course I remember; -but perhaps you don't. You were there with Marian. I think I knew -then--" - -"Knew what?" asked Julian, leaning forward a little. "You seem awfully -interested in that gravel path, Stella?" - -"Knew," she said, without turning her head, "what you meant to her." - -"Where were you?" Julian inquired. "Looking down from the ceiling or up -from a hole in the ground, where the good people come from? I never saw -you." - -"Ah, you wouldn't," said Stella. "I was in the gallery. Do you remember -the music?" - -"Russian stuff," Julian said. "Pack of people going into a fire, yes. -Funnily enough, I've thought of it since, more than once, too; but I -didn't know you were there." - -"And then when you were hurt," Stella went on in a low voice, "Marian -told me. Julian, she did mind _frightfully_. I always wanted you to know -that she _did_ mind." - -"It altered her plans, didn't it," said Julian, "quite considerably?" - -"You've no business to talk like that!" said Stella, angrily. "It's not -fair--or kind." - -"And does it matter to you whether I'm fair or kind?" Julian asked, with -deadly coolness. - -"I beg your pardon," said Stella, quickly. "Of course it has nothing to -do with me. I have no right to--to mind what you say." - -"I'm glad you recognize that," said Julian, quietly. "It facilitates our -future intercourse. And you agreed with Marian that she only did her -duty in painstakingly adhering to her given word? Perhaps you encouraged -her to do it? The inspiration sounds quite like yours." - -She looked at him now. - -"Julian," she said, "am I all wrong? Would you rather that we weren't -friends at all? You are speaking as if you hated me." - -"No, I'm not," he said quickly, "you little goose! How could I keep you -here if I hated you? Have a little sense. No, don't put your hand there, -because, if you do, I shall take it, and I'm rather anxious just now not -to. You shall go directly you've answered me this. Did you agree with -Marian's point of view about me? You know what it was, don't you? She -didn't love me any more; she wished I had been killed, and she decided -to stick to me. She thought I'd be grateful. Do you think I ought to -have been grateful?" - -"You know I don't! You know I don't!" cried Stella. "But why do you make -me say it? I simply hated it--hated her not seeing, not caring enough -to see, not caring enough to make you see. There! Is that all you wanted -me to say?" - -"Practically," said Julian, "but I don't see why you should fly into a -rage over it. In your case, then, if it had been your case, you would -simply have broken off the engagement at once, like a sensible girl?" - -"I can't imagine myself in such a situation," said Stella, getting up -indignantly. - -"Naturally," interposed Julian smoothly. "But, still, if you had -happened, by some dreadful mischance, to find yourself engaged to me--" - -"I should have broken it off directly," said Stella, turning to -go--"directly I found out--" - -"Found out what?" asked Julian. - -"That you were nothing but a cold-blooded tease!" cried Stella over her -shoulder. - -"You perfect darling!" said Julian under his breath. "By Jove! that was -a narrow squeak!" - - - - -CHAPTER XXIII - - -It puzzled Stella extremely that she found herself unable to say, "What -is it that you want, Julian?" She knew that there was something that he -wanted, and there was nothing that she would dream of denying him. What, -therefore, could be simpler than asking him? And yet she did not want to -ask him. - -She began by trying hard to understand what it was that he had told her -above the bluebell wood, because she thought if she discovered what he -wanted then, the rest would follow. He had wanted a particular kind of -help from her; that was plain. It had something to do with her being a -woman; that was plainer. But was it to his advantage or to his -disadvantage that she was a woman? Ought she to suppress the fact or -build on it? And how could she build on it or suppress it when she never -felt in the least like anything else but a woman? - -Cicely used to say that the only safe way with men was never to be nice -to them; but Stella had always thought any risk was better than such a -surly plan. Besides, Julian couldn't mean that. He liked her to be nice -to him. She saw quite plainly that he liked her to be nice to him. - -Unfortunately, Julian had taken for granted in Stella a certain -experience of life, and Stella had never had any such experience. She -had never once recognized fancy in the eyes of any man. As for love, it -belonged solely to her dreams; and the dreams of a woman of -twenty-eight, unharassed by fact, are singularly unreliable. She thought -of Mr. Travers, but he did not count. She had never been able to realize -what he had felt for her. Her relation to him was as formal, despite his -one singular lapse, as that of a passenger to a ticket-collector. She -had nothing to go on but her dreams. - -In her very early youth she had selected for heroes two or three -characters from real life. They were Cardinal Newman, Shelley, and -General Gordon. Later, on account of a difference in her religious -opinions, she had replaced the Cardinal by Charles Lamb. None of these -characters was in the least like Julian. - -One had apparently no experience of women, the other two had sisters, -and Shelley's expression of love was vague and might be said to be -misleading. - - She met me, robed in such exceeding glory, - That I beheld her not. - -Life had unfortunately refused to meet Shelley on the same terms, and -difficulties had ensued, but it was this impracticable side of him that -Stella had accepted. She had skipped Harriet, and landed on -"Epipsychidion." Love was to her "a green and golden immortality." She -was not disturbed by it, because the deepest experiences of life do not -disturb us. What disturbs us is that which calls us away from them. - -It made it easier to wait to find out what Julian wanted that he was -happier with her. He was hardly ever impersonal or cold now, and he -sometimes made reasons to be with her that had nothing to do with their -work. - -It was June, and the daffodils had gone, but there were harebells and -blue butterflies upon the downs, and in the hedges wild roses and Star -of Bethlehem. Lady Verny spent all her time in the garden. She said the -slugs alone took hours. They were supposed by the uninitiated to be -slow, but express trains could hardly do more damage in less time. So -Stella and Ostrog took their walks alone, and were frequently -intercepted by Julian on their return. - -Julian, who ought to have known better, thought that the situation might -go on indefinitely, and Stella did not know that there was any -situation; she knew only that she was in a new world. There was sorrow -outside it, there was sorrow even in her heart for those outside it; but -through all sorrow was this unswerving, direct experience of joy. She -would have liked to share it with Julian, but she thought it was all her -own, and that what he liked about her--since he liked something--was her -ability to live beyond the margin of her personal delight. The color of -it was in her eyes, and the strength of it at her heart; but she never -let it interfere with Julian. She was simply a companion with a hidden -treasure. She sometimes thought that having it made her a better -companion; but even of this she was not sure. - -It made her a little nervous taking Ostrog out alone, but she always -took the lead with him, and slipped it on him if a living creature -appeared on the horizon. There were some living creatures he didn't -mind, but you couldn't be sure which. - -One evening she was tired and forgot him. There was a wonderful sunset. -She stood to watch it in a hollow of the downs where she was waiting for -Julian. The soft, gray lines rose up on each side of her, immemorial, -inalterable lines of gentle land. The air was as transparently clear as -water, and hushed with evening. Far below her, where the small church -steeple sprang, she saw the swallows cutting V-shaped figures to and fro -above the shining elms. - -For a long time she heard no sound, and then, out of the stillness, came -a faint and hollow boom. Far away across the placid shapes of little -hills, over the threatened seas, the guns sounded from France--the dim, -intolerable ghosts of war. - -Ostrog, impatient of her stillness, bounded to the edge of the hollow -and challenged the strange murmur to the echo. He was answered -immediately. A sheep-dog shot up over the curve of the down. Ostrog was -at his throat in an instant. - -There was a momentary recoil for a fresh onslaught, and then the shrieks -of the preliminary tussle changed into the full-throated growl of -combat. There was every prospect that one or other of them would be dead -before their jaws unlocked. - -Stella hovered above them in frantic uncertainty. She was helpless till -she saw that there was no other help. The sheep-dog had had enough; a -sudden scream of pain stung her into action. She seized Ostrog's hind -leg and twisted it sharply from under him. - -At the moment she did so she heard Julian's voice: - -"Wait! For God's sake, let go!" - -But she could not wait; the sheep-dog was having the life squeezed out -of him. She tugged and twisted again. Ostrog's grip slackened, he flung -a snap at her across his shoulder, and then, losing his balance, turned -on her in a flash. She guarded her head, but his teeth struck at her -shoulder. She felt herself thrust back by his weight, saw his red jaws -open for a fresh spring, and then Julian's crutch descended sharply on -Ostrog's head. Ostrog dropped like a stone, the bob-tailed sheep-dog -crawled safely away, and Stella found herself in Julian's arms. - -[Illustration: She tugged and twisted again] - -"Dearest, sure you're not hurt? Sure?" he implored breathlessly, and -then she knew what his eyes asked her, they were so near her own and so -intent; and while her lips said, "Sure, Julian," she knew her own eyes -answered them. - -He drew her close to his heart and kissed her again and again. - -The idea of making any resistance to him never occurred to Stella. -Nothing that Julian asked of her could seem strange. She only wondered, -if that was what he wanted, why he had not done it before. - -He put her away from him almost roughly. - -"There," he said, "I swore I'd never touch you! And I have! I'm a brute -and a blackguard. Try and believe I'll never do it again. Promise you -won't leave me? Promise you'll forgive me? I was scared out of my wits, -and that's a fact. D' you think you can forgive me, Stella?" - -"But what have I to forgive?" Stella asked. "I let you kiss me." - -"By Jove!" exclaimed Julian, half laughing, "you are an honest woman! -Well, if you did, you mustn't 'let me' again, that's all. Ostrog, you -wretch, lie down! You ought to have a sound thrashing. I'd have shot you -if you'd hurt her; but as I've rather scored over the transaction, I'll -let you off." - -Stella looked at Julian thoughtfully. - -"Why mustn't I let you again?" she inquired, "if that is what you want?" - -Julian, still laughing, but half vexed, looked at her. - -"Look here," he said, "didn't I tell you you'd got to help me? I can't -very well keep you here and behave to you like that, can I?" - -Stella considered for a moment, then she said quietly, "Were you -flirting with me, Julian?" - -"I wish to God I was!" said Julian, savagely. "If I could get out of it -as easily as that, d'you suppose I should have been such a fool as not -to have tried?" - -"I don't think you would have liked me to despise you," said Stella, -gently. "You see, if you had given me nothing when I was giving you all -I had, I should have despised you." - -Julian stared at her. She was obviously speaking the truth, but in his -heart he knew that if she had loved him and he had flirted with her, he -would have expected her to be the one to be despised. - -He put out his hand to her and then drew it back sharply. - -"No, I'm hanged if I'll touch you," he said under his breath. "I love -you all right,--you needn't despise me for that,--but telling you of -it's different. I was deadly afraid you'd see; any other woman would -have seen. I've held on to myself for all I was worth, but it hasn't -been the least good, really. I suppose I've got to be honest about it: I -can't keep you with me, darling; you'll have to go. It makes it a -million times worse your caring, but it makes it better, too." - -"I don't see why it should be worse at all," said Stella, calmly. "If we -both care, and care really, I don't see that anything can be even bad." - -Julian pulled up pieces of the turf with his hand. He frowned at her -sternly. - -"You mustn't tempt me," he said; "I told you once I can't marry." - -"You told me once, when you didn't know I cared," agreed Stella. "I -understand your feeling that about a woman who didn't care or who only -cared a little, but not about a woman who really cares." - -"But, my dear child," said Julian, "that's what just makes it utterly -impossible. I can't understand how I ever was such a selfish brute as to -dream of taking Marian. I was ill at the time, and hadn't sized it up; -but if you think I'm going to let _you_ make such a sacrifice, you're -mistaken. I'd see you dead before I married you!" - -Stella's eyebrows lifted, but she did not seem impressed. - -"I think," she said gently, "you talk far too much as if it had only got -to do with you. Suppose I don't wish to see myself dead?" - -"Well, you must try to see the sense of it," Julian urged. "You're young -and strong; you ought to have a life. I'm sure you love children. You -like to be with me, and all that; you're the dearest companion a man -ever had. It isn't easy, Stella, to say I won't keep you; don't make it -any harder for me. I've looked at this thing steadily for months. I -don't mind owning that I thought you might get to care if I tried hard -enough to make you; but, darling, I honestly didn't try. You can't say I -wasn't awfully disagreeable and cross. I knew I was done for long ago, -but I thought you were all right. You weren't like a girl in love, you -were so quiet and--and sisterly and all that. If I'd once felt you were -beginning to care in that way, I'd have made some excuse; I wouldn't -have let it come to this. I'd rather die than hurt you." - -"Well, but you needn't hurt me," said Stella, "and neither of us need -die. It's not your love that wants to get rid of me, Julian; it's your -pride. But I haven't any pride in that sense, and I'm not going to let -you do it." - -"By Jove! you won't!" cried Julian. His eyes shot a gleam of amusement -at her. It struck him that the still little figure by his side was -extraordinarily formidable. He had never thought her formidable before. -He had thought her brilliant, intelligent, and enchanting, not -formidable; but he had no intention of giving way to her. Formidable or -not, he felt quite sure of himself. He couldn't let her down. - -"The sacrifice is all the other way," Stella went on. "You would be -sacrificing me hopelessly to your pride if you refused to marry me -simply because some one of all the things you want to give me you can't -give me. Do you suppose I don't mind,--mind for you, I mean, -hideously,--mind so much that if I were sure marrying you would make you -feel the loss more, I'd go away from you this minute and never come near -you again? But I do not think it will make it worse for you. You will -have me; you will have my love and companionship, and they are--valuable -to you, aren't they, Julian?" - -Julian's eyes softened and filled. - -"Yes," he muttered, turning his head away from her; "they're valuable." - -"Then," she said, "if you are like that to me, if I want you always, and -never anybody else, have you a right to rob me of yourself, Julian?" - -"If I could believe," he said, his voice shaking, "that you'd never be -sorry, never say to yourself, 'Why did I do it?' But, oh, my dear, you -know so little about the ordinary kind of love! You don't realize a bit, -and I do. It must make it all so confoundedly hard for you, and I'm such -an impatient chap. I mightn't be able to help you. And you're right: I'm -proud. If I once thought you cared less or regretted marrying me, it -would clean put the finish on it. But you're not right about not loving -you, Stella, that's worse than pride; loving you makes it impossible. I -can't take the risk for you. I'll do any other mortal thing you want, -but not that!" - -"Julian," asked Stella in a low voice, "do you think I am a human -being?" - -"Well, no!" said Julian. "Since you ask me, more like a fairy or an elf -or something. Why?" - -"Because you're not treating me as if I were," said Stella, steadily. -"Human beings have a right to their own risks. They know their own -minds, they share the dangers of love." - -"Then one of 'em mustn't take them all," said Julian, quickly. - -"How could one take them all?" said Stella. "I have to risk your pride, -and you have to risk my regret. As a matter of fact, your pride is more -of a certainty than a risk, and my regret is a wholly imaginary idea, -founded upon your ignorance of my character. Still, I'm willing to put -it like that to please you. You have every right to sacrifice yourself -to your own theories, but what about sacrificing me? I give you no such -right." - -For the first time Julian saw what loving Stella would be like; he would -never be able to get to the end of it. Marriage would be only the -beginning. She had given him her heart without an effort, and he found -that she was as inaccessible as ever. His soul leaped toward this new, -unconquerable citadel. He held himself in hand with a great effort. - -"What you don't realize," he said, "is that our knowledge of life is not -equal. If I take you at your word, you will make discoveries which it -will be too late for you to act upon. You cannot wish me to do what is -not fair to you." - -"I want my life to be with you," said Stella. "Whatever discoveries I -make, I shall not want them to be anywhere else. You do not understand, -but if you send me away, you will take from me the future which we might -have used together. You will not be giving me anything in its place but -disappointment and utter uselessness. You'll make me--morally--a -cripple. Do you still wish me to go away from you?" - -Julian winced as if she had struck him. - -"No, I'll marry you," he said; "but you've made me furiously angry. -Please go home by yourself. I wonder you dare use such an illustration -to me." - -Stella slipped over the verge of the hollow. She, too, wondered how she -had dared; but she knew quite well that if she hadn't dared, Julian -would have sent her away. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV - - -Stella was afraid that when she went down to dinner it would be like -slipping into another life--a life to which she was attached by her love -for Julian, but to which she did not belong. It did not seem possible to -her that Lady Verny would be able to bear her as a daughter-in-law. As a -secretary it had not mattered in the least that she was shabby and -socially ineffective. And she couldn't be different; they'd have to take -her like that if they took her at all. She ranged them together in her -fear of their stateliness; she almost wished that they wouldn't take her -at all, but let her slink back to Redcliffe Square and bury herself in -her own insignificance. - -But when she went down-stairs she found herself caught in a swift -embrace by Lady Verny, and meeting without any barrier the adoration of -Julian's eyes. - -"My dear, my dear," said Lady Verny, "I always felt that you belonged to -me." - -"But are you pleased?" whispered Stella in astonishment. - -"Pleased!" cried Lady Verny, with a little shaken laugh. "I'm satisfied; -a thing that at my age I hardly had the right to expect." - -"Mother thinks it's all her doing," Julian explained. "It's her theory -that we've shown no more initiative than a couple of guaranteed Dutch -bulbs. Shall I tell you what she was saying before you came -down-stairs?" - -"Dear Julian," said Lady Verny, blushing like a girl, "you're so -dreadfully modern, you will frighten Stella if you say things to her so -quickly before she has got used to the idea of you." - -"She's perfectly used to the idea of me," laughed Julian, "and I've -tried frightening her already without the slightest success. Besides, -there's nothing modern about a madonna lily, which is what we were -discussing. My mother said, Stella, that she didn't care very much for -madonna lilies in the garden. They're too ecclesiastical for the other -flowers, but very suitable in church for weddings. And out in ten days' -time, didn't you say, Mother? I hope they haven't any of Stella's -procrastinating habits." - -"You mustn't mind his teasing, dear," Lady Verny said, smiling. "We will -go in to dinner now. You're a little late, but no wonder. I am delighted -to feel that now I have a right to scold you." - -"The thing that pleases me most," said Julian, "is that I shall be able -to remove Stella's apples and pears forcibly from her plate and peel -them myself. I forget how long she has been here, but the anguish I have -suffered meal by meal as I saw her plod her unreflecting way over their -delicate surfaces, beginning at the stalk and slashing upward without -consideration for any of the laws of nature, nothing but the -self-control of a host could have compelled me to endure. I offered to -peel them for her once, but she said she liked peeling them; and I was -far too polite to say, 'Darling, you've got to hand them over to me.' -I'm going to say it now, though, every time." - -"Hush, dear," said Lady Verny, nervously. "Thompson has barely shut the -door. I really don't know what has happened to your behavior." - -"I haven't any," said Julian. "I'm like the old lady in the earthquake -who found herself in the street with no clothes on. She bowed gravely to -a gentleman she had met the day before and said, 'I should be happy to -give you my card, Mr. Jones, but I have lost the receptacle.' Things -like that happen in earthquakes. I have lost my receptacle." He met -Stella's eyes and took the consent of her laughter. He was as happy with -her as a boy set loose from school. - -Lady Verny, watching him, was almost frightened at his lack of -self-restraint. "He has never trusted any one like this before," she -thought. "He is keeping nothing back." It was like seeing the released -waters of a frozen stream. - -While they sat in the hall before Julian rejoined them, Lady Verny -showed Stella all the photographs of Julian taken since he was a baby. - -There was a singularly truculent one of him, at three years old, with a -menacingly poised cricket-bat, which Stella liked best of all. Lady -Verny had no copy of it, but she pressed Stella to take it. - -"Julian will give you so many things," she said; "but I want to give you -something that you will value, and which is quite my own." So Stella -took the truculent baby, which was Lady Verny's own. - -"You look very comfortable sitting there together; I won't disturb you -for chess," Julian observed when he came in shortly afterward. "I was -wondering if you would like to hear what I did in Germany. It's a year -old now and as safe with you as with me, but it mustn't go any further." - -Julian told his story very quietly, leaning back against the cushions of -a couch by the open window. Above his head, Stella could see the dark -shapes of the black yew hedges and the wheeling of the bats as they -scurried to and fro upon their secret errands. - -Neither Lady Verny nor Stella moved until Julian had finished speaking. -It was the most thrilling of detective stories; but it is not often that -the roots of our being are involved in detective stories. - -They could not believe that he lay there before them, tranquilly -smoking a cigarette and breathed on by the soft June air. As they -watched his face comfort and security vanished. They were in a ruthless -world where a false step meant death. Julian had been in danger, but it -was never the danger which he had been in that he described; it was the -work he had set out to do and the way he had done it. He noticed danger -only when it obstructed him. Then he put his wits to meet it. They were, -as Stella realized, very exceptional wits for meeting things. Julian -combined imagination with strict adherence to fact. He had the courage -which never broods over an essential risk and the caution which avoids -all unnecessary ones. - -"Of course," he broke off for a moment, "you felt all the time rather -like a flea under a microscope. Don't underrate the Germans. As a -microscope there's nothing to beat them; where the microscope leaves off -is where their miscalculations begin. A microscope can tell everything -about a flea except where it is going to hop. - -"I had a lively time over my hopping; but the odd part of it was the -sense of security I often had, as if some one back of me was giving me -a straight tip. I don't understand concentration. You'd say it is your -own doing, of course, and yet behind your power of holding on to things, -it seems as if Something Else was holding on much harder. It's as if you -set a ball rolling, and some one else kicked it in the right direction. - -"After I'd been in Germany for a month I began to believe in an -Invisible Kicker-Off. It was company for me, for I was lonely. I had to -calculate every word I said, and there's no sense of companionship where -one has to calculate. The feeling that there was something back of me -was quite a help. I'd get to the end of my job, and then something fresh -would be pushed toward me. - -"For instance, I met a couple of naval officers by chance,--I wasn't out -for anything naval,--and they poured submarine facts into me as you pour -milk into a jug--facts that we needed more than the points I'd come to -find out. - -"I'm not at all sure," Julian finished reflectively, "that if you grip -hard enough under pressure, you don't tap facts. - -"Have you ever watched a crane work? You shift a lever, and it comes -down as easily as a parrot picks up a pencil; it'll lift a weight that a -hundred men can't move an inch, and swing it up as if it were packing -feathers. Funny idea, if there's a law that works like that. - -"I came back through Alsace and Lorraine, meaning to slip through the -French lines. A sentry winged me in the woods. Pure funk on his part; he -never even came to hunt up what he'd let fly at. But it finished my -job." - -Lady Verny folded up her embroidery. - -"It was worth the finish, Julian," she said quickly. "I am glad you told -me, because I had not thought so before." Then she left them. - -"It isn't finished, Julian," murmured Stella in a low voice. "It never -can be when it's you." - -"Well," said Julian, "it's all I've got to give you; so I'm rather glad -you like it, Stella." - -They talked till half the long summer night was gone. She sat near him, -and sometimes Julian let his hand touch her shoulder or her hair while -he unpacked his heart to her. The bitterness of his reserve was gone. - -"I think perhaps I could have stood it decently if it hadn't been for -Marian," he explained. "I was damned weak about her, and that's a fact. -You see, I thought she had the kind of feeling for me that women -sometimes have and which some men deserve; but I'm bound to admit I -wasn't one of them. When I saw that Marian took things rather the way I -should have taken them myself, I went down under it. I said, 'That's the -end of love.' It was the end of the kind I was fit for, the kind that -has an end. - -"Now I'm going to tell you something. I never shall again, so you must -make the most of it, and keep it to hold on to when I behave badly. -You've put the fear of God into me, Stella. Nothing else would have made -me give in to you; and you know I have given in to you, don't you?" - -"You've given me everything in the world I want," said Stella, gently, -"if that's what you call giving in to me." - -"I've done more than that," said Julian, quietly. "I've let you take my -will and turn it with that steady little hand of yours; and it's the -first time--and I don't say it won't be the last--that I've let any man -or woman change my will for me. - -"Now I'm going to send you to bed. I oughtn't to have you kept you up -like this; but if I've got to let you go back to your people to-morrow, -we had to know each other a little better first, hadn't we? I've been -trying not to know you all these months. - -"Before you go, would you mind telling me about Mr. Travers and the -cat?" - -"No," said Stella, with a startled look; "anything else in the world, -Julian, but not Mr. Travers and the cat." - -"Ostrog and I are frightfully jealous by nature," Julian pleaded. "He -wouldn't be at all nice to that cat if he met it without knowing its -history." - -"He can't be unkind to the poor cat," said Stella; "it's dead." - -"And is Mr. Travers dead, too?" asked Julian. - -"I should think," said Stella, "that he was about as dead as the -red-haired girl in the library." - -"What red-haired girl?" cried Julian, sharply. "Who's been telling -you--I mean what made you think I knew her? It's a remarkably fine bit -of painting." - -"But you did know her," said Stella; "only don't tell me anything about -her unless you want to." - -"I won't refuse to answer any questions you ask," said Julian after a -pause, "but I'd much rather wait until we're married. I am a little -afraid of hurting you; you wouldn't be hurt, you see, if you were used -to me and knew more about men. You're an awfully clever woman, Stella, -but the silliest little girl I ever knew." - -"I'll give up the red-haired girl if you'll give up Mr. Travers," said -Stella. She rose, and stood by his side, looking out of the window. - -"Do you want to say good night, or would you rather go to bed without?" -he asked her. - -"Of course I'll say good night," said Stella. "But, Julian, there are -some things I so awfully hate your doing. Saying good night doesn't -happen to be one of them. It's lighting my candle unless I'm sure you -want to. I want to be quite certain you don't mind me in little things -like that." - -Julian put his arms round her and kissed her as gently as he would have -kissed a child. "Of course you shall light your candle," he said -tenderly, "just to show I don't mind you. But it isn't my pride now. I -don't a bit object to your seeing I can't. I'm quite sure of you, you -see; unless you meant to hurt me, you simply couldn't do it. And if you -meant to hurt me, it would be because you wanted to stop me hurting -myself, like this afternoon, wouldn't it?" - -Stella nodded. She wanted to tell him that she had always loved him, -long before he remembered that she existed. All the while he had felt -himself alone, she was as near him as the air that touched his cheek. -But she could not find words in which to tell him of her secret -companionship. The instinct that would have saved them only brushed her -heart in passing. - -Julian was alarmed at her continued silence. - -"You're not frightened or worried or anything, are you?" he asked -anxiously. "Sure you didn't mind saying good night? It's not -compulsory, you know, even if we are engaged. I'd hate to bother you." - -"I'm not bothered," Stella whispered; "I--only love you. I was saying it -to you in my own way." - -"I'll wait three days for you," said Julian, firmly. "Not an hour more. -You quite understand, don't you, that I'm coming up at the end of three -days to bring you home for good?" - -Stella shivered as she thought of Redcliffe Square. Julian wouldn't like -Redcliffe Square, and she wouldn't be able to make him like it; and yet -she wouldn't be able not to mind his not liking it. - -Julian knew nothing about Redcliffe Square, but he noticed that Stella -shivered when he told her that he was going to bring her home for good. - - - - -CHAPTER XXV - - -It would be too strong an expression to say that after Stella's -departure Julian suffered from reaction. He himself couldn't have -defined what he suffered from, but he was uneasy. - -He had given himself away to Stella as he had never in his wildest -dreams supposed that one could give oneself away to a woman. But he -wasn't worrying about that; he hadn't minded giving himself away to -Stella. - -Samson was the character in the Old Testament whom Julian most despised, -because he had let Delilah get things out of him. What Samson had got -back hadn't been worth it, and could probably have been acquired without -the sacrifice of his hair. He had simply given in to Delilah because he -had a soft spot for her; and Delilah quite blamelessly (from Julian's -point of view) had retaliated by crying out, "The Philistines be upon -thee, Samson!" - -Julian had always felt perfectly safe with women of this type; they -couldn't have entrapped him. But there wasn't an inch of Delilah in -Stella. She had no Philistines up her sleeve for any of the -contingencies of life and she had not tried to get anything out of -Julian. - -That was where his uneasiness began. He understood her sufficiently to -trust her, but he was aware that beyond his confidence she was a mapless -country; he did not even know which was water and which was land. His -uncertainty had made him shrink from telling Stella about Eugénie -Matisse. - -If Marian had been sharp enough--she probably wouldn't have been--to -guess that Julian knew the girl in the picture, she would have known, -too, precisely what kind of girl she was, and she would have thought -none the worse of Julian. - -But he didn't know what Stella expected. He wasn't afraid that she would -cast him off for that or any other of his experiences; then he would -have told her. She would have forgiven him as naturally as she loved -him; but what if her forgiveness had involved her pain? - -He had spoken the truth when he told Stella that she had "put the fear -of God into him." Julian had not known much about God before or anything -about fear; but he was convinced now that the fear of God was not that -God might let you down, but that you might let down God. He wanted to be -as careful of Stella as if she had been a government secret. - -Did she know in the least what she was in for. Or was she like an -unconscious Iphigenia vowed off to mortal peril by an inadvertent -parent? - -He had done his best to make her realize the future, but there are -certain situations in life when doing one's best to make a person aware -of a fact is equivalent to throwing dust in his eyes. And Stella herself -might by a species of divine fooling, have outwitted both himself and -her. She might be marrying Julian for pity under the mask of love. - -Her pity was divine, and he could stand it for himself perfectly; but he -couldn't stand it for her. Why had she shivered when he had said he was -going to bring her home? He cursed his helplessness. If he had not been -crippled he would have taken her by surprise, and let his instincts -judge for him; but he had had to lie there like a log, knowing that if -he asked her to come to him, she would have blinded him by her swift, -prepared responsiveness. - -The moment on the downs hardly counted. She had been so frightened that -it had been like taking advantage of her to take her in his arms. - -The one comfort he clung to was her fierce thrust at his pride. He -repeated it over and over to himself for reassurance. She had said, if -he wouldn't marry her, he would make her morally a cripple. That really -sounded like love, for only love dares to strike direct at the heart. If -he could see her, he knew it would be all right; if even she had written -(she had written, of course, but had missed the midnight post), he would -have been swept back into the safety of their shared companionship. But -in his sudden loneliness he mistrusted fortune. When a man has had the -conceit knocked out of him, he is not immediately the stronger for it; -and he is the more vulnerable to doubt not only of himself, but of -others. The saddest part of self-distrust is that it breeds suspicion. - -It would be useless to speak to his mother about it, for, though a just -woman, she was predominantly his mother; she wanted Stella too much for -Julian to admit a doubt of Stella's wanting him for herself. She would -have tried to close all his questions with facts. This method of -discussion appealed to Julian as a rule, but he had begun to discover -that there are deeper things than facts. - -Lady Verny was in London at a flower show, and Julian was sitting in the -summer-house, which he was planning to turn into a room for Stella. His -misgivings had not yet begun to interfere with his plans. He had just -decided to have one of the walls above the water meadows replaced by -glass when his attention was attracted by the most extraordinary figure -he had ever seen. - -[Illustration: The most extraordinary figure we had ever seen] - -She was advancing rapidly down a grass path, between Lady Verny's -favorite herbaceous borders, pursued by the butler. At times Thompson, -stout and breathless, succeeded in reaching her side, evidently for the -purpose of expostulation, only to be swept backward by the impetuosity -of her speed. Eurydice was upon a secret mission. She had borrowed a -pound from Stella with which to carry it out; and she was not going to -be impeded by a butler. - -She no longer followed the theories of Mr. Bolt, but she still had to -wear out the kind of clothes that went with Mr. Bolt's theories. He -liked scarlet hats. Eurydice's hat was scarlet, and her dress was a long -purple robe that hung straight from her shoulders. - -It was cut low in the neck, with a system of small scarlet tabloids let -in around the shoulders. Golden balls, which were intended to represent -pomegranates, dangled from her waist. - -Eurydice's hair was thick and very dark; there was no doing anything -with it. Her eyebrows couched menacingly above her stormy eyes. Her -features were heavy and colorless, except her mouth, which was -unnaturally (and a little unevenly) red. - -She wore no gloves,--she had left them behind in the train,--and she -carried a scarlet parasol with a broken rib. - -"I wish you'd send this man away," she said as she approached Julian. -"He keeps getting under my feet, and I dislike menials. I saw where you -were for myself. I nearly got bitten by a brute of a dog on the terrace. -You have no right to keep a creature that's a menace to the public." - -"I regret that you have been inconvenienced," said Julian, politely; -"but I must point out to you that the public are not expected upon the -terrace of a private garden." - -"As far as that goes," said Eurydice, frowning at a big bed of blue -Delphiniums, "nobody has a right to have a private garden." - -Thompson, with an enormous effort, physical as well as spiritual, cut -off the end of the border by a flying leap, and reached the young -woman's elbow. - -"If you please, Sir Julian," he gasped, "this lady says she'd rather not -give her name. She didn't wish to wait in the hall, nor in the -drawing-room, sir, and I've left James sitting on Ostrog's 'ead,--or I'd -have been here before. What with one thing and another, Sir Julian, I -came as quickly as I could." - -"I saw you did, Thompson," said Julian, with a gleam of laughter; "and -now you may go. Tell James to get off Ostrog's head." He turned his eyes -on his visitor. "I am Miss Waring," she said as the butler vanished. - -"This is extraordinarily kind of you," Julian said, steadying himself -with one hand, and holding out his other to Eurydice. "I think you must -be Miss Eurydice, aren't you? I was looking forward to meeting you -to-morrow. I hope nothing is wrong with Stella?" - -"Everything is wrong with her," flashed Eurydice, ignoring his -outstretched hand; "but she doesn't know I've come to talk to you about -it. She'd never forgive me if she did. So if I say anything you don't -like, you can revenge yourself on me by telling her. I haven't come to -be _kind_, as you call it. I care far too much for the truth." - -"Still, you may as well sit down," said Julian, drawing a chair toward -her with his free hand. "The truth is quite compatible with a wicker -arm-chair. You needn't lean back in it if you're afraid of relaxing your -moral fiber. - -"As to revenge, I always choose my own, and even if you make it -necessary, I don't suppose it will include your sister. What you suggest -would have the disadvantage of doing that, wouldn't it? I mean the -disadvantage to me. It hasn't struck you apparently as a disadvantage -that you are acting disloyally toward your sister in doing what you know -she would dislike." - -Eurydice flung back her head and stared at him. She accepted the edge of -the wicker arm-chair provisionally. Her eyes traveled relentlessly over -Julian. She took in, and let him see that she took in, the full extent -of his injury; but she spared him pity. She looked as if she were -annoyed with him for having injuries. - -"What I'm doing," she said, "is my business, not yours. It mightn't -please Stella,--I must take the risk of that,--but if it saves her from -you, it will be worth it." - -Julian bowed; his eyes sparkled. An enemy struck him as preferable to a -secret doubt. - -"I didn't know," she said after a slight pause which Julian did nothing -to relieve, "that you were as badly hurt as you appear to be. It makes -it harder for me to talk to you as freely as I had intended." - -"I assure you," said Julian, smiling, "that you need have no such -scruples. My incapacities are local, and I can stand a long tongue as -well as most men, even if I like it as little." - -"I thought you would be insolent, and you are insolent," said Eurydice, -with gloomy satisfaction. "That was one of the things I said to Stella." - -Julian leaned forward, and for a moment his frosty, blue eyes softened -as he looked at her. - -"I admit I'm not very civil if I'm wrongly handled," he said in a more -conciliatory tone. "Your manner was just a trifle unfortunate, Miss -Eurydice; but I'd really like to be friends with you. I've not forgotten -that Stella told me you were her 'special' sister. Shall we start quite -afresh, and you just tell me as nicely as you know how what wrong you -think I'm doing Stella?" - -"I couldn't possibly be friends with you," Eurydice said coldly. "The -sight of you disgusts me." - -Julian lowered his eyes for a moment; when he raised them again the -friendliness had gone. They were as hard as wind-swept seas. - -"I suppose," he suggested quietly, "that you have some point to make. -Isn't that a little off it?" - -"I don't mean physically," said Eurydice, with a wave of her hand which -included his crutches. "You can't help being a cripple. It is morally I -am sick to think of you. Here you are, surrounded by luxury, waited on -hand and foot by menials, and yet you can't face your hardships -alone--you are so parasitic by nature that you have to drag down a girl -like Stella by trading on her pity." - -"It would," said Julian in a level voice, holding his temper down by an -effort, "be rather difficult for even the cleverest parasite to drag -your sister down in the sense of degrading her. Possibly you merely -refer to her having consented to marry me?" - -"No, I don't," said Eurydice, obstinately. "I call it dragging a person -down if you make them sacrifice their integrity. Stella and I always -agreed about that before. She cared more for the truth than anything. -Now she doesn't; she cares more about hurting your feelings. I faced her -with it last night, and she never even attempted to answer me. She only -said, 'Oh, don't!' and covered her face with her hands." - -"What unspeakable thing did you say to her?" asked Julian, savagely, -"to make her do that?" - -Ostrog, released from James, rejoined them, cowering down at his -master's feet; he was aware that he was in the presence of an anger -fiercer than his own. - -"I didn't come here to mince matters," said Eurydice, defiantly. "If you -want to know what I said to Stella, I asked her why she was going to -marry a tyrannical, sterile cripple?" - -For a moment Julian did not answer her; when he did, he had regained an -even quieter manner than before. - -"Very forcibly put," he said in a low voice; "and your sister covered -her face with her hands and said, 'Oh, don't!'--you must have felt very -proud of yourself." - -"If you think I like hurting Stella, you're wrong," said Eurydice. "But -I'd rather hurt her now than see her whole life twisted out of shape by -giving way to a feeling that isn't the strongest feeling in her, or I -wouldn't have come down here. But she didn't deny it." - -"What didn't she deny?" asked Julian. - -"What I came to tell you," said Eurydice. "The strongest feeling in -Stella's life is her love for Mr. Travers, and she gave him up because -she discovered that it was also the strongest thing in mine." - -Julian flung back his head. - -"Seriously, Miss Eurydice," he asked, "are you asking me to believe that -your sister's in love with a town clerk?" - -Eurydice flushed crimson under the undisguised amusement in Julian's -eyes. He was amused, even though he had suddenly remembered that Mr. -Travers was the name of the town clerk. - -"Why not?" asked Eurydice, fiercely. "He's wonderful. He isn't like -you--he works. He's like Napoleon, only he's always right, and _he_ -hasn't asked her to be his permanent trained nurse!" - -Julian had a theory that you cannot swear at women; so he caught the -words back, and wondered what would happen if Eurydice said anything -worse. - -"Don't you think," he said after a pause, "that if you insulted me once -every five minutes, and then took a little rest, we might finish -quicker? I will admit that there is no reason why Stella shouldn't be -in love with Mr. Travers except the reason that I have for thinking -she's in love with me." - -"Well, she isn't," asserted Eurydice. "She's awfully fond of you, but it -all started with her finding out that you were unhappier than she was. -She came to you to get over what she felt about Mr. Travers, and to free -him to care for me; but he doesn't. That's how I found out; I asked -him." - -"The deuce you did!" exclaimed Julian. "Poor old Travers!" - -Eurydice ignored this flagrant impertinence. She repeated Mr. Travers's -exact words: "I cared for your sister, Miss Waring; I am not a -changeable man." - -"But I notice," said Julian, politely, "that this profession of Mr. -Travers's feelings which you succeeded in wringing from him does not -include your sister's. I had already inferred from my slight knowledge -of your sister that Mr. Travers was attached to her. The inference was -easy." - -"I hoped that myself," said Eurydice--"I mean, that she didn't care. I -wrote and asked Cicely. She's my other sister; she hates me, but she's -just. She doesn't know about you, of course. Would you like to see her -letter?" - -"It seems a fairly caddish thing to do, doesn't it?" asked Julian, -pleasantly. "However, perhaps this is hardly the moment for being too -particular. Yes, you can hand me over the letter." Julian read: - - My dear Eurydice: - - You ask if I think Stella cared for Mr. Travers. I dislike this - kind of question very much. However, as you seem to have some - qualms of conscience at last, you may as well know that I think she - did. She's never had anything for herself. You've always taken all - there was to take, and I dare say she thought Mr. Travers ought to - be included. She never told me that she cared for him, but of - course even you must know that Stella wouldn't do such a thing as - that. She spoke during her illness of him once in a way that made - me suspect what she was feeling, added to which I was sure that she - was struggling against great mental pain, as well as physical. She - evidently wanted to get away from the town hall and leave Mr. - Travers to you. You can draw your own inferences from these facts. - Stella would rather be dragged to pieces by wild horses than tell - you any more; so, if I were you, I would avoid asking her. - - Your affectionate sister, - - CICELY. - -"You did ask her, of course," said Julian, handing Eurydice the letter; -"and as we are both acting in a thoroughly underhand way, perhaps you -will not mind repeating to me Stella's reply." - -"At first she didn't answer at all," said Eurydice, slowly, "and then -when I asked her again she said; 'I'm not going to tell you anything at -all about Mr. Travers. I came here to tell you about Julian, only you -won't listen to me.' Then," said Eurydice, "she cried." - -"Please don't tell me any more," said Julian, quickly, shading his eyes -with his hand. "I should be awfully obliged if you'd go. I think you've -said enough." - -Eurydice also thought that she had said enough; so she returned with the -satisfaction of one who has accomplished a mission, on the rest of -Stella's pound. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI - - - This is going to be my last love-letter to you, Stella. I wonder if - you will know it is a love-letter. It won't sound particularly like - one. It's to tell you that I can't go through with our marriage. I - can't give you my reasons, and I can't face you without giving them - to you. You must try to take my word for it that I am doing what I - think best for both of us. - - You see, I trust you to do what I want, though I know I am acting - in a way that you'll despise. If you will think of what it means - for me to act in such a way, you'll realize that I am pretty - certain that I am right. - - You are the best friend I ever had, man or woman, and I know you - value my friendship, so that it seems uncommonly mean to take it - away from you; and yet I'm afraid I can't be satisfied with your - friendship. - - It would honestly make me happier to hear that you were married; - but I couldn't meet you afterward, and if you don't marry, I - couldn't let you alone. - - You see, I tried that plan when I didn't know you'd let me do - anything else, and it can't be said to have worked very well, can - it? It would be quite impossible now. There are two things I'd like - you to remember. One is, if you set out, as I think you did, to - heal a broken man, you've succeeded, and nothing can take away - from your success. You put in a new mainspring. I am going to work - now. Some day I'll finish the book, but not yet. The second thing - is something I want you to do for me. I know I have no right to ask - you! I'm only appealing to your mercy. Will you let my mother help - you a little? I know you won't let me, but you would have let me, - Stella. Think what that means to me--to know that you would have - taken my help, and that by freeing you I am also, in a sense, - deserting you. If you still want to make a man happier who has only - been a nuisance to you, you can't say I haven't shown you the way. - - I should like to give you Ostrog, but I suppose he'd be out of - place in a town hall. - - I'm not going to ask you to forgive me; for I'm not really sorry - for anything except that there wasn't more of it and I'm never - going to forget anything. - - Good-by. - - Your lover, - - JULIAN. - -Stella was in the middle of ironing the curtains when she received -Julian's letter. Everything else was ready for his visit except the -curtains. - -Mrs. Waring was dressed. It had taken several hours, a needle and -cotton, and all the pins in the house, and now she was sitting in a -drawing-room which was tidier than any she had sat in since her early -married life. She thought that it looked a little bare. - -Professor Waring was in the Museum. He had become so restless after -breakfast that it had seemed best to despatch him there, and retrieve -him after Julian arrived. - -Eurydice had not asked Mr. Travers for a morning off; she had merely -conceded that she would allow Stella to arrange a subsequent meeting -with Julian on Sunday, if it was really necessary. - -Eurydice kissed Stella tenderly before she left the house to go to the -town hall. She knew that she had saved her sister, but she foresaw for -the victim of salvation a few painful moments. Even a kindly Providence -may have its twinges of remorse. - -Stella let the iron get cold while she was reading Julian's letter; but -when she had finished it, she heated the iron again and went on with the -curtains. They could not be hung up rough dried. - -Mrs. Waring was relieved to hear that Julian was not coming. Stella told -her at once, while she was slipping the rings on the curtains, which she -had brought up-stairs. She added a little quickly, but in her ordinary -voice: - -"And we aren't going to be married, after all." - -"Dear me!" said Mrs. Waring, trying not to appear more relieved still. -"Then there won't have to be any new arrangements. Marriage is very -unreliable, too--it turns out so curiously unlike what it begins, and it -even begins unlike what one had expected. I often wish there could be -more mystical unions. I can't agree with dear Eurydice about the -drawback of Julian's being rich. We are told that money is the root of -all evil, but there is no doubt that it is more peaceful and refreshing -to have it, as it were, growing under one's hand; and, after all, evil -is only seeming. I think I'll just go up-stairs and take off these -constricting clothes, unless, dear, you'd like me to help you in any -way. You'll remember, won't you, that sensation is but the petal of a -flower?" - -Stella said that she thought, if she had the step-ladder, she would be -all right. - -The only moment of the day (it was curiously made up of moments -prolonged to seem like years) when Stella wasn't sure whether she was -really all right or not was when she heard Lady Verny's voice in the -hall. Lady Verny's voice was singularly like Julian's. - -Something happened to Stella's heart when she heard it; it had an -impulse to get outside of her. She had to sit down on the top of the -stairs until her heart had gone back where it belonged. - -The drawing-room had gone to pieces again. The kitten's saucer was in -the middle of the floor, and the plate-basket came half in and half out -of the sofa-cover. Lady Verny was looking at it with fascinated eyes. -She had never seen a plate-basket under a sofa-cover before. Mrs. -Waring, exhausted by her hours of dressing, had gone to lie down. So -there was only Stella. She came in a little waveringly, and looked at -Lady Verny without speaking. - -Lady Verny shot a quick, penetrating glance at her, and then held out -her arms. - -"My dear! what has he done? What has he done?" she murmured. - -Stella led Lady Verny carefully away from the saucer of milk into the -only safe arm-chair; then she sat down on a footstool at her feet. - -"I thought," she said in a very quiet voice, "that you'd come, but I -didn't think you'd come so soon. I don't know what he's done." - -"It's all so extravagant and absurd," said Lady Verny, quickly, "and so -utterly unlike Julian! I have never known him to alter an arrangement in -his life, and as to breaking his word! I left him happier than I have -ever seen him. He'd been telling me that you insisted on my staying with -you after your marriage. I told him that I had always thought it a most -out-of-place and unsuitable plan, and that he couldn't have two women in -our respective positions in his house, and he laughed and said: 'Oh, -yes, I can. Stella has informed me that marrying me isn't a position; -it's to be looked on in the light of an intellectual convenience. You're -to run the house, and she's to run me. I've quite fallen in with it.' I -think that was the last thing he said, and when I came back, there was -his astounding letter to say that your marriage was impossible, and that -I was on no account to send him on your letters or to refer to you in -mine. - -"He gave me his banker's address, and said that he'd see me later on, -and had started some intelligence work for the War Office. He was good -enough to add that I might go and see you if I liked. I really think he -must be mad, unless you can throw some light on the subject. A letter -came from you after he had gone." - -Stella, who had been without any color at all, suddenly flushed. - -"Ah," she said, "I'm glad he didn't read that before he went! I mean, if -he'd gone after reading it, I should have felt--" She put out her hands -with a curious little helpless gesture, but she did not say what she -would have felt. - -"Can't you explain?" Lady Verny asked gravely. "Can't you explain -_anything_? You _were_ perfectly happy, weren't you? I haven't been a -blind, meddling, incompetent old idiot, have I?" - -Stella shook her head. - -"When he left me," she said, "he gave me this." She took it out of her -belt and handed it to Lady Verny; it was a check for two hundred pounds -inclosed in a piece of paper, on which was written, "Dearest, please!" -"I took it," said Stella. - -Lady Verny was silent for a moment; then she said more gravely still: - -"My dear, I think I ought to tell you something,--it is not fair not to -let you have every possible indication that there is,--but the day after -you left, while I was away, I hear from Thompson, who seemed to be -extremely upset by her, that a lady _did_ call to see Julian and she -would not give her name. Thompson says he thinks she was a foreigner. - -"I do not know what Julian may have told you about his life, but I -myself am quite positive he would have asked no woman to marry him -unless he felt himself free from any possible entanglement. Still, there -it is: he went away after this person's visit." - -For a moment it seemed to Stella that some inner citadel of security -within her had collapsed. She knew so little about men; she had nothing -but her instincts to guide her, and the memory of Eugénie Matisse's -evil, laughing eyes. She covered her face with her hands and shut out -every thought but Julian. It seemed to her as if she had never been so -alone with him before, as if in some strange, hidden way she was -plunging into the depths of his soul. - -When she looked up she had regained her calm. - -"No," she said; "I am quite sure of Julian. Perhaps some woman could -make him feel shaken--shaken about its being right to marry me. I can -believe that, if she was very cruel and clever and knew how to hurt him -most; but there is nothing else, or Julian would have told me." - -Lady Verny gave a long sigh of relief. - -"That is what I think myself," she said; "but I couldn't have tried to -persuade you of it. My dear, did Julian know that you had always loved -him?" - -Stella shook her head. - -"I thought he knew all that mattered," she explained. "I didn't tell him -anything else. You see, there was so very little time, and I was rather -cowardly, perhaps. I didn't want him just _at once_ to know that I had -loved him before he even knew that I existed." - -"I see, I see," said Lady Verny. "But would you mind his knowing now? He -can't be allowed to behave in this extraordinary way, popping off like -a conjurer without so much as leaving a decent address behind him. I -intend to tell him precisely what I think of his behavior, and I hope -that you will do the same." - -Stella turned round to face Lady Verny. - -"No," she said firmly; "neither of us must do that. I don't know why -Julian has done this at all, but it is quite plain that he does not want -to be interfered with. He wishes to act alone, and I think he must act -alone. I shall not write to him or try to see him." - -"But, my dear child," exclaimed Lady Verny, "how, if we enter into this -dreadful conspiracy of silence, can anything come right?" - -"I don't know," said Stella, quietly; "but Julian let it go wrong quite -by himself, and I think it must come right, if it comes right at all, in -the same way. If it didn't, he would distrust it. I shouldn't--I should -be perfectly happy just to see him; but, then, you see, I _know_ it's -all right. Julian doesn't. Seeing me wouldn't make it so; it would -simply make him give in, and go on distrusting. We couldn't live like -that. You see, I don't _know_ what has happened; but I do know what he -wants, so I think I must do it." - -"But you don't think this state of things is what he _wants_, do you?" -Lady Verny demanded. "I may of course be mistaken, but up till now I -have been able to judge fairly well what a man wanted of a woman when he -couldn't take his eyes off her face." - -"He wants me more than that," said Stella, proudly. "I think he wants me -very nearly--not quite--as much as I want him. That's why I couldn't -make him take less than he wanted. To take me and not trust me would be -to take less. If we leave him quite alone for six months or a year, -perhaps, he'll have stopped shutting his mind up against his feelings. -It might be safer then to make an appeal to him; but I shouldn't like to -appeal to him. Still, I don't say I won't do anything you think right, -dear Lady Verny, if you want me to, to make him happier; only I must be -_sure_ that it will make him happier _first_. I know now that it -wouldn't." - -"You're the most extraordinary creature!" said Lady Verny. "Of course I -always knew you were, but it's something to be so justified of one's -instincts. I'm not sure that I sha'n't do precisely what you say--for -quite different reasons. Julian will count on one of us disobeying his -injunctions, and he'll be perfectly exasperated not to have news of you. -Well, exasperation isn't going to do any man any harm; it'll end by -jerking him into some common-sense question, if nothing else will." - -Stella smiled, but she shook her head. - -"Please don't hope," she said under her breath. - -"There's one thing," Lady Verny said after a short pause, "that I do ask -you to be sensible about. I can't take you abroad, as there hardly seems -at the present time any abroad to take you to, but I want you to come -and live with me. I think, after all this, I really rather need a -companion." - -Stella hid her face in Lady Verny's lap. - -"I can't," she whispered. "You're too like him." - -Lady Verny said nothing at all for a moment; she looked about the room. -It was clean; for a London room it was quite clean, and Stella thought -she had hidden all the holes in the carpet. Lady Verny's ruthless, -practised eye took the faded, shabby little room to pieces and -reconstructed the rest of the dingy makeshift home from it. She knew -that Stella's room would be the worst of all. - -"My dear," she said at last, "you are so very nearly a member of my -family that I think I may appeal to you about its honor. Are you going -to live like this and not let me help you? You are not strong enough to -work, and this folly of poor Julian's won't make you any stronger. Since -you can't live with me, won't you accept a little of what is really -yours?" - -"Money?" asked Stella, looking up into Lady Verny's face. "I would if -you weren't his mother, because I love you; but I can't now. You see, -Julian's taken his honor away from me; he's left me only my own. I know -he'll think me cruel, and I'll never return what I did take. He'll think -perhaps I would use it, if I needed it, and that may make him happier; -but I mustn't take any more. I must be cruel." - -"Yes, you're very cruel," said Lady Verny, kissing her. "Well, I sha'n't -bully you, for I wouldn't do it myself. It'll only make my heart ache in -a new way, and really, I'm so used to its aching that I oughtn't to -grumble at any fresh manifestation. As to Julian's heart, he's been so -extraordinarily silly that only the fact that folly is a sign of love -induces me to believe he's got one." She rose to her feet, with her arms -still about Stella. "I'm simply not to mention you at all?" she asked. - -Stella shook her head. She clung to Lady Verny speechlessly, but without -tears. - -"And when I see him next," Lady Verny asked a little dryly,--"and, -presumably, he'll send for me in about a fortnight,--he'll say, 'Well, -did she take the money'? What am I to answer to that?" - -"Say," whispered Stella, "that she would have liked to take it, but she -couldn't." - -"I could make up something a great deal crueller to say than that," said -Lady Verny, grimly. "However, I dare say you're right; it sounds so -precisely like you that it's bound to hurt him more than any gibe." - -Stella burst into tears. - -"Oh, don't! don't!" she sobbed. "You must--you must be kind to him! I -don't want anything in the world to hurt him." - -"I know you don't," said Lady Verny, gently. "You little silly, I only -wanted to make you cry. It'll be easier if you cry a little." - -Stella cried more than ever then, because Lady Verny was so terribly -like Julian. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVII - - -It was the hour of the day that Julian liked least. Until four o'clock -in the afternoon his mind was protected by blinkers; he saw the road -ahead of him, but the unmerciful vastness of the world was hidden from -him. He was thankful that he could not see it, because it was possessed -by Stella. - -He could keep her out of his work; but there was no other subject she -left untouched, no prospect that was not penetrated with her presence, -no moment of his consciousness that she did not ruthlessly share. - -He knew when he left her that he must be prepared for a sharp wrench and -an unforgetable loss; what he had not foreseen was that the wrench would -be continuous, and that he would be confronted by her presence at every -turn. - -Women's faces had haunted him before, and he had known what it was to be -maddened by the sudden cessation of an intense relationship; but that -was different. He could not remember Stella's face; he had no visual -impression of her physical presence; he had simply lost the center of -his thoughts. He felt as if he were living in a nightmare in which one -tries to cross the ocean without a ticket. - -He was perpetually starting lines of thought which were not destined to -arrive. For the first few weeks it was almost easier; he felt the -immediate relief which comes from all decisive action, and he was able -to believe that he was angry with Stella. She had obeyed him implicitly -by not writing, and his mother never mentioned her except for that worst -moment of all when she gave him Stella's words, without comment. "She -would like to take the money, but she cannot do it." This fed his anger. - -"If I'd been that fellow Travers, I suppose she'd have taken it right -enough," he said to himself, bitterly, and without the slightest -conviction. He said nothing at all to his mother. Julian knew why Stella -had not taken the money. It was because she had not consented to what he -had done; he had forced her will. Of all her remembered words, the ones -that remained most steadily in his mind were: "You are not only -sacrificing yourself; you are sacrificing me. I give you no such right." - -That was her infernal woman's casuistry. He had a perfect right to save -her. He was doing what a man of honor ought to do, freeing a woman he -loved from an incalculable burden. It was no use Stella's saying she -ought to have a choice,--pity had loaded her dice,--and it was sheer -nonsense to accuse him of pride. He hadn't any. He'd consented to take -her till he found she had a decent marriage at her feet. He couldn't -have done anything else then but give her up. The greatest scoundrel -unhung wouldn't have done anything else. It relieved Julian to compare -himself to this illusory and self-righteous personage. - -As to facing Stella with it, which he supposed was her fantastic claim, -it only showed what a child she was and how little Stella knew about the -world or men. There were things you couldn't tell a woman. Stella was -too confoundedly innocent. - -Why should he put them both to a scene of absolute torture? Surely he -had endured enough. He wasn't a coward, but to meet her eyes and go -against her was rather more than he could undertake, knocked about as he -was by every kind of beastly helplessness. He fell back upon self-pity -as upon an ally; it helped him to obscure Stella's point of view. She -ought to have realized what it would make him suffer; and she didn't, or -she would have taken the money. He did well, he assured himself, to be -angry; everything in life had failed him. Stella had failed him. But at -this point his prevailing sanity shook him into laughter. He could still -laugh at the idea of Stella's having failed him. - -You do not fail people because you refuse to release them from acting up -to the standard you had expected of them; you fail them when you expect -less of them than they can give you. When Julian had faced this fact -squarely he ceased to beat about the bush of his vanity. He confessed to -himself that he was a coward not to have had it out with Stella. But he -acquiesced in this spiritual defeat; he assured himself that there were -situations in life when for the sake of what you loved you had to be a -coward. Of course it was for Stella's sake; a man, he argued, doesn't -lie down on a rack because he likes it. - -He wished he could have gone on being angry with Stella, because when he -stopped being angry he became frightened. - -He was haunted by the fear of Stella's poverty. He didn't know anything -about poverty except that it was disagreeable and a long way off. He had -a general theory that people who were very poor were either used to it -or might have helped it; but this general theory broke like a bubble at -the touch of a special instance. - -The worst of it was that Stella had not really told him anything about -her life. He knew that her father was a well-known Egyptologist, that -her mother had various odd ethical beliefs, and he knew all that he -wanted to know about Eurydice. But of Stella's actual life, of its -burdens and its cares, what had she told him? That there weren't any -bells in the house and that the clocks didn't go. - -This showed bad management and explained her unpunctuality, but it -explained nothing more. It did not tell Julian how poor she was, or if -she was properly looked after when she came home from work. - -If she married Travers, she would have about nine hundred a year. Julian -had made investigations into the income of metropolitan town clerks. - -He supposed that people could just manage on this restricted sum, with -economy; but there seemed no reliable statistics about the incomes of -famous Egyptologists. Why hadn't he asked Stella? She ought to have told -him without being asked. He tried being angry with her for her -secretiveness, but it hurt him, so he gave it up. He knew she would have -told him if he had asked her. - -Julian made himself a nuisance at the office for which he worked on the -subject of pay for woman clerks. It relieved him a little, but not much. - -Logically he ought to have felt only his own pain, which he could have -stood; he had made Stella safe by it. But he had deserted her; he -couldn't get this out of his head. He kept saying to himself, "If she's -in any trouble, why doesn't she go to Travers?" But he couldn't believe -that Stella would ever go to Travers. - -The lighting restrictions--it was November, and the evening -thoroughfares were as dark as tunnels--unnerved him. Stella might get -run over; she was certain to be hopelessly absent-minded in traffic, and -would always be the last person to get on to a crowded bus. - -It was six months since he had broken off their engagement. Julian did -not think it could possibly remind Stella of him if he sent her, -addressed by a shop assistant, a flash-light lamp for carrying about the -streets. She wouldn't send back a thing as small as a torch-lamp, even -if she did dislike anonymous presents. He was justified in this -conjecture. Stella kept the lamp, but she never had a moment's doubt as -to whom it came from; if it had had "Julian" engraved on it she couldn't -have been surer. - -Julian always drove to his club at four o'clock, so that he didn't have -to take his tea alone. He didn't wish to talk to anybody, but he liked -being disturbed. Then he played bridge till dinner, dined at the club, -and went back to his rooms, where he worked till midnight. This made -everything quite possible except when he couldn't sleep. - -He sat in an alcove, by a large, polished window of the club. It was -still light enough to see the faces of the passers-by, to watch the -motor-buses lurching through the traffic like steam tugs on a river, and -the shadows creeping up from Westminster till they filled the green park -with the chill gravity of evening. - -A taxi drew up opposite to the club, and a man got out of it. There was -nothing particularly noticeable about the man except that he was very -neatly dressed. Julian took an instant and most unreasonable dislike to -him. He said under his breath, "Why isn't the fellow in khaki?" - -The man paid the driver what was presumably, from the scowl he received -in return, his exact fare. Then he prepared to enter the club. He did -not look in the least like any of the men who belonged to Julian's club. -A moment later the waiter brought to Julian a card with "Mr. Leslie -Travers" engraved upon it. - -"Confound his impudence," was Julian's immediate thought. "Why on earth -should I see the fellow?" Then he realized that he was being angry -simply because Mr. Travers had probably seen Stella. - -Julian instantly rejected the idea that Stella had sent Mr. Travers to -see him; she wouldn't have done that. He wasn't in any way obliged to -receive him; still, there was just the off chance that he might hear -something about Stella if he did. Julian would rather have heard -something about Stella from a condemned murderer; but as Providence had -not provided him with this source of information, he decided to see the -town clerk instead. You could say what you liked to a man if he happened -to annoy you, and Julian rather hoped that Mr. Travers would give him -this opportunity. - -Mr. Travers entered briskly and without embarrassment. His official -position had caused him to feel on rather more than an equality with the -people he was likely to meet. He did not think that Sir Julian Verny was -his equal. - -Mr. Travers considered all members of the aristocracy loafers. Even when -they worked, they did it, as it were, on their luck. They had had none -of the inconveniences and resulting competence of having climbed from -the bottom of the ladder to the top by their own unaided efforts. - -There were three or four other men in the room when he entered it, but -Mr. Travers picked out Julian in an instant. Their eyes met, and neither -of them looked away from the other. Julian said stiffly: "Sit down, -won't you? What will you take--a whisky and soda?" - -"Thanks," said Mr. Travers, drawing up a chair opposite Julian and -placing his hat and gloves carefully on the floor beside him. "I do not -drink alcohol in between meals, but I should like a little aërated -water." - -Julian stared at him fixedly. This was the man Eurydice had compared -with Napoleon, to the latter's disadvantage. - -Mr. Travers refused a cigar, and sat in an arm-chair as if there were a -desk in front of him. It annoyed Julian even to look at him. - -"I have no doubt," said Mr. Travers, "that you are wondering why I -ventured to ask you for this interview." - -"I'm afraid I am, rather," Julian observed, with hostile politeness. "I -know your name, of course." - -"Exactly," said Mr. Travers, as if Julian had presented him with a -valuable concession greatly to his advantage. "I had counted upon that -fact to approach you directly and without correspondence. One should -avoid black and white, I think, when it is possible, in dealing with -personal matters." - -"I am not aware," said Julian, coldly, "that there are any personal -matters between us to discuss." - -"I dare say not," replied Mr. Travers, blandly, placing the tips of his -fingers slowly together. "You may have observed, Sir Julian, that -coincidences bring very unlikely people together at times. I admit that -they have done so in this instance." - -"What for?" asked Julian, succinctly. He found that he disliked Mr. -Travers quite as much as he intended to dislike him, and he despised him -more. - -"An injustice has been brought to my notice," said Mr. Travers, slowly -and impressively. He was not in the least flurried by Julian's hostile -manner, which he considered was due to an insufficient business -education; it only made him more careful as to his own. "I could not -overlook it, and as it directly concerns you, Sir Julian, I am prepared -to make a statement to you on the subject." - -"I'm sure I'm much obliged to you," said Julian; "but I trust you will -make the statement as short and as little personal as possible." - -"Speed," Mr. Travers said reprovingly, "is by no means an assistance in -elucidating personal problems; and I may add, Sir Julian, that it is at -least as painful for me as for you, to touch upon personal matters with -a stranger." - -"The fact remains," said Julian, impatiently, "that you're doing it, and -I'm not. Go on!" - -Mr. Travers frowned. Town clerks are not as a rule ordered to go on. -Even their mayors treat them with municipal hesitancy. Still, he went -on. Julian's eyes held him as in a vice. - -"You have probably heard my name," Mr. Travers began, "from the elder -Miss Waring." Julian nodded. "She was for two years and a half my -secretary. I may say that she was the most efficient secretary I have -ever had. There have been, I think, few instances in any office where -the work between a man and woman was more impersonal or more -satisfactory. It is due to the elder Miss Waring that I should tell you -this. It was in fact entirely due to her, for I found myself unable to -continue it. There was a lapse on my part. Miss Waring was consideration -itself in her way of meeting this--er--lapse; but she unconditionally -refused me." - -Julian drew a quick breath, and turned his eyes away from Mr. Travers. - -"At the same time," Mr. Travers continued, "she gave me to understand, -in order, I fancy, to palliate my error of judgment, that her affections -were engaged elsewhere." - -Julian could not speak. His pride had him by the throat. He could not -tell Mr. Travers to go on now, although he felt as if his life depended -on it. - -"There are one or two points which I put together, at a later date," Mr. -Travers continued, after a slight pause, "and by which I was able to -connect Miss Waring's statement with her subsequent actions. She is, if -I may say so, a woman who acts logically. You were the man upon whom her -affections were placed, Sir Julian, and that was her only reason for -accepting your proposal of marriage." - -Julian stared straight in front of him. It seemed to him as if he heard -again the music of Chaliapine--the unconquerable music of souls that -have outlasted their defeat. He lost the sound of Mr. Travers's -punctilious, carefully lowered voice. When he heard it again, Mr. -Travers was saying: - -"It came to my knowledge through an interview with the younger Miss -Waring, who has also become one of our staff, that she had regrettably -misinformed you as to her sister's point of view. The younger Miss -Waring acts at times impetuously and without judgment, but she had no -intention whatever of harming her sister. She has been deeply anxious -about her for the last few months, and she at length communicated her -anxiety to me." - -"Anxious," exclaimed Julian, sharply. "What the devil's she anxious -about?" - -"Her sister's state of health is not at all what it should be," Mr. -Travers said gravely. "She looks weak and thin, and she occasionally -forgets things. This is a most unusual and serious sign in a woman of -her capacity." - -"Damn her capacity!" said Julian savagely. "Why on earth couldn't you -stop her working?" - -"It is not in my province to stop people earning their daily bread," -said Mr. Travers, coldly, "and I have never discussed this or any other -private question with the elder Miss Waring since her return. When she -came back to the town hall she refused to displace her sister, who had -undertaken her former work and went into the surveyor's office." - -"All right, all right," said Julian, hastily. "I dare say you couldn't -have helped it; but how on earth did you find out if you've never talked -to Miss Waring, what had happened?" - -"I investigated the matter," said Mr. Travers, "with the younger Miss -Waring. She confessed to me, under some slight pressure on my part, her -very mistaken conclusions, and the action she had based upon them. I -sent her at once, without mentioning what course of action I had decided -to take myself, to her sister." - -"You shouldn't have done that," said Julian, with the singular injustice -Mr. Travers had previously noted and disliked in members of the upper -classes. "There wasn't any need to give Eurydice away to her; I could -have managed without that." - -"You forget," said Mr. Travers, steadily, "the younger Miss Waring had -forfeited her sister's confidence; it would have been impossible to -avoid clearing up the situation by bringing all the facts to light. It -will not, I feel sure, cause permanent ill feeling between the two -sisters." - -Julian gave a long, curious sigh. His relief was so intense that he -could hardly believe in it; but he could believe, not without -reluctance, in the hand that had set him free. It had taken a town clerk -to show him where he stood. - -"It would be difficult," he began--"By Jove! it's impossible to express -thanks for this kind of thing! You won't expect it, perhaps, and I know -of course, you didn't do it for me. For all that, I'm not ungrateful. -I--well--I think you're more of a man than I am, Travers." - -"Not at all, Sir Julian," said Mr. Travers, who privately felt surprised -that there should be any doubt upon the matter. "Any one would have -done precisely the same who had the good fortune to know the elder Miss -Waring." - -"Perhaps they would," said Julian, smiling, "or, you might add, the -misfortune to come across the erratic proceedings of the younger one." - -Mr. Travers looked graver still. - -"There I cannot agree with you," he said quietly. "Perhaps I should have -mentioned the matter before, but it scarcely seemed germane to the -occasion; I am about to marry Miss Eurydice." - -A vivid memory of Eurydice shot through Julian's mind. He saw her -advancing down the grass path arrayed in the purple garment, with the -scarlet hat and the dangling pomegranates; and the thought of her in -conjunction with the town clerk was too much for him. Laughter seized -him uncontrollably and shook him. He flung back his head and roared with -laughter, and the graver and more disapproving Mr. Travers looked, the -more helplessly and shamelessly Julian laughed. - -"I'm most frightfully sorry," he gasped, "but I can't help it. Are you -sure you're going to marry her? I mean, _must_ you?" - -Mr. Travers took his hat and gloves carefully in his hand. - -"This is not a subject I care to discuss with you, Sir Julian," he said, -with dignity, "nor is your tone a suitable one in which to refer to a -lady. A man of my type does not shilly-shally on the question of -matrimony; either he is affianced or he is _not_. I have already told -you that I am. You may have some excuse for misjudging the younger Miss -Waring; but there can be no excuse whatever for your flippant manner of -referring to our marriage. It is most uncalled for. I might say -offensive." - -A spasm of returning laughter threatened Julian again, but he succeeded -in controlling it. - -"My dear Travers," he said, holding out his hand, "please don't go away -with a grievance. I am thoroughly ashamed of myself as it is, and more -grateful to you than I can possibly express. You'll forgive me for not -getting up, won't you? And try to overlook my bad manners." - -It was the first time during the interview that Mr. Travers realized -Julian's disabilities, but they did not make him feel more lenient. - -Mr. Travers liked an invalid to behave as if he were an invalid, and he -thought that a man in Julian's position should not indulge in unseemly -mirth. - -"Pray don't get up," he said coldly. "I am bound to accept your apology, -of course, though I must confess I think your laughter very ill timed." - -Julian took this rebuke with extraordinary humility. He insisted on -giving Mr. Travers an unnecessarily cordial hand-shake, and invited him -to drop in again at some hour when he would have a drink. - -Mr. Travers waived aside this suggestion, he did not wish to continue -Julian's acquaintance and he disapproved of Julian's club. The large -luxurious lounges, the silent obsequious servants and the sprinkling of -indolent men swallowed up in soft arm-chairs, bore out Mr. Travers's -opinion of the higher classes. They were drones--whether they were in -khaki or not. - -Mr. Travers sighed heavily as he crossed the threshold. "She was a -perfect business woman," he said to himself bitterly, "nipped in the -bud." - -For the first time since Mr. Travers had known her, he found himself -doubting the judgment of the elder Miss Waring. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVIII - - -Julian's first impulse was to drive to the town hall and carry Stella -off. He was debarred from doing so only by a secret fear that she might -refuse to come. He was a little afraid of this first meeting with -Stella. She might haul him over the coals as much as she liked; but he -wanted to stage-manage the position of the coals. - -He decided after a few moments of reflection to ring her up on the -telephone. The porter at the other end said that Miss Waring was still -at work, and seemed to think that this settled the question of any -further effort on his part. Julian speedily undeceived him. He used -language to the town hall porter which would have lifted every separate -hair from Mr. Travers's head. It did not have this effect upon the -porter. He was a man who appreciated language, and he understood that -there was an expert at the other end of the line. It even spurred him -into a successful search for Stella. - -"That you, Stella?" Julian asked, "Do you know who's speaking to you?" - -There was a pause before she answered a little unsteadily: - -"Yes, Julian." - -"Well," said Julian, with an anxiety he could hardly keep out of his -voice, "I want to see you for a few minutes if you can spare the time. -Will you come to the Carlton to tea? I suppose I mustn't ask you to my -rooms." - -"I can't do either," replied Stella. "I'm too busy. Can't you wait till -Saturday?" - -"Impossible," Julian replied firmly. "May I come and fetch you in a -taxi? I suppose you don't dine and sleep at the town hall, do you?" - -"No, you mustn't do that," said Stella, quickly; "but you can come to -the Cottage Dairy Company, which is just opposite here, if you like. I -shall go there for a cup of tea at five o'clock. I can spare you half an -hour, perhaps." - -"Oh, you will, will you?" said Julian, grimly. "I suppose I -must be thankful for what I can get. Five sharp, then, at the -what-you-may-call-'em." - -Stella put up the receiver, but he thought before she did so that he -heard her laugh. - -Julian had never been to the Cottage Dairy Company before. It was a very -nice, clean, useful little shop, and there was no necessity for him to -take such an intense dislike to it. The rooms are usually full, and for -reasons of space the tables are placed close together. The tables are -marble-topped and generally clean. There is not more smell of inferior -food than is customary in the cheaper restaurants of London. - -Julian arrived at five minutes to the hour, and he turned the place -literally upside down. It did no good, because Cottage Dairy Companies -are democratic, and do not turn upside down to advantage. - -He only succeeded in upsetting a manageress and several waitresses, and -terrifying an unfortunate shop-girl who was occupying the only table in -the room at which Julian could consent to sit by standing over her until -she had finished her tea, half of which she left in consequence. - -Stella was ten minutes late; by the time she arrived Julian had driven -away the shop-girl, had the table cleared, and frozen every one in the -neighborhood who cast longing glances at the empty place in front of -him. He was consumed with fury at the thought that in all probability -Stella had had two meals a day for six months in what he most unfairly -characterized as a "loathsome, stinking hole." - -As a matter of fact, Stella had not been able to afford the Cottage -Dairy Company. She had had her meals at the People's Restaurant, which -is a little cheaper and not quite so nice. - -Julian's anger failed him when he saw Stella's face. She looked ill. He -could not speak at first, and Stella made no attempt whatever to help -him. She merely dropped her umbrella at his feet, sat down opposite him, -and trembled. - -"How dare you come to this infernal place?" Julian asked her at last, -with readjusted annoyance, "and why didn't you tell me you were ill?" -Then he ordered tea from a hovering waitress. "If you have anything -decent to eat, you can bring it," he said savagely. - -Stella smiled deprecatingly at the outraged waitress before she answered -Julian. - -"I'm not ill," she said gently, "and I couldn't very well tell you -anything, could I, when I didn't know where you were?" - -"Of course, if you make a point of eating and drinking poison," said -Julian, bitterly, "you aren't likely to be very well. I suppose you -could have told my mother, but no doubt that didn't occur to you. You -simply wished--" He stopped abruptly at the approach of the waitress. - -Stella did not try to pour out the tea; she showed no proper spirit -under Julian's unjust remarks. She only put her elbows on the table and -looked at him. - -"There, drink that," he said, "if you can. It's the last chance you'll -get of this particular brand. They call it China, and it looks like dust -out of a rubbish-heap. I don't know what you call that thing on the -plate in front of you, but I suppose it's meant to eat. So you may as -well try to eat it." - -"Food," said Stella, with the ghost of her old fugitive smile, "isn't -everything, Julian." - -"It's all you'll get me to talk about in a place like this," said -Julian, firmly. "I wonder you didn't suggest our meeting in one of those -shelters on the Strand! Do you realize that there's a Hindu two yards to -your right, a family of Belgian refugees behind us, and the most -indescribable women hemming us in on every side? How can you expect us -to talk here?" - -"But you and I are here," said Stella, quietly. "Julian, how could you -believe what Eurydice told you?" - -Julian lowered his eyes. - -"Must I tell you now?" he asked gravely. "I'd rather not." - -"Yes, I think you must," said Stella, relentlessly, "You needn't tell me -much, but you must say enough for me to go on with. If you don't, I -can't talk at all; I can only be afraid." - -Julian kept his eyes on a tea-stained spot of marble. There was no -confidence in his voice now; it was not even very steady as he answered -her. - -"I made a mistake," he said. "You weren't there. I wanted you to have -everything there was. I can't explain. I ought to have let you choose, -but if you'd chosen wrong I should have felt such a cur. I can't say any -more here. Please, Stella!" - -She was quick to let him off. - -"I oughtn't to have left you so soon," she said penitently; "that was -_quite_ my fault." - -Julian made no answer. He drew an imaginary pattern on the table with a -fork; he couldn't think why they'd given him a fork unless it was a -prevision that he would need something to fidget with. It helped him to -recover his assurance. - -"I suppose you know," he said reflectively, contemplating the -unsuspicious Hindu on his right, "that I'm never going to let you out of -my sight again?" - -"I dare say I shall like being alone sometimes," replied Stella; "but I -don't want you to go calmly off and arrange things that break us both to -pieces. I'd never see you again rather than stand that!" - -"Now," said Julian, "you've roused the Belgians; they're awfully -interested. I'll never go off again, though you're not very accurate; it -was you that went off first. I only arranged things, badly I admit, when -I was left alone. I wasn't so awfully calm. As far as that goes, I've -been calmer than I am now. Have you had enough tea?" - -"You know it's you I mind about," said Stella, under her breath. - -"You mustn't say that kind of thing in a tea-shop," said Julian, -severely. "You're very nearly crying, and though I'd simply love to have -you cry, I believe it's against the regulations. And there's a fat lady -oozing parcels to my left who thinks it's all my fault, and wants to -tell me so." - -"I'm not crying," said Stella, fiercely. "I'm going back to work. I -don't believe you care about anything but teasing." - -"I don't believe I do," agreed Julian, with twinkling eyes; "but I -haven't teased any one for six months, you know, Stella. How much may I -tip the waitress? Let's make it something handsome; I've enjoyed my tea. -I'll take you across to the town hall." - -"It's only just the other side of the road," Stella objected. - -"Still, I'd like you to get into this taxi," said Julian, hailing one -from the door. - -Stella looked at him searchingly. "I should be really angry if you -tried to carry me off," she warned him. - -"My dear Stella," said Julian, meeting her eyes imperturbably, "I -haven't the nerve to try such an experiment. I'm far too much afraid of -you. Get in, won't you? The man'll give me a hand." He turned to the -driver. "Drive wherever you like for a quarter of an hour," he -explained, "and then stop at the town hall." - -The taxi swung into the darkened thoroughfare, and Julian caught Stella -in his arms and kissed her as if he could never let her go. - -"Not very clever of you," he murmured, "not to guess why I wanted a -taxi." - -[Illustration: "Not very clever of you," he murmured, "not to guess why -I wanted a taxi"] - -Stella clung to him speechlessly. She did not know what to say; she only -knew that he was there and that the desperate loneliness of the empty -world was gone. - -She wanted to speak of the things that she believed in, she wanted not -to forget to reassure him, in this great subdual of her heart; but she -did not have to make the effort. It was Julian who spoke of these things -first. - -He spoke hurriedly, with little pauses for breath, as if he were -running. - -"I know now," he said, "I've been a fool and worse. I saw it as soon as -I looked at you; it broke me all up. How could I tell you'd mind losing -a man like me? I'm glad it's dark; I'm glad you can't see me. I'm -ashamed. Stella, the fact is, I gave you up because I couldn't stick it; -my nerve gave way." - -"I shouldn't have left you so soon; it was all my fault for leaving -you," Stella murmured. - -"That rather gives the show away, doesn't it," asked Julian "not to be -able to stand being left?" - -"You weren't thinking only of yourself," Stella urged defensively. - -"Wasn't I?" said Julian. "I kept telling myself I was behaving decently -when I was only being grand. Isn't that thinking of yourself?" - -"But on the downs," urged Stella, "you weren't like that, darling." - -"You were on the downs, remember," said Julian. "I got your point of -view then--to give in, anyhow, to love. It wasn't easy, but it made it -more possible that if I didn't marry you, you only had hard work and a -dull life. It seemed different when I heard about that fellow Travers. -You see, that cut me like a knife. I kept thinking--well, you know what -a man like me keeps thinking--at least I don't know that you do. It was -my business to fight it through alone." - -"No it isn't," Stella protested quickly. "We haven't businesses that -aren't each other's." - -"Well," admitted Julian, "I couldn't bear thinking I'd cheated you out -of my own values; so I let yours slide. I knew, if I gave you the -choice, you'd stick to me; but I couldn't trust you not to make a -mistake. That's where my nerve broke down." - -"Ah, but I didn't know," whispered Stella; "I didn't know enough how to -show you I loved you. If you'd seen, you wouldn't have broken down. I -was afraid to try. Now I can. All these six months have eaten up my not -knowing how." She put her arms around his neck and kissed him. "You see, -I do know how!" - -He held her close, without speaking; then he murmured: "And knowing how -doesn't make you afraid?" - -"It's the only thing that doesn't," said Stella, lifting her eyes to -his. - -The taxi stopped before the door of the town hall. - -"And have I got to let you go now?" Julian asked gently. - -"I shall never really go," Stella explained; "but you can let me get out -and tidy up the surveyor's papers, and then be free for you to-morrow." - -Julian opened the door for her. She stood for a moment under the arc of -light beneath the lamp-post looking back at him. - -The love between them held them like a cord. Julian had never felt so -little aware of his helplessness; but he wondered, as he gazed into her -eyes, if Stella realized the bitterness of all that they had lost. - -She neither stirred nor spoke. She held his eyes without faltering; she -gave him back knowledge for knowledge, love for love; and still there -was no bitterness. At last he knew that she had seen all that was in his -heart; and then for a moment, if but for a moment, Julian forgot what -they had lost; he remembered only what they had found. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIX - - -When Stella reëntered the town hall the porter was still sitting at his -desk near the door, but every one else had gone. - -"Oh, I hope I have not kept you, Humphreys," Stella said apologetically. -"I had no idea it was so late. I'll be as quick as I can." - -"Mr. Travers is still in 'is room," Humphreys admitted gloomily; "'e -came back an hour ago. Gawd knows how long 'e'll be at it. There's been -a tri-bunal and wot not this afternoon. Talk abaht mud in the trenches! -'Alf the gutters of Lunnon 'as been dribbling through this 'ere 'all. -I've asked for an extra char, an', what's more, I mean ter 'ave 'er. War -or no war, I'll 'ave a woman under me." - -The surveyor's office was empty. Stella's papers were just as she had -left them, but her whole life lay in between. - -She would never copy the surveyor's plans again or do the office -accounts or look through the correspondence. She would not hover in the -drafty passages and listen to the grumbling Humphreys nor stand outside -glass doors and help bewildered fellow-clerks over their blunders before -they went in to face a merciless authority. - -She would probably never see green baize again. She tried to fix her -mind on the accounts, but through the columns of figures ran the wind -from the downs. The half-darkened, empty room filled itself with -Amberley. - -She tried to imagine her life with Julian. It would be unlike anything -she had lived before; it would require of her all she had to give. The -town hall had not done this. It had taken the outer surfaces of her -mind, her time, and much of her youth: but her inner self had been free. - -It was not free now; it had entered that dual communion of love. It was -one with Julian, and yet not one; because she knew that though he filled -every entrance to her heart, though her mind companioned his mind, and -her life rested on him, yet she was still herself. She would be for -Julian the Stella of Amberley, but she would not cease to be the Stella -of the town hall. - -She would not part with her experiences; poverty, drudgery, the endless -petty readjustments to the ways of others should belong to her as much -as joy. Privilege should neither hold nor enchain her, and she would -never let anything go. - -She would keep her people, her old interests, Mr. Travers, even the -surveyor, if he wished to be kept. Stella mightn't be able to impart -them to Julian, but she could give him all he wanted and still have -something to spare. Julian himself would profit by her alien interests; -he would get tired of a woman who hadn't anything to spare. Stella was -perfectly happy, but she could still see over the verge of her -happiness. Joy had come to her with a shock of surprise which would have -puzzled Julian. He had the strength of attack, which is always startled -when it cannot overcome opposition. Julian never coöperated with -destiny, he always fought it. Sometimes he overcame it; but when it -overcame him, he could not resign himself to defeat. Stella took -unhappiness more easily; in her heart, even now, she believed in it. She -believed that the balance of life is against joy, that destiny and fate -prey upon it, overcloud it, and sometimes destroy it; and she believed -that human beings can readjust this balance. She believed in a success -which is independent of life, an invisible and permanent success. - -She did not think of this for herself, it never occurred to her that she -possessed it; but she believed in its existence, and she wanted it, and -sought for it, in every soul she knew. She wanted it most for Julian, -but she did not think it could be got for him to-morrow. She did not -expect to get it for him, though she would have given all she possessed -to help him to obtain it. - -She only hoped that he would win it for himself, and that she would not -be a hindrance to his winning it; that was as far as Stella's hopes -carried her before she returned to the accounts. - -When she had finished the accounts, she took them to the town clerk's -room. - -Mr. Travers was sitting as usual at his desk, but he did not appear to -be writing. Perhaps he was also doing his accounts. - -"I'm afraid," Stella said apologetically, "I'm very late with these -papers, Mr. Travers. I was detained longer than I had intended." - -"I expected you to be late," said Mr. Travers, quietly. "In fact, I -should not have been surprised if you had not returned at all. It -occurred to me that you might not come back to the town hall again." - -"I had to finish my work," said Stella, gently, "and I wanted to see -you; but after this, if you and Mr. Upjohn can find some one else to -take my place, I shall not return. I know I ought not to leave you in -the lurch like this without proper notice; I should have liked to have -given you at least another week to find some one to take my place, but I -am afraid I must leave at once." - -"I think I can make a temporary arrangement to tide us over," Mr. -Travers replied thoughtfully. "Your leaving us was bound to be a loss in -any case." - -They were silent for a moment. Mr. Travers still sat at his desk, and -Stella stood beside him with the papers in her hand. - -"I hope you will not think I took too much upon myself, Miss Waring," -said Mr. Travers at last, "in going to see Sir Julian Verny this -afternoon. It seemed to me a man's job, if I may say so, and not a -woman's. I thought your sister had done enough in letting you know -herself how gravely she had misunderstood us all; and if I had notified -you of my intention, I feared that you might not have seen your way to -ratify it." - -"I am very glad indeed you spared Eurydice," said Stella; "I would not -have let her go to Julian. I would have gone myself; but I am glad I did -not have to do it. You spared us both." - -"That," said Mr. Travers, "was what I had intended." - -Stella put the papers on the desk; then she said hesitatingly: - -"Mr. Travers, may I ask you something?" - -"Yes, Miss Waring; I am always at your disposal," replied Mr. Travers, -clearing his throat. "You are not an exacting questioner." - -"I hope you will not think me so," said Stella, gently; "but are you -sure--will you be quite happy with Eurydice?" - -Mr. Travers met her eyes. She did not think she had ever seen him look -as he looked now; his eyes were off their guard. It was perhaps the only -time in his life when Mr. Travers wished any one to know exactly what -he felt. - -"You will remember, Miss Waring," he said, "that I told you once before -that I am a lonely man. I have not won affection from people. I think I -have obtained your sister's regard, and I am proud to have done so. I -suppose, too, that all men have the desire to protect some one. I do not -know much about feelings in general, but I should suppose that the -desire for protection _is_ a masculine instinct?" - -Stella nodded. She wished to give Mr. Travers all the instincts that he -wanted, and if he preferred to think them solely masculine, she had not -the least objection. - -"I see that you agree with me," said Mr. Travers, with satisfaction, -"and you will therefore be able to understand my point of view. I have a -very real regard for Miss Eurydice. Her work is of great, though -unequal, value, and I should like to see her happy and comfortable and, -if I may say so, safe. I do not think that the life of women who work in -public offices, unless they are peculiarly gifted by nature, is safe. I -may be old-fashioned, Miss Waring, but I still maintain that woman's -sphere is the home." - -"I am glad you feel like that about Eurydice," said Stella, softly. - -She paused for a moment. She wanted to thank him, but she knew that she -must thank him only for some little thing. The greater things she must -leave entirely alone. He trusted her to do this; he was trusting her -with all he had. She must protect him from her gratitude. - -"Before I leave the town hall, Mr. Travers," she said, "I want to thank -you for what I have learned here. That is really one of the reasons I -came back to-night. You have been such a help to me as a business woman. -I am not going to give it up. I shall keep all that you have taught me, -and take it into my new life with me. It has been an education to work -in your office under your rule." - -"I am glad you have felt it to be so, Miss Waring," said Mr. Travers, -with grave satisfaction. "I have devoted what talents I possess to the -running of this town hall, under the auspices of the mayor, of course. I -am very much gratified if my methods have been of any service to you. -Our relationship has certainly not been a one-sided benefit. I took -occasion to say to Sir Julian this afternoon that I had never had a more -efficient secretary." - -"I am so glad you told Julian that," said Stella, smiling. "My work with -him was only make-believe." - -"There is a leniency about your dealings with people," Mr. Travers -continued, ignoring her reference to Julian, "which sometimes needs -restraint, Miss Waring. The world, I fear, cannot be run upon lenient -principles. Nevertheless, in some cases I am not prepared to say that -your system has not got merits of its own. I recognize that personal -leniency modifies certain problems even of business life. I should be -apprehensive of seeing it carried too far; but up to a certain point," -said Mr. Travers, rising to his feet and holding out his hand to Stella -to close the interview, "I am prepared to accept your theory." - -THE END - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Second Fiddle, by Phyllis Bottome - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SECOND FIDDLE *** - -***** This file should be named 41107-8.txt or 41107-8.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/4/1/1/0/41107/ - -Produced by Bill Tozier, Barbara Tozier, Mary Meehan and -the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at -http://www.pgdp.net - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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